Perhaps the most forgettable of these characters is, alas, our protagonist, John Connor. Put simply, Salvation has bold concepts and an interesting tone but the characters just aren’t all that compelling. Like last year’s Solo: A Star Wars Story, many of the best parts of Salvation come from bold choices to try meant to separate itself from its predecessors.īut also like Solo, Salvation stumbles the most when in terms of an undercooked screenplay. This means most of the characters (save for protagonist John Connor and Anton Yelchin’s Kyle Reese) are new creations that haven’t been seen before in the series, another welcome way Salvation sets itself apart from its predecessors. Rather, Salvation takes the viewer into a post-Judgment Day world, one whose morose atmosphere hasn’t been found in any of the Terminator sequels save for the ending of Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines.
For one thing, it’s the lone post- T2 movie that isn’t just trying to redo the story or setting of T2. Those kinds of atmospheric moments are just one way in which Terminator Salvation is able to stand out in the pantheon of Terminator sequels. Salvation has bold concepts and an interesting tone but the characters just aren’t all that compelling. As Avengers: Endgame recently showed, focusing a summer blockbuster on characters grappling with surviving a horrific tragedy can lead to some interesting storytelling and the best parts of Salvation lean on this conceit. The somber tone in Salvation takes the post-9/11 influences of the American blockbuster phenomenon of the 2000s to their zenith by having the grimness of Salvation stem from characters still reeling from a massive tragedy (Judgment Day being the stand-in for 9/11 here) that totally upended existence as the characters know it. Many blockbusters from this era tend to come off as grating rather than harrowing, but there are some undercurrents in Terminator Salvation’s specific morose tone that are tied to real-world events and lend some (intentionally or otherwise) substance to this tone that makes it more agreeable.
The Terminator series always had prominent dark elements to it but Terminator Salvation takes advantage of the grim n’ gritty era of Hollywood blockbuster filmmaking to realize a post-Judgment Day world that’s wall-to-wall despondency. There are no comic relief characters to be found, no quippy lines emerge in the screenplay and misery is the de facto status of what’s left of the world. Terminator Salvation was no exception to this trend: the whole movie takes place in a landscape devoid of bright colors, whose ground seemingly consists of solely grey-hued pebbles. Arriving in May 2009 four years after Batman Begins, the gritty reboot sensation had taken hold of Hollywood like a dog sinking its teeth into a chew toy. Perhaps more than any of the other 21 st-century Terminator movies, Terminator Salvation feels very much like a product of the blockbuster era it was released in. (Yup, the McG one.) Generously, you could argue that it’s the best, most interesting and challenging post- Terminator 2 entry in this series, but its conceptual promise just isn’t fulfilled, eclipsed by post- Avatar franchise-building and viral meltdowns from its star. With the marketing for that new installment now begun, it is time to take a moment to recognize a Terminator movie celebrating its tenth anniversary this month – Terminator Salvation.
We’ll be getting our fourth attempt to reinvigorate the Terminator franchise in November with Terminator: Dark Fate, which will bring Linda Hamilton’s Sarah Connor back into the saga. Something else each of them shared? Underwhelming box office results that ensured none of them could end up spawning the numerous sequels their producers were hoping for. In the 21 st century, there have been three separate attempts to get the Terminator saga back up and running again, each of them carrying different creative teams and storytelling ambitions. Much like Kyle Reese suggested of his titular nemesis, Terminator movies “will not stop”, presumably until we’re all dead.