If there’s something McG wishes he could retcon out of the original TERMINATOR, it must be Kyle Reese saying, “The Resistance was winning. We were overrunning SkyNet when the machines sent back a Terminator to kill you before you could bear John Connor. And John Connor sent me back to save you.”
See, TERMINATOR SALVATION is all about an assault on SkyNet. And we know that the Resistance doesn’t overrun SkyNet until Kyle Reese is at least in his late twenties. So it can’t work, right? Right?
Still forget that niggling complaint. And forget the facts that CGI stunts are (by definition) dull, one of the heroes is a murderer, and Christian Bale’s “gruff guy” schtick is getting old. Anton Yelchin and Moon Bloodgood have great screen presence, and Sam Worthington makes for a fun hero even if his role forces him to retread stuff that Battlestar Galactica did three years ago. The goods balance the bads in this picture, leaving us with a reasonably effective action picture that achieves its goals of (a) blowin’ up stuff real good and (b) giving us all another opportunity to bask in the glory that is Michael Ironside.
So, y’know, TERMINATOR SALVATION is ok. Not great, not terribly bad, and worth the money if you see it for free. I’m not complaining. I got what I paid for.
