Terminator Genesis - now "Genisys"

TMBTM said:

A worthy sequel, to me, would have been a Terminator sets during the war with the machine with ver little, if not at all, time travel involved, until the very end with Kyle being sent in 1984. I think that's what everyone wanted

Click to expand...

I think that would please just about everyone. You can even throw Arnie in again as a Terminator/test subject. I've seen this kind of pitch countless times.

I can only assume it hasn't been made because every new studio that touches it wants to build a franchise. It's like they don't want to show us all the stuff we want until the eventual end of the trilogy. As long as the producers look too far ahead, we're gonna get these disappointing new takes that promise all sorts with no pay-off.

^ It makes more sense than the actual movie.

yeah i watched that movie it;s nice but not too good

Kirestananderson01 said:

yeah i watched that movie it;s nice but not too good

Click to expand...

TMBTM said:

Click to expand...

O, horrible! O, horrible! Most horrible!


This movie was awful from the very start. A goddamn exposition monologue explaining the premise of the series?! In the fifth freaking movie?! WHAT THE F*** -

Cutting back and forth between 1984 and the machine-war present? Who in their right mind would do that?

Opening credits playing over dramatic and important scenes?! Look, assholes, either do opening credits over something atmospheric, like T2's burning playground, or don't do opening credits at all. I dunno, maybe I'm being hypocritical here, because I think T3's opening credits totally work, but while they also play over important scenes, those scenes are also mostly familiar to us as fans (time-traveling, acquiring clothes, etc.), so the distraction isn't a big deal, and the overall direction is far better. With Genisys, the scenes are new, and it doesn't work at all.

(I really thought for a minute J.K. Simmons was gonna be Dr. Silberman. That would actually have been a fun twist, unlike the completely pointless token minority castings Dysons cameos. Of all the movie's twists, it doesn't go with that one?! I mean, sure, it wouldn't make any sense with the character as we know him, but nothing else in the movie makes a damn iota of sense, so why the hell not?! Even so, Simmons is pretty much the only good thing about the movie, with even Arnie being completely wasted.)

I'm not gonna spend much time nitpicking the movie, because it's total and utter garbage, with pure-shit dialogue, rotten story points, and everything is terrible and fuck it all and STOP MAKING MORE TERMINATOR; T1 is a classic, T2 is one of my top five all-time favorite movies and I also love T3 as a sheer popcorn entertainment (at least it has the dignity to be hard-R, with some legit gore, strong direction and good acting), but THE GODDAMN COLD WAR IS OVER, and therefore THIS SERIES HAS NO MORE REASON TO EXIST, PERIOD, ANYONE WHO SAYS OTHERWISE IS TOTALLY AND NON-DEBATABLY ABSOLUTELY WRONG.

But I am gonna bring up one point.

I was born and raised in the City and County of San Francisco.

I love San Francisco. It's my home, and I'm very proud of it.

I'm also proud of our rich cinematic history, from The Maltese Falcon to Vertigo to Dirty Harry, Milk, Zodiac, and beyond.

I also think San Francisco should be in more movies. Granted, it's gotten a lot of starring roles lately, and even when movies I have no interest in are set there - like the new Apes series, nu-Godzilla, and more - I like and appreciate that.

And I love Terminator 1-3.

So I think I'm being fairly objective and clear-eyed here when I say HOLY LIVING FUCK, DO NOT EVER, EVER, SET A TERMINATOR MOVIE IN SAN FRANCISCO! WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU?!

San Francisco is a gem of Planet Earth. It's one of the world's most beautiful cities. It's a very educated, very progressive place. It is the HOME OF STARFLEET ACADEMY, the BEATING HEART of the United Federation of Planets. I am very, very proud of this, fiction as it is. (And inspired by the fact that the UNITED NATIONS Charter was signed there, in '45. The UNITED NATIONS, people. PEACE and HARMONY among HUMANKIND.) Okay?

TERMINATOR IS A GODDAMN LOS ANGELES STORY. In its endless sprawl, oppressive heat, pollution and all that, it's GODDAMN IMPORTANT for TERMINATOR to take place in LA because LA is ALREADY kind of dystopic and dehumanizing and all that. LA is very large; SF - at least the downtown/urban parts - is quite small. SF represents the light; LA represents the dark. LA is also directly adjacent to desert, which is also important; whereas SF is adjacent to evergreen forests, massive bays and estuaries, and pleasant, smallish towns. Even T3 understood this completely, and stuck to LA and its surroundings as it should have.

SO, DON'T SET A GODDAMN TERMINATOR MOVIE in MY SAN FRANCISCO, SHITBAGS. JUST DON'T FUCKING DO IT. NO. NO, NO, NO.

...


...

(Now, am I saying one can't set a dark/dystopic movie in SF/the Bay Area? No, I am not. I kind of love that The Matrix Reloaded basically places the virtual Megacity in/as Oakland. And sure, there is good satire/sci-fi paranoia to be made out of our digital/Cloud-dependent culture, which is also based in and around SF, but goddamn it, Terminator is a Cold War story, based in Los Angeles. Christ.)

(And, if you're gonna send someone forward in time to SF, how about targeting, oh, THE GODDAMN BEACH? The one that's MANY MILES LONG?! Or GOLDEN FRICKING GATE PARK? HELLO? MCFLY?!)

This gets the same grade as Tomorrowland.: an F.


(And if I'd actually sat through Vacation, I'd have seen three F's in the base theater this year. Jeeeeeeeezus.)



 

TM2YC said:

- Big gaps in the story unless I missed something? Who sent Pops back? How/when did John get back? Who sent the South Korean T-1000 back?

Click to expand...

Exactly. Burn this movie to pieces. May it kill this festering unholy zombie franchise once and for all.

I will now proceed to set every edit I make in San Francisco.

Gaith said:

STOP MAKING MORE TERMINATOR; T1 is a classic, T2 is one of my top five all-time favorite movies and I also love T3 as a sheer popcorn entertainment (at least it has the dignity to be hard-R, with some legit gore, strong direction and good acting), but THE GODDAMN COLD WAR IS OVER, and therefore THIS SERIES HAS NO MORE REASON TO EXIST, PERIOD, ANYONE WHO SAYS OTHERWISE IS TOTALLY AND NON-DEBATABLY ABSOLUTELY WRONG.

Click to expand...

So T3 gets a post-Cold War pass because...?

Uncanny Antman said:

So T3 gets a post-Cold War pass because...?

Click to expand...

A noble question, good sir!

It is true that T3 did not need to exist. Both T1 and T2 offer perfect ending points. But T3, IMO, did half-justify its own existence in the sense that it wrapped up a coherent Skynet story arc:




T1 is a perfect loop. But in T2, according to BttF rules, if destroying both Terminator chips really did wipe out Judgment Day, why does John still exist? So T3, in showing the origins of the "original" Skynet, has a story to tell. (Can one nitpick this interpretation? Yes, absolutely; it's not at all rock-solid, but it does make a fair amount of sense, IMO.)

Also, thematically speaking, while it was produced a decade after the Cold War ended, T3 at least keeps the focus on the military-industrial complex and the horror of nuclear war, with the computer virus as a cool twist. T4 offers nothing in this regard, and T5 makes Skynet an amped-up iTunes or some inane shit, and that absolutely crosses the line into unforgivable franchise-gutting. (And why the hell would some kid be excited for a tablet that integrates all his other devices? What other devices does a kid have besides a phone, a FitBit? Nuke this god-forsaken fiasco from freaking orbit!!!)

Again, I'm not saying T3 needed to exist; not at all. But I love the cast (Stahl and Danes are great, and Lokken is a lot of fun), the recycled story structure still works, and so do the quiet scenes - even amidst all the contrivances, there are recognizably human characters at play. (Not so in T5; not at all.) Like I said, it's a popcorn entertainment, not a sci-fi classic. But it's not a waste of time like T4, and it's definitely not a steaming pile of shit like Genisys. :-o

Gaith said:

But in T2, according to BttF rules, if destroying both Terminator chips really did wipe out Judgment Day, why does John still exist?

Click to expand...

There's no indication that the Terminator series follows BTTF rules.

Gaith said:

And why the hell would some kid be excited for a tablet that integrates all his other devices?

Click to expand...

Because Genisys does what Nintendon't.

Mark Moore said:

There's no indication that the Terminator series follows BTTF rules.

Click to expand...

Right, which is why I call T3 far from necessary, but not a total pointless waste of time from its very conception, either. The problem with the Terminator series post-T3, as many have noted, is that small victories are pointless (because the machines are relentless and time travel means that everything can be undone anyway), and a definitive victory would end the story and preclude the possibility of future movies. Until some suit has the balls to actually make the definitive very last Terminator movie, with zero intention of making any more than said final chapter, these movies are pretty much guaranteed to suck giant monkey balls, which is exactly what T4 and 5 do. (And even an intentional finale would probably be pretty naff, also, as the future war is boring.)

Gaith said:

Right, which is why I call T3 far from necessary, but not a total pointless waste of time from its very conception, either. The problem with the Terminator series post-T3, as many have noted, is that small victories are pointless (because the machines are relentless and time travel means that everything can be undone anyway), and a definitive victory would end the story and preclude the possibility of future movies. Until some suit has the balls to actually make the definitive very last Terminator movie, with zero intention of making any more than said final chapter, these movies are pretty much guaranteed to suck giant monkey balls, which is exactly what T4 and 5 do. (And even an intentional finale would probably be pretty naff, also, as the future war is boring.)

Click to expand...

They should just re-release T1 and T2 in theaters with the alternate ending of T2 where Judgment Day never arrived. That's the ending.

Ahem, bottom right:




NO. It's a horrible ending. A happy ending is one thing, but an ending where a child terrorist becomes a US Senator? That's just garbage, and an awful tonal departure from the rest of Cameron's films. The dark yet hopeful road into the future is perfect.

Love the honest trailer but I honestly think the movie's good, judging by the last Terminator sequel we got too, not to mention a damn sight better than T3. Sure I don't like the casting choices (Jai Courtney, Jason Clarke and Not-Robert Patrick), and the time bending story makes a messy salad out of the franchise timeline, but like James Cameron said I think it's the rightful sequel to Judgement Day.

EDIT - Oh, also the requests at the beginning making the Terminator music - Haha, Nice.

Okay the rest of the movie was dreck but this stuff was pretty cool. Nice comparison vid...