Terminator: Dark Fate

In its core its a rehash of everything we have seen before only worse. As many said before some characters are almost a parody of their former selfs. The writers wanted to mess with the viewers expectations. So they also included a couple of surprises that no one asked for. They even succeeded in gender swapping a key character which happens a lot in movies theses days. And of course lots of stupid jokes. The action seems to be all CGI so nothing really exiting happening. I hope they won't do another one. Its depressing to see a franchise getting destroyed this way.

Milking a brand-name is a Hollywood pastime, getting worse by the minute. This overblown followup movie (with a huge budget totally wasted) has zero appeal and inexplicably one of the weakest supporting casts (made up of no-name talent) imaginable. After her great success in "Halt and Catch Fire", Mackenzie Davis certainly destroyed her promising career with this fiasco.

The reminders of the earlier "Terminator" hits including bringing back Hamilton and Arnie only remind the viewer of how pointless is this addition to the franchise. Hack director Tim Miller of "Deadpool" fame did an awful job.

I'll be honest, Dark Fate is more mediocre than unwatchable, probably the best Terminator since T2... yeah, I know, the bar is so low, it's like limbo dancing at this point. This feels similar to The Force Awakens: in itself a slick, decent movie, but I've already watched the much better original, so thanks but no thanks.

Positives? Mackenzie Davis, for whom I've had a hopeless crush since seeing her as a cute NASA geek in The Martian (and then again in Blade Runner 2049), plays a relatable, compelling character, with an intriguing mix of power and vulnerability. There are also a couple of neat set-pieces, especially in the first half, before everything becomes over-the-top tiresome.

Linda Hamilton and Arnold show up for fanservice. It's kind of nice to see them both back with significant roles but, as is typical of fanservice, it's like gorging on too much chocolate: tastes good at first, but then come nausea and a vague feeling of shame.

My main point is, the Terminator series is now hopeless, as the last movies, especially Genisys, have poisoned the well. The continuity is a mess and keeps being rebooted, so everything is pointless: no development can feel meaningful. Show of hands: who would be particularly surprised if the next Terminator movie was once again about John Connor leading the Resistance in another alternate continuity? No one? Thought so.

Also, the new villain being so talkative was possibly the single stupidest idea in the whole project. You know why Arnold in T1 and Robert Patrick in T2 were so terrifying? Because they shut up! They said very little and, the few times they spoke, it always felt like something they did out of pure necessity (probing for informations, setting up a trap) but was fundamentally alien to their nature.

This Rev-9 tries to talk its antagonists out of fighting him! Can anyone picture the T-1000 reasoning with its targets? The great Robert Patrick studied and imitated the body language of birds of prey to look creepier and inhuman, and the new bad guy wants to chat. Give me a break.

5/10

It's the same story as the original only this time with the now common women empowerment theme added to it.

And a very irritating Linda Hamilton.

Reminds me of how the Force Awakens was a copy of the original SW film but slighten towards women too.

Shame but we need some fresh stories. I expected MUCH better from James Cameron.

Arnie saves this, Seen it a few times, skip till when Arnie comes in the movie. He has a great subtle wit about him. This kind of humour would be great to see him do more of.