As the summer grinds through one installment of franchise entertainment after another it’s probably a good thing for critics and fans to reflect on what make those films different from each other rather than moan endlessly about why they think they are all basically the same. Number one all summer blockbuster movies are basically the same in that they promise bang for the buck. I’m not being metaphorical. We go to these things to watch stuff blow up real good. Anything else we get is icing on the cake. In Wolverine stuff did not blow up real good and the rest of the movie was entirely forgettable. Those are mortal sins for any summer film.
T4 blows up lots of stuff real real good. It’s well worth seeing on the big screen. And it inverts the thing that made T2 a less than perfect film to, I think and felt, better effect. But before I expound on that let me lay some groundwork. Some sequels are far more respectful of what has built their mythos than others (much less what has made that myth commercially viable). And even more importantly some sequels know how to take what has gone before and do something slightly different with it.
Terminator? It hasn’t aged all that well. It’s a good film but it barely hints at what T2 will be. But since when has the Terminator franchise ever offered a story that was more than a fairly thin backdrop for updating our concept of the sci fi action film form? Have you watched T2 lately? It’s a brilliantly mounted, well acted film, by far the best of the series (including T4) but it does rest it’s shiny metallic shoulders back against an ending that anybody can see coming a mile away. T2 is far and away a technical achievement before it is a dramatic achievement. Cameron is smart enough to hide the science rather than explain the T-800’s development of emotion and choice of self sacrifice at the end. He knows we need that moment and while we go along with him I’ve never met anybody who, on reflection, really bought it. They go back to T2 because it hints that men are more than machines, we are in fact better than machines at things that are more important than what machines are good at doing.
Take Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines. It’s a near parody of the first two (especially the second) installments but it has fun being just that and you know right away going in not to expect anything else. I contend you even get a little more than that. In any case Some critics thought it was too much fun. I say that’s their problem. Terminator Salvation? It is respectful of what’s come before, manages to be a lot of fun in spots, has, in my opinion, compelling characters and very good, sometimes outstanding, action sequences. In short TS or T4 or however you abbreviate it, is a summer tentpole movie that stops short of being much of anything else but it’s a darn site better that Wolverine and one critic whom I overheard say differently is just plain wrong. Fox made Wolverine without one lick of respect for the fans, or even the energy of the last three films in its series. Even X3 is tons better than Wolverine. Terminator Salvation is at least if not more enjoyable than T3.
And that is because it doesn’t betray the central notion that makes us able to invest anything in the series at all. If John Connor is an after thought in this film he is an after thought to a more compelling reworking of the terminator character story arc. Let’s face it the Terminator has always been a more interestin g character than Connor anyway. And here we get Marcus Wright. A human being at the end of a failed life, the best possible argument for why man is secondary to machines. A convicted murderer he signs away his body on death row only to be given a second chance at ....what exactly? Now a T-600 prototype he wakes up into an apocalyptic landscape to discover for himself if he is redeemable, if he is even alive in any human sense of the term. While nobody really buys Arnold’s T-800 as a human being, or truly sentient being at the end of T2 I think any person who can let go of their cynicism or frustrations with this films bombast should be able to connect with the character of Marcus and even John Connors bewilderment at having to lay down his survival instincts long enough to trust again.
Notice I haven’t talked about the film much in it’s specifics of plot. If that is why you want to go see this film you might be better off catching Star Trek again (a film whose plot is about as simple as this one). Or maybe you should re-watch episodes of the generally good TV show based on the Terminator series. In the end the plot isn’t what you’re likely to remember here anyway. The fight on the bridge, at the gas station or the helicopter sequence are take home. And if you have heart enough, the character of Marcus Wright, a man in need of a second chance, not deserving of it, just in need.
That is the story of the human race after all. We aren’t owed anything. Whether you believe in a loving God or an indifferent cosmos man finds himself always in the need of a second chance. Its our ability to love, forgive, render compassion, and nurture that make us more than machines. Without a second chance the whole human race might just as well rust in whatever apocalyptic landscape that awaits.