With Alan Taylor the
director of THOR: THE DARK WORLD has been named to reboot The TERMINATOR series
Patrick looks back at TERMINATOR: SALVATION and points out that some fandom
sectors may have missed something.
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| Alan Taylor: set to direct next Terminator Movie |
Warning: Possible Spoilers
There have been many movies in recent times that have been given a great
deal of criticism when it comes to blockbusters, Terminator Salvation has shifted a great deal. Salvation gained
notoriety because of Christian Bale’s, now infamous, outburst on set. What
happened afterwards was that a perfectly decent Action/Thriller was cast by the
way side and left in the shadow of the incident. This article is going to look
at the movie and make the case that Terminator
Salvation is not only a decent action movie but one that should be
reassessed.
The Franchise Effect.
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| Arnie in T2 |
Many movies have suffered what I would call the franchise effect. Salvation is one such movie. Much like Prometheus, Salvation was killed by its
predecessors. Terminator and Terminator 2: Judgement Day are classics
and without doubt the best example of the on-the-run, on-the-edge-of-your-seat,
white knuckle rides that have probably ever been put on screen. Honestly it
wasn’t until The Dark Knight that I
can say that I have seen any movie that can match Judgement Day for intensity. Unfortunately for Salvation this was always going to be tough to follow and like Prometheus the weight of the franchise
can be seen to a certain degree on the film. Like Prometheus and the Alien movies, the last of the series did
not live up to the standard set by those before it. Rise of the Machines definitely showed that the Terminator franchise had lost its way;
the evidence of this is in Salvation,
with none of the cast from that movie returning to for the movie. It seemed
that studio executives and fans wanted to erase any existence of the film and
start a new. There was huge hope and hype surrounding Salvation, as there is with all blockbusters now, but this was seen
as something special. This was going to
put Terminator back on track and
there was talks that this was going to kick start the resurgence of the
franchise. This was going to be the first of three new movies and would have fans
flocking to get back to the multiplexes. But why was there all this hope? The
main reason was the set up of the movie: the aftermath of Judgement Day was
going to be realised for the first time on screen. This was going to be an all
out war movie. Fans had always wanted to see this and this gave them hope of
something fresh and interesting for them to latch on to. The fact that McG was
directing as well was also a plus of sorts. He’s a director with visual flare
and can handle the large scale action and special effects. Another plus was
that Christian Bale was going to portray John Connor, the leader in the war
against the machines. This was the actor who helped resurrect Batman and made it believable. This was
an actor who had the credentials and the experience to carry this kind of
movie.
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| McG on set of Terminator Salvation |
Along with this Bale was to be surrounded by indie actors who would
compliment the history of the Terminator
Franchise, a franchise known for making stars out of their actors. It’s
funny that this can be explained after watching the movie but the fact that Salvation, again like other disappointing franchise
instalments, tries so hard to associate
it’s self with what has gone before means that it suffers because of it. Salvation in many ways is completely
different from the other movies. This is definitely seen in the storyline of
the movie.
Story.
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| Bale in action |
In Salvation, Judgement Day
has happened. The Resistance is trying to take on the machines in what seems to
be a losing war. In the other movies they were always trying to stop this from
happening. This made the earlier instalments a race against time/ chase movie
compared to the all out action movie Salvation
is. This is what made the chase movie so compelling. Would they get there
in time to stop it? What this is replaced with in Salvation is the chase to save Kyle Reese, Connor’s father. There
are a few problems with this however. It brings to light the complexity and the
sheer daftness of Connor’s existence in the first place. The fact the other
movies didn’t focus on this meant that the audience wouldn’t question it
because it wasn’t a focal point of the story. This means that it is very hard
to really get an emotional footing in the story. It’s hard to root for Connor
as he is saving someone for his own gain really. The fact that humanity was in
danger and not just one person it was easier to root for the good guy. Here it
comes off as selfish and confusing and in the end no-one really cares too much.
It doesn’t help that the B story surrounding Sam Worthington’s character is
quite slow and lame for the most part. This is due to the fact that Marcus has
no memory for the most part. We never get the sense that his story is going
anywhere until all of a sudden he becomes the focal point for the whole movie.
The audience already knows that he is part machine but this isn’t revealed
until three quarters through the movie to the rest of the characters.
I think if this had been revealed sooner the tension could have really
boosted the story line as well. Leaving it so late means that any tension
between Connor and Marcus is rushed at the end. The pacing of all this makes it
even more unbelievable that Connor would then trust Marcus in his time of need.
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| Anton Yelchin as Kyle Reese |
It also doesn’t help that the resistance has no direct opponent like the
first three Terminator movies. Skynet
as a whole is the enemy and this is hard to connect to. Skynet is faceless
enemy and this makes the danger that the resistance is facing seem quite
distant from the viewer. Unlike the Lord
of the Rings which had Sauron as a faceless enemy, it got away because the
overwhelming odds were shown to us. Salvation
never shows us truly what the resistance is up against. This problem could
have been rectified if there had been more fire battles on screen. I get that
there are small bands of resistance fighters in small fire fights but a large
scale fight would have been nice and would have given us the sense of the
uphill battle that the resistance had.
Characters
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| Bale and Worthington at loggerheads |
The movie’s characters are solid but not well rounded. I always felt
that Connor’s character was bound too much by his destiny. Bale moves away from
Nick Stahl’s conflicted and depressed Connor to a more aggressive and hard
edged version of the character. The reason for this choice was probably for to
show how war has hardened Connor. This seems reasonable but it does make Connor
a hard character to warm to. The fact that he risks everything to save his
father (for the main reason of saving himself), makes him seem selfish.
The other main character, Marcus is well played by Sam Worthington, his
only problem is that he isn’t helped by the fact that his character has no
memory. This in a way allows us to see into his character as the movie progress.
However this is sidetracked by the Kyle Reese story. Anton Yelchin does a good
job with a very under written character of Kyle Reese. He tries to add gravity
and character to Reese but he is given very little screen time to develop the
character. The fact that the character is a teenager and not seen as all that
important, except to Connor. Other actors like Bryce Dallas Howard are given
too little screen time to really comment on their characters other than to say
that they give solid performances. This is where the characters and the story
fall down. The action in this movie makes up for some of its problems.
Action
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| Terminator Salvation as some good action sequences. |
Outcome
The outcome of the movie is one of indifference really for most fans.
There are some good action sequences but the story itself is very undercooked.
More development of the characters and a better structure of the story would
help the movie no end. The reboot that Alan Taylor is scheduled to direct is
has been rumoured to take place in the ‘50s which is an interesting premise. It
allows for an interesting question of how to stop a machine with ‘50s
technology but I think neglecting the work done in Salvation would be a miss. We finally saw the effects of Judgement
Day and with some slight tweaking there is a lot that can be done in that
environment. I think that the given the time to develop its own sense of where
the franchise can go, change the direction slightly the Terminator franchise could work again. Neglecting Salvation, a part of the story that will
inevitably have to be revisited may be a trick that the studios may be missing
and one that could make it very hard to go back too.
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