Terminator: Dark Fate*

That happened to the Star Trek movie franchise, so it could definitely happen.

Despite how people may feel about Arnie, he is the Terminator. You don't include him in the franchise, it will not sell as big. When Terminator Salvation came out, I had no interest
in seeing it, and have not ever seen it. When Genisys came out, I made it a point to go see it first week, regardless of whether it had good or bad reviews.

 

looks that way - the sequel takes over where Judgement Day ended

 

I'm fine with living in a world where T3, T4, and T5 didn't happen.

 

Cameron's ownership of the rights to the Terminator franchise come 2019 is great news. Finally, we may have hope of restoring dignity to the series and properly finishing Cameron's plot from the iconic first two films. I'm hesitant that Cameron won't return as a director, and I'm not sure if three films are warranted, as I'm of the mind that only a proper third-and-final instalment to conclude Cameron's story as a trilogy would be needed. The third film should just completely and utterly ignore the three post-Cameron films - he should even just call it Terminator III (with a roman-numeral) to differentiate it from the 2003 Terminator 3: Return of the Machines. Besides Return of the Machines (which was severely weak, but at least attempted to credibly progress the plot of the preceding two films), the other two films (which were even more dire in quality), Salvation and Genisys, added almost nothing to the story, and were utterly unnecessary instalments at that.

The events of Terminator 2: Judgment Day, although a magnificent movie, simply created a gigantic plot-hole by destroying Cyberdyne and the 1984 Arnold T-800 arm endoskeleton (thereby precluding the nuclear war, the rise of Skynet, and so forth), which should have made John outright disappear from existence a la Back to the Future. T3 failed to sufficiently explain this away, other than radically changing the nature of Skynet's rise from what Kyle Reese had related to Sarah in the original 1984 movie (thereby inadvertently making that entire movie set in a separate timeline, along with T2, from that of the first film).

Most importantly, though, would be the return of Linda Hamilton as Sarah Connnor (especially since I hated how the character was simply killed off-screen before the events of the mediocre T3). As emblematic as Schwarzenegger is to the Terminator series, it's often all-too-forgotten that Linda Hamilton's Sarah Connor was the original two films' true protagonist, and its soul (Lena Headey and Emilia Clarke may have brought two of the greatest female characters in 'geekdom' to life as Cersei and Daenerys on Game of Thrones, but their interpretations of Sarah were, in my opinion, very poor). I'd also hope for the return of Edward Furlong as John for continuity, but from everything I've heard of his decline in recent years, I doubt any studio in the world would cast him, and he would likely be unfit to portray John at this point, issues notwithstanding. John should be portrayed significantly more militarily-savvy and heroic than he was by Nick Stahl (although his resemblance to Michael Biehn/Kyle Reese was well-cast, at least in that respect).

 

I wonder if Edward Furlong will sign up? It's not like he's exactly swamped with other work...

 

Star Wars was a massive success from the moment of the release of the original, initially eponymous, film in May 1977, and had a significantly richer fictional universe, plot, and ensemble of characters. Additionally, comics, several TV specials, books, and more were all released within three years, at which point a beloved cinematic sequel was released in theatres with The Empire Strikes Back. I was 16 when Avatar came out, and it was spread like wildfire through word-of-mouth, but this was largely based upon its special FX marvels, as opposed to its characters, plot, et al (and many of my peers loathed Avatar, or were simply nonplussed by it). After a month or two of its release on home video, the movie almost entirely disappeared from discussion, whereas other seminal films from that decade (e.g., Napoleon Dynamite, Juno, The Hangover and The Dark Knight) remained fixtures of our lexicon for years to come.

 

I would love to see them make the Terminator Trilogy written by SM Stirling or have Greg Bear write a new take.

 

Please don't. It's a crime against humanity.

 

I think you hit the nail on the head regarding Empire. It was beloved, and well received. In many ways, to my mind it is the pivotal film of the entire saga/franchise - if that film had STANK (as was/is the case with many sequels) would anybody even remember Star Wars?

 

he's swamped with a gallon of ice cream at the moment.

 

I did enjoy them digitally creating the young Arnold T-1000, although it is impossible to replace Arnold's physique, so the body double was not quite right.

 

I mean the movie itself. If given a choice between nuclear war and watching it again I would rather choose the former.

 

Yes, because people still remember The Matrix.

 

It should have been.... 1 is excellent,2 is ok but the rest blow.....

 

T2 is just "Okay" to you?

 

None of the Trek films were ret-conned out. The post-2009 films take place in a divergent, alternate reality/timeline, which the original timeline's Spock and Nero, in 2387 (eight years after the events of Nemesis, and a century after the events of Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home), enters into as an unintended consequence of nullifying the supernova which destroyed Romulus in the prime universe. The original ten TOS and TNG films from 1979-2002 are all still canon and remain unchanged from the events of the Abrams 'reboot' films.

 

Sorry for getting that wrong, but could you at least give your definition of ret-conned?

 

I agree. The original Star Wars film was a ground-breaking combination of disparate genres, styles, and universal archetypes. If no sequels had been made, it still would be watched alongside other seminal films from the mid-to-late-'70s such as Rocky, JAWS (which was followed by pop-corn cash-in sequels which were all dreadful and near-universally panned), Close Encounters of the Third Kind, China Town, Alien (only one good sequel) Apocalypse Now, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Halloween (poor sequels in this case, too), Carrie, Superman: The Movie (only one generally-liked sequel, with two atrocious follow-ups), The Rocky Horror Picture Show, and even Grease (atrocious sequel), and Animal House (failed TV spin-offs).

Without the success of Empire and Jedi (the latter of which firmly entrenched the Star Wars saga and its characters as an ongoing, mass pop-cultural phenomenon for the children of the '80s and well into the mid-'90s), yes, Star Wars would merely be a classic '70s space-fantasy adventure film, and not the multi-media merchandising empire continues to be, but the iconic characters and quotes would still have remained part of the cultural phenomenon. Maybe the film's reputation be more well-regarded today without the Prequel Trilogy, and the endless stream of current sequels and spin-offs, and onslaught of merchandising that exists today.

It should also be pointed out that contemporary 1980 critical reviews of The Empire Strikes Back were generally pretty lacklustre. Critics even harshly criticised the sequel for its divergent tone from the original, its infamous plot-twist, and the introduction of a puppet as a main-character.

Likwewise, I think The Terminator from 1984 would still be widely aired and appraised as a cult-classic, 'tech-noir' sci-fi film, but T2, with its groundbreaking effects, larger scope, exceptional plot, and less 'dated' aesthetic, certainly made it marketable as an ongoing entity. Otherwise, I think we would have merely seen a remake of the original sometime down the road.

 

Sorry buddy,i mean its awesome also!!!

 

I really hope we get the actual Terminator war film we've been wanting since 1991.

A bit off-topic but I much prefer T1 to T2.

 

Arnold wasn't even the only T-800 in the original Terminator!

There's so many ways they can go with this universe, in all honesty. Imagine the blue, night-set war scenes - a whole movie?

Or a movie about the rise of the machines, and humanity being pushed to the brink - the backstory Kyle Reese mentioned?

Even a movie about the LAST BATTLE with Skynet, leading to the capturing of the Time Displacement Facility, could work as a whole film, with the film ending with Kyle being sent back to 1984. It just has to be a well-written, taut, dark movie about a last brutal, bloody battle with Skynet that ends where the very first film begins.

 

There are patches to these holes; for example:
-While Dyson may have been head of Skynet's development, are you really going to tell me a huge corporation gave development of its most promising project over to one guy, at one location? It's possible there were backups at other Cyberdyne locations, or perhaps even with the government (it's implied Cyberdyne was a government contractor). While these off-site developers may not have had the direct materials such as the microchip and arm, they may have things like notes, photographs, diagrams, and computer files about these sensitive materials. It would push back Judgement Day, but the Skynet project could be reconstructed off-site.

Remember, Sarah Connor was in the mental hospital because she had previously tried to blow up Cyberdyne and had been shot and arrested; this is stated outright in T2. Cyberdyne was also engaged in a massive cover-up of the events of the first film. It's illogical to assume that a corporation which has already been the target of terrorism attempts would store all of its data at one location. The physical pieces, perhaps, but if they were working for the government, maybe Dyson was sending (secret) reports to the government with each step he took. Maybe a different Cyberdyne location was keeping data backups, etc. Plenty of ways to explain it away.

Also, while the CPU and arm of the original Terminator were destroyed, the rest of the chassis was not. We never do learn what happens to it, either. There are pieces of the Terminator strewn all over the Cyberdyne facility at the end of Terminator 1. Most notably, there is the chest portion, which contains a nuclear fuel cell. Imagine how much might be gleaned in terms of energy production and such from just studying the Terminator's power cell alone?

Also, the second Terminator loses HIS arm in T2 at the steel mill. It could presumably have been found in the aftermath of the events of T2.

There are ways around this, or else John Connor would never have existed. The fact that John Connor exists at the end of Judgement Day says to me that Judgement Day is inevitable. Maybe it won't have happened on August 29th 1997, but his very existence is tied to the existence of Skynet. You cannot have one without the other. In order to truly kill Skynet, you have to prevent John from being born; in order to kill John, you have to prevent the rise of Skynet before Reese and the Terminator are sent back. Since John is alive, neither of those things has happened, thus allowing for Judgement Day to still happen.

 

I don't understand why Linda would even think working with Cameron
after horrible marriage she had with him..
This makes no sense she got large pay out from him during the divorce.

 

Thinking back on it, John could have still existed, as long as the future-setting that brought forth the original Skynet/time travel events remains, but branches off as a separate reality/timeline/universe, etc., or if, as you said, Dyson's research was backed-up, and/or other salvaged components of the T-800 were preserved and stored by Cyberdyne (but the original film, to my memory, seemed to show the main endoskeleton being crushed to nothing, saved for its forearm, in the factory compressor). If Judgement Day occurred in 1997, but doesn't occur until 2004 in the post-Cameron sequels, then T2 through to Salvation could very well take place in a different timeline/reality from the original. A seven-year delayed apocalypse would considerably off-set the original chronology of events, however.

When googling these incongruities (which is a mind-twisting endeavour unto itself - the Terminator series is even more of a mess with the post-Cameron sequels than I was even led to believe!), it's come to my attention that the official Terminator wiki and recent, licensed supplementary materials are unclear on timelines, but widely assert that every Terminator film exists in a separate timeline:

- The T1 timeline is seemingly a 'closed loop' that only involved the single time-travel affair depicted in the original film [which may not have been the original timeline - see below*], but also involves the time-displacement that occurred in T2 (according to Cameron). In this timeline, Kyle was born after Judgement Day, which occurred in 1997, and fathers John in 1984, and the timeline culminates in the Human Tech-Com resistance's total victory against Skynet (developed prior to 1997 by Cyberdyne Systems for SAC-NORAD) in 2029, having destroyed their defence grid prior to sending Kyle to 1984, and utterly destroying Skynet at its mountain base, shortly after both parties sent Kyle and the T-800 back in time to 1984 at the Skynet time displacement lab complex. The events leading up to T2, up until 'Uncle Bob' and the T-1000 entered through time, still occurred in this reality, but Cameron's script for T2 includes the original timeline's John Connor having sent the modified 'Uncle Bob' T-800 back in time to 1995 immediately after sending Kyle to 1984 and preceding the destruction of the time displacement lab complex. Katherine Brewster does not appear to be a major player in John's life or the Resistance in this timeline.

- The T2 timeline initially follows the T1 timeline, but branches off the T1 timeline by delaying the date of Judgment Day from 1997 to 2004. In another timeline, it prevents the rise of Skynet and Judgment Day all together (as Cameron's deleted, alternative ending made clear, and which he suggests was his intention, despite cutting the scene - [see below +]).

- T3 originates from the altered events of the T2 timeline, but diverges as the military assumed control of the Skynet project in tandem with a different corporation than Cyberdyne (Cyber Research Systems), developed from the back-up files stored of Dyson's Cyberdyne research, (as you brilliantly mentioned as a possibility!), resulting in a 'delayed' 2004 Judgement Day. Somehow the post-war future has been altered in this timeline, in which Skynet is not destroyed in 2029, and in fact only further advances its technology. Skynet survives on in 2032 (and presumably thereafter), and succeeds in killing John in that year.

- Salvation parallels the timeline of T3 with the altered 2004 date of Judgement Day, with Kate Brewster John's wife and close companion in the Resistance, which itself follows the altered timeline of T2. However, this timeline branches off as the T-800 Terminator model is developed ten years prior to when the original timeline's Kyle Reese stated they did in T1 and Cyberdyne is stated to have created Skynet, as opposed to Cyber Research Systems and the U.S. military, as occurred in T3.

- Genisys follows a wildly divergent future timeline in which the final assault on Skynet in 2029 initially adheres to that of the original timeline, but John Connor is turned into a Terminator (T-3000) by a more advanced Skynet. In this timeline, Skynet is created by Miles Dyson's son in tandem with a time-displaced T-3000 John Connor, and it is a significantly more advanced technology developed into an ambitious A.I. programme, 'Genisys', which even has an anthropomorphic personality in Alex. The past branches off into several discrepant timelines.

The thematic pre-ordainment of the original film and the irony of Skynet having ultimately led to John's birth, along with its own creation and demise, resulted in a nuanced narrative that went far beyond typical action, sci-fi/B-film fodder (especially through Kyle and Sarah's tragic love story), in my opinion, made the original The Terminator the unique, classic film that it is, as opposed to a generic '80s action-flick. The paradoxical implications of Skynet ultimately never having actually been created by anything (as Skynet is simply developed by Dyson and Cyberdyne from the already-built components of the destroyed T-800), along with the alteration of events in T2 and the sequels, trouble a number of hardcore sci-fi and Terminator fans.

* A recent popular online fan theory posits that the original 2029 which Kyle and the T-800 Terminator were sent from was an entirely separate timeline/reality from that of the events which occur in 1984 in The Terminator, in which no time-travelling occurred in its past, Cyberdyne developed Skynet on its own (without having reverse-engineered a Terminator limb from the future), and, most significantly of all, John wasn't fathered by Kyle Reese, but rather some man 'native' to 1984 who impregnated Sarah [I find this theory to be interesting, but ultimately 'bunk', due to Kyle remarking that the supposedly non-Kyle fathered, 'original' John Connor of his 'timeline' resembles him, sent Kyle back to 1984 - although Kyle volunteered - and gave Kyle the photograph of Sarah, which happened to have been taken when a pregnant Sarah was in Mexico, intending to stockpile weapons in preparation for the 'storm coming' in the rise of Skynet. It's all far too coincidental]. However, Anton Yelchin (Kyle Reese in Salvation), in an MTV interview conducted during the promotion for Terminator Salvation, stated that this theorised original, non-Kyle fathered Connor timeline divergent from the original film is the case: 'When Connor sent Kyle back, that was a world in which Kyle wasn't Connor's father. So when he sent him back, it then started this chain of the Connor that you have in [all the sequels] where Kyle Reese is his father.'

+ As for what Cameron intended, he's incredibly unclear and indecisive on what he was trying to convey (especially when his alternate, filmed ending of a future where John becomes a Senator and Skynet & Judgement Day never happens is considered.), always seeming to vacillate between a single timeline that can be radically altered, a single timeline that is entirely predestined, multiple timelines, or a timeline that can only be slightly altered, but still culminate as it had. Cameron also has, apparently, never addressed the plot-incongruity involved with 'Ultimately, Cameron does definitively state that Terminator 2 did severely alter the future from which the Uncle Bob T-800 and T-1000 originated to the point where it 'no longer exists at all'. He never definitively states if that's just by means of a few details having changed, or if Skynet/Judgement Day, et al. is completely undone, as his deleted, original ending intended:

'Basically, what I did in Terminator 2 is say that everything is meant to be a certain way. At least to that point in time where they're sending somebody back from that future. But can you grab that line of history like it's a rope stretched between two points, and pull it out of the way? If you can pull it just a little bit before it rebounds, and cut it exactly at that moment, then you can change it and go in a different direction. If you do that you get a future that no longer exists at all, except in the memories of the people that are here now. They have a memory of a future that will never happen...That's become my point of departure...It's like the Terminator's been born from the forehead of Zeus but he's an anomaly in our time because he's the only one who has memories of a time that will never exist...and it's his existence here that prevents that particular future from ever popping into existence.' - James Cameron to Syd Field, 1992.

 

Jeez dude, you're thinking way too much about this; they're only movies... but just for the record, and after watching T2 again recently on the big screen, I always thought the CPU and arm from the first Terminator were the only things salvaged from the crusher (the chassis would have been a pancake), once they and the second Terminator were destroyed, the timeline closed and that possible future did likewise... end of story.

The Terminator saga ended with T2... stop flogging the dead horse, people... the flesh was scourged off it's bones long ago!!!