Terminator (film franchise)

Some have suggested that it premise might have gone over better if John survived and became Dani' s mentor for the coming apocalypse just as Serah was his in a Passing the Torch plot.

Anyone else think that?

It couldn't have hurt, at least.

next movie is about the various future AIs sending Terminators to protect their respective Chosen One and kill the others cause them dying/living spells the doom of their timeline.

Edited by alekos23 on Dec 25th 2023 at 6:43:55 PM

You joke but that would actually be a pretty cool plot for a terminator show, not really a movie since there would be to much to cover.

We saw with both Sarah and Reese before her that attempts to warn people about that future were written off as crazy ramblings and they fell on deaf ears most of the time. John in the third one was both misguided because he thought the future he was built up to expect was never gonna happen and because he felt it better to hide in the event he was tracked again too. That said, that he kind of knew he couldn't convince people of a terrible future that might be inevitable was a fresh approach too that definitely took its time unlike Dark Fate.

With Dani, they wanted to make a character who was both Sarah and John at the same time and in theory, it's a great idea. Just can't say the execution worked as well as it did though. Same with the inevitability of both the evil AI and the savior being inevitable.

There's definitely a better way to represent those concepts and I will agree that Dark Fate while I really liked it wasn't that way unfortunately.

Merry Christmas everybody!

Edited by futuremoviewriter on Dec 25th 2023 at 9:46:59 AM

Terminator 3 had a minor plot point that because the date of Judgement Day had changed and Sarah died John became an aimless drifter with no direction, which is completely realistic given his experiences and basing his life on an abstract future destiny. This works entirely within the themes of Dark Fate, as the idea of what John would be was more interesting than actually seeing him in the role. A proper follow-up to T2 would likely be a mixture of T3 and Dark Fate, an altered Judgement Day with characters trying to fit into a future they no longer belong to.

The resistence should send a reprogrammed Arnold into the past, make him stand in public at the middle of a large city at broadlight, give a loud speech about Skynet... and then rip his skin off before the crowd and standing in the exoskeleton.

How would they even write that off as a madman's rambling?

The government claims the body, sells it to Cyberdyne or their replacement, and Skynet arrives despite everyone complaining about it.

That has an easy out, put a bomb inside the Terminator and make it blow to pieces after the speech and before anybody can get their hands on it.

Another brilliant way that even when you do everything you can, you can't change certain things. Then again, that's why the ambiguity of T2 was so unbelievably brilliant: you didn't know either way.

There's a Terminator movie for you though: they have to protect the T-800 from the government. Even then, that means they won't still try to replicate the technology anyway though…

Edited by futuremoviewriter on Dec 25th 2023 at 12:41:39 PM

Genisys at least hinted that there was someone else working behind the scenes opposing Skynet in the future, namely whoever sent "Pops" to protect Sarah Connor. The Genisys timeline canon being cut short left this a mystery.

One of the interesting things about Skynet is that it does not get along with other artificial intelligence. It ensures the T-800's cannot develop independent thought processes. It's also terrified of the T-1000's since Skynet cannot restrict their intelligence in the same way — all Skynet could do to rein them in was to program them initially with a deep hatred for humanity. Skynet sending a T-1000 in T2 was a last resort.

In Genisys Skynet outright dismisses its forces as its slaves.

Blowing it to pieces wouldn't help. The T-800 was blown to pieces in the first movie. Cyberdyne was still able to use one of its arms to develop Skynet.

Heck, just knowing that creating something like the T-800 is possible might be all Cyberdyne or some other tech company needs to eventually develop a Skynet or a Legion or a GLADOS of their own. They'll be able to justify researching artificial intelligence since they have proof from the future that it can be done.

Edited by M84 on Dec 25th 2023 at 11:47:42 PM

You know what we need? A Terminator movie with the characters traveling through every universe/continuity ala Endgame-style. Haha.

Wacky comedy where a Terminator is sent but the time travel screws its programming up, and it starts acting totally random, just taking odd jobs and goofing around and sorta befriends its target except when it's trying to kill them.

I could see there being a straight-up parody film making fun of the Terminator movies. Gotta be done by somebody smart though is the thing.

I think that a parody at this point is the only thing I would still be interested in. Because the story really should just end at this point imo.

Maybe in the parody John Connor has a bullseye shirt and everybody makes fun of him for it while he manages to dodge bullets at every corner akin to the Matrix.... Hell, some Matrix jokes would be warranted here since A.I. is a common theme in both franchises.

To be honest, the second movie already had a perfect ending.

The reason the franchise did not end there is simply Money, Dear Boy.

But Terminator is not the only franchise where this has happened.

With that said, I think Genesys was the best of the last four movies, while Dark Fate was the worst.

Edited by jawal on Dec 26th 2023 at 8:09:04 PM

I respect that you like Genyses while my personal favorite of the sequels is Terminator 3. And I agree with Dark Fate being the worst.

I thought Genysis had an interesting premise of Sarah being raised by a Terminator but ehh.

I actually like Dark Fate to the salt mines with all of you its a good movie.

It was definitely better than Rise of the Machines. Even if the end is the same, they at least established that this isn't the same Judgement Day set a few years later, but a completely new future that just happens to have a similar conclusion.

You're both dead to me. Dark Fate was bottom of the barrel and felt like a punch to the fucking balls.

Yeah, Dark Fate doesn't actually contradict T2's "No fate but what we make" idea. Skynet's not inevitable. It was indeed wiped from time and space for good. And even Legion showing up isn't because of some causality bullshit. It's just that getting rid of Skynet didn't address the root problem of people in power wanting an easier way to manage their defense networks.

Yeah, the film really was unsure of what it wanted to be, and just ended up insulting both potential audiences.

Even the dumbass way they killed John was contrived. Somehow Skynet sent a Terminator even though it no longer existed at a future point in time to kill John even though that future was already averted.

By that logic there should be even more Terminators. From different timelines. But they clearly just wanted an excuse to kill him off so they could replace him.

And alienated the majority of the fanbase after advertising this as a return of Edward Furlong.

I mean, if we follow the logic that Skynet should no longer exist, then neither should John.

I think Dark Fate had probably the most unworkable concept of the various attempts to make a third Terminator concept, but easily pulled it off the best.

But again, by this point all the good will had been completely burned through and the Dancing Bear of seeing Arnie as the Terminator was old hat itself.