Movie Review: Terminator Genisys (2015) *Not the Apocalypse You Were Expecting*

Disaster.  That’s what I was expecting when I went to see Terminator: Genisys tonight.  The critical reviews were so low that I walked into this thinking that somehow it was going to be worse than Terminator: Salvation, which I didn’t think was possible for a movie in this franchise.  Rotten Tomatoes currently has the film at 26%.  That’s Adam Sandler movie territory (and roughly what I expect Pixels to get when it comes out).  Well, you know what?  Walking out of T5, the two things I’m maddest at are the critics that make up Rotten Tomatoes ever-increasing unreliability and the unbelievable meathead who put together the movie’s trailers.  This is not a disaster.  This is a TERMINATOR MOVIE!  Like I said, I like T3, but this makes the most sense as a direct sequel to Jim Cameron’s first two films in the franchise and it is a more than worthy entry.

My Favorite Scene: Terminator 3 Rise of the Machines (2003) “Sarah Connor’s Grave”

Ok, I’m going to come clean with you people, because we’re a close-knit family by this point…..I like Terminator 3.  I do not get all the hate for this film just because it’s not directed by James Cameron.  I know I said we were going to go through the entire franchise, but given the dismal reviews Terminator: Genisys is getting, I cannot make myself next week try to pick a favorite scene from Terminator: Salvation (the hate for I DO GET).  Oh, ok, here’s my favorite part from T4: the end credits which meant I could run out of the theater and scream at the moon.

Terminator 3 is not a bad film.  It’s not the film the first two are, but it’s not anywhere close to the franchise-buster that some people consider it to be.  A lot of the hate centers on the ending and how it negates the “we make our own fate” theme of the first two films, but I like that.  I like that trying everything possible through multiple timelines, they still were unable to avoid Judgment Day and that dichotomy is, to me, more interesting and could have been intelligently explored in future sequels (it apparently will not be).

The weakest part of the film are the leads.  Stahl and Danes can both act, but they were miscast.  They never felt like they belonged in that world.  That doesn’t negate some fantastic action pieces like the two chases, another poignant Terminator sacrifice and my favorite scene: Sarah Connor’s grave.  Since she was smoking like a chimney in T2 (and let’s face it, under kind of a lot of stress), I find it entirely plausible she died between the 11 years between the second and third films.  What I find even more Sarah is that she filled her coffin with enough ordinance to bring down a small kingdom.  I love everything about the sequence at the cematary, right down to that poor, poor shrink getting his head messed with again.  Sarah should have filled him with Drano in the second movie and done him a favor.

My Favorite Scene: Terminator 2 Judgment Day (1991) “Galleria/Motorcycle Chase”

It’s not an overstatement to say that Terminator 2: Judgment Day is one of the most important movies of all-time.  That title is earned, not only because the movie still stands as one of the greatest action films ever made, but because it changed the way movies are made forever.  Before T2, you would have to look back to the Star Wars original trilogy and Godfather Part II to find sequels that critics and audiences both hailed as surpassing their original.  “Sequel” was a radioactive word in Hollywood, and T2 is one of the main films that helped to change than and (for better and worse) brought the modern trend of franchising to the fore.

My Favorite Scene: The Terminator (1984) “I’ll Be Back”

As the fifth film in The Terminator franchise looms as the next summer blockbuster, it’s time to run back through the previous installments for the best scenes.  1984’s original Terminator cemented Arnold Schwarzenegger as the premiere action star for over a decade and began a mythology that changed cinematic science fiction forever.  That being said, there’s a lot of the film that has not aged well.  The film contains some painfully dated practical effects, and that could relegate the film to corny to a series newcomer, but when the T-800 tracks Sarah Connor to an LAPD Station, you realize the terrifying singular destructive capability of these killing machines, not to mention you get one of the most quoted lines in film history.

LEGO Terminator T-800

Longtime readers of Killing Time will know the massive and near-holy respect we here at the home office have for intricately built works of LEGO geekery. Not only do they demonstrate a dedication to killing time that we strive for in our daily lives, but the end products are so cool it defies the imagination. Today’s LEGO achievement is a life-size Terminator (T-800 model) built from the building blocks of life…LEGOs. Constructed by LEGO master artist Martin Latta, the LEGOnator took over 15,000 LEGO bricks to complete. Stick an iPhone in this thing’s head and we’ll be living out James Cameron’s apocalypse by the end of the month.