Terminator: Salvation

[Velorath]

Hm. If they actually start to explore the meanings of 'human', 'sentience' and what it is to be 'alive' this movie could turn out to be quite good indeed.

?

What don't you get?

Whether or not you're being sarcastic it would seem.  I kinda see where he's coming from given that what you just said could have easily been used to describe the Matrix trilogy as well.

[NowhereMan]

At the same time it could raise all those sorts of questions and explore the issues without actually having the characters sit down and monologue about them in the same way Crime and Punishment deals with questions concerning human freedom, justice and morality without being a socratic dialogue. If they pulled it off it could be an awesome action movie with some genuine depth to it beyond what the original Terminator movies achieved. Which I think is why there was confusion over the sarcasm.

Also: Connor's breaking the cycle could create a Paradox that destroys existence. P4rad0x!!11! Fuck his own life over and restart Judgement Day or give up entirely?

[Riggswolfe]

Also: Connor's breaking the cycle could create a Paradox that destroys existence. P4rad0x!!11! Fuck his own life over and restart Judgement Day or give up entirely?

I was using Back to the Future logic. Connor would fade out while playing Johnny B. Goode at the victory celebration!

[NowhereMan]

That's an ending worth watching! Arnie could appear just to give him the thumbs up as they fade

[lamaros]

At the same time it could raise all those sorts of questions and explore the issues without actually having the characters sit down and monologue about them in the same way Crime and Punishment deals with questions concerning human freedom, justice and morality without being a socratic dialogue. If they pulled it off it could be an awesome action movie with some genuine depth to it beyond what the original Terminator movies achieved. Which I think is why there was confusion over the sarcasm.

Also: Connor's breaking the cycle could create a Paradox that destroys existence. P4rad0x!!11! Fuck his own life over and restart Judgement Day or give up entirely?

I'd rather read a Socratic dialogue before reading the last bit of Crime and Punishment again. In fact, I have. There are lots of fun Socratic dialogues to read, while parts of C&P are about as explicit and monologue-y as you can get. You know this!

I'm all for concepts of all sorts being entertained in films, but when it comes to a film like Terminator I can't see how you can have explicit exploration of these issues side by side it being an entertaining action film without it being a giant clusterfuck.

I mean imagine the directior coming out and saying "this film isn't going to be anything like the other Terminator films, we're going to focus on exploring what it means to human and sentient instead". You know that is a recipie for suck.

[NowhereMan]

Alright that wasn't a great set of examples, say more like Dickens' social messages, you can inform people of the plight of the poor without writing a pamphlet. The issues are there but it doesn't have to be handled by constantly talking about them. Hell the first Matrix film had some deep elements while still being an awesome action movie. With all the stuff they've done in the series I get the feeling that this isn't going to be an attempt to recreate the first films and I think making something that raises some interesting issues could be awesome.

[lamaros]

Alright that wasn't a great set of examples, say more like Dickens' social messages, you can inform people of the plight of the poor without writing a pamphlet. The issues are there but it doesn't have to be handled by constantly talking about them. Hell the first Matrix film had some deep elements while still being an awesome action movie. With all the stuff they've done in the series I get the feeling that this isn't going to be an attempt to recreate the first films and I think making something that raises some interesting issues could be awesome.

I think the Matrix films are actually a good point here. First one was pretty good action film with interesting underlying themes. Second one I havn't seen, but going off the third it probably also ended up going into the "fuck making an action film, lets get exploring the deep shit n stuff" and ended up comming across like first year philosophy students who think they know everything because they just read two pages from Descartes.

Which is to say I think the themes are inherent in the genre and 'world' allready but that an explicit attempt to foreground them would just show the paucity of depth. It's better to hint and keep it on the frienges and let people bring in whatever depth they want rather than try and force something on them and come across shallow.

Maybe it's just me... but I found watching the third Matrix film painful, and would rather T: S be fun.

[Ironwood]

It wasn't just you.

[stray]

The Matrix sequels were a failure because they stopped being about the Matrix. The second one has some good action scenes though (the highway chase is top notch really) and Monica Bellucci.

[Ironwood]

Show, don't tell.

[stray]

That should be a rule for all movies. If you can show something, then do that as much as possible. Even in a drama. Leave all of the exposition/subtext wankery to critics.


What I'm commenting also though is that the Zion element was very boring. It should barely be shown, let alone told. The Matrix stories are more fun when you're bending the rules of action scenes.

[Samwise]

Matrix 2 also had a cameo from Stoney Burke, one of my favorite Berkeley characters.

[Rishathra]

Show, don't tell.

Was that an general expression of what do do in a movie or a request?

I'll pretend it was the latter.



I suppose technically this wasn't even in the Matrix, but here it is anyways.

[Ironwood]

lol.

The general Cinemaey one.

But the pics are nice.

[DLRiley]

Hm. If they actually start to explore the meanings of 'human', 'sentience' and what it is to be 'alive' this movie could turn out to be quite good indeed.

ghost in the shell? errrr...no.

[schild]

Hm. If they actually start to explore the meanings of 'human', 'sentience' and what it is to be 'alive' this movie could turn out to be quite good indeed.

ghost in the shell? errrr...no.

Ghost in the shell sucked because of the writing. Also, it just wasn't good.

Edit: I'd rather the tv show explore this bit by bit anyway. When I go to a Terminator movie, I expect visual amazingness.

[stray]

That, and I prefer it to be a bit scary. First Terminator is basically a horror with a sci-fi theme, like Aliens. T2 and T3 I guess got a little more lighthearted, but I guess they were basically chase movies as well. Not sure what angle you can pull that's "horror-ish" in this setting, but I'd like to see some of that. All this shit about AI or time travel are just sidenotes. It's a horror.

Sarah Connor: Are you saying it's from the future?
Kyle Reese: One possible future. From your point of view... I don't know tech stuff.
Sarah Connor: Then you're saying you're from the future, too. Is that right?
Kyle Reese: Right.
Sarah Connor: Right.

Dr. Silberman: Why didn't you bring any weapons, something more advanced? Don't you have, uh, ray guns? Show me a piece of future technology.
Kyle Reese: You go naked. Something about the field generated by a living organism. Nothing dead will go.
Dr. Silberman: Why?
Kyle Reese: I didn't build the fucking thing!

Heh. So yeah, Kyle doesn't give a fuck to explain it. I like that.

What's he really want to say though?

You still don't get it, do you? He'll find her! That's what he does! It's *all* he does! You can't stop him! He'll wait for you! He'll reach down her throat and tear her fuckin' heart out!

[Ironwood]

Agree with all of that, good post.

Bear in mind, though, that even the trailer seems to have the 'scary robot' factor down.

I hope it's good.

[SurfD]

I kind of like where they seem to be going with this.

Sort of brings the entire series of terminator movies to a close by closing the loop to complete the never ending vicious circle of temporal paradox.

- Human race creates sky-net to keep human race from wiping itself out.
- Sky-net circumvents 3laws, decides best way to stop humans from killing humans is to wipe them all out as a 3rd party instead of trying to protect them from themselves.
* Mankind's own creation turns on it

- Sky-net, in an effort to build better machines fpr killing and / or impersonating humans starts creating nearly sentient terminators?
- one of which, goes all "self-aware" on it, and decides to bite the hand that feeds it?
* Sky-net's own creation turns on it?

[schild]

- Sky-net, in an effort to build better machines fpr killing and / or impersonating humans starts creating nearly sentient terminators?
- one of which, goes all "self-aware" on it, and decides to bite the hand that feeds it?
* Sky-net's own creation turns on it?

Largely irrelevant since we know they can reprogram the terminators.

Really, this movie will be great because it's the first time they're not reprogramming and trying to change fate but rather striking straight at the root of the problem in the present day (well, their present day).

At the same time, it leaves room for the TV show to get crazy assuming it doesn't get canned. I wouldn't be surprised if the infiltrator bot in the movie was actually sending information back without knowing it and was programmed to think it was human. Really the best way to infiltrate the humans in that war, make one that doesn't even know what it is. Of course, after they find out, well, that becomes the crux of the movie now doesn't it?

[SurfD]

- Sky-net, in an effort to build better machines fpr killing and / or impersonating humans starts creating nearly sentient terminators?
- one of which, goes all "self-aware" on it, and decides to bite the hand that feeds it?
* Sky-net's own creation turns on it?

Largely irrelevant since we know they can reprogram the terminators.

I dont know, reprogramming a terminator and changing its directives, vs having an actual self aware terminator, fully sentient in every sense of the word, which believes it is human are two totally different things i think.

[schild]

I was referring to the SkyNet's own creation turns on it. Since humans can already make the creation turn on it's master. Much like the robots make themselves turn on their master (humans) through self-reprogramming or whathave you.

The second part that you snipped talked more about the self-aware part and I'm not sure why you snipped it.

[DraconianOne]

Largely irrelevant since we know they can reprogram the terminators.

I dont know, reprogramming a terminator and changing its directives, vs having an actual self aware terminator, fully sentient in every sense of the word, which believes it is human are two totally different things i think.
[/quote]

I'd argue that a terminator is self-aware. It knows what it is, it understands what it means when it uses a personal pronoun, it is capable of learning (depending on which way the switch is set), it can make autonomous decisions and can understand the impact of its actions on itself, on others and the future (evidenced by the Arnie-bot insisting that it be terminated in molten metal at the end of T2). It also learns to understands emotion ("I know now why you cry. But it is something I can never do.")

Having a terminator believe that it's human (which is suggested in the new trailer) is entirely new to this series. Ontology and Cartesian Doubt have been covered before in Blade Runner and The Matrix though so it will be interesting to see how far they go in T:S beyond paying it lip-service.

[Geki]

I think the concept of a sentient terminator that is unaware that he is in fact a terminator is interesting.  It could be a spy/timebomb from skynet or it could genuinely be a renegade unit, etc.  The problem I have is the time travel device.  It's been used in every movie repeatedly.  It would seem since this is supposed to take place in 2019 that an advanced model that uses literal harvested flesh/organs is way way more advanced than the current models being fought by the resistance.  It looks as if they're fighting early models (600-700) most of which don't have any kind of flesh to disguise themselves, or they're bad versions (look like rotting zombies, etc.).  It would seem that the new model must come from the future which I was really hoping they'd get away from that theme with this movie. 

I just want to see the resistance fighting robots in a regular timeline.  I want to find out why the hell John Connor is so super wicked awesome that all of humanity is rallied behind him and is willing to go back in the past to make sure he's born, etc.

I really don't want to see a remake of the new BSG

[schild]

I want to find out why the hell John Connor is so super wicked awesome

Well, that would be because he's the batman.

[Geki]

I want to find out why the hell John Connor is so super wicked awesome

Well, that would be because he's the batman.

The one thing skynet didn't calculate... 

[HaemishM]

I didn't get the idea from the trailers that the new terminator model was from the future. It would make sense given the previous movies reliance on time travel, but I never got that impression from the trailer.

[Wasted]

John Conner is so wicked awesome because Skynet conveniently sends back in time each new model for him to train on and prepare him for the war before Judgment day ever happens.

[UnSub]

The Terminator series has suffered a bit from the "and so we send through our best merciless killing machine through time, and then a more advanced prototype goes next!" plotting. All I can think is that the writers are going to screw up yet another time travel story by continually moving the goal posts.

[stray]

John Connor can't be that awesome if everyone keeps getting raped in his timeline so much to the point that he decides he can only win by changing the past.

[Tebonas]

To be fair the original Skynet had to desperately change the past to survive, so the original John Connor likely was that awesome!

[Riggswolfe]

To be fair the original Skynet had to desperately change the past to survive, so the original John Connor likely was that awesome!

Except there was no "original" John Connor. Skynet caused him to exist by its own actions.

[MrHat]

To be fair the original Skynet had to desperately change the past to survive, so the original John Connor likely was that awesome!

Except there was no "original" John Connor. Skynet caused him to exist by its own actions.

Now I'm confused.

[Hindenburg]

Bound to happen in any plot involving time traveling.

[kaid]

Yup fun with time traveling would there be a John Conner who could kick the robots ass if they were not sending robots back in time to try and kill him and in the process manage to get him trained and motivated to learn all he can to kick robots ass. Self fulfilling prophecies for the win!