TERMINATOR GENISYS: A New Low For The Terminator Franchise

Sequels sell like hotcakes. Filmgoers cannot be faulted for summing up today’s film industry simply as that. We don’t really need to draw up any charts or statistics to figure out that half of the films in 2015 consist of sequels. This year alone, a record for the highest-grossing opening for a motion picture previously held by 2012’s The Avengers was broken with Jurassic World’s $208.8 million opening, which, surprise surprise, is another sequel. By those standards, it is just some mundane news when Paramount quickly jumped onto the sequel bandwagon in putting the protracted fifth installment to the sci-fi classic Terminator into production.

Titled Terminator Genisys, many hoped it would be the sign of the franchise going back on track after the underwhelming Terminator Salvation six years ago. Despite having the much-needed fresh bloods like Christian Bale, Sam Worthington and Bryce Dallas Howard, to name some, Salvation lacked the original’s suspense, gritty action and certainly Arnold Schwarzenegger’s deadpan charm. Surely, with the ex-Governor of California going bionic one last time in Genisys, fingers crossed it is the franchise’s first step towards recovery.

One thing is for certain: Terminator Genisys will not outlive the first two Terminator films’ legacy. With briskly-paced action coming aplenty, but bare in suspense, Schwarzenegger’s triumphant return in Genisys as T-800 sadly sinks the once-revered franchise towards another low.

“Come with me if you wanna live”

For those who remembered 1984’s Terminator fondly, then Terminator Genisys’s narrative won’t stray too far from it. Basically, a post-apocalyptic Earth in 2029 sees humans (Resistance) and machines (Skynet) involved in a battle of seismic proportions towards supremacy. Against all odds, a makeshift Resistance army led by John Connor (Jason Clarke) conquers the Skynet-controlled machines. In response to the defeat, Skynet sends the T-800 machine (Arnold Schwarzenegger) back in time to assassinate John’s mother Sarah Connor (Emilia Clarke) as a way to undo his victory. At the same time, John sends his right-hand man Kyle Reese (Jai Courtney) to safeguard Sarah against the T-800’s threat. So far, it all sounds familiar, right?

Only this time, there’s a twist in the tale. Kyle stumbles across an alternate universe of the year 1984, where Sarah has already defeated her assassinator and in the process, befriended an aging T-800-shaped machine. Together, the trio must travel across time to stop Skynet from going into operation with its Genisys program, whilst evading the hordes of Skynet machines coming after them. As always, the trio’s quest would soon meet its toughest obstacles when Skynet finally unleashes their most lethal weapon: John Connor.

1984

James Cameron is Terminator. On-screen, the titular character is Arnold Schwarzenegger, but on a narrative sense it is one fact that we cannot dispel. After all, his personal nightmare formed the basis of such an overarching man v. machine mythology. Still, the nightmares were so well-crafted narratively that it left the dreamer himself being the only qualified storyteller able to expand its universe.

By then, Terminator post-Cameron era has been bogged down by a series of alternate retellings. Claimed as a new take to the sci-fi classic, recent Terminator releases clearly lacked Cameron’s world-building skill. Even with new chief storytellers Laeta Kalogridis and Patrick Lussier on board for the fifth Terminator film, Genisys’ premise has not seen a shift in this trend. An alternate retelling in spirit, Genisys simply rips the leaf off the original’s narrative from root to branch. Whether the back-to-basics approach means an in-depth expansion of the 1984 universe, it is for us to judge. Sadly, but logically, Kalogridis and Lussier are no James Cameron. Cameron’s special craft brought the killer robot into life, while the duo’s reliance on nostalgia crashed and burned in such helter-skelter fashion.

An example of that can be seen from the inclusion of multiple villains in the narrative. On the one hand, ask any avid Terminator fan what their favorite villain in the series are, and names like T-800 and T-1000 would pop up. However, their roles as secondary villains this time around seemed underused, even to a certain extent, unnecessary. We already know John Connor would be the main villain, but the character’s belated introduction as that by the second act eventually render those iconic characters irrelevant. Throughout the years, Terminator’s villains thrived from being that lone wolf presence. With that in mind, going against the numerical rule, one is actually better than three.

Robots and Explosions

It is no rocket science that The Terminator would not be Terminator without the titular character itself. It seemed like just yesterday that the Terminator follow-up in Terminator 2: Judgment Day was the landmark film in CGI technology development. Almost two decades onwards, watching Judgment Day over and over again and reminiscing the moments when the shape shifting T-1000 wandered menacingly through dark places in its liquid, razor-armed form or snapping at T-800’s heels, they still take us filmgoers’ breath away in terms of action and suspense. A copycat scene of that is made present in Genisys, this time with Korean actor Lee Byung-Hun instead of Robert Patrick. Certainly, Lee tries his utmost best and the special effect to pull that stunt is still as mesmerizing, but the film’s overall reliance on this rather than shock factor makes even such scenes lethargic the second time around.

The same can be said about the action sequences. In the past, the Terminator films live and breathe through Cameron’s restrained approach, building the moment up dramatically before the big bang. However, billed as the conventional summer flick, that approach gives way to the more blood-and-thunder approach. The special effect-driven opening of the Resistance taking down the Skynet machines alone sets that particular tone throughout. To that end, director Alan Taylor truly delivers. Sadly, as in the old saying, “all bark, no bite”, Genisys comes across as all action, but no suspense.

Old but not obsolete

To the international eyes, Terminator would not be the global phenomenon it is today without Arnold Schwarzenegger. It is true that the Austrian-born honcho remains the franchise’s poster boy, but the idea of seeing an aging robot walking around town with white hair, sagging skin and more fat seems like a laughable prospect to begin with. In contrast, Schwarzenegger’s return as T-800 can be best reflected with a quote from Genisys itself: “Old but not obsolete.” At the age of 68, the ex-Governor still has enough brawns and deadpan humor in his old man exterior to mark the good-guy cyborg’s final rodeo in such glorious fashion. Other than him, Jason Clarke is another stand-out as John Connor. The Australian’s brief appearance as Earth’s savior John Connor would not be the most memorable if compared to his villainous take on that character. Just like the other main characters, he is involved in the thick of the action. More than that, his creepy tone and gesture in those moments give him the edge over the others, Schwarzenegger aside.

Which is why for John’s parents, Emilia Clarke and Jai Courtney’s take as Sarah Connor and Kyle Reese fails to elevate beyond action heroine/hero pin-ups. For starters, the couple will not match Linda Hamilton and Michael Biehn’s flawless portrayals of the same characters. Their athletic presences when doing the physical stunts really shine through, but unlike Clarke’s John Connor, their back-story moments fell flat. Also, their brief love chemistry seems rather half-hearted.

Conclusion

There is a saying that maintaining a success is the hardest. Terminator 2: Judgment Day unarguably dispelled such a statement back in 1992. Almost two decades onwards, Terminator’s fifth installment Genisys doesn’t follow the same track. On one side, Arnold Schwarzenegger shows that the T-800 still has some life in him at age 68. Still, in sacrificing suspense for all the action-packed chaos, all the technical achievements in Genisys go into such tension-free waste.

What did you think of Terminator Genisys? How does it compare to the other post-Cameron Terminator installments?

https://youtu.be/62E4FJTwSuc

(top image source: Paramount Pictures)