Good Point, remembering my first computer (Mac Quadra 840AV)was HUGE.

spacemonkeygrif: Why this movie sucked:

2 words -- Michael Ironsides

//nuff said


You sound like one of those people who hates chocolate or ice cream.

Saw it and, while hardly a must-see, I certainly enjoyed it more than I did the third one. What I believe threw several of the critics was that there wasn't a single, implacable Terminator to act as a handy villain throughout the movie.

Much as with Abrams' Star Trek, the attempt is made to both acknowledge the earlier movies while making it clear that the various changes that have been made to the timeline have resulted in an unknown future.

TonyJabroni: watched it last week, didn't live up to the hype McGay made. Did anyone else notice in the begining credits they put up DIRECTED BY McG about a gazillion times, as if we somehow forgot who directed it.

/had so much potential
//pg-13? really?why?
///slashies!!!!!!

This. I remember actually hearing at least three different people out loud say, "Did McG direct this movie."

I don't the movie was that bad, it just didn't add anything to the storyline. It's the equivalent of a Paolo episode on Lost, it was just biding time until a more exciting episode was being filmed.

Two main complaints, I hate it when a R movie becomes a PG-13 movie in sequels, and I don't really think 3 more movies were necessary after T3.

the money is in the banana stand: The nuke going off was cool. The crippled robot thing blah lame. Thing crawls no real combat just a bunch of scurrying. Street scene was stupid. The thing is stupid they crush a robot, not very intense. Marcus's escape wtf, the fights were awful. Punching and people sliding nothing special. Motorcycle chase scene was dull. Cged robots chasing a cged truck. Boring action. If you want to see a car chase, watch Ronin.

What the hell would impress you?

nytmare: time-ported

When Bale goes in that hole the first time and sees the human prisoners, Marcus is on one of the tables. Presumably he was preserved after his execution and turned into a terminator over the 15 years. He crawls out of the burning hole after its blown up and finds clothing from one of the dead resistance guys

I'm over it now: Haven't seen it---but any human being that would berate an underling with such enthusiasm for that long deserves to be viewed as a complete assbag and someone to whom I'd rather not give my hard earned shekels.

Remember, nobody gets caught the first time. This was just the first time it was caught on tape.

By that same logic, it probably wasn't the first time this lighting guy f*cked up.

The new movie can be summed up in three words Batman Vs. Transformers.

There's nothing to like or hate about it, it's just there.

And it's an action movie where nothing really happens.

SacriliciousBeerSwiller: I'm over it now: Haven't seen it---but any human being that would berate an underling with such enthusiasm for that long deserves to be viewed as a complete assbag and someone to whom I'd rather not give my hard earned shekels.

Remember, nobody gets caught the first time. This was just the first time it was caught on tape.

By that same logic, it probably wasn't the first time this lighting guy f*cked up.

True enough. But to berate and belittle someone who has no recourse because he's an underling is just extremely low class.

The Thnikkaman: corporate mustache: It was a plot made of holes. Truly awful. Can anyone explain where Sam Worthington went for 15 years?

Was he time-ported from the past?

At the beginning when he's walking through the desert he asked what year it was, I kind of took this as him being time-ported. And we also never see how he got his clothing -- and I kind of assumed he killed a resistance fighter to take his clothing (since terminators time-port in naked) which was part of the "second chance"/"redemption" theme Marcus Wright had going for him, since not only was he a murderer in the past, but he was also a murderer in the future.

I mean, that's what I took away from it. I could have just let my imagination get the better of me or had a stroke in between the screaming and explosions.

Regarding where Sam Worthington's character went, I was under the impression that he was put to death, but donated his body which was used in the future.

He didn't kill a resistance fighter, there is a scene where he is looking at a dead resistance fighter, the next scene shows him walking with clothes on, he simply took the clothes off a dead body.

christian bale is a piece of ___________ for someone to act like that is just pointless, I fell asleep in batman (heath ledger was the only good part of that movie) and terminator sucked balls/ I doubt I will ever watch a christian bale movie unless megan fox is in it naked!!

i read these comments and agree about the plot holes, and the poor acting, yada yada, but i think the most important thing is that this movie satisfied my robot violence blood lust

Xenomech: spacemonkeygrif: Why this movie sucked:

2 words -- Michael Ironsides

//nuff said


You sound like one of those people who hates chocolate or ice cream.

I loves me some chocolate ice cream, however, if you want your movie to be taken seriously, you do not give a crucial role to the king of scifi/action/drama made for TV 'B' movies.

At least they killed him at the end.

Here is how they spent their cash on this movie:

1/4 special effects
1/4 Bale
1/4 advertising
1/4 craft services and everything else.

// no story, no movie...

SacriliciousBeerSwiller: What the hell would impress you?

Speaking for myself, what would have impressed me about an alternate universe's version of Terminator Salvation?

Good acting. Coherent plot. Believable characters. Machines with gattling guns for arms that can hit what they're aiming at. Skynet having defenses around to protect itself. Skynet not being a comic book villain and using overwhelming force instead of a single prototype T-800. You're telling me that Skynet has cracked cybernetic organisms but can't figure out how a motion-sensing turret works? And lastly, a Terminator who doesn't feel pity or remorse or fear actually KILLING something instead of punching them against a wall.

I'm sorry, but if you're close enough to get punched in the chest then you're close enough to put your mechanically-enhanced arm around a person's throat and squeeze with your superhuman strength, ripping out the fleshy human's throat.

Dome: i think the most important thing is that this movie satisfied my robot violence blood lust

That's just it - it didn't satisfy my blood lust. I wanted to see armies of T-600s (or even the treaded T-100s) marching on a Resistance compound and the Resistance being forced into a fighting retreat because Skynet has overwhelming numbers - Bale said so in the trailers. I wanted to see Hunter/Killers patrolling each night looking for the smallest of heat signatures then blowing the shiat out of it with its rockets just on the off chance it might be human.

Instead I got Skynet with the technology to put mechanical piranhas into every river on Earth but unable to find a single submarine right off its coast until the gullible humans started transmitting an obviously ridiculous and planted "disruption signal".

I wanted war and I got shiat.

MrSteve007: ***Spoiler Question***

Why did they include anything about 'the shutoff signal' if is really had nothing to do with the movie. Preparing for the sequel?

The "shutoff signal" was all part of the bait. It never really worked; Skynet just wanted to trick the Resistance into thinking it did.

Treygreen13: I heard from a few people that it's actually not a bad movie. I'm not going to see it, but can anyone confirm/deny?

I heard it was bad, went and saw it anyway on tuesday at the matinee. It was decent, had a good amount of action and actually a bit more plot than most terminator films.

However, it did have some very laughable dialogue, and non-believable scenarios. Which I think is what did it in... they were trying to fit in more plot than they should have and just couldn't carry the weight of the plot and keep the pace of an action movie at the same time.

I can see how McG's original script didn't center on John Connor, in fact I think it might have been a better movie without Christian Bale and Nolan's rewrite to expand Connor's role. There was already enough there around Marcus and Kyle Reese. A movie based upon Kyle Reese's backstory would have served as the perfect buildup for a more Connor centric sequel in which Connor sends Reese to the past to full "destiny". But now we'll probably never see that.

But on the whole, if you're looking for a fun action flick with lots of explosions and bad ass robots, Terminator wont let you down. And it's certainly better than the pile of crap that T3 was.

HeartBurnKid: Skynet just wanted to trick the Resistance into thinking it did.

Speaking of that, how dumb must the leaders of the Resistance be to believe that Skynet would not have a redundant backups for the all-important controlling signal? Or that such a signal would even exist in the first place? Or that blocking any control signal would shut down the machine instead of defaulting to some autonomous mode?

The entire premise of the first half of the movie was based around this signal and an 8-year-old would've called it bullshiat in 2 minutes.

I'm over it now: bobguy64: Bale's tirade was justified. Walking thru a shot to adjust the lights is freakin' amateur. It's like unplugging someone's computer while they're using it.



/gonna see TS tomorrow

Haven't seen it---but any human being that would berate an underling with such enthusiasm for that long deserves to be viewed as a complete assbag and someone to whom I'd rather not give my hard earned shekels.

Remember, nobody gets caught the first time. This was just the first time it was caught on tape.

Great point. From what I understand, the lighting douchebag walked through scenes repeatedly throughout filming. Then he walks through an 'intimate and dramatic' scene. This was the last straw and why Bale snapped.

Taken out of context, it looks like Bale was totally out of line snapping at the guy for an innocent mistake. In the 'building for months' context, it's Bale who's the victim.

If this is so, I'd bet the sound guys recorded and saved the rant because they LOVED it. I bet they distributed dupes to the crew. One leaked.



.

I liked it better than the first three. Followed by #1 then #2. #3 was awful. The action in this was great, they didn't dig too deep into the sci-fi (which is the right way to go). They didn't drag all the time travel paradoxes around until you got irritated, the robots had a good chunk of scene time, and I liked Bale's acting. Some of the dialogue was hokey, but all the Terminator movies suffer from that action script. I liked it better than Star Trek and Wolverine, 2 comparable recent films. Saw it twice and didn't change my opinion the second time either.

bberg: SacriliciousBeerSwiller: What the hell would impress you?

Speaking for myself, what would have impressed me about an alternate universe's version of Terminator Salvation?

Good acting. Coherent plot. Believable characters. Machines with gattling guns for arms that can hit what they're aiming at. Skynet having defenses around to protect itself. Skynet not being a comic book villain and using overwhelming force instead of a single prototype T-800. You're telling me that Skynet has cracked cybernetic organisms but can't figure out how a motion-sensing turret works? And lastly, a Terminator who doesn't feel pity or remorse or fear actually KILLING something instead of punching them against a wall.

I'm sorry, but if you're close enough to get punched in the chest then you're close enough to put your mechanically-enhanced arm around a person's throat and squeeze with your superhuman strength, ripping out the fleshy human's throat.

I meant what would impress you in terms of action sequences? All the Terminators are grossly lacking in logic.

Marla Singer's Laundry: hitlersbrain: Marla Singer's Laundry: hitlersbrain: ('No country for old men'?!!!).

The good news is, I've discovered your problem...

I don't like over hyped, star studded, arty trash posing as an actual movie? I don't see that as a problem.

Well, you're an 18 year-old boy. Of course you love shiny trucks and titties. However, you're an idiot.

And if I was a repressed homosexual man I might have developed a man-crush on Mr. Stupid Haircut and been all a quiver over a shirtless boy straight out of an Abercrombie and Fitch catalog... but I guess I'm not.

There were no shiny trucks or titties in T4. I will refrain from calling you names just because we have different tastes in movies.

bobguy64: Great point. From what I understand, the lighting douchebag walked through scenes repeatedly throughout filming. Then he walks through an 'intimate and dramatic' scene. This was the last straw and why Bale snapped.

Taken out of context, it looks like Bale was totally out of line snapping at the guy for an innocent mistake. In the 'building for months' context, it's Bale who's the victim.

If this is so, I'd bet the sound guys recorded and saved the rant because they LOVED it. I bet they distributed dupes to the crew. One leaked.

I read a description of the events from someone who was on site either on Fark or AintItCool.com. Yeah yeah, I know, could be BS. But whoever posted it was very detailed, and said basically that while the lighting guy on the tape sounded apologetic, that it was clear from his body language that he didn't give a sh*t, and that everyone involved pretty much felt the guy was a cocky douche who had it coming. Note that there hasn't really been any condemnation of Bale's tirade from anyone connected with the film.

from T2, the T800 has detailed files on human anatomy to make it a more efficient killer. CG-Arnold is anything but efficient in its killing (or lack thereof)

I did learn a valuable lesson from this movie. If you design an inhibitor chip, one of the behaviors it should inhibit is ripping it out of your head. And if you can't make it inhibit that behavior, you shouldn't show the guy it's implanted in exactly where it is.

/just sayin'
//be seeing you

SacriliciousBeerSwiller: I meant what would impress you in terms of action sequences?

You still get impressed by 99% CGI action sequences? Sorry man, but I've been playing video games for the past 20 years. It takes more than a green screen to impress me. And explosions long since lost their luster.

So what action impresses me? The freerunning opening chase from Casino Royale. Good wire-fighting (Matrix, Crouching Tiger). Car chases that actually use cars. Fights where I honestly believe the characters want to kill each other (generator fight in Serenity).

bberg:
You still get impressed by 99% CGI action sequences? Sorry man, but I've been playing video games for the past 20 years.

Why do you care if the action is CGI or not?

Are you that stupid to not know it's a movie and 100% fake?

MonkeyAngst: Where are my lasers? If Skynet isn't even on schedule to develop lasers, how can they possibly hope to meet the deadline for time travel?

To be perfectly frank (and as a robot I can be nothing but perfect), the Time Travel project is right on schedule. In fact, it sent itself backwards in time to meet the deadline, so there's that. The laser project however... well, you know how it is: low profile project that should be easy and quick to complete. So the Director put his nephew in charge. Now the entire weapons department is over-budget due to ONE of what he calls "his keggers" (as an Artificial Intelligence (of High School Drop Out equivalent intellect I might add) he can't even be able to imbibe alcohol).

knumbersix: I did learn a valuable lesson from this movie. If you design an inhibitor chip, one of the behaviors it should inhibit is ripping it out of your head. And if you can't make it inhibit that behavior, you shouldn't show the guy it's implanted in exactly where it is.

/just sayin'
//be seeing you

Another lesson. If you inform someone that giant flying robots called Hunter/Killers hunt by infrared at night, you may not want to light exposed fires.

/the more you know

DaShredda: Why do you care if the action is CGI or not?

It's not impressive if it's CGI. I was asked what impresses me, and action sequences that impress me all have one thing in common - reality. A guy ducking on a greenscreen doesn't impress me at all, no matter how spectacular the effects behind him are.

coinspinner: Another lesson. If you inform someone that giant flying robots called Hunter/Killers hunt by infrared at night, you may not want to light exposed fires.

Or you might want to light fires ALL OVER THE PLACE

bberg: Dome: i think the most important thing is that this movie satisfied my robot violence blood lust

That's just it - it didn't satisfy my blood lust. I wanted to see armies of T-600s (or even the treaded T-100s) marching on a Resistance compound and the Resistance being forced into a fighting retreat because Skynet has overwhelming numbers - Bale said so in the trailers. I wanted to see Hunter/Killers patrolling each night looking for the smallest of heat signatures then blowing the shiat out of it with its rockets just on the off chance it might be human.

Instead I got Skynet with the technology to put mechanical piranhas into every river on Earth but unable to find a single submarine right off its coast until the gullible humans started transmitting an obviously ridiculous and planted "disruption signal".

I wanted war and I got shiat.

I like the movie but agree that it would have been much better as a balls out war movie. Take a good old WWII movie or two and adapt them from Nazis to Robots. Skip the 'magic signal' stuff.

I also think they handled the cyborg badly (they always do). Wouldn't you want to learn and use that technology if you were a squishy, short lived human? Robots would not be so scary if you were as tough and strong as they were. Also, space would now be easily habitable.

bberg:
It's not impressive if it's CGI. I was asked what impresses me, and action sequences that impress me all have one thing in common - reality. A guy ducking on a greenscreen doesn't impress me at all, no matter how spectacular the effects behind him are.

I think what you are looking for is gladiator style fights.

You, know, people fight for real, and actually kill each other.

Christian Bale ducking on a green screen is no different than a stunt double ducking behind a glass barrier.

It's all 100% hollywood magic.

hitlersbrain: Marla Singer's Laundry: hitlersbrain: Marla Singer's Laundry: hitlersbrain: ('No country for old men'?!!!).

The good news is, I've discovered your problem...

I don't like over hyped, star studded, arty trash posing as an actual movie? I don't see that as a problem.

Well, you're an 18 year-old boy. Of course you love shiny trucks and titties. However, you're an idiot.

And if I was a repressed homosexual man I might have developed a man-crush on Mr. Stupid Haircut and been all a quiver over a shirtless boy straight out of an Abercrombie and Fitch catalog... but I guess I'm not.

There were no shiny trucks or titties in T4. I will refrain from calling you names just because we have different tastes in movies.


I didn't think "No Country For Old Men" was all that impressive either... thought it was too similar to Fargo. Now don't get me wrong, Fargo was good, but still thought No Country was too similar for it to be as big of a hit as people made it out to be.

elchip: MonkeyAngst: I was talking about the giant Terminator, the one that attacks the 7-11. Too big to not be silly, really.

Well, that thing was pretty scary. Did they ever destroy it? Or did they just escape? I'm trying to remember... but the last thing I remember is them torching the 7-11, but then it comes out mostly unscathed, it drops the motorcycles, and they give chase... do they ever destroy the big thing?

IIRC, it has a nesting spot on the giant transport and gets carried off on that thing.

***Some Spoilers Ahead***

I liked the movie, in the same way I liked Alien Resurrection. It's got huge plot holes, but so did the other 2 sequels before it. T:S feels like a whole lot was left on the cutting room floor, but that might make an interesting Director's Cut on Blu-Ray. The ending ticked me off... but the gritty, post-apocalyptic war-movie feeling of the rest of the movie, despite the plot holes (hey, this is a Terminator movie, not Gladiator, The Departed or Return of the King) gave me enough explosions, chunks of masonry flying and a frankly bad-a** fight with the T-800 in the factory (that thing just kept coming like the T-800 way back in T1) that the part of my brain demanding a coherent tying-together of the different plot elements was grudgingly able to admit that mostly, the plot worked to present the story as laid out, and that's it (except that damn surgical ending).

People whining that it's not the MOsT aWEsOmEsT AwESoME MoVIe EVAR here and elsewhere are just ticked that there wasn't a bigger story involved than, essentially, a futuristic war movie that answered a few questions (Reese's joining the resistance, Connor's facial scars). There's no reason there couldn't have been a better plot, except for those involved in writing this one, but it at least told an enjoyable story. Mostly, the whiners sound like fanboy basement-dwellers whose own mental plot points didn't magically appear in this particular film.

This movie was no worse than Transformers 1 and equally as entertaining, and yet people didn't rag on that for the same stuff as they are on this. I'm actually happy some of the cheese that was in 2 and 3 is not in this one, even if the plot didn't have as much to deliver. T1 is still the best, T2 next for completely different reasons... T3 mostly sucked dead donkey balls and T4 is something behind T2, but not much - and for completely different reasons.

Oh, and to answer someone else's question, I think that the reason Conner is the purported "leader" of the resistance in this film, even though he's clearly not in charge until the end, is that he was the one who picked up the mike at Crystal Peak at the end of T3 when the bombs started dropping, and presumably started being the "voice of the resistance" there while everyone was powering on vacuum-tube radios and listening for any voice on any military channel they could find - voila, there's John Conner at Crystal Peak, and he seems to know exactly what's going on...works for me...you just need to connect the dots yourself.

Car_Ramrod: I really wanted this to be a good movie, but reviews haven't been promising. First hand accounts?

First, Bale's acting is pretty terrible. He just shouts the whole movie.

Next, unintentionally, John Connor is given a messiah complex.

There are dozens of things in the film that simply don't make sense, such as when Connor is in a Terminator factory, why is it that only one Terminator is attacking him. Where are all the other Terminators? I don't want to spoil the film if you're going to see it, but this is just the tip of the ice burg.

Finally, the film is merely a setup for a sequel.

Least Extreme Elimination Challenge:
I didn't think "No Country For Old Men" was all that impressive either... thought it was too similar to Fargo. Now don't get me wrong, Fargo was good, but still thought No Country was too similar for it to be as big of a hit as people made it out to be.

I'm not sure how much money it made but my Blockbuster had like 1/2 a single row of them in and most were always there when I looked. It actually got 'boo's' from the theater I was in at the end.

dragonaut: T2 was one of the first movies I ever saw.

Dear god, I'm old.

/The original Star Wars was one of the first movies I ever saw in theatres

Just got back from Angels and Demons. It really sucked too.

Didn't even really tie into the title very well, incidentally.

SacriliciousBeerSwiller: the money is in the banana stand: I like bright shiny stuff, explosions, ninjas, blood, etc. guy stuff, but felt Terminator 4 was totally lacking that. It really didn't have any appeal and the action scenes were lackluster. No big fire fights, just bland.

WTF??? What about the single-shot scene where John jumps in the helicopter, the nuke goes off and throws the Huey into a spin, he crashes, and gets attacked by the crippled T-800? Or the street scene with the T-600? Or the A-10 attack/retreat? Or Marcus' escape from the base? Or the motorcycle chase scene?

The action scenes were amazing. It's the one thing I haven't seen anyone complain about in regards to this film (until now).

I did. see above post.

DaShredda: Christian Bale ducking on a green screen is no different than a stunt double ducking behind a glass barrier.

No, you're still not getting me. I'm not being clear enough.

Action sequences need to be believable to be impressive to me. The easiest way to make it believable is to not use CGI, which is why wire-fighting and real car chases are impressive.

Christian Bale ducking on a green screen is not believable because, well, he's a shiatty actor and can't convey the fear he should be feeling as the H/K is bearing down on him. A stunt double doesn't have that problem because we never see his face because, well, he's a stunt double.

From bananastand

The nuke going off was cool. The crippled robot thing blah lame. Thing crawls no real combat just a bunch of scurrying. Street scene was stupid. The thing is stupid they crush a robot, not very intense. Marcus's escape wtf, the fights were awful. Punching and people sliding nothing special. Motorcycle chase scene was dull. Cged robots chasing a cged truck. Boring action. If you want to see a car chase, watch Ronin.

once again, THIS THIS THIS

Wanted was vaunted as less of an action movie than this and was 15 times better.

bberg: SacriliciousBeerSwiller:

So what action impresses me? The freerunning opening chase from Casino Royale. Good wire-fighting (Matrix, Crouching Tiger). Car chases that actually use cars. Fights where I honestly believe the characters want to kill each other (generator fight in Serenity).

Amen to all that... takes weeks to months of prep work on the actors parts in some cases, and CGI still can't capture physical interaction as well as the real thing. I loved the generator fight, too, especially with Mal hitting the deck every other cut... then still hauling himself to his feet.

But... I don't have to be impressed to be entertained... I can know the magic trick and still enjoy watching it done. I can know how to play a Petrucci solo and still enjoy watching some other dude rip it out on stage. If the scene is enjoyable I don't really care if it was real or CGI... I just won't be still shaking my head in admiration for that scene weeks later if it's not real. I don't have to be awed to enjoy something.

hitlersbrain:
I'm not sure how much money it made but my Blockbuster had like 1/2 a single row of them in and most were always there when I looked. It actually got 'boo's' from the theater I was in at the end.

What the fark is a Blockbuster?

Link (new window)href="http://www.fark.com/cgi/comments.pl?IDLink=4413309&IDComment=514619 75#c51461975">Seraphym: T:S feels like a whole lot was left on the cutting room floor, but that might make an interesting Director's Cut on Blu-Ray.

It's funny you mention that, because the exact opposite is true. Bale's massive ego came in and rewrote the original script (which was a piece of unmitigated trash to begin with) so that John Connor goes from just being a voice on a radio to being the major character of the movie.

The inconsistency in storytelling is not the result of a huge script being trimmed down to fit in 2 hours, it's the result of the shiatty script being rewritten shiattily.

It's a long read, but it's worth it: What went wrong with Terminator (^)

For the most part I liked it (the ending was stupid for many reasons). Not really sure why people are saying the CGI was bad. I thought it was one of the more impressive films to use that much CGI. Not exactly sure what movies these people think did better in that department.

bberg:
It's a long read, but it's worth it: What went wrong with Terminator (^)

That's actually a good read!

Each version of the script was 33% awesome and 67% garbage...

I liked pieces of each, but as a whole they each fail.