Terminator: Dark Fate - Cause we need another one of these apparently.

[LightDragonman1]

Once again, I’m gonna have to point you all in the direction of the video game Terminator Resistance.

It’s probably the only other Terminator related media that is actually good.

 

[XYZpdq Jr.]

so it seems like at least some of the presell media was trying to obscure that Arnold was a good guy in T2
this makes me curious to dig into exactly how much effort was spent on that

 

[TheHarbinger]

so it seems like at least some of the presell media was trying to obscure that Arnold was a good guy in T2
this makes me curious to dig into exactly how much effort was spent on that

It was the opposite. James Cameron wrote T2 so that the first third of the film was ambiguous about what the two terminators were up to. Like were they both going to kill John and Sarah? Was one sent to protect them? You would not know until the original terminator starts fighting the new terminator. It was meant to be a big twist for the audience. But it was spoiled by promotional material months in advance because they wanted to sell the movie around the original terminator being the good guy and the main character.

When the movie was being promoted it was promoted at first with "there are two terminators....one is programmed to kill......but one is programmed to PROTECT!". It was beyond obvious which one was there to protect John. In fact it was so obvious that by the time T2 came to HBO's First Look they literally had the cast openly talking about how it was a neat change for the original terminator to be the good guy this time. It was basically spoiled in the trailers, press, and in the big exclusive HBO preview. Everyone knew. James Cameron did not intend for it to be spoiled but the company that ran the advertising campaigns literally sold the movie as "This time Arnold is a good guy".

Side note. Michael Biehn was in some of the original trailers and promotional material but was cut from the film by the time it premiered. But the press kept asking him about what his character was doing in the movie even though he knew by then that he had been cut.

 

[XYZpdq Jr.]

It was the opposite. James Cameron wrote T2 so that the first third of the film was ambiguous about what the two terminators were up to. Like were they both going to kill John and Sarah? Was one sent to protect them? You would not know until the original terminator starts fighting the new terminator. It was meant to be a big twist for the audience. But it was spoiled by promotional material months in advance because they wanted to sell the movie around the original terminator being the good guy and the main character.

When the movie was being promoted it was promoted at first with "there are two terminators....one is programmed to kill......but one is programmed to PROTECT!". It was beyond obvious which one was there to protect John. In fact it was so obvious that by the time T2 came to HBO's First Look they literally had the cast openly talking about how it was a neat change for the original terminator to be the good guy this time. It was basically spoiled in the trailers, press, and in the big exclusive HBO preview. Everyone knew. James Cameron did not intend for it to be spoiled but the company that ran the advertising campaigns literally sold the movie as "This time Arnold is a good guy".

Side note. Michael Biehn was in some of the original trailers and promotional material but was cut from the film by the time it premiered. But the press kept asking him about what his character was doing in the movie even though he knew by then that he had been cut.

yeah that's sorta what I was getting at, I recalled it all being ARNOLD IS THE GOOD GUY but apparently some of the shit was trying to hide it, I'm curious what is and isn't keeping with that

 

[Ahriman]

So now this is a thing.

Welcome to 2022 Japan, where the war between man and the machines is about to change. This clip represents the Cold Open of TERMINATOR ZERO - premieres August 29 (Judgment Day), only on Netflix.

 

[Hijo de D. Woodchucks Jr.]

So now this is a thing.

Who knew they'd end up making Chinese cartoons for a franchise dormant since 1991?

 

[The handsome tard]

So now this is a thing.

Its promising, but just on the very basis that the franchise is so fucked at this point it really has no direction to go beyond continuing in other media like comics, books and animated movies. With that said, there is already eye rolling stuff like the T-800 not being able to gun down a human female with a minigun.

Also, should we have a thread dedicated for Terminator since this is dedicated to Dark Fate

 

[Ahriman]

A warrior from a post-apocalyptic future travels to 1997 to protect an AI scientist being hunted by an unfeeling — and indestructible — cyborg.

https://www.netflix.com/title/81316561

 

[Clown College 2nd Year]

https://www.netflix.com/title/81316561

Ok this had me a bit more interested. Nice to know they're not pulling any stops with the violence and gore. Also girlboss getting her hand broken is a good sign that she won't be a complete Mary Sue.

 

[Quarterback Rex Grossman]

Its promising, but just on the very basis that the franchise is so fucked at this point it really has no direction to go beyond continuing in other media like comics, books and animated movies.

They tried doing that with Salvation but the studio folded. I thought a couple of the spin-off novels were pretty decent (one was written by Timothy Zhan) but there was also a CG movie about Moon Bloodgood's pilot character, plus the video game which looked pretty cool for the time. A shame everyone else just ignored Salvation in favor of slop.

 

[AWizard]

So now this is a thing.

This was shit. Terminator series is probably fucked beyond repair but this is such a japanese/anime take on Terminator with your usual (tired) anime exposition claptrap about humanity's self-destructiveness, whether humanity deserves to survive, AI, fate etc. Now don't get me wrong there's elements of this in the good Terminator films (T1 and T2) but fuck me, the japanese are always overdramatic, bogged down in trite exposition that pokes holes in it's own logic (they start discussing the complications of time travel and timelines) and can't seem to view AI without persistently anthropomorphising it.

Not to mention that the terminators in this seem to weigh the same as a human and can be slowed down with your bare fists but invincible apart from that.

The thing that makes the Terminators a terrifying villain is that they are literally emotionless unstoppable killing machines with no sentience only looking to achieve their programmed goals, even Skynet has a certain lack of sentience even if it is described as "self-aware" (at least in T1 and T2) because it can be argued that it's just performing as intended but because of human oversights it lead to disastrous consequences. (It's programmed top priority was probably to defend itself at all costs. Like how in Deux Ex, the AI Daedalus, was created to identify terrorist organisations and then inadvertently designates it's creators as terrorists because they fit the pattern recognition of a terrorist organisation because didn't code themselves as an exception.)

There's no point psychoanalysing why Skynet decided to nuke humanity, just that through inhuman calulation and pure cold logic, it decided that it was the best outcome according to it's programming. It's not really the scope of the Terminator franchise, nor should it be. The termiantors and skynet are just an incomprehensible black box that can't be bargined with.

If the anime is taken as "robot skeletons from the future" it's a generic-as-hell passable anime timewaster: 4/10. As a terminator product it's overly-familiar and misses the point of the first two films: 3/10

 

[The handsome tard]

They tried doing that with Salvation but the studio folded. I thought a couple of the spin-off novels were pretty decent (one was written by Timothy Zhan) but there was also a CG movie about Moon Bloodgood's pilot character, plus the video game which looked pretty cool for the time. A shame everyone else just ignored Salvation in favor of slop.

Its one of those movies that was sadly not appreciated for doing something that wasnt seen as a big deal back then, being different.

This was shit. Terminator series is probably fucked beyond repair but this is such a japanese/anime take on Terminator with your usual (tired) anime exposition claptrap about humanity's self-destructiveness, whether humanity deserves to survive, AI, fate etc. Now don't get me wrong there's elements of this in the good Terminator films (T1 and T2) but fuck me, the japanese are always overdramatic, bogged down in trite exposition that pokes holes in it's own logic (they start discussing the complications of time travel and timelines) and can't seem to view AI without persistently anthropomorphising it.

Not to mention that the terminators in this seem to weigh the same as a human and can be slowed down with your bare fists but invincible apart from that.

The thing that makes the Terminators a terrifying villain is that they are literally emotionless unstoppable killing machines with no sentience only looking to achieve their programmed goals, even Skynet has a certain lack of sentience even if it is described as "self-aware" (at least in T1 and T2) because it can be argued that it's just performing as intended but because of human oversights it lead to disastrous consequences. (It's programmed top priority was probably to defend itself at all costs. Like how in Deux Ex, the AI Daedalus, was created to identify terrorist organisations and then inadvertently designates it's creators as terrorists because they fit the pattern recognition of a terrorist organisation because didn't code themselves as an exception.)

There's no point psychoanalysing why Skynet decided to nuke humanity, just that through inhuman calulation and pure cold logic, it decided that it was the best outcome according to it's programming. It's not really the scope of the Terminator franchise, nor should it be. The termiantors and skynet are just an incomprehensible black box that can't be bargined with.


If the anime is taken as "robot skeletons from the future" it's a generic-as-hell passable anime timewaster: 4/10. As a terminator product it's overly-familiar and misses the point of the first two films: 3/10

Oddly enough, other pieces of media, like the books, tried to give Skynet some sort of personality and I agree that its just missing the point...but the drawback is that it almost makes Skynet lack presence. The closest the movies ever did in giving Skynet a personality was in Salvation where it speaks to Marcus but it still does in a mostly mechanical way and only simulating humanity rather than actually being human...which obviously leads to Marcus telling it to go fuck itself and break the screen it was on.

Its just counter-intuitive of the whole point of this franchise.

Besides that, its just more of the same we had for years with this franchise. The closest thing to a good thing was Resistance and Im starting to doubt we are getting a sequel to that anytime soon given how not that many people played since it came off hot off the wheels of Dark Fate and people associated one with the other.

 

[Tor Lugosi]

I went into Zero with an open mind, figuring it couldn't be much worse than most of the franchise at this point. I still thought it mostly sucked. The animation is really bland and generic, it's far too long and slow, and all the attempts at being philosophical are the stupidest, most navel-gazing, surface-level shit you can imagine.

Spoiler: random shit that came to me while watching it

- The AI Kokoro is supposed to be a super intelligence that rivals Skynet yet thinks humans are the only animals that do war and use tools for violence.
- Malcolm Lee, black scientist man, is a super genius that can make his own AI but cannot think of a single good thing the entirety of humanity has ever done.
- if Kokoro is already uploaded onto the Internet, would the EMP have actually been a danger to its existence? We see it taking over every networked electronic device in Japan, so even if the main hub/'brain' was destroyed surely there'd be enough of it left to easily rebuild itself.
- if "lol i just love my family" was the answer that got Kokoro to believe in humanity -- and Malcom seems to have been sure that'd be the case -- why didn't he just give it limited access to a robotic body and let it monitor his family over the years, living beside them like Misaki?
- if Malcolm Lee is such a super genius and could easily fake everything enough to join a major company, why didn't he just join CyberDyne and sabotage Skynet or model it after Misaki?
- Why not just use Misaki's AI in the first place instead of creating Kokoro?

 

[Overly Serious]

I agree with what people are saying here about not humanising Skynet and that the unemotional, inhuman mind is part of the horror of the idea. The skull-faced reality of the Terminator under their superficial likeness to a living being works well as symbolism for the idea as well. They aren't alive. They're walking death.

Which makes it odd that my favourite interpretation of the franchise is the one that breaks this, slightly. I think the key is that the writers did so knowingly and without truly undermining the premise. The exception that proves the rule, as it were. That is of course the Sarah Connor Chronicles TV show.

Now it doesn't break it carelessly or without thought. The main terminator that pursues the Connors through the first season is superb for being cold and rational. If people have seen the episode where it sets a trap for them via an old flame and his new partner, you get to see it being elegantly and simply intelligent in a way that shows how advanced the T-888 is. But in the second season you do briefly and kind of get dialogue from Skynet itself. But it's creepy and wrong. Particularly the way it puppets another character around in order to speak through him. Like human voice and thought is like trying on a glove for it. It's a brief glimpse at a malign intelligence. You see after that it starts to learn how to use people as well. Again, in this creepy and anonymous way, like an alien intelligence learning what buttons to press.

The other is Cameron, the Terminator that is protecting John Connor. She swings from convincingly human on occasion to near Arnie-like detachment. And what makes it effective, even palatable, is that they're not making her completely more human, but more parallel. When she doesn't need it, the humanness just switches off like a light, which again is that exception that proves the rule. She's sometimes more alien because you see how good she can be at faking humanity. And as the series goes on there's an increasing ambiguity over just how aware she actually is. Like at one point, you see her remove her jacket before going in to talk to John. She can detect that the male response exists. But learning this doesn't really make her more relatable, it makes her more creepy. Or the episode where you see Skynet interrogating someone in order to better impersonate them - practical, focused and thorough.

One of my favourite episodes is "Self-Made Man", aka the library episode. All the way through you're not quite certain if she is merely manipulating someone or if on some level she is trying to claw her way towards some sort of self-awareness. It's interesting because at the end she draws a point of comparison between herself and a human character and it could be a her actually experiencing empathy or it could not. And the episode doesn't resolve it. It's one of two, maybe three, moments where she seems genuinely to be trying to understand people

But you're never quite sure.

 

[SamTheEagle]

I loved TSCC for showing the Terminators as infiltrators. It made them all the more horrifying. One episode has the heroes hacking a Terminator's chip and going through its memories. It had posed as a woman's husband, I believe to ensure she went through her project at work that would lead to Skynet. All she ever suspects is that her husband is suffering depression, but the Terminator is able to encourage her in her work. It even has sex with her, and even acts affectionate, loving with it.
And once her task is complete, it strangles her to death.
I'm also reminded of an episode where Cameron attends a dance class as part of the plot. Everyone involved in that plot is dead or about to be by the end (I think Cameron coldly leaves the innocent behind once their purpose is served), and yet Cameron starts practicing dance at the very end, alone in her room, without any logical reason to do so. Sarah's narration talks about how if the machines learn to appreciate beauty and create art, "They won't have to destroy us. They'll be us."

As a note on Cameron, I always thought that part of her influence on John came from knowing him in the future, that she knew exactly what makes him tick (and he very well may have instructed her). It's why she comes off more autistic (so to speak) when dealing with other humans.

Strongly recommend that series to anyone who hasn't watched it. When it comes to a Terminator 3 story, I'll only accept either TSCC or the video game Terminator: Resistance.

 

[Curzon Dax-sama]

I just want a movie or series about the war against Skynet itself, not these endless time travel bullshit shenanigans. If I was to do it, I'd probably make it like Band of Brothers: just a team of grunts going from one mission to take out some Skynet-factory to the next where they get ambushed by T-600s or something. Just give me the action, the why and what are not really important here.

 

[DeadwastePrime]

I just want a movie or series about the war against Skynet itself, not these endless time travel bullshit shenanigans. If I was to do it, I'd probably make it like Band of Brothers: just a team of grunts going from one mission to take out some Skynet-factory to the next where they get ambushed by T-600s or something. Just give me the action, the why and what are not really important here.

terminator resistance may interest you then. its a game but similar premise

 

[Get the rope Macaulay!]

I think someone already mentioned ITT, but a plot some anon came up with awhile back would be to see the reverse, have the robots go back in time to protect someone like say Miles, and the humans are the killers. With the added fact that the type of human that lived through the apocalypse is going to be completely different from a human that wasn't. So you'd have the robots acting like humans vs a human thats so crushed by the environment where he was raised that he acts like a deranged killer.

another point someone probably pointed out but they really shot themselves in the foot with the first 10 minutes of movie. If they kept John Connor alive and just had it be a true reboot it wouldn't have been so bad. Have the cast caught by authorities and Sarah goes "well i know someone" and its Senator Connor, I'm sure Ed in a suit would look clean enough. You just have Arnie play some soldier working security detail, "yeah my cyberdyne stock went to shit, i could have retired back in '96"

At least give the fans of the franchise a reason to watch vs doing a reboot for people that would have hated the original while also being a shittier remake of it. T2 was really the type of film that's only considered as good as it is because it was pre-CGI. All the mind blowing action scenes and effects are now so easily done it makes the film bland.

 

[Backpack Knight]

There is also Terminator Dark Fate Defiance. It is from the Terminator Dark Fate universe instead of the original for some reason. The game advertises itself as a real-time strategy but it is more of a real time tactics. It is really easy to get your units perma-killed but the robots.

Dark Fate like an Terminator Salvation RTT/RTS with a very good story and voice acting.

My favorite feature from The Sarah Connor Chronicles were the Grays. People who not only willingly joined Skynet, but taught Skynet and Terminator units how humans worked and by torturing people in like a sort of horrific classroom setting. Surprisingly, Skynet was very loyal or at least trusted the Grays enough to allow them to use a time travel device (which is usually ruinously expensive power wise).

It might of been interesting to have a dark mirror of Sarah and Terminator or John and the Terminator in the form of a Gray and their "student".

 

[marvlouslie]

Terminator was a really great first couple of movies that quickly got overshadowed by the weird time travel bullshit.