I watched most of Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines last night on television, weird considering that I own it on DVD and could have watched all of it including what I missed during my shower break without commercials.  Tracey believes it to be a shared experience kind of thing, that popping in the DVD takes away from the communal sharing of the movie or television show.  I’m happy to go with that.

A week or so ago I watched Terminator: Salvation and I just couldn’t make up my mind whether or not I liked it on any level, I know, as a Terminator film that I really disliked it.  This kind of overshadowed what I could take away from the film as an action scifi piece.  The stigma of being a Terminator film seemed like to much weight for the film to carry.

So it was with more of a curious mind that I found myself watching T3.

Terminator 3 has its share of problems, it has its share, your share and probably my share as well, it has a lot of problems.  But then the film almost redeems itself for all of its problems with that last 15 minutes, when we see judgement day take place and John and Kate are tricked by the T101 (I’m so confused over the numbering system – I thought it was a T-800 but he very clearly says he is a T101) into going down into the bunker.

The acting in this scene is superb and like I said it really makes up for a lot of the stupidity of the rest of the film.

Is T3 really better than Terminator: Salvation?

Whoa now!  Now did I say that?

Well, maybe it is.

You see for all of its flaws, T3 is a Terminator film and frankly I don’t think you can call Terminator: Salvation a Terminator film.  You certainly can’t say that it is part of the series, maybe it is as some have been calling it a reboot?

If that’s the case then I would happily cut it some slack, maybe go back and watch it with less cautious eyes.  But I’m not convinced this is the case.

Not that there isn’t stuff to like in Terminator: Salvation, the Sam Worthington character is really interesting, the Kyle Reese character (played by Chekov) likewise.  The Arnold Terminator appearance is actually the absolute highlight of the film.  But there are more problems than there is good.

Namely one Christian Bale as Connor.

Apparently in the future, if someone doesn’t listen to you yelling something the first time you just yell louder until they see your point.

“I need to go to HQ”

“Sorry dude but you’re pretty much no one so I can’t take you there”

“TAKE ME TO HEAD QUARTERS!”

“Ok.”

And here lies another problem, John Connor didn’t rise up to lead the resistance, he became some podcasting messiah guy (he’s not the messiah he’s just a very naughty boy, who happens to yell a lot).  He’s not a great military leader, he’s not even in the loop, and it has to be said that Michael Ironside had a much nicer submarine when he was in SeaQuest.

The whole film feels like a cross between Transformers and the Matrix, but never a Terminator film and had John Connor survived judgement day by hiding in a lead lined fridge I would not have been surprised.

What did you guys think of Terminator: Salvation?