Terminator: Genisys (2015)

nTerminator: Genisys (2015)

nDirector: Alan Taylor

nCast: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jason Clarke, Emilia Clarke,nJai Courtney, J.K. Simmons

nTerminator: Genisys is one of those movies that nobody reallynfelt safe about because, if it’s a Terminator film and Terminator creator JamesnCameron isn’t involved, then what’s the point right? Terminator (1984) and Terminatorn2: Judgment Day (1995) are as mind blowing as they are because of Cameron’sninvolvement and because of the creative team that he amassed to make them. A work of artnis the way it is because of the artist behind it. In the world of film makingncertain directors stand out as having their own unique style. There’s only onenSam Raimi, there’s only one David Lynch, and there’s only one James Cameron.nYou try and follow in the footsteps of a distinctive filmmaker that everybodynloves and you’ve got trouble coming at you on a massive scale. In this sense,nAlan Taylor, the director behind Thor: The Dark World (2013) had a gargantuanntask in front of him. Why give a huge film like this one to a director whosenonly made one film prior to this one? It was probably a monetary decision; inexperiencedndirectors are probably cheaper than paying an a-lister. Still, a Terminatornfilm is better than no Terminator film so of course I decided to givenTerminator: Genisys a chance. The previews didn’t look to promising, but I’dnread some good reviews saying it was at the very least, entertaining. So isnthis new Terminator movie worth a damn?

nThe thing about Terminator sequels from Terminator 3: Risenof the Machines (2003) onward is that they’ve all been made by differentnproduction companies, so each sequel has a different tone and voice to it. Mostnof them have tried to imitate James Cameron’s first two films. Did they try andnfail? No. They tried and died. The rights to the Terminator films have beennbouncing around from Production Company to Production Company like a hypernactive jumping bean. Sadly, this has created unevenness in the whole franchise,nactors keep changing, concepts get twisted…by now we’ve had four differentnactors play John Connor! And that’s without including the television show! Thenonly consistency in these films has come from Arnold Schwarzenegger who keepsncoming back to play the T-800 because he is very fond of this particularnfranchise almost as much as he’s fond of the Conan franchise. No matter hownshitty the idea, he’s going to be there because Terminator and Conan madenArnold who he is, those where the films that truly put him on the map. So herenhe is, back again in another Terminator sequel without James Cameron behind thencamera. My question is, if it wasn’t for Arnold, would we even care about thesensequels? I’m thinking Arnold is the only thing keeping us old school Terminatornfans going back to these films. Thankfully, we do get a good dose of Arnoldnthroughout the whole film; he’s on it for most of the running time which isngreat. The younger cgi version of Arnold was well achieved in my book, not asnfake as I thought it would look.

nThe thing about these sequels (at least from my point ofnview) is that they are not complete crap. In my book, Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003) wasna decent sequel; it had tons of action and took the story to interestingnplaces. I didn’t like Nich Stahl as John Connor, but whatever, the movie was wellnmade. After Rise of the Machines, the rights went to some other production companynand so those characters were never heard of again. And then we got Terminator: Salvation (2009), which introduced us to a whole other set of actors, charactersnand premises. Salvation had its moments, but it kind of fell apart in its thirdnact, the way these filmmakers envisioned Skynet was such a letdown! And now withnTerminator: Genisys we’re presented yet again with a new premise set of actorsnand so forth, there’s just no consistency with this series of films! Each one isna different take on the Terminator universe and not a true blue sequel with anynsort of continuity. The big problem is there’s no creative force uniting thesenfilms, like say George Lucas behind the Star Wars films. Fine, so the sequelsnare all a disparate bunch, what was this fifth installment like?

nBasically the idea behind this sequel is forget everythingnthat happened in the previous films because what happens on this film is annalternate timeline, so everything has changed. If you thought this wasngoing to be a remake, then you will soon discover you were completely wrong, this is a straight reboot of the franchise. Forna moment we do visit 1984 and we get to see familiar events transpire, we soonndiscover this isn’t the same 1984 we saw in Cameron’s The Terminatorn(1984). This is where I step in and warn you that the whole time travel elementncan get a bit confusing, so you’re better off just ignoring the whole timentravel mumbo jumbo and just enjoy the movie, it’s what I did and it worked out justnfine. Time travel movies by nature can get your brain circuits all crossed, especiallynwhen Arnold starts talking about quantum fields and nexuses and time points…mynadvice is let it all glaze over. That being said, I was having a blast with thenfirst half of Genisys. The film functions as a prequel, showing us the eventsnthat lead to Kyle Reese being sent to 1984. This part of the film I reallynloved! These are events that have always been alluded to in previous films but werennever shown, so it was great to finally get to see how it all went down.

nIn terms of action and special effects, nothing will evernsurpass Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1995). What James Cameron offers us withnhis movies is jaw dropping action scenes that are meticulously planned; showstoppersnthat take over the film. This is something that a lot of the directors thatnhave taken over the franchise don’t understand; the action in these films hasnto be special because it’s what we’ve become accustomed to. Action scenes can’tnbe five second cgi cheats, they can’t be run of the mill chase sequences, theynhave to be special somehow, they have to blow us away and they have to benspectacles. I mean, how bad ass was it when they blew up that real building innT2? Sadly, no single Terminator sequel has ever come close to achieving thisnlevel of awesomeness, Genisys included. While Genisys does have explosivenaction sequences, there’s nothing that offers that extra wow factor because wenknow a lot of it wasn’t done live. Most of the stunts and action scenes innGenisys are computer generated, including this nifty helicopter chase sequencenthat was cool, yet completely unrealistic, and realism my friends is what sellsnan action scene. One other action sequence involving a school bus in the SannFrancisco Bridge was cool, but sadly falls on cliché. How many times have wenseen a car or a truck flip over? How many times have we seen said vehiclendangling from the edge of a bridge? Actually, that scene with the bus danglingnfrom the bridge was the only true letdown in the whole film for me, I wasnrolling my eyes. So the film does have its action, it’s just nothing that wenhaven’t seen before.

nThe film does have a decent cast holding it together andnthat’s a bonus for this one. The ones that stood out for me were Emilia Clarkenas Sarah Connor and Jason Clarke as John Connor, they offered good, solidnperformances. J.K. Simmons does his usual crazy guy thing here, again, but ofncourse it’s J.K. Simmon’s so it’s entertaining. And of course, it was anpleasure seeing Arnold back (just like he always said he would) playing ThenTerminator. Its funny how they’ve gone and switched things around making thenmonster from the first film into a father figure throughout the rest of thensequels. This is one of the things that I miss the most from the original film,nthat feeling like you’re in a horror movie, and The Terminator is the monster.nThat first film has a feeling of dread that none of the sequels has been ablento match. By comparison, this new one feels like a family film. No guts, nonnudity, no profanity, no blood. The first film was for adults, a hard ‘R’, thisnone is aimed at everyone. Everything here is squeaky safe, a la Disney films.nThere’s no edge like in the first film, when the Terminator rips his hand opennto fix it, or when he gauges out his eye. There’s no steamy sex scene…oncenagain, the dreaded terror of the PG-13 rating has struck with a vengeance. It’snthe same cleansing process that films like Total Recall, Robocop andnPoltergeist went through with their remakes. I’m dying to see films with annedge again. I remember going to the theater at one time was kind of scarynbecause you never knew when a film was going to go “over the line” and shocknyou. Nowadays it’s all a lot of gee whiz effects, but none of the edge. It’snall perfectly safe entertainment. Terminator: Genisys falls in that ballpark.

nBottom line with Terminator: Genisys is it didn’t surpass mynexpectations, but it didn’t piss me off either. James Cameron endorsed this film by sayingnthat “if you like the Terminator films, you’ll love this movie”, and I have tonsay that I agree somewhat with this statement. Genisys does give us a lot ofnvisual homage’s to the first two films and then twists them around just whennyou think you know what’s going to happen, I really liked that. It has manyninside jokes that Terminator fans will no doubt enjoy. Also as a fan of thenfirst two Terminator films, I was twisting and turning in my seat with some ofnthe events that transpire which is a good thing. At least the film was gettingna reaction from me. But essentially, what we have here is a squeaky cleannreboot of a franchise that has had trouble trying to return to the grandeur thatnonce was. They’ve gone and rebooted Terminator for a generation that has beennborn and bred in PG-13 cinema. Once again, a franchise has been neutered.nStill, I reiterate that it’s not a total disaster, but then again, I don’t wantna Terminator film that’s just ‘okay’ I want one that will freaking blow menaway! Let’s see if this film makes enough money to jumpstart a new cycle ofnTerminator films. They better spit out as many as they can before 2018, when thenrights to the Terminator films go back to James Cameron! That will be the day!nMaybe then we’ll see a decent Terminator film, cause god knows only Cameronnknows how to make a Terminator film right.

nRating: 3 out of 5