Could it be that the Terminator franchise doesn't have anything left in the tank? First the Sarah Connor Chronicles gets canceled. Which as you know, I think is an injustice. I think the TSCC was one of the best shows on TV and easily one of the best things that ever happened to the Terminator franchise. Now it appears that Terminator: Salvation lost at the box office to "Night at the Museum 2"...

And it makes me slightly happy inside. Now technically Terminator made more money on Thursday and it'll probably benefit from the Memorial day weekend, but I'm thinking Terminator may be on it's way to being a "successful bomb" as it were. As it stands Terminator: Salvation actually opened up making LESS money than T3, which I actually liked. Many fans hated T3 and weren't interested in it, so when your movie does less than that, it's not a good sign.



The movie is also getting ho-hum reviews in addition to the so-so box office, even the Terminator fans seem to find it largely average and it's carefully teetering into the 1998 Godzilla movie territory. If you don't remember that movie, good, but know that it's the most successful bomb in the history of movies. It made like $400 million dollars but turned everything it touched into crap.

I'm not sure why I hate the new Terminator movie so much (Hate is probably a strong word) but I think it's just a combination of factors. A good Terminator movie really needs to focus in on one or two Terminators. Once you blow 900 of them up, the robot beasts just aren't nearly as compelling. Second you really need time to craft a good Terminator. Arnold was able to develop over the first movie and the second as well and that's what made him so fierce in the role.



One of the big problems with T3 is that the Terminator didn't inspire the fear that the previous ones did. T2 got a pass because the T-1000 was creepy on it's own and the CGI effects were so mind blowing at the time that it didn't matter. Now effects can't surprise us. We've seen it all. You have to have clever story telling to make the Terminator seem badass.


Probably scarier than any of the new Terminators. Garret Dillahunt as Cromartie.

That's what this movie seems to be supremely lacking. See, in TSCC for a while the Terminators weren't very scary. They fell into the same trap. CGI robots a threat do not automatically make. But once they started writing the Terminators in a good fashion, they created a really scary entity. This new film just seems more intent to blow stuff up.

Plus I more or less hate Christian Bale. It's weird, I liked him around Batman Begins and his work before that, but then he just went and got too much of an ego for me. I just can't stand to see the guy anymore. He's not at all what I envisioned John Connor to be and frankly after he grunted his way through Dark Knight (Which I've also began to detest) I just can't get behind him anymore.



Bale needs to reinvent himself with a dramatically different role than grunting boring guy around explosions, or needs to take some time off from films. Anyway, since I do love Terminators I'm sure I'll probably eventually see the film and maybe some of my negativity will rub off. But until then I'm off to the theatre, where I'm going to go see Night at the Museum 2... And no, that's not a joke. I'm more interested in that then Terminator: Suckvation.