3+1 Short Paragraphs: Terminator: Dark Fate

2019, Tim Miller (Deadpool) -- download

I could literally transplant the first paragraph of my writeup for Terminator: Genisys as the opening paragraph for this movie. Both had a brief period of hype, a claim to resurrect the franchise with something entirely new, a failed opening at the box office and then a quiet fade into On Demand and Streaming. Sorry guys, I guess few people care any longer.

And yet, much like I enjoyed the last one, I rather enjoyed this one. It's not perfect, but what is these days. Well, actually there are many many Very Good movies, but with genre we often accept what we get. That's another post. ANYWAYZ, this is a Trump-era movie, made by Miller to piss off the Red Hat Legion, set in Mexico and (re)placing the focus from Sara Connor to a new, young Mexican woman. She will not bear the leader of the rebellion against the machines, she will be the leader of the rebellion. I like that; fuck you, neckbeard fan boys.

This movie also washes away, much like the last did, all the movies after the 2nd. This is still the world where Arny came for Sara Connor, where Kyle Reese saved her, where her own son rescued her from the hospital, but not long after, while they were on the run, another Terminator appeared and killed John. Even with John dead, 1997 comes and goes with no apocalypse, but that doesn't mean she lets her guard down. Come 2019, Sara Connor is old, grizzled and very very angry. Thus Grace (MacKenzie Davis, Halt & Catch Fire) appears, a Terminator-adjacent warrior from another future where we are again fighting the machines. She's human, but augmented. And just behind her comes an Uber-T1000 (Gabriel Luna, Agents of SHIELD), all liquid metal with an internal, independent skeletal chassis; alas no flaming skull. Grace shows up to find & protect Dani Ramos (Natalia Reyes, Cumbia Ninja) but other than that, they have no goal in mind, beyond stay alive. Old Sara saves their ass, leading them to the source of her unlikely coincidental appearance, someone who has been feeding her the time & locations of other Terminator incursions for the last 30 years. Its the old Arny model, the one that killed John. Old in much of the sense of the word, in that his human skin has aged, but also his expanding his sentience, settled into a life protecting a woman & her son. Sara hates him, but acknowledges he can help. And thus, they combine forces to protect Dani.

There's a lot there, enough already for the three (not short) paragraphs. But what I liked about his movie was more than the small movie appeal, the less-than-blockbuster nature that the first also was, but that it played a tune on many notes. For one, it felt a lot like Logan, visually and tonally, with a weight and fatigue, yes for the franchise as well as the seemingly unending battle for the future. The future is very Who-vian, in that there seems to be fixed events. You can change the future, delay things, but these events always eventually happen, in some form or another. This is not the Skynet future we know, just another rising of the machines, another death of humanity and another appearance of a warrior to lead the survivors. And again, the paradox of she who is sent back to protect the warrior actually begins the cycle.

Note: If I can say one bad thing about this movie is that Miller majorly skimped on the special effects budget. This was so below even current TV capabilities and quality, it was extremely distracting. Everytime Liquid Terminator appeared, he was rubbery and off-colour, looking like a test-pattern instead of the final work. Not sure why this happened.