Terminator Genisys Review
I’m a giant fan of the Terminator franchise. The Terminator and Terminator 2: Judgment Day are among the greatest films in the
science fiction , action, and horror genres, and I even find the inferior
sequels, Terminator 3: Rise of the
Machines and Terminator Salvation,
watchable and not without merit.
Now here we are with the latest installment, which messes
with the timeline, gives us an elderly T-800, a new T-1000, and lots more. If
you’ve seen any of the trailers, then several major scenes and big plot twists
have already been spoiled for you. I will avoid any spoilers not detailed in
the trailers or give a spoiler warning prior.
If you’re a big fan of the Terminator films, then chances are you’ve already seen the new one.
If you were on the fence about seeing Terminator
Genisys or curious about it, I’m here to tell you, as a fan of movies in
general, to not see it.
The movie starts with voiceover explaining everything we
already know about Skynet becoming self aware, Judgment Day, the war against
the machines, etc. We see the future as glimpsed in Terminator and Terminator 2—not
the different looking future from Salvation.
I actually loved this opening. There was some cool action, visual effects were
decent (but not perfect), and we finally get to actually see the time travel equipment that sends the T-800 and Kyle Reese
back in time. We don’t get an explanation of how it works, but hey, at least we
get to see it working. The lore of the first Terminator remains consistent as we know it in the opening—Kyle
sent back to 1984 to protect Sarah Connor—but as soon as Kyle arrives in L.A.
’84, the movie starts to suck. Badly.
Scenes from the first film are literally re-created
shot-for-shot, before old Arnold fights cgi young Arnold, in a fight that lasts
about two minutes. It quickly becomes apparent the timeline is screwed up,
because the T-1000, which doesn’t show up until T2 in 1991, is suddenly present in 1984 and trying to kill Kyle.
There’s no explanation for this. Then Sarah Connor shows up, and instead of
being a vulnerable waitress, she’s a badass like she was in T2, and with her is an elderly
Terminator that was sent back in time to protect her back in the 70’s. Who sent
him? Don’t know, never explained. Now Kyle Reese and Sarah Connor must try to
stop Skynet in this new timeline, and in order to do (spoiler alert) they must time travel to the future in 2017, where
Skynet is an operating system called Genisys that’s been created by Miles
Dyson’s son (the guy who worked at Cyberdyne in T2 and created Skynet) with the
help of...John Connor? (spoiler over)
As the trailers indicate, John Connor has become a nano-bot
Terminator that’s gone back in time to stop Sarah and Kyle and the Terminator
Sarah calls “Pop”. I won’t try to explain the rest of the plot from here
because it gets way too confusing and convoluted to try and rearticulate. If
you’re really curious, just go see it, or better yet, read the synopsis on
Wikipedia.
Terminator Genisys
looked bad from the first trailer, and going into it, I could not have had
lower expectations. To be fair, it was not as bad as it could have been, nor
was it as bad as I thought it would be. Does that mean its good? No. It’s as if
the writers went, “What ideas do we have for a new Terminator movie?” and they dumped all the ideas they had into this
one script and went with it. This movie is all over the place, both in regards
to plot and the timeline. There are alternate timelines, which are sure to
confuse those not well versed in heavy sci-fi time travel plots (fans of Fringe might have an easier time, but
even then, it still doesn’t make a lot of sense) but it becomes so convoluted
by the end there are severe plot holes that cannot be repaired.
As much as I did not like this movie, there were some things
I actually did like. By far the best part of this movie is Arnold
Schwarzenegger. It’s a shame he couldn’t have made a return to the franchise in
a better film. The explanation for why he’s old works, and most of his humor
works—better than it did in T3, for
the most part. He’s as good as he’s ever been, but his co-stars don’t fare as
well. Emilia Clarke looks good as Sarah Connor, but she has poor dialogue and
material to work with, and as a result, does not make for a good Sarah Connor.
But it’s not her fault. She does become more likable by the end, but ultimately
is inferior to Linda Hamilton. Jai Courtney, who was in another poor action
sequel in a once proud franchise (A Good
Day to Die Hard) is once again, emotionless and boring. He’s not as bad as
I’ve seen him in other movies, and he’s not as bad as I thought he would be,
but he is still just not Kyle Reese. Perhaps even worse is Jason Clarke as John
Connor. Not only does he not look like John Connors of the past, he is bad in nearly
every other aspect. The whole idea of a nano-Terminator feels desperate, and
once again, is still inferior to a liquid metal T-1000. This nano-Terminator is
sensitive to magnets, and even though it’s far superior to Arnold’s T-800, it
still struggles to fight him, even though it should, in theory, be able to
destroy him without a hassle. But I can’t really fault the movie for that.
The action in this movie is unremarkable. By the end, there
is so much cgi flying at the screen, it becomes too much to process (I can’t
imagine what it would have looked like in 3D). The cgi ranges from good to
poor, but the young Arnold looks much better than in Terminator Salvation. Somehow, the liquid metal Terminator still
doesn’t look quite as good as it did back in 1991, which blows my mind. Like Jurassic World which came out last
month, the visual effects are not consistent throughout the movie. One scene
looks incredible, the next looks like a cartoon (for the record, Jurassic World had much better effects
overall than Terminator Genisys)
The best analogy I can think of to describe this movie is
it’s like a bad rollercoaster. You get on, dreading it, then as you start out,
it’s kind of fun, shows the promise of greatness, then once you go down the
first big hill, you realize how not fun it is, then it’s a series of ups and
downs—fun moments, glimmers of hope, followed by dumb moments, glaring
failures—and long before the ride’s over, you’re wondering how much longer is
left, and you feel like the ride’s been going on too long. Then you get off,
and forget about it ten minutes later. No one wanted this movie to be good more
than I did, but it simply was not a good Terminator
movie. I would hate for people who have never seen any of the original films to
see this one first. Do yourself a favour if you are new to the franchise: watch
the first two films at home and avoid going out to see this new one.
Is this the end of the franchise? I sincerely hope not, and
highly doubt it. If they continue with the planned sequel to this film, they
could, theoretically, fix a lot of the issues that came up in Genisys and make a much superior sequel.
I still believe we could get a good Terminator
sequel that isn’t Judgment Day. If
they can get a better script, that isn’t such a mess with too many ideas and a
lack of focus, bring back old Arnold, give Jai Courtney some acting lessons (or
just re-cast him), and patch up as many plot holes using time travel paradoxes
and alternate time lines as possible, then maybe, just maybe, I can face the
future of this franchise with a sense of hope.
