He's Back, Baby

When I first heard about Terminator: Genisys I was slightly annoyed, because I had liked Terminator: Salvation and it seemed like this was not going to be playing off of that (Christian Bale was not involved). I then saw a preview and was mildly intrigued. Then I saw the preview that decided to show what the film was really going to be about: an alternate timeline where 1984 Sarah Connor is awesome and waiting for Kyle Reese to show up. I was intrigued. (I thankfully missed the other trailer that decided to give out all the twists. That is super lame.)

I liked the film. Like really liked it. Which surprised me, especially after my lukewarm reaction to Jurassic World. I think it's because T:G was having fun. Unlike Jurassic World, which I felt was just telling the same story from Jurassic Park but with everything bigger, T:G  gets out of that rut and tells a new story. Well, I guess it's not an entirely new story. But it worked for me. Sometimes I have no idea why some things do and some things don't.

I'm not going to spoil any of the surprises and twists in the film, as they are quite fun to see unspool. Suffice it to say, I didn't see some of them coming (especially because I had not seen the last "official" trailer released for the film). I literally gasped.

Jason Clarke plays John Connor, and he's an actor I've liked since he did a short-lived show on FOX. I thought he was terribly underrated in Zero Dark Thirty. Emilia Clark was great as the young Sarah Connor, channeling the iconic Sarah Connor created by Linda Hamilton in Terminator 2: Judgement Day. I was concerned that Jai Courtney would be the weak link, as he had not impressed me as the bad guy in the Divergent movies, but he surprised me. He and Clarke played well opposite each other, and their simple romance was nice.





The original Terminator was a low budget, sci-fi/horror film set in 1984. It was limited by the effects of its day, and yet it is still a great film. A lot of that is due to James Cameron. I imagine when James Cameron made The Terminator in 1984 he did not expect it to spawn four sequels (the second being the last one he was involved in). I certainly didn't expect it after Terminator: Rise of the Machines and certainly not after Terminator: Salvation. The story has become quite convoluted and intricate now (read this article for a very serious discussion of the timelines) and it really fascinates me.

So put this one squarely in the "Pleasantly surprised" column.