Terminator: Dark Fate Movie Review

Terminator: Dark Fate (2019)

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Written by: David S. Goyer & Justin Rhodes and Billy Ray (screenplay by) James Cameron & Charles H. Eglee & Josh Friedman & David S. Goyer & Justin Rhodes (story by), James Cameron, Gale Anne Hurd (based on characters created by)
Directed by: Tim Miller
Starring: Linda Hamilton, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Mackenzie Davis, Natalia Reyes, Gabriel Luna
Rated: R
Watch the trailer

Plot
An augmented human and Sarah Connor must stop an advanced liquid Terminator from hunting down a young girl, whose fate is critical to the human race.

Verdict
It's the best Terminator movie since Terminator 2, but that's not a high bar to cross. This is no where near as iconic as the first two. This is heavy on the action, and as a direct sequel to 2 it pushes more action, characters, and call backs. This banks heavily on the franchise name without trying to expand on the story, content to avoid plot in favor of action scenes and reerences to the first two movies. This is Terminator 2, but bigger. Previous movies in the franchise seems like an inspiration, with the thought of making it 'bigger.' I wish the movie had more story and wanted to be more original.
It depends.

Review
I'm always excited to see this franchise again even if it's best days are decades behind it. Each new movie is a disappointment. The last Terminator movie was Terminator Genisys, and it felt like fan fiction with a large budget. It was worse than Terminator Salvation.

I don't even expect these movies to come anywhere close to Terminator or Terminator 2. Genisys set such a low bar, that Linda Hamilton coming back is enough to make this one better. For the record my favorite is the first. It's got a great twist when it reveals the Terminator, and the story and character motivations add to the sci-fi thriller. 

Jim Cameron, director of the first two, considers this the true sequel to Terminator 2. It also happens to be the first movie of the franchise he's been involved in since 2.

Gabriel Luna plays the REV-9 Terminator.

This is another shape shifting Terminator hunting down the savior of the human race. While the CGI in 2 was a leap forward, this one isn't. After the introduction with CGI de-aging of Linda Hamilton, Edward Furlong (who was on set despite playing a child version of himself which I don't understand), and Arnold Schwarzenegger, I figured I'd see a lot of T1 and T2 callbacks. I was right.

This follows the tried and true pattern of a Terminator sent back in time to stop the future and resistance fighter on a suicide mission. The franchise needs to change it up. The world is bigger than that. Salvation finally took us into the future, but what a disappointment that movie was. I read a short story years ago [edit: It may be this story about Cheyenne Mountain, having read about Cheyenne Mountain while reviewing WarGame.] about humans trapped in a Skynet mountain bunker just as Skynet started their coup. I wish I could find it, but that story would be a great low budget addition to the franchise. I would love to see the franchise tell a different story. Forget John Connor. Going back in time to stop a war was a great idea in 1984, but for some reason the franchise can't let go.

Mackenzie Davis, Linda Hamilton plays Grace, Sarah Connor.

Grace (Mackenzie Davis) is sent back to stop the Terminator.  The first question is whether she's human. She bleeds, but the way she swings a sledge hammer, she's really strong. Turns out she's augmented. She has a lot of scars which I assumed were from inserting sub-dermal armor, which is true. It's a great concept and limitation to put on the hero. That kind of augmentation is more than the human body can handle, but the movie never quite made that work. It felt like a gimmicky setback rather than a way of life. It was unclear whether she was augmented for this one mission or if she's a super solider in the future.

Linda Hamilton plays Sarah Connor.

Sarah Connor shows up to save the day. How did she know where to be? We get into that as Grace and Sarah's mission lead them to Texas.

The movie gets a bit cute with Skynet not existing, instead a cyber warfare AI Legion was created. The name is on the nose. I'd rather Skynet always exist despite what humans do. The future is inevitable, it can only be delayed. While the movie talks about changing the future, that never happens. Accept the fact that annihilation will happen and AI will arise to vanquish everything. It's bleak, but Terminator is a bleak franchise. Why spend time on explaining a Skynet clone instead of developing characters?

Linda Hamilton, Natalie Reyes, Mackenzie Davis, Arnold Schwarzenegger play
Sarah Connor, Dani, Grace, and T-800/Carl.

Dani is the savior of humanity, I guess. She's a macguffin for the plot, little more than an audience surrogate. In T1 Sarah had to wrestle with who she is and who she's told to be. Dani is just along for the ride.

The jump from T1 to T2 was revolutionary, and this jump isn't. This focuses solely on the action, and that's how the screenplay was written, action scenes first. The movie needs more of a story to underpin it. This is a T2 retread with less story and more action. Dani needs to be a better character. She needs to be meaningful. T1got that so perfect, and this just feels like a poor imitation.  The humor can be uneven, though Arnold talking about drapes was a nice touch. The movie almost delved into whether a terminator can develop a conscience, but that would have required the movie to slow down the action. That wasn't about to happen.

This movie feels like the result of pulling the best action scenes from the franchise and making them bigger & better or riffing on them as a wink to the audience. The movie continually tries to one up the last action sequence, and that just makes me wonder what's the point.