Movie Review: Terminator Salvation
The Short Version: Terminator is an amazing action movie that must really be seen on the big screen to enjoy fully. Unfortunately the movie was poorly written and we never really care for any of the characters – after watching it you’ll ultimately feel that nothing really happened. Click for more
Why GOD whyyyyy!
Terminator Salvation Review
You know what? I don’t care that McG did Charlies Angels. I don’t care that the writers of this movie also wrote the wonderful (sarcasm) Terminator 3: Rise of Machines [2/5] or the award winning (lie) Catwoman feature film [refuse to rate].
I was willing to forget that history of such great work and let this movie stand on its own. I let myself get extremely excited about this film, this was exactly what I had asked for as a kid when I saw the first two terminator films – I said to myself then, “why can’t I see more in the future with the lasers and the human resistance!? I want more war, war and more war – and less story – and have it all be in the future!”
The Action was BAS ASS in this movie!
Only problem is, and something I just now realized, I was a stupid effing kid. Terminator deserves more than this.
And by this I mean the movie was basically just one huge action sequence – and what’s odd about this whole thing is it was actually one REALLY good action sequence. You’ll definitely get your fill of explosions and high intensity action with great fresh new camera work – its all really fun to look at. But is that all we should expect from it?
Terminator deserves more.
OMG, I yelled at that crew member for nothing!
I don’t understand what happened to the story! Christian Bale reportedly had declined to be in the movie –
“That sounds great but until it’s on the page: f**k off. Get it so we can read it in a room, without special effects and explosions and still have it be engaging, then I’ll do your film.”
Well he’s in it – and he’s there delivering a flat one dimensional performance. What happened? Well I guess it must have gone like this…
Conversation from the Editing Room
McG and his Writers:
MCG: The first draft of your script was good, it didn’t feel like it had enough action though, so let’s do this. Add some action here…
Writers: Check.MCG: Action there.
Writers: Got it no problem.
MCG: ..and Lets get more Action here.
Writers: Okay, Nice. Well, alright it is a war film now, just like you wanted, bleak and apocalyptic, we’ve achieved the future war stuff, so, okay how about we do some story now?
MCG: No, instead of that, lets put some Action there and there. Oh and I want motorcycles, terminator motorcycles – also I want mechanical dolphins with lasers on their heads, but most of all I want a Transformer-nator in my movie! Make it all happen!
Writers: Ive done that, ive done everything you’ve asked, but what about the Story, sir?
MCG: TO HELL with the DAMN STORY, I said ACTION. Action here and here and here.
Me being that stupid kid, I wanted to see the war for 2 hours straight not caring about story. I’ve grown up now and after this movie, I realize that I actually do need a little story with my action. Thank you Terminator Salvation.
I will still dream of a full 2 hour war movie in the Terminator Franchise that provides us with an engaging story and emotional characters we pull for like with Saving Private Ryan, but we don’t have that here.
Back then, it was a full plate of action with a side of story (which I would sometimes skip like vegetables), but now I realized I enjoy eating healthier with the main course a story and a nice sized side of action.
The T-600's Were Effing Awesome!
Things I Liked:
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• It’s a War Movie through and through – The Action, the Colors, and the Tone. They really Nail this aspect – I feel the bleakness of the future.
• The Terminators are BAD ASS, and I’m glad they use animatronics for most of the T-600’s, it brings back great memories from the original movies.
• Sam Worthington does a great job as Marcus, he was the only character, besides Kyle Resse that I actually cared about.
Bear with me as I deliver a few terrible lines of dialouge written for me, we will be back to the Action soon!
Things I Hated:
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• The Story is Weak as Hell – NOTHING HAPPENS. I Feel like all this movie did was try to setup its damn “new trilogy”, and I hate it when the guys behind these things try to setup a franchise trilogy before it even releases – that should be a result of the first movie being just that damn good enough that it deserves one.
• Far too much “Suspension of Disbelief” is required!
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o Why doesn’t skynet attack the airstrip with all the A-10’s and Helicopters. It makes no sense that they have a headquarters above ground out in the open – underground maybe, but not out in the open like that.
o Why does Skynet keep Kyle Resse in a cell when they capture him? Instead of just shooting him on site – effectively ending the war in victory for the machines!
• Christian Bale as John Connor wasn’t the charismatic leader I had hoped he would be.
Here’s the Kicker though, I demand you see this movie at some point. Contribute to its success. It’s a great popcorn flick, and worth seeing in theaters. As much as I wanted it to be the BEST of the series – its not. If I had to rank it it would rank like this:
I want to see another film – hopefully they ditch McG and/or get a new set of writers.
So go see the film so this can happen!
As Marcus would say, “Everybody deserves a second chance.” So does this new vision of Terminator.
3/5
STONE’S SECOND OPINION
So yeah, I went into this movie wanting to hate it. I heard nothing good from people about it before it came out, then the awful news that they want to time travel AGAIN for the follow up. But you know what?
I love this movie! From beginning to end it is totally ass kicking. I do not know what people were expecting.
It’s not meant to be anything but a roller coaster of a movie that just pounds you every second. I loved Marcus, I loved the down and out John Connor who is struggling with his own destiny and those who claim to be on his side. I loved the T-600′s and their zombie like demeanor’s. I loved all the robots and explosions and action sets.
The camera work was f-ing awesome. Especially that helicopter scene in the beginning. Genius. And I especially loved the T-800 fight at the end of the movie. Fuck yeah.
This movie blew away anything I expected it to be. Now I do not want them to go back in time. What a waste that would be. Give me more awesome machines. Give me more apocalyptic future wars.
This is a solid 5 of 5!! Go see this, you wont be disappointed.
5/5
the effect was good and the story was there but down playing the action to a PG-13 had hurt the movie in some degree also there was really nothing new the movie had to offer and John Conner had became a side catertor and the mine person in the story. overall it was a good movie but it could have been better
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Don’t know about you guys…But it all ended at T2 for me.
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We all live in a yellow-colored submarine, yellow-colored submersible, yellow submersible.
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Not a bad movie, but a wasted opportunity. I agree with John above- I hope the next one isn’t set in london present day, that would just tank. I’m hoping the other rumour is true (http://notasoul.t35.com/shh).
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Went and saw this movie and holy shit this was bad ass and so f#cking epic i loved the bit were Arnold appeared and loved the character Marcus. Bale did a good job playing John Conner and all the action in this was f#cking sweet cant wait for the next one but i hope they DONT!!! make John Conner go BACK IN TIME. I would rate this 100000000000/10
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i hav been a huge terminator fan since i was little, for a girl i was amazed by it and i didnt even like the romance in it wen i was little (i can appreciate that now that i hav matured). The third movie was not wat i was expecting, to i had been waiting for it for 3 fuking years. and so wen it came out, i cudnt stand watching it cuz it blew my opinion of the series. too much humor. wen they sed they were making a 4th one in 2005 (i think) i sighed and sed, im not gonna watch that, they fuked up the last one. so wen i saw christian bale in it, i cringed. i hate christian bale for no apparent reason, amazing actor, just dont like him. then i saw the harvestor that looked like a transformer, i got pissed and walked away. wen it finally came out, i promise to see it with my bro cuz, hey, i had been a big fan since the 2nd one came out to vhs the wen i was a baby. I saw it…
AMAZING! INCREDIBLE! i didnt really look forward to seeing a whole film out of the war, war bored me, but it was full of awesome action and still had a plot. tho the plot wasnt too deep, it was there and thick enough to sustain me thru 2 hours of just watching ppl kill machines. the performance of the actors was great, not really christina bale, he acted like john, but he had batman overtones i didnt like. However, his reaction when he first saw kyle was the most tingly part of the entire film. i wanted to laugh, but in a good way. Anton Yelchin is a perfect Kyle, he got a little moody with marcus in the beginning, but after i watched the 1st movie again right after i understood that it was an ideal performance, plus he is a hormonal teenager who has never gotten laid so u can figure hes a little pissy lol. Marcus was great, Sam Worthington did a good job, but i didnt really feel any signifigance of his being there. yeah, it helped show that john was struggling with the unknown and it was the reason for john meeting kyle in the first place, and it saved johns life, tho he wudnt hav needed saving if it wasnt for kyle being stuck in skynet, but he wudnt kno about it if it wasnt for marcus, but marcus was the reason kyle got captured anyway because his radio played Rooster by Alice in Chains (yay!) but other than that, if hes dead? theres not really any reason for him to be in the movie in the first place.
Everyone did phenominally. the action was awesome, the story was good cuz the entire time i was begging for kyle and john to run into each other, but it could hav been better, but it was awesome. Plus Anton Yelchin is so cute! (but ive had a huge crush on Kyle since i was a kid) I totally suppor this film, out of the league i thought it would be cuz everything sux lately in theaters.
NO MORE TIME TRAVELING!!! the only time traveling should be done in the 6th one wen they send kyle back in time to 1984.
To watch mine and my frends review of the movie…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVTCZo8ABxo
and this is the vid of my reaction to Angry Joes Terminator 5 plot details video. It has info on what they hav fuked up and what they r going to fuk up if they make this movie this way
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_piewXeFz8
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Sorry Joe, but I’m going to have to side with Stone on this one. I personally couldn’t see anything wrong with this film, but then again, I’m not really the critic type…unless Bethesda softworks, or Daikatana is involved.
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thats exactly what I thought about the new terminator however the one thing that didn’t make sense was undoubtedly the strangely uncanny time paradox. I really don’t want them to think up somethign retarted like terminator in the first movie was duplicated in chips that would be retarted
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The problem I think is that the Terminator was always well balanced out, It had enough action and story to tell, the trick is to put those moments together at the right time. Now T3 I didn’t think was awful … but it just goes to fast does not give enough explanations, not like T2 when the Terminator tells how SkyNet is build who is responsible and so on. The same problem sticks with T4 and in a way that is a huge disappointment, making the move hard to enjoy and see it’s place in the Terminator Saga.
So why don’t we look at the Terminator chronology to see if we can understand the motives of the writes and try to imagine where the T5-6 can take the audience. I’ll try to make it short as I can:
1984:
- May 13 the assassinations of Sarah L Connor and Sarah N Connor attempts of the T-800 (or Unknown “human” assailant) to kill Sarah J Connor.
- May 13-14 The police arrests Kyle Reese in accusation of kidnapping Sarah Connor and questions him. The accused Kyle Reese (male age 25-30 no known address no known place of berth) states that he is a part of the human resistance led by a man named John Connor in the war against the machines led by the AI known as Skynet, also states that he is sent back in time from the year 2027 to protect Sarah Connor. The attack on the LA police department by T-800 that led to the deaths of 17 police officers. Sarah Connor and Kyle Reese escape.
- May 15 An accident at Cyberdyne steel mill leads to death of Kyle Reese and discovery of 2 fragment of an unknown origin broken CPU and a robotic arm
- February 28 1985 berth of John Connor.
1995:
- June 8 Sarah Connor escapes from Pescadero state Hospital. She was added by her son and an Unknown individual presumably responsible for killing 17 LA police officers in 1984.
- June 9 Attack on the Cyberdyne research facility leads to the destruction of the new processor research as well as the destruction of the robotic arm and CPU of unknown origin and the death of Miles Dyson lead programmer of Skynet.
- At some point between 1995-2000 CRS obtains the patent to Skynet AI from Cyberdyne – this info is from the deleted scene of T3. This could mean that there where reserve copies of Miles Dyson’s work that did not get destroyed but where out of date and caused the Skynet creation to slowdown.
- The 1997 Judgment day does not take place.
2003:
Marcus Wright donates his body for scientific research to Cyberdyne systems.
2004:
- July 7-8 Assassinations of Jose Barrera, Elizabeth and William Anderson, General Robert Brewster by the newest terminator T-X(which I thought was a great idea for a new generation of terminator).
- July 8 at 06:18 PM Skynet becomes self-aware and launches a massive attack on mankind.
- From 2004-to the future (or present) formation of the resistance and the war against the machines.
2018:
- The destruction of one of Skynet’s T-600 production factories, power plant and one of the Air Defense station. This information is from “The Terminator Salvation Prequel” comic book. It shows 2 groups of the resistance that weaken Skynet’s defenses operation “Sand in the gears”.
- Skynet’s experiment with living human tissue leads to creating the first T-800s.
- John Connor prevents the death of Kyle Reese and successfully executes the destruction of Skynet military server (one of many I beet).
Q&A. Now I’ll try to answer some of the question that this movie raises in the Terminator saga:
1) How does Skynet know of Kyle Reese – well going back to 1984 there should have been police reports that may have the recording of Kyle’s conversation with Dr. Silverman and that would give Skynet some good leads (the words war man vs machine 2027 Skynet) would indicate that this man is from a different time line and sense the events he describes do happen… well that’s where the Machine becomes systematic. Skynet hunts all possible Kyle Reeses that match the age and the time period (but fiends only one he-he).
2) This lead to another question why not kill Kyle if he is dangerous well… I guess Skynet needed to be sure that the Kyle it captured was realy the one who goes back in time and also if Skynet is a supper intelligent AI it had predicted a human reaction of JC to sacrifice his life to save his possible father which is exactly what Skynet planed out.
3) How does Skynet fined a submarine and destroy it when it could not fined the radio signal from JC… well again look at the time this is the 2018 not the 2029 Skynet has not evolved to the level at which it can create plasma rifles and time spheres yet. Going back to the comic book in it the resistance uses devices to hide there location so Skynet resaves the transmission but does not pinpoint the location from where it is coming from but don’t worry It’ll will one day . So how does it locate the sub simple it evolve at the last second and sunk that bitch
4) Why doesn’t Skynet terminate the whole time traveling thing well think about it if Kyle Reese is JC’s dad then the first T-800 is Skynet’s dad. Without the first broken cheep there wouldn’t be a Skynet.
Well that’s about all I can think of now. If u have something to ask please do but keep in mind that after the T2 the original time line is changed the Skynet of 1997 nolonger exsists.
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4 writers on this Joe, 4! And one of them was just there to do rewrites on set as they shot.
I wanted to like the movie, but yeah John Conner was such a plank of wood. His best scenes were with Marcus.
John was was rewarded for disobeying orders, then obeys orders just long enough for the target to be out of reach? They used the hackneyed last man left in platoon plot device??
And the rifle shown in 1st 2nd and 3rd acts without even being brought up, pregnant wife/girlfriend? I so called the scar though, but by that time I really didn’t care what happened to John.
From the promos I came to the conclusion that Marcus would be our Robocop avatar, and darned if I wasn’t right. And yes he was the stronger character, stronger arc, stronger development.
You forgot to mention the little girl was not insufferable, a movie gains a point if they can avoid that.
Physics doesn’t work like that, bodies don’t work like that, injuries don’t work like that, logic doesn’t work like that, organ transplants… I know not five minutes after that scene there had to be someone to mention that they have futuristic —-ing tech so it was completely unnecessary… it brought nothing to the story and was completely telegraphed at set-up 2 scenes before.
You’ll have to excuse me Joe, I left the theater angry because I could see where this could have been a great movie.
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Star trek was really awesome, and GI JOE WILL ROCK!!! Except Angry Joe is too timid to make a counter bet to my human paintball target challenge.
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Hmm..am i the only one who sees a trend here??? Wolverine SUCKED ASS or atleast did not meet expectations. Terminator did not meet expectations (i hope u weren’t expecting a 3/5 movie joe). SO WTF is next? Will transformers be another movie pushed out during the summer? Blah sadly i can see nothing but terrible movies coming out in the summer just like there have been nothing but terrible movies being made lately. I pray and hope that a summer movie comes out that makes me change my mind! GO HOLLYWOOD!
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Huh, seems like an decent flick. Might gonna go see it now. The reviews of this movie seems to differ alot, NC liked it, spoony seemed to hate it and james liked it…confusing :S. And Joe, do you like metalocalypse?
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My biggest issue is how the holy hell does Skynet know about Kyle Reese? From the first three movies, I could see Skynet sending back Terminators to kill the Resistance leader that led to its defeat. That makes sense.
But according to this plot, Skynet KNOWS that John Connor’s father is Kyle Reese and that he’s a kid in the future. HOW?!?! Is there some record of this? Sarah Connor’s psych review? John Connor going around saying “Oh, by the way, my dad came back in time to impregnate my mother and his name is Kyle Reese”? Some kind of hint would have been nice.
Basically, if Skynet knows that John Connor, the human that will lead the humans to killing it, was born because IT sent robots into the past, then it should abandon all time travel research. If, on the other hand, it realizes that that it’s very existence is owed completely to its failed Terminator plot being salvaged by the past’s humans, then it showed try to kill Kyle Reese in the future. There were so many questions and none of them were explored.
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Angry Joe, you know that the ending was the half robot half human was going to shot them all, kill them all and have Conner’s face, which would of been the most kick-ass ending to this movie, but they didn’t do it because bell sign on for 5 and 6:(
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I don’t buy that excuse for the change to the ending for one reason. With the type of Terminator that Marcus was he would have infiltrated The Resistance as John Connor. Therefore Bale would be taking over the role of Marcus who would be appearing as John Connor allowing for Bale to stay on for the next two films. It would have worked. They changed the ending because it was a bleaker ending and I heard it didn’t test well with the test audience.
I went to the midnight showing of Salvation with my wife and her sister and we all loved it though. It was a really fun movie and definitely worth seeing in the theatre like Joe keeps saying.
Side note: GI Joe had better have a friggin’ PSA at the end of the movie. That along will make it worth while.
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If a friend invites me to go, then I will go see it, if not, I will just wait till it’s on DVD.
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stone 5/5 when joe 3/5 =o
i guess if i go in with moderate expectations ill think its 4/5
good review guys
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Yep, but you should see it, its still good!
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hey angry joe nice review but i got a unrelated question xD do u have a steam account? because im gonna donate u some games 1 day when i get the money
(im only 13 so i dont have much cash xD i bought some cymbals for my drumset so im kinda broke right now 
)
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3\5 ?
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I said it before, I just think McG is completely overrated and a new Terminator movie after all these years deserved a better director. After reading several reviews, I just have the urge to watch the first two films back to back and wait for Terminator Salvation to come out on DVD to rent.
Oh and the barchart ain’t so bad. :p
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haha thanks man! I do think you should see it on the big screen though.
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I’M NOT A MAN! I still think I’ll save my money for the festival.
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I don’t think that i’ll watch for the second time. Its just not that interesting anymore :/
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Hmm, a honest account. When I saw the trailer it reminded me of Transformers; seems I wasn’t too far off. Not a big fan of franchises anyway ( I am convinced that the Alien series should have ended after the first film). I’ll see it and will try and enjoy the decent parts.
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