Terminator Salvation, colon, Really Long Movie Title

[anime52k8]

Poor soul, for you can not truly appreciate "The Matrix," until you see how blatantly it copied "Megazone 23."

no, The Matrix blatantly copied Dark City, which blatantly copied Magazone 23.

[Repiv_Onex]

Here's one to make you think... Why didn't Skynet send a terminator back through time to kill Sarah Connor's mom before she was born, thereby killing Sarah before she was concieved to grow up to squirt out John Connor? Yeah, figure that one out.

Seriously I think it's not a tough question, but I really have problems putting the logic into words. (My English sux)

The logic I was thinking is, even they kill John Connor, there will be another "John Connor"(anyone else as the Leader of the Resistance). Likewise, if Sarah Connor was killed, some other woman would have give birth to another man who would become the future leader of the resistance be it Tom, Dick or Harry(but I prefer to called it "John Connor" here). So, given the way the logic works, even Skynet kills Sarah Connor's grandmother, "John Connor" will always be there. Ok I think I didn't answer the question lol.

Anyway what's the difference between "Sarah Connor was dead before she was pregnant and John Connor was never born" and "Sarah Connor was never born as her mom was dead before having her and therefore John Connor was never born"?

[VFTF1]

I agree with your logic. "Resistence leaders" are a dime a dozen really.

Terminator has a bit of a romantic pretence. Like, if George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and John Adams were all killed during the American revolution - there would be nobody to write the constitution, create the republic etc. Well -actually no. If you look at the debates in the constitutional convention - there was a large number of intelligent people there who all had a hand in it, and absent these now historically renowned individuals, certainly something similar would have arisen.

Same with John Conor...or so one might think.

But here's where Terminator 4 held out a lot of (wasted) promise. The opening of T4 said that John Conor was seen by some as a "false prophet."

Not THIS is truly interesting - and think about it: what made John Conor critical to the resistence?

The fact that he KNEW. That he had more advanced knowledge due to his experiences than the rest of humanity. That's it. And he was the ONLY one (save his wife) who knew. Now - does this knowledge in any way become critical to the resistence at some point?

Does John's experience with Terminator from T2 and T3 somehow impact the future?

We don't know.

Sky Net somehow assumes it does.

In fact - it could be argued that Sky Net really creates John Conor's power by giving him the forenknowledge of what is to come.

My theory is that Sky Net can't eliminate John Conor because sub-consciously Sky Net wants an equal: a time traveling sentient being who see more than the regular humans.

Otherwise - Sky Net would be lonely.

What Terminator really has yet to explore is just who Sky Net is. And I use "who" consciously - because Sky Net is not an "it" - Sky Net is a self-aware intelligent device. Sky Net has personal thoughts of some sort...we just don't know what they are, what does Sky Net want (beyond self-preservation?).

Lots of unanswered questions in the Terminator universe. Lots and lots.

Pete

[eugimon]

You have it backwards, John can't stop skynet because without skynet he can't exist.

[Repiv_Onex]

In fact - it could be argued that Sky Net really creates John Conor's power by giving him the forenknowledge of what is to come.

Yupe, that's what I'm trying to say. John was so important to the Resistance because of his knowledge on Skynet/Terminators/future, and those knowledge was from his dad and his terminators that he sent back himself to protect him. Let's say if John dies at T2, and somehow a random guy Dickson becomes the Leader of the Resistance, I believe Dickson will do the same thing as John Connor by sending terminators back to protect himself where young little Dickson get to learn about the Skynet/Terminators/future.

My theory is that Sky Net can't eliminate John Conor because sub-consciously Sky Net wants an equal: a time traveling sentient being who see more than the regular humans.

Otherwise - Sky Net would be lonely.

Most important of all, we would be all bored.

You have it backwards, John can't stop skynet because without skynet he can't exist.

That's so true and I have never thought of that.

Edited December 8, 2009 by Repiv_Onex

[VFTF1]

You have it backwards, John can't stop skynet because without skynet he can't exist.

It's called irony

Pete

[eugimon]

It's called irony

Pete

if by irony you mean paradox, then yes, it's irony...

[taksraven]

no, The Matrix blatantly copied Dark City, which blatantly copied Magazone 23.

I really wish that they had blatantly copied Dark City when it came to ending the Matrix series, then they might have had a proper conclusive ending instead of the "open for more films" one that they had. They really only ended with a "cease-fire" with the machines, what a joke.

Taksraven

[bandit29]

no, The Matrix blatantly copied Dark City, which blatantly copied Magazone 23.

And yet MegaZone23, Dark City and The Matrix are all terrible.. go figure.

Terminator Salvation was good. At least it didn't use the same chase time travel formula as the first 3 movies. I liked it more than T3, that's for sure. The actors themselves were too clean and polished. They looked like they should be wearing Affliction T-shirts. Also I would have cut the beginning of the movie.

The sound on Blu-ray is freaking awesome though. Demo worthy.

The man with the worst name wants more Terminator

So director McG recently did one of those BD Live screening sessions for the Terminator Salvation Blu-ray release (these BD Live screenings are really becoming all the rage). During the screening, discussion apparently turned toward future installments of the Terminator franchise and McG apparently claimed that he will in fact be back to direct the fifth and sixth installments in the series, as was originally planned back when Salvation was conceived as a new Terminator trilogy.

However, if you’ve been keeping up with Terminator news here at Screen Rant (and you should be!) then you already know that the franchise rights are currently up for auction after the company which owns them, Halcyon, put them up for sale to avoid financial ruin.

http://screenrant.com/rumore-patrol-mcg-ma...lms-kofi-36736/

[anime52k8]

And yet MegaZone23, Dark City and The Matrix are all terrible.. go figure.

YOU SHUT YOUR MOUTH!

Dark City is such a great movie. also Megazone 23 parts 1 and 2 where really good (the character designs in 2 weren't nearly as good, but it was a really well done sequel. 3 could have been good but it was unnecessary and the in-between animation was SO BAD. I love part 1 )

Edited December 9, 2009 by anime52k8

[taksraven]

YOU SHUT YOUR MOUTH!

Dark City is such a great movie.

Seen the directors cut? Even better than the original release. And it is a great film, an underrated gem. Part of the reason I like this and the original Matrix film is because both of them portray my city of Sydney well. Dark and moody, the way it should be.

Taksraven

[VFTF1]

Well, why shouldn't McG say he's be doing the next ones - let's him remain viable. What's he supposed to say "I don't know. Nobody wants me. Boo hoo?"

I haven't heard anyone blame HIM for the movie's dismal performance or for the CR owners having to go belly up... he did a good job as the director. For the script he got - it was clearly a very well directed film. I mean - the sequencing, action shots and pacing were all great.

My problem has to do with stuff that goes outside the realm of pure directing.

I think...

Pete

[Chewie]

You have it backwards, John can't stop skynet because without skynet he can't exist.

Exactly.

It's all a self-fulfilling prophecy.

[bandit29]

I haven't heard anyone blame HIM for the movie's dismal performance

Pete

Actually Terminator Salvation's world wide numbers (372 million) are close to the new Star Trek Movie (385 million). Everyone considers the new Star Trek a success while the new Terminator was a flop... it wasn't. Terminator Salvation did better internationally and Star Trek did better in the US.

Star Trek

Terminator Salvation

[VFTF1]

Actually Terminator Salvation's world wide numbers (372 million) are close to the new Star Trek Movie (385 million). Everyone considers the new Star Trek a success while the new Terminator was a flop... it wasn't. Terminator Salvation did better internationally and Star Trek did better in the US.

Yeah - sorry. I should have been more precise. By "dismal performance" I really just meant that the company that got the whole thing into gear went bankrupt and is now trying to sell Terminator - which immediately makes it LOOK like the movie was somehow this collosal flop that led them to bankrupcy...it's the association.

But yeah -T4 did alright financially - sure. No reason not to continue with the next two installments of the new trilogy.

Pete

[red2alpha]

It's one of those things that can't be over-analyzed or it unravels like a cheap sweater.

Dude, it's ALREADY unraveled!

My wife gets annoyed when I start picking away a stuff like this. She will ask me,"Why can't you just enjoy the story? What about Robotech?" (Since she is knows Robotech more than Macross she picks on that.)

And I tell her,"Okay, you want me to pick apart Robotech ( the science and not the story, though I can do that too)" and I launch into how the VTs are totally unfesable in space ( the canpoy is way to big to survive micro meter strikes, thats why the space shuttle and the International Space Station have really small windows, and flying around like a jet fighter in atmo would be a total waste of fuel and time in the vacume of space, blah, blah, blah...

Still, discussions like this are fun and I think add more to the story, makes it more real. Someone before said, and I can't remember who or I would give credit to them, in reality you wouldn't have good looking actors and actresses with good skin and perfect teeth, and sexy tight fitting leather flight suits. Does the public at large want to see what real poor nutrition and radation sickness look like? Do you want to see John Conner have to stop every half hour and s*** out blood because his insides are falling apart? NO! But we geeks live for this, at least I do.

(Getting back into the discussion)

Skynet is like the uber internet. It knows everything that humans do and has infinte time to go over the ramifications of sending bunches of Terminators back in time while still fighting the current war against the humans. It would know that every one sent back would alter the time line (keeping with the Multivers theory) but alter it miminally.

Okay, so Conner says on the Resistance sub that the newer human like Terminators, with real skin, weren't supposed to show up for another 10 years but here they are now. Skynet has learned from the past and sped up production.

So lets assume that from the first film through T2 that that is a stable timeline until the end of T2 then things get shaky. Judgement Day has been postponed but not averted, as we see in T3.

However... The Skynet from the first film is still there on another branch of an alternate universe.

And there is the Skynet from T3 out there too, the one that does arise, which, I guess is the Skynet in TS.

What I'm getting at, sort of, considering I'm coming up on being awake for almost 24hrs and am working on getting drunk, is that Skynet knows in it's crafty computer brain - or would it be brains? - is that it will eventually get IT right and win. While on some other timeline it loses. Or the war ends up in a draw....

You can drive yourself to drink just thinking about it.

Which I will do, thank you.

Edited December 9, 2009 by red2alpha

[red2alpha]

I agree with your logic. "Resistence leaders" are a dime a dozen really.

Terminator has a bit of a romantic pretence. Like, if George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and John Adams were all killed during the American revolution - there would be nobody to write the constitution, create the republic etc. Well -actually no. If you look at the debates in the constitutional convention - there was a large number of intelligent people there who all had a hand in it, and absent these now historically renowned individuals, certainly something similar would have arisen.

Pete

Pete, my man! I swear, sometime YOU sound like an American! Good point, Sir!

[VFTF1]

Pete, my man! I swear, sometime YOU sound like an American!

PM sent.

And for the second time (first time was in the Robotech/HG thread)...I am an American....

Maybe I need to make this my new sig??

Pete

[jenius]

We sent Peter to Poland after he professed a love for Macross7.

[RD Blade]

As a reward?

[anime52k8]

As a reward?

to spread the word of the one true faith.

Edited December 10, 2009 by anime52k8

[eugimon]

to spread the word of the one true faith.

Hallowed are the Ori?

[Keith]

I really wish that they had blatantly copied Dark City when it came to ending the Matrix series, then they might have had a proper conclusive ending instead of the "open for more films" one that they had. They really only ended with a "cease-fire" with the machines, what a joke.

Taksraven

Which is the Megazone 23 Part III Part-2 ending. Seriously, the Matrix follows Megazone far more closely than Dark City ever did.

[anime52k8]

Which is the Megazone 23 Part III Part-2 ending. Seriously, the Matrix follows Megazone far more closely than Dark City ever did.

wat? that's not how megazone 23 part 3 ended

[Keith]

wat? that's not how megazone 23 part 3 ended

For the most part it is. After Megazone 23 Part II, Shogo was forcibly joined with "the system" to be its operative "Wong Dai."(who also serves a simlar role to "the architect.") Much in the same way Neo sacrificed himself & wound up being taken in by the machines. The Sentinals were extremely similar to the Dezalg of Part II, complete with the way they kill. The Resistence in its run down operations were very similar to the teen punk resistence of Part II. The overall "Matrix" structure, is quite similar to how EDEN is set up in Part III. Eve & the Oracle share a very similar role, Yui's death & ressurection at the end of part II is mirroed by the same events with Trinity, etc.

The closer you look at the two, the more direct plot points they share, complete with the way in which both 3rd parts end. Though to be honest I was a lot angrier at what they did to Shogo than what happened to Neo.

[anime52k8]

For the most part it is. After Megazone 23 Part II, Shogo was forcibly joined with "the system" to be its operative "Wong Dai."(who also serves a simlar role to "the architect.") Much in the same way Neo sacrificed himself & wound up being taken in by the machines. The Sentinals were extremely similar to the Dezalg of Part II, complete with the way they kill. The Resistence in its run down operations were very similar to the teen punk resistence of Part II. The overall "Matrix" structure, is quite similar to how EDEN is set up in Part III. Eve & the Oracle share a very similar role, Yui's death & ressurection at the end of part II is mirroed by the same events with Trinity, etc.

The closer you look at the two, the more direct plot points they share, complete with the way in which both 3rd parts end. Though to be honest I was a lot angrier at what they did to Shogo than what happened to Neo.

Most of those I do see the connection, but the actual conclusion of Megazone part III doesn't seem like the ending of the matrix trilogy. The ending of the Matrix (as I understood it) was that Neo agrees to go on a suicide mission to stop agent smith and restore the matrix for the machines and in exchange the machines would stop trying to wipe out zion. Neo wins, the Matrix is restored and the machines decide to give humans the freedom to choose whether or not to stay in the matrix. I don't see how this relates to the actual ending of Part III.

In Megazone 23 it's (as far as i can tell) never explicitly stated why shogo had joined with Eden's core but in any event it's functionally a very different thing. in the Matrix Neo dies and is just carried away. shogo becomes corrupted by the system and actually start using it to try and undo everything he did in the first two films (i.e. bringing humanity back to earth).

also Megazone 23 part III had an actual conclusion to everything (the real Eve leaves with Edens computer core to dismantle ADAM and get rid of the last of the computer's controlling humanity), the matrix is just "well we're not fighting now, wounder how long that will last?"

[aerocombatpilot]

I just finished watching Terminator Salvation on DVD, and all I could think of is Mospeada!!!! It would be possible to make a live action Mospeada/Robotech movie and it wouldn't suck!!! OK, as far as the movie goes, it was OK. It wasn't great, but for some reason, I didn't expect too much from Terminator Salvation. After T3, I didn't really expect to see another Terminator film, so I wasn't all that hyped for TS. The robots were cool, and seeing a (young) Arnold was a nice treat, plus seeing how Connor got that huge mark on his face was intresting( I'D always wondered about that). Moon Bloodgood's character was the ONLY one I liked in the entire film (go figure), and the fighter scene with the A-10 versus the HK's was awesome. Beyond that, Meh. I'm glad I rented it, and will probably buy the DVD when Blockbuster has another 4 movies for $20 sales again.

[emajnthis]

I hate how they portrayed John Connor in this film, he was nothing like they always built him up to be from previous films (calm, tactful, and reliable) he shouted and grunted for absolutely no reason (which was very annoying), had little in the way of tactics (let's just raid the main hq that sounds like a good idea), and was flaky and reckless. I like Christian Bale a lot, but i really didn't like him in this movie, i dunno if anyone else noticed, but he had a horrible lisp when speaking through connor's dialogue, not sure if it was on purpose, but it was painful to my ears. On the flip side though, the action scenes were fantastic, and the CG was definitely on point. Some of the designs that looked poor in concept ended up looking very good in practice. The films premise was actually pretty good, but i couldn't help but think that it would've turned out so much better with a different director and some better dialogue. Any scene where Bale had to speak was hard to sit through, i don't know if it was casting as much as it was crappy writing. I can only hope that once Cameron gets bored with 10ft blue cat creatures that he'll come back and maybe helm a Terminator flick.

[eugimon]

Wuh? John is never portrayed as calm and tactful... in T2 he was an impulsive kid and in T3 he was an impulsive and emotional loser. Even in the show he's portrayed this way.

I do agree the writing sucked though. Just the overall plot was weak.

[VT 1010]

Wuh? John is never portrayed as calm and tactful... in T2 he was an impulsive kid and in T3 he was an impulsive and emotional loser. Even in the show he's portrayed this way.

I do agree the writing sucked though. Just the overall plot was weak.

In T2, he was impulsive because he was a kid. And even at that, he was still quite tactful. This was emphasized more in the deleted scenes and early screenplay drafts. It's yet another reason why the franchise died after T2...

[eugimon]

In T2, he was impulsive because he was a kid. And even at that, he was still quite tactful. This was emphasized more in the deleted scenes and early screenplay drafts. It's yet another reason why the franchise died after T2...

how was he tactful? When he flicked people off? Or when he used his terminator to beat up those guys in the parking lot who came to his defense?

Wait, are you thinking of strategic? That John was shown to be strategic?

[jenius]

I just finished watching Terminator Salvation on DVD, and all I could think of is Mospeada!!!! It would be possible to make a live action Mospeada/Robotech movie and it wouldn't suck!!! OK, as far as the movie goes, it was OK. It wasn't great, but for some reason, I didn't expect too much from Terminator Salvation. After T3, I didn't really expect to see another Terminator film, so I wasn't all that hyped for TS. The robots were cool, and seeing a (young) Arnold was a nice treat, plus seeing how Connor got that huge mark on his face was intresting( I'D always wondered about that). Moon Bloodgood's character was the ONLY one I liked in the entire film (go figure), and the fighter scene with the A-10 versus the HK's was awesome. Beyond that, Meh. I'm glad I rented it, and will probably buy the DVD when Blockbuster has another 4 movies for $20 sales again.

I've been saying that a Mospeada movie would be a great idea for a long time. Mospeada is so episodic it wouldn't be that insane to cut it down to a 2 hour movie. They could fix some of the plot contrivances that had folks with jets driving motorcycles across country and stuff like that. Make it the story of a guy crash-landing on Earth. Dealing with Earth people so sick of war they're willing to turn on their own. Have him be a hardened alien hating bigot that meets a beautiful girl and takes her along with him so he can protect her. Then she turns out to be an evolved alien, big fight, nearly scorched Earth, the end.

Edited December 15, 2009 by jenius

[RD Blade]

big fight, nearly scorched Earth, the end.

I see what you did there.

[Renato]

I watched the movie just yesterday, and I really enjoyed it. Yeah, there were a number of plotholes, but there have been since even the very first movie what with paradoxes and everything (also, trying to prevent Cyberdyne from continuing research to create Skynet in the second movie would endanger the very existence of John). I enjoyed it much more than bloody Avatar (BECAUSE I DIDN'T SEE EVERY BLOODY THING THAT WOULD HAPPEN A MILE OFF), and about the same as Star Trek. I expected to hate it judging from bad reviews and also because of the dungpile that was T3, but it was good. Marcus Wright is an interesting character.

Secondly, I wanted to point out something. I mentioned a while back, I cannot remember in which thread, that I was surprised to hear from all of you that Sarah Connor Chronicles takes place in a different timeline to T3 and T4 as I had thought that the Sarah Connor Chronicles were "canon" according to promotional material in Japan. I never found the leaflet that I had picked up which had this information, but never mind -- the chart was on the official website all along.

Just go here: http://wwws.warnerbros.co.jp/sarahconnor/ and click on TIMELINE, at the top. The chart you see has the "official" canon timeline with T1, T2, SCC and T4 set pretty much in stone, and Terminator 3: Lovers Again was apparently given the "alternate timeline" treatment.

Noteworthy is the date of Judgement Day. It is in 1997 originally, of course, but according to this chart it changed to 2011 in SCC due to the events of T2. In the T3 universe, it takes place in 2004. Also, John dies in 2032 in the T3 timeline. I guess they wanted to retcon this stuff.

So, my (first) question is: is there an official source that contradicts this Japanese information? Where did the timeline set-up of "[T1+T2], [T3+T4], [sCC]" come from in the first place (if I'm even understanding it correctly)?

Edited January 6, 2010 by Renato

[Warmaker]

Just go here: http://wwws.warnerbros.co.jp/sarahconnor/ and click on TIMELINE, at the top. The chart you see has the "official" canon timeline with T1, T2, SCC and T4 set pretty much in stone, and Terminator 3: Lovers Again was apparently given the "alternate timeline" treatment.

Oh, the sniping continues. Poor T3 & Macross II!