Terminator: Salvation

[Speed]

Congratulations Mr. Bale, you are now a meme.

[Lurch1982]

Saw it today.

Biggest complaint was AMC screwing with the matinee prices. All new releases are priced at "weekend" prices until Tuesday due to the three day weekend. Total bullcrap. Changed my price from 4.50 to 9.xx.

Excellent movie. Not as good as T2, and nowhere near T1, but so far beyond T3 to make T3 irrelevant.

3.5 out of 4

[spoiler]Bale was excellent. Thought they did a really good job showing the transition of John Connor from crazy drifter-bum to military leader. He's not in charge, but has a cult-like following among the resistance.

Wasn't too crazy about them blatantly showing that Marcus is a terminator in the opening scene.

Kyle Reese works. He's sort of this movie's version of John (T-2) and Sarah (T1 & 2). The mute little girl doesn't work at all. They could have done something with her, but didn't. She just felt kind of tacked on, and the character could have been used better.

Maybe I missed something, but how is Skynet aware of John Connor/Kyle Reese at this point in the timeline? That felt a little sloppy, as Skynet indicated that it knew about the prior attempts on John Connor and they actually knew about Kyle Reese. Did I just miss something?

Biggest complaint you'll hear is "not enough terminators." You don't really have the Terminator-of-the-month" effect here. You have Marcus as a one-shot prototype and a T-600, but mostly the enemies are confined to hunter-seekers, drones, and a giant capture thing that shoots mini-bikes. The T-800 does make an appearance, and its skin looks close to Arnold (played by Roland Kickinger, who looks close enough to Arnold to play the 1973 version of him in a forgettable biopic). The T-800 also regains some of the bad-assness from the original Terminator that T-2 and T-3 managed to tard out of existence.

I thought the ending was kind of stupid and was tacked on for no other reason than to kill off Marcus.

It does set up a few possibly compelling sequels. The glimpse of humanity shown in this one is a fractured, almost Road Warrior society, and Skynet isn't fully defeated in this one. Bale is extremely strong as John Connor, and this movie actually does the series justice. It manages to deliver on an often-rumored concept since they showed the very few brief future-war scenes in T1 and T2.
[/spoiler]
Nothing at the end of the credits.
First line of the credits dedicated the movie to the late Stan Winston.

[Sean P Kelly]

Don't know if I'll eventually see this film, but I decided on Night at the Museum 2 for the weekend.

[Lurch1982]

Don't know if I'll eventually see this film, but I decided on Night at the Museum 2 for the weekend.

Its closer to the first Terminator. If you like T1, you'll probably like this one. If you're more into T2/T3, where its a Terminator-of-the-week style, you probably won't. They actually have a functional script that's thought out (similar to Alien and Aliens compared to Alien 4 or Alien v Predator, or Batman Begins vs Batman and Robin). Jumping from T3 to this is like jumping from hamburger to blue cheese crowned filet.

[Sean P Kelly]

^ The thing is, I'm WAY behind on the series (haven't seen a single film)

[ChuckleHuck]

I was invited to watch it without seeing any of the other Terminators, but I caught on to it kinda well. It explains alot, so you can pretty much get the guist of it all...at least, I did.