Nerds That Geek Movie Review - 'Terminator: Salvation'

Written by John Edward Betancourt

When it comes to the Terminator franchise, every film that arrived after Judgment Day has been heavily scrutinized and picked to pieces by the fans time and time again. It's to be expected really, Terminator 2 was a damn good film when it came out and its a damn good film years later. 

Yet, out of all of the films in the franchise, there is one that manages to polarize the fans more than any other (yes, even more than Rise of the Machines) and despite its star studded cast and bleak look at the future in an era when post apocalyptic stories rule the airwaves, Terminator: Salvation is a motion picture that instantly stirs up debate as it is one of those films that you either seem to love to seem to hate. 

The plot we won't be discussing much of today, if anything today's review of this film will serve as a more in depth look at a couple of questions. For one, is it a good film and second, why the heck is it so polarizing? So let's start with the latter of the two. On the surface, the film tends to ignite our passions for one particular reason...no Arnold. Yes, I get that a CGI cameo comes at the end of the movie, but we both know that's not the same thing. Arnold's portrayal of the T-800/T-101 is the heart of the franchise so to do this without him was a grand mistake.  

The fans wanted one thing in this film...the Terminator we came to know and love, and we barely got a taste of that. However, if that seems like too simple a reason for debates to on rage about this motion picture, I agree and I think it does go deeper than that. Because while the film does feature a magnificent cast in Christian Bale and Bryce Dallas Howard, at the same time, this movie simply doesn't feel like a Terminator film and those A list names seem lost in the mix of a story that is truly missing something at its core, and not's just the matter of the massive plot holes in this story, like say Skynet's trap, it all comes down the fact that this is a film that is completely and utterly hopeless.

There's a powerful bleakness to this film in a franchise that started out giving us nothing but hope. In fact I recall many fans having a bit of a 'the hell' style reaction to Terminator 3 for the same reason...because the hope that we were left with at the end of the second film has been robbed from us, even more so in this story, and despite the heroic acts from the characters in this film, there's a sense that the audience has been cheated due to the fact that there was never a shot at changing the future, the fate of this world was always to face Armageddon and the horrors thereafter. On the plus side however, visually this film looks great but if anything this film feels like a place holder, one that's here to just fill in a few gaps because we know the ending will eventually be Kyle Reese heading back to 1984 to save Sarah Connor. 

In summary however, is it a good film? No. Is it a bad film? No. It's simply a film. Another take on the mythos that just happens to be set years after Skynet finally took control and beat down humanity. If anything, I've always seen this film as a love letter to the dark memories that Kyle Reese brought back with him to 1984, of the grand war that we have always seen snippets of and alas, there's nothing glorious about a bleak and never ending war in a franchise that was put together on the notion of hope and free will. Regardless, it is worth a watch to see Christian Bale's tortured performance as John Connor, and to experience one bleak and ugly post apocalyptic world. Until next time. ​

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