“Hasta la vista, baby!”

May 23, 2019 10:22 AM

Terminator Dark Fate [YouTube][Teaser Trailer] Terminator: Dark Fate is the sixth film in the Terminator franchise, but acts as a direct sequel to only the first two movies: Terminator and Terminator 2: Judgment Day. The other three films are now considered part of an alternate timeline, according to the filmmakers.
posted by Fizz (95 comments total)

Terminator: A Wizard Did It
posted by thelonius at 10:23 AM on May 23, 2019 [8 favorites]

I'm here for the Linda Hamilton gun show!! I have no doubt that this film will likely be a hot mess when it comes to all the time-travel bullshit, but I honestly don't care. I'm here for Linda Hamilton!!
posted by Fizz at 10:27 AM on May 23, 2019 [43 favorites]

Works for me!
posted by probably not that Karen Blair at 10:29 AM on May 23, 2019 [2 favorites]

All of the films are alternate timelines. Even Terminator has to be at least a second loop.
posted by Karmakaze at 10:31 AM on May 23, 2019 [13 favorites]

Also, a reminder of why Linda Hamilton will forever be one of the most badass women of SF.
posted by Fizz at 10:33 AM on May 23, 2019 [7 favorites]

Why didn't they just use the original Björk version of the song though?
posted by aubilenon at 10:38 AM on May 23, 2019 [15 favorites]

This... looks good!? Man this is a weird feeling.
posted by Reyturner at 10:39 AM on May 23, 2019 [8 favorites]

I wanna say it's time for Terminator: Terminated, but in all honesty having Linda Hamilton back makes me interested.

My ongoing issue with this franchise has become the fact that Skynet apparently keeps creating bigger/more sophisticated as well as meaner robots and sending them through time, when the solution to me appears to be to create nanobots that infiltrate humanity at a microscopic level and destroy us that way. Or, you know, just kick back and let us destroy ourselves via climate change.

But that wouldn't allow Linda Hamilton to fire a bazooka, so I can see the dilemma.
posted by nubs at 10:41 AM on May 23, 2019 [14 favorites]

Cautiously interested. The Sarah Connor Chronicles really sold me on Terminator as a story that could have complexity and depth, but the most recent films have failed miserably to tell such a story. This won't be hours of Lena Heady exploring PTSD and cycles of abuse disguised as a show about killer robots, but it looks like it might at least remember what made the first two movies worthwhile.
posted by Fish Sauce at 10:46 AM on May 23, 2019 [21 favorites]

but....where's the wine tie-in?
posted by es_de_bah at 10:47 AM on May 23, 2019 [5 favorites]

But that wouldn't allow Linda Hamilton to fire a bazooka, so I can see there's no dilemma.

Now, I'm not normally about 'fixing' other folk's posts, but low-hanging fruit...
posted by meinvt at 10:47 AM on May 23, 2019

I liked the first Deadpool film but I'm wary about Tim Miller's ability to bring the right tone to this.
posted by octothorpe at 10:51 AM on May 23, 2019

I just don't understand who this franchise is for anymore.
posted by guiseroom at 10:52 AM on May 23, 2019 [1 favorite]

It looks good to me, but my bar is low.
posted by blaneyphoto at 10:54 AM on May 23, 2019 [2 favorites]

Man, the fifth season of Halt and Catch Fire looks really dark.
posted by dephlogisticated at 10:54 AM on May 23, 2019 [22 favorites]

Terminator: It Was All Bobby's Dream
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 10:55 AM on May 23, 2019 [1 favorite]

I hope it's good. But even if it's mediocre, I am totally here for the growing film genre of "middle aged women kicking ass and fucking shit up".
posted by rmd1023 at 11:09 AM on May 23, 2019 [52 favorites]

I wanna say it's time for Terminator: Terminated, but in all honesty having Linda Hamilton back makes me interested.
It would also be good if there is no Arnold.
posted by Bee'sWing at 11:20 AM on May 23, 2019 [2 favorites]

This looks kinda cheap for a Terminator movie.
And they reveal so much in the teaser - not a good sign either.
posted by mit5urugi at 11:22 AM on May 23, 2019

solution to me appears to be to create nanobots that infiltrate humanity at a microscopic level and destroy us that way

I think that's what the last movie, Terminator: Genisys, was about.

I think.

I'm still not really sure what that movie was supposed to be.
posted by Servo5678 at 11:23 AM on May 23, 2019 [5 favorites]

So.. I'm not normally terribly sensitive to these things but after viewing this poster image I'm a bit befuddled by how the poster designers found space for seven different men's names but no credit mention for the woman whose image is the central focus of the poster and whose character is the hook for the whole story.

[On edit: I started thinking about this when I saw the poster for the first time and my first question was "is that Linda Hamilton or did they get some other actress to play the Linda Hamilton role?" because I thought it would be much cooler if it was Hamilton. Apparently that's not a question that the designers were concerned about answering. Much better to tell me about the third associate screenwriter or whoever.]
posted by Nerd of the North at 11:24 AM on May 23, 2019 [35 favorites]

Everybody knows Skynet is just going to automate away all the jobs and slowly starve us to death, then post comments all over the Internet about how we can't let losers who don't want to work freeload off the rest of us.
posted by BrotherCaine at 11:37 AM on May 23, 2019 [18 favorites]

I'm also here for the Linda Hamilton gun show, and also for women kicking ass. I do think that the lack of Sarah Connor has been a major issue with, uh, every Terminator movie that doesn't include her, but let's be serious for a minute: why is the director the guy who did Deadpool, and not, like, literally any woman?
posted by bile and syntax at 11:53 AM on May 23, 2019 [9 favorites]

The linked trailer generates income for The Sun and therefore Rupert Murdoch. This one appears to have no association with such filth.
posted by epo at 12:04 PM on May 23, 2019 [23 favorites]

I used to drive from Berkeley down to Sunnyvale a couple of times a week, before they widened the bit of 880 between Fremont and Milpitas it was easier to head off the freeway for an exit or two to get past the terrible traffic, for months I walked past this typical Silicon Valley tiltup being built, it was a bit over the top, more bling on the front than the usual such building .... one Monday I came past and it was a war zone, some disaster had happened, the parking lot was full of burnt out police cars
posted by mbo at 12:04 PM on May 23, 2019 [4 favorites]

So much goddamned CGI.
posted by killdevil at 12:08 PM on May 23, 2019 [6 favorites]

>Also, a reminder of why Linda Hamilton will forever be one of the most badass women of SF.

As I recall, it was extra cool because she was playing against type. She'd previously appeared in that really unfortunate TV rendition of Beauty And The Beast, playing opposite Lion-O from Thundercats. I never watched it, but my impression was that there were a lot of ruffles. So when she showed up with triceps, it was like, 'uh-oh, shit's gonna go down'.
posted by Sing Or Swim at 12:09 PM on May 23, 2019 [3 favorites]

It was Ron Perlman who wore ruffles in that show. Hamilton mostly wore unfortunate late 80s business wear and turtlenecks.
posted by muddgirl at 12:27 PM on May 23, 2019 [13 favorites]

On one hand, I'm totally with the school of thought that it'd be nice for the powers that be to take a chance on something new, rather than endlessly repeating proven ideas. On the other hand, this looks fun and significantly better than the last few, so I guess I'm in. Mission accomplished by James Cameron.
posted by Kikujiro's Summer at 12:27 PM on May 23, 2019

Beauty and the Beast came out three years after The Terminator.
posted by octothorpe at 12:28 PM on May 23, 2019 [3 favorites]

This won't be hours of Lena Heady exploring PTSD and cycles of abuse disguised as a show about killer robots, but it looks like it might at least remember what made the first two movies worthwhile.

Oh how I could gush ON about that show. But one of the moments from the show I think of most is the look on Derek Reese's face after seeing a machine practicing ballet by it's self, seemingly for the joy of it.

All this is to say I try to set the bar low for these films now, and hope to be pleasantly surprised.
posted by The Legit Republic of Blanketsburg at 12:28 PM on May 23, 2019 [7 favorites]

I think I've seen Terminator 3 & Terminator Salvation but I remember nothing about them. I ... didn't hate Genisys, really. It had some good parts. I also don't really remember that much about it. (I was drinking while watching it, so I think that explains the somewhat liking it and not really remembering it.)

I will watch this. Likely not in theaters, but at a friends' house with some drinks. I was expecting it to look worse and instead it looks sort of good.

(The Terminator is one of my favorite movies and also one of the best movies of all time.)
posted by darksong at 12:33 PM on May 23, 2019

The cool thing for me was seeing this posted on reddit by Arnold himself and the fact that it sort of turned into an impromptu AMA.

Also, the reason this looks good is a) it's written and produced by James Cameron, who invented the Terminator mythos and b) they are completely ignoring anything after T2. This is a direct sequel to T2, according to Cameron.
posted by daq at 12:43 PM on May 23, 2019 [5 favorites]

Also, Gabriel Luna was awesome as Ghost Rider in Agents of S.H.i.E.L.D, and he looks awesome in this teaser trailer.
posted by daq at 12:46 PM on May 23, 2019 [2 favorites]

The other three films are now considered part of an alternate timeline, according to the filmmakers.

Thank god
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 12:50 PM on May 23, 2019 [5 favorites]

The other three films are now considered part of an alternate timeline, according to the filmmakers.

NO FATE
posted by snuffleupagus at 12:51 PM on May 23, 2019 [2 favorites]

Linda Hamilton is having her Liam Neeson moment!

This looks good, though I'm curious about old Arnold in the cabin.
posted by grumpybear69 at 12:52 PM on May 23, 2019 [1 favorite]

Also also, Mackenzie Davis being the "protector" figure, which, if I'm picking up the subtext here, this is going to be an awesome movie about 3 women banding together to protect each other from the new Terminator(s). It will be interesting to see how they incorporate whatever Arnold is supposed to be (somehow a T-800 again?) with the whole thing. If they can at least get the well paced action and chase sequences to equal those from T2, they have a hit on their hands. The question is whether Tim Miller will try and mimic the directorial style of George Miller from Mad Max: Fury Road (center-framing the action, keeping the sense of space clear in the viewers mind, etc, etc), or if he misses that mark. The trailer seems to indicate they are going for that, which is _AWESOME_.
posted by daq at 12:53 PM on May 23, 2019

I actually like Terminator 3, which did a decent job of updating the film's themes to an age of computers being scary again. Terminator took place when computers were new and scary; Terminator 2 came out with Windows 3.1 as everyone was getting a computer on their desk and they weren't that scary. Terminator 3 was right when the internet became mainstream and you can see some of the fears about privacy start to take shape then. The film's actually fairly relevant even today!

(I also liked it at the time for having a downer ending with a mild bit of hope.)

The other movies looked bad and I was never particularly interested in seeing them. I'm kind of excited about this, but I hope that like the first three it taps into what's scary about computing technology at this moment.
posted by thecaddy at 12:59 PM on May 23, 2019 [3 favorites]

Also I'm calling it: the woman is the mother of a hybrid human/machine species Skynet desperately wants to prevent.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 12:59 PM on May 23, 2019 [2 favorites]

hybrid human/machine species

Didn't the Terminator novels do something with that? Like, Skynet cyborgs that were human with robot-loyal parts inside calling the shots?
posted by Servo5678 at 1:08 PM on May 23, 2019 [2 favorites]

Terminator: Fast and Furious
posted by mecran01 at 1:09 PM on May 23, 2019 [2 favorites]

Never thought I'd get to see Gabriel Luna's face morph into a scary CGI skull.
posted by straight at 1:17 PM on May 23, 2019 [5 favorites]

The cool thing for me was seeing this posted on reddit by Arnold himself and the fact that it sort of turned into an impromptu AMA.

Ha! I loved the comment that's it's clearly self promotion and should be deleted.
posted by greermahoney at 1:25 PM on May 23, 2019 [1 favorite]

It's great they recognize that past T2 it's all garbage. But I see a LOT of CGI, which could equal Boring Action with No Suspense, a problem when movies lean too much on "we'll do it in post!"
posted by zardoz at 1:27 PM on May 23, 2019 [2 favorites]

And they reveal so much in the teaser - not a good sign either.

It wouldn't be the first good Terminator movie that revealed stuff in the trailer it really, really shouldn't have.
posted by straight at 1:31 PM on May 23, 2019 [1 favorite]

I pretty conclusively left the Terminator train at Station 3. I didn't think it was bad, but it just seemed like my stop. I won't say this looks amazing or anything, but I will say if they wanted me back on that train, this is very similar to what it'd look like.

So I'll check it out. I'm not expecting the dynamic tension of the first film or the mind-blowing spectacle of the second. I'd go so far as to say expecting that would be unfair, and is the reason I wasn't wild about the third.
posted by Phobos the Space Potato at 1:33 PM on May 23, 2019

Ha! I loved the comment that's it's clearly self promotion and should be deleted.

I cracked up at his answer to the question about whether Terminators can age:

“I’m a cybernetic organism. Living tissue over a metal endoskeleton.”

Can someone else find the Kyle Reese quote about bad breath from the first Terminator? I’m not good enough with my machine.
posted by nubs at 1:43 PM on May 23, 2019

This franchise can't be bargained with. It can't be reasoned with. It doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop making more movies, ever, until you are dead.
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 2:13 PM on May 23, 2019 [22 favorites]

So I guess Edward Furlong was too busy for this?
posted by octothorpe at 2:16 PM on May 23, 2019 [3 favorites]

I'm still not really sure what that movie was supposed to be.

It was the best attempt at the point behind S. M. Stirling's T2 series.

Which had some damned fine writing.
posted by mikelieman at 2:19 PM on May 23, 2019 [1 favorite]

The 600 series had rubber skin. We spotted them easy. But these are new, they look human. Sweat, bad breath, everything. Very hard to spot. I had to wait till he moved on you before I could zero him.
posted by postel's law at 2:21 PM on May 23, 2019 [4 favorites]

This franchise can't be bargained with. It can't be reasoned with. It doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop making more movies, ever, until you are dead.

Imagine a reboot, stamping on a human face, forever.
posted by thelonius at 2:31 PM on May 23, 2019 [10 favorites]

One of these days Cyberdyne is going to deprecate the Terminator subroutine that causes them to slowly turn back and glare at the protagonists after getting punched/shot/blown up/whatever to show that it didn't really hurt that much.

That or they'll give up on the whole human lookalike thing and make dog terminators and then we're all screwed.
posted by subocoyne at 2:32 PM on May 23, 2019 [3 favorites]

The manbabies are already upset that there are so many women in it and how you can't make a Terminator movie without John Connor in it and there was a man in it and he was bad and it warms me in my heart.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 2:32 PM on May 23, 2019 [9 favorites]

So I guess Edward Furlong was too busy for this?

Yeah, "busy", that's the ticket
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 2:35 PM on May 23, 2019 [4 favorites]

>It was Ron Perlman who wore ruffles in that show.

Holy crap, that was Ron Perlman? I mean, of course it was, now that I stop to think about it. I wonder if it would function as a Hellboy TV series if you digitally changed his makeup.
posted by Sing Or Swim at 2:44 PM on May 23, 2019

If they can at least get the well paced action and chase sequences to equal those from T2

Okay it looks like it could be pretty good, but that is asking too much. The technology to replicate what they did in early-90's action films is decades away.
posted by sfenders at 2:44 PM on May 23, 2019 [5 favorites]

Another fun fact about the Beauty and Beast TV show is that George RR Martin was a writer...
posted by flaterik at 2:47 PM on May 23, 2019 [9 favorites]

Surely the sequel to Terminator 2 would be named Terminator 3: The Offsite Backups.
posted by acb at 2:52 PM on May 23, 2019 [2 favorites]

The 600 series had rubber skin.

I’m imagining a terminator skeleton in a floppy hat and apron lovingly spritzing rubber plants in a Skynet greenhouse.
posted by dephlogisticated at 2:59 PM on May 23, 2019 [2 favorites]

Beauty and the Beast came out three years after The Terminator.

Sure but her triceps came out in 1991 in T2.
posted by warriorqueen at 3:01 PM on May 23, 2019 [7 favorites]

That or they'll give up on the whole human lookalike thing and make dog terminators and then we're all screwed.

That was indeed terrifying.
posted by mordax at 3:03 PM on May 23, 2019 [1 favorite]

I'm a bit befuddled by how the poster designers found space for seven different men's names but no credit mention for the woman whose image is the central focus of the poster

So, a bit inside baseball talk: who gets credit on movie posters, and where that credit goes, and in what order the names are listed, is actually a thorny subject in blockbusters, where negotiations go back and forth between producers, actors, agents, marketing, etc. This is why TVTropes has separate pages for Misplaced Names Poster and Diagonal Billing.

Since this negotiation happens after the movie's done, it's not always covered in actor contracts, or if it is, the studio always assumes it can be renegotiated if they float enough money around. And for a movie without a set release date, this won't even be the final poster. Much safer to leave off all the actors' names until credit order and placement is settled.
posted by The Pluto Gangsta at 3:05 PM on May 23, 2019 [9 favorites]

That or they'll give up on the whole human lookalike thing and make dog terminators and then we're all screwed.

and when they bark they shoot bees at you
posted by entropicamericana at 3:15 PM on May 23, 2019 [5 favorites]

I enjoyed Terminator: Genisys. I felt like even though the time travel stuff was dumb and didn't make sense, it was dumb and nonsensical in a way that was fun and used for some nifty scenes and callbacks that were more than just "Hey remember this?" And Emilia Clarke was great. I wish they could have found a way to include her in this.
posted by straight at 3:29 PM on May 23, 2019

I still miss the Sarah Connor Chronicles, and I resent the hell out of Fox for cancelling it (in order to keep frelling Dollhouse, ptuie). So I like this trailer, but I keep looking for Summer Glau.
posted by suelac at 4:06 PM on May 23, 2019 [6 favorites]

Between T3, 4, and 5... I didn't mind Genisys as a goofy ride. This looks like it has potential, especially if 3, 4, and 5 are officially alternate Twilight Zone low-probability timelines now.

It's great seeing the love the Sarah Connor Chronicles is getting in this thread - I rewatched it recently and it's still terrific television. Of course Hedy and Glau, but the rest of the cast was solid too. Dillahunt and Manson especially, Dekker is the least annoying John Connor and this was the least annoying Green role that I can remember.
posted by porpoise at 4:17 PM on May 23, 2019 [6 favorites]

This looks good, though I'm curious about old Arnold in the cabin.

That's actually John Matrix from Commando.
posted by kirkaracha at 4:22 PM on May 23, 2019 [10 favorites]

The cool thing for me was seeing this posted on reddit by Arnold himself and the fact that it sort of turned into an impromptu AMA.

SunBroPatches: Did y'all know how hilarious COMMANDO was (in a great way!) while filming it?

GovSchwarzenegger: As soon as I carried a thousand pound log with one arm I knew it was funny. But let me share the scenes you didn’t see that I tried to get in.

I wanted to cut off a guy’s arm and kill him with it. This wasn’t in the script. He would throw a knife at me and after he missed, while his arm was still extended, I chop it off at the shoulder with a machete and beat him to death with it. Needless to say, I was asked by the head of the studio, Larry Gordon to come to his office. And he said “what the fuck is the matter with you? Do you want to make money with this movie or an x-rated movie?”

I said “you’re right” and he said “get the fuck out of my office.”

KingJoedorah: After killing the guy, what would the one-liner be?

juniSMASH: "Thanks for lending me a hand."

GovSchwarzenegger: You’re hired.

posted by kirkaracha at 4:26 PM on May 23, 2019 [27 favorites]

She'd previously appeared in that really unfortunate TV rendition of Beauty And The Beast, playing opposite Lion-O from Thundercats. I never watched it, but my impression was that there were a lot of ruffles.

The second sentence explains the wild ignorance of the first. That show fucking owns, particularly by the standards of 1980s television.
posted by Parasite Unseen at 4:57 PM on May 23, 2019 [11 favorites]

While it was never precisely my cup of tea, the BatB TV show was quite important as it produced one of the first of what we'd recognize as a truly modern fandom for a TV property. The historical through-line, imo, goes (the before times & trek) ---> BatB --> X-files & Xena --> modern TV fandom. One thing that's always interested me is how women were so dominant in the proto-fandoms. Although it may only seem like that was a change as my understanding is that the role of women in the urfandom of early Trek has been consistently underestimated and underportrayed.

And, uh, the trailer for the new Terminator movie which is the topic here is also interesting. Yeah.
posted by Justinian at 6:03 PM on May 23, 2019 [4 favorites]

Much safer to leave off all the actors' names until credit order and placement is settled.

If they’re late enough in the process to have hammered out story and screenplay credits, they’re late enough in the process to have hammered out actor credits, especially in a one-shot poster.

Also, “LINDA HAMILTON IS BACK AS SARAH CONNOR” doesn’t need negotiation vs. Schwarzenegger when he isn’t on the poster. Individual posters with only one actor’s name happen all the time.
posted by Etrigan at 6:05 PM on May 23, 2019

I just want to add a bit randomly that after I posted my factually correct quip about the triceps, I actually did remember what it was like in 1991 to watch that scene of her working out in a jail cell. In The Terminator she was the damsel in distress, at least in my perception. But my god, the the era following the sexy Aerobics/Jane Fonda era, to see a woman — a mother — who had turned her body into weaponry like that and built visible muscle...a woman who was living not just by her wits but as a soldier, that really did something for me that has stayed with me. She and Ripley and Princess Leia were basically my fairy godmothers.


That is all.
posted by warriorqueen at 6:06 PM on May 23, 2019 [29 favorites]

aubilenon: "Why didn't they just use the original Björk version of the song though?"

You have to use a maudlin cover of a pop hit as the soundtrack for a trailer; blame David Fincher.
posted by octothorpe at 6:20 PM on May 23, 2019 [3 favorites]

I guess there's never going to be a better time to link this Terminator sequel generator I wrote!

Most of the results (like most Terminator movies) are about Skynet trying to kill John Conner, but I hid a romantic comedy pattern in there somewhere, plus a post-apocalyptic remake of Dead Man on Campus.
posted by Iridic at 7:03 PM on May 23, 2019 [8 favorites]

My favorite thing about the Terminator movies is this series of twists on the same line / scenario:

Terminator: "Come with me if you want to live!" (Kyle Reese to Sarah Connor)
Terminator 2: "Come with me if you want to live!" (T800 to Sarah Connor)
Terminator: Genisys: "Come with me if you want to live!" (Sarah Connor to Kyle Reese)

I hope this movie gives us a new permutation.
posted by automatronic at 7:26 PM on May 23, 2019 [4 favorites]

Now we're all thinking "Live with me if you want to come!"

Thx
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 7:34 PM on May 23, 2019 [15 favorites]

The mesh under Mackenzie Davis' skin reminds me of the second-generation upgraded soldiers from Brin's The Postman
posted by the man of twists and turns at 7:42 PM on May 23, 2019 [1 favorite]

Now we're all thinking "Live with me if you want to come!"

This is how porn parodies get started.
posted by nubs at 7:45 PM on May 23, 2019 [2 favorites]

I hope this movie gives us a new permutation.

In SCC it's "Cameron" (Summer Glau's Terminator) who says it to John Connor in the pilot. It's pretty great.
posted by suelac at 10:04 PM on May 23, 2019 [1 favorite]

I have never seen a Terminator movie in theaters and never thought I would (I was in elementary school when T2 premiered and T3+ on looked bleh), but grizzled warrior Linda Hamilton and Gabriel Luna are damn sure going to get me to buy that ticket.

I adored Luna as Robbie Reyes / Ghost Rider on Agents of SHIELD, which definitely must've been the role that made the Terminator casting people decide "hey, this Gabriel Luna guy is great at glaring menacingly and he can fight while wearing awkward CGI props and he's handsome. SOLD!" Happily, Luna will be reprising his Robbie role headlining the new live-action Ghost Rider series for Hulu, which may or may not be related to the Agents of SHIELD run, though I'm going to pretend it is until they make me stop.

tl;dr I will be extremely sad if Robot Gabriel Luna gets killed off 20 minutes into this movie, but also LINDA HAMILTON!!
posted by nicebookrack at 10:11 PM on May 23, 2019

Gabriel Luna rocking the awkward CGI props, Ghost Rider-style: this is a meetcute + reveeeennnge + this fight's my fave because chain
posted by nicebookrack at 10:43 PM on May 23, 2019

"Come with me if you want to live!"

Someone's absolutely going to say the line TO the Terminator this time.
posted by nicebookrack at 10:47 PM on May 23, 2019 [1 favorite]

It was the best attempt at the point behind S. M. Stirling's T2 series.

Which had some damned fine writing.

OK? I bounced off Stirling's Emberverse books after a couple. Cool concept, but the characters were cardboard cutouts and he tended to repeat stuff all the time, IIRC. Did he do better with the Terminator franchise?
posted by Harald74 at 12:43 AM on May 24, 2019 [1 favorite]

I enjoyed Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, like apparently many of you did. Good plots and acting (especially by Lena Headey). And it was great fun (like in Firefly) to watch spindly but very athletic Summer Glau kick all kinds of ass. Too bad Fox cancelled it after a short run.
posted by Harald74 at 12:47 AM on May 24, 2019 [3 favorites]

I abandoned the franchise after T3. My So-Called Life meets Dr Evil's kid? Whichever one that was.

The thing about it that turned me off was kind of abstract. Something about the camerawork or green-screen or music or something made it seem as though the world was already empty of people. It's not an objective emptiness, but it really felt like these vacated sets where a couple of actors would step into frame now and again. The other films showed you populated worlds you felt had to be saved, but there was little difference in atmosphere as the story progressed.

The original two films had crowd scenes, where you felt the mass of humanity that would be lost once the machines took over. T3 felt like it sleep-walked through a world that had already mostly automated everyone away.

The original two films also had one basic shared idea: the machines travelled back in time to a point where they are vastly outnumbered, and they have to play along and fit in in order to meet their objectives. I don't think I'm that interested in pursuing the "good robots vs bad robots" thread any further than T2 took it.

But yeah, Hamilton brought back the badass in that trailer. Highly tempting!
posted by rum-soaked space hobo at 1:01 AM on May 24, 2019 [4 favorites]

Iridic, that's AMAZING, and I love the wacky campus hijinks option. OTOH, this is genius:

After reading up on historiography, Skynet (Vincent D'Onofrio) comes to reject the "Great Man" theory of history and loses interest in murdering John Connor (Dylan McDermott). After dipping into the relevant literature himself, John feels compelled to re-organize the Resistance along anarcho-syndicalist lines.

posted by epersonae at 9:57 AM on May 24, 2019 [3 favorites]

You have to use a maudlin cover of a pop hit as the soundtrack for a trailer; blame David Fincher.

The Auralnauts lampooned this pretty good.
posted by aubilenon at 10:39 AM on May 24, 2019 [4 favorites]

I got this from Iridic's generator, and I think it is worth it for the casting alone:

SUMMER OF THE TERMINATOR
(PG-13; 124 minutes)
Skynet (portrayed by Albert Brooks) considers using time travel to eliminate John Connor (Benedict Cumberbatch) before his birth, but decides that makes no fucking sense. Meanwhile, in 1984, Sarah Connor (Rita Ora) starts a somewhat successful dog-grooming business.
posted by nubs at 11:04 AM on May 24, 2019 [4 favorites]

i thought rita ora was the actress from thriller (ola ray) and then i imagined the thriller video with arnold schwarzenegger

Arnold: [flat terminator affect] I have something I want to tell you.
Girl: Yes, Arnold?
Arnold: [flat terminator affect] I’m not like other guys.
Girl: Of course not. That’s why I love you.
Arnold:[flat terminator affect] No, I mean I’m different.
Girl: What are you talking about?
Arnold pulls out a knife and starts wordlessly cutting into his bicep while maintaining unwavering eye contact
posted by entropicamericana at 11:13 AM on May 24, 2019 [2 favorites]

I got a great one from Iridic's generator:

A TERMINATOR SUMMER
(PG-13; 136 minutes)
In spite of all the Connors' best cross-temporal efforts, Skynet (Hayley Mills) finally comes online in 2025. To everyone's amazement, Skynet displays no interest in destroying humanity; it seems to prefer writing Harry Potter fanfiction.
posted by Caduceus at 2:23 PM on May 24, 2019 [3 favorites]

If that appeals to you then you might enjoy The Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells.
posted by Harald74 at 3:47 AM on May 25, 2019 [2 favorites]

Now we're all thinking "Live with me if you want to come!"

This is how porn parodies get started.

Sperminator: Fark Date
posted by chavenet at 10:08 AM on May 26, 2019

No Dark Fate But What We Dark Make
posted by ckape at 6:59 PM on May 28, 2019