I wouldn't call myself
The Bearded Nerd if for some reason I in fact
wasn't a nerd, and I guess that alone goes to explain the following dissertation. Therefore I'll go ahead and give you a heads-up by saying that if you're not a fan of
The Terminator, then you may just wanna sit this one out.
However if you're
not a fan of
The Terminator, but you
are a fan of
Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, then you may just wanna go fuck yourself and end it all now before you accidentally reproduce because you're either retarded or you enjoy watching other people suffer (in which case you're a fucking deviant and should be put-down anyway).
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| Oh I get it! You wacky computer geeks are the wittiest! |
And I'm not going to give you a plot synopsis of the films and the fictitious history they establish because if you're still reading this then it's safe to assume you've already seen them all and have at least a basic understanding of them.
I guess the point of this is to relay a very major grievance I have with the franchise. Not that it's the first one I've ever had, but it's one that I fear will destroy any possibility of a viable future with the series.
First off,
T2: Judgement Day is my favorite film of the series. Notwithstanding the fact that the original film is a masterpiece---I kind of grew up with the sequel, and yes I kind of enjoy the slightly lighter tone and "buddy film" feel of it.
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| On the set, as Arnold shoots "suck" with his shotgun of badassery |
And yes I understand that part one is essentially a "slasher flick" with a robot instead of a Michael Myers or Freddy Krueger type slasher, and yes I understand that it's a really fucking genius concept, especially for it's time, but I like the sequel goddamnit so get off of
The Bearded One's nuts!
I realized recently however, that regardless of the awesomeness that
T2 holds----the liquid-metal guy, the rebellious pre-teen protagonist, the motorcycle-chase in the LA aqueducts, Linda Hamilton's strong female archetype, etc etc etc---the foundations of the entire franchise and any installments to come were prematurely fucked because of that great film.
See, when
Terminator Salvation trailers dropped in 2008 I almost came in my pants. And then to hear that douche of a director named McG explain that he was trying for a
Children of Men feel to this movie (despite the fact that his only claim to fame was
Charlie's Angels), I was elated and a little more than intrigued, to say the least.
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| "'Avatar'? Try 'Dark Fucking Knight', bitch..." |
And then I actually
saw the film.
And possibly only because I have a raging hard-on for just about anything dealing with the post-apocalyptic future, I actually didn't hate it. And I still don't. Hell, there were some fantastic moments in it, and fuck you for judging me, but I proudly own it to this day.
On BluRay, at that.
And I even bought the
Hot Toys John Conner and Marcus figures.
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| "we look like we smell like smoke!" |
No,
you suck! (Okay so those toys aren't actually
mine, but they're awesome)
My numero uno complaint with
Terminator Salvation wasn't the CGI young Arnold (hey quit being so goddamned anal retentive and give-way to the future of cinema, already). It wasn't the fact that Helena Bonham Carter was the "face" of the neurological core of the "machines" (even though that was terribly gay, I concur). It sure as hell wasn't that they cast Christian Bale as John Connor, because you honestly just don't get much more badass than Christian
"you're fucking unprofessional!" Bale.
My problem was with Sam Worthington. Well, not the fact that it was Sam Worthington (although he is kind of overrated and being shoved down my fucking throat lately) but rather with the character he was playing----"Marcus".
Why did this movie need Marcus?
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| "I think about stuff, too." |
Considering that they already squatted down and dumped
T3: Rise of the Machines into the world with a title that very obviously insinuated that we
Terminator fans would finally get a broader glimpse of the "Future Wars", only to learn (after buying our tickets) that it was in-fact a watered-down version of
T2 with a less interesting (albeit sexier) version of Robert Patrick's T-1000, and with that annoying skank from HBO's
Carnivale as John Connor instead of that likeable skank from
Animal Factory,
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| "Unemployment came from the future to kill me!" |
I thought for sure that with
Terminator Salvation we were finally getting a movie about "The Future Wars". And judging from the foundations that were laid in all 3 of the
Terminator films before it, it was safe to assume that John Connor played a really
really major role in these said Future Wars. In fact, we were specifically told that he was the leader of the human resistance against the rise of the machines.
Therefooooooooore, since
Terminator Salvation was about The Future Wars, and John Connor was the key element
in The Future Wars, then
Terminator Salvation must be about John Connor.
Then who the
fuck is Marcus and why is he getting all of Bale's screentime?
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| "I was in a little movie called Ava-fucking-Tar, bitch." |
Uh-oh.
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| "what?" |
Oh no.
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| "what, goddamnit?" |
Oh you gotta be shitting me...
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| "It's not what you think..." |
Don't tell me that he's a------oh goddamn it....
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| "Okay...I'm sorry." |
So yet again, just as it happened in
T3, the story of John Connor gets put on-hold. Except this time, there's no Arnold Schwarzenegger to blame. It's one thing to rehash a stale storyline if you can plug an international superstar into the same old role again and sell a few more tickets and toys...but it's another thing entirely to cover the same fucking ground again with an unknown Australian actor.
And yet there it was...the same shit (essentially) all over again. In a film which was supposed to either show us how much of a motherfucking bad ass John Connor was, or show us
how he became the motherfucking badass we always assumed he was (considering that motherfucking robots from the future deemed him enough of a threat to invent time-travel just to go back and kill him while he was still in the womb....)
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| "Oh Kyle...put a little Christian Bale inside of me" |
Whoa,
stop. Give me that
parenthesis again. I'm not done with that thought...
(think about that for a second. John Connor was such a fucking badass and a thorn in the side of these advanced killing machines that they couldn't even assassinate him in his own time, nor did they originally attempt to just go back in time and kill him when he was a little kid. No, he was so fucking dangerous and badass that their first method of attack was to go directly to the source, and to destroy the very womb which begat him.
Now that...is some serious badass-edness.
End paranthesis.)
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| "He said 'End Parenthesis'...." |
And so instead of witnessing all of Connor's badassery firsthand in
Terminator Salvation, we as the audience were instead handed a great amount of potential with Christian Bale in the role, being as fucking intense as he always is...and then we were slapped in the face and beat over the head with Sam Worthington's Marcus. Instead of being a badass, we got a sort of "
John Connor Begins" scenario, which is fine...except for the fact that in
Batman Begins we actually got to see Batman kick some serious ass. In
John Connor Begins we see John Connor get all fired-up to raid the Terminator's base for the last epic battle (set to "Guns N' Roses" as a nod to
T2, no less), only to arrive and get his bitch-ass handed to him by a CGI Arnold.
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| "By ze power of Greyskull!" |
In the opening scene a helicopter lands on a Terminator endoskeleton, and John Connor jumps out and fires a couple of rounds into it's head like a total badass....only to end up crashing the same helicopter ten minutes later like a total dumbass.
Terminator Salvation was in no way the story of John Connor, and in fact it paved the way for a very dim future for the entire Terminator franchise. Granted, I wouldn't say it was the equivalent of seeing the origins of Darth Vader getting it's shit wrecked on the big-screen...but it was hugely disappointing to say the least.
Now...how did such a vastly superior film like
T2, despite being followed by a turd like
T3 and a disappointment like
Terminator Salvation actually do more to
hurt the legacy of this franchise?
It introduced idiots everywhere to the idea of "
Good Robots".
See I'll speak for most (somewhat) normal people by saying that we're way past the astonishment that a robot could not only be programmed to be a good guy, but could then therefore begin to drop subtle hints as to the possibility that it's developing human emotions as well.
Circa 1991:
"Oh okay...he's really starting to respect the mom and has developed a bond with the little boy. Therefore he knows without a doubt he has to destroy himself in order to preserve their future. Or is he just following his programmed protocol? Okay, that's neat and poetic.
Oh look, now he's 'terminated'."
For idiots however, that idea
still rages like a fire, and consumes their tiny minds to this day. The first
Terminator was way ahead of it's time in terms of story, and paved the way for what could have been the greatest science-fiction franchise of all time.
T2 took that concept and shook it up in a unique way by having one (
ONE) of the fucking robots get captured and reprogrammed so that he could be sent back to protect John Connor because the
new terminator (T-1000) the machines were sending back this time around was going to be too much for even a badass human like Kyle Reese to handle.
Okay, cool. That particular terminator (T-800) did his job and then destroyed himself to try and prevent the war altogether. He failed to prevent the war inevitably, because the franchise at that point still had very strong legs, but he succeeded in wrapping-up the particular story-arc called, "
That One Time a Good Robot Helped Us".
And it was cool. But it's over now. No more "backsies," goddamnit. You can't triple-stamp a double-stamp so stop contemplating over goddamn good robots! Yes I realize that if the machines can become self-aware enough to feel the desire to destroy mankind that they can probably become self-aware enough to feel the desire to save it just as well, but there's
one little problem with that----
it's not fucking interesting. By giving the good guys their own near-indestructible robots, you destroy the protagonists which the audience identifies with, and you eliminate the qualities of your original "underdog" that makes them an underdog to begin with (and everyone loves an underdog).
Regardless, some of these "good robot loving idiots" from 1991 went on to do usual idiot stuff with their lives. And some of them landed in Hollywood and got big opportunities in life.
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| McG |
To direct
Terminator movies, for instance.
And that's how we got Marcus.
Yes that's how we got another goddamn self-aware robot in another motherfucking
Terminator movie which was supposed to be about how just regular old-fashioned human fucking beings fought against an army of robots who were self-aware enough to know that they hated them some goddamn humans.
And although I looked past a lot of this because
Terminator Salvation has so many fucking cool scenes of post-apocalypia, and because I honestly think that young Kyle Reese was a really cool character with some solid moments, I have finally come to grips with the realization that the entire series is doomed because of idiots and their fascination with self-aware fucking robots.
Even if a sequel to
Salvation gets green-lit, it will undoubtedly be an abortion filled with humans programming robots to go back in time to fight robots who have gone back in time to destroy the parents of humans who we are shocked to realize were actually self-aware robots sent back in time to impregnate the human mother of the leader of the human resistance who was actually killed years ago in a glorious battle but in order to keep-up morale was replaced with a "good" self-aware robot who becomes so unaware of being self-aware that he/it convinces him/itself that it/he thinks it/he is actually the human leader of the resistance.
Orrrrrrrrr iiiiiiissssss he/ittttttttt?
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| "In the future machines have declared war on diets" |
So be warned,
Terminator fans. We're fucked. The only thing worse that could happen at this point is if James Cameron returned to direct one.
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| "Look they're not gonna care because I'm James fucking Cameron and I made it and they'll pay to see it. So shut the fuck up and pretend like you're living in the avatar of a blue robot." |
