News broke late last week that a companion television series is in the early stages of development as both an accompaniment and lead up to 2015’s Terminator franchise reboot, and I for one couldn’t be more thrilled. I think. Thrilled, right? No, that’s not it; this is a different feeling. Cautiously optimistic? Unsure of how this plot could work? Hungry? Let’s try that again – news broke late last week that a companion TV series would supplement the newly-rebootedTerminator trilogy, and I for one couldn’t be more conflicted.
Before we go any further, it’s worth noting that I’ve been a loyal fan of the Terminator franchise since childhood. Much like John Connor himself, the original film predated my existence, but following some questionable parental decision-making, Judgment Day became the first “adult” movie I was lucky enough to view in its entirety. The Sega Genesis video game came next, along with the phrases “I’ll be back” and “Hasta la vista, baby” being integrated as part of my vernacular. And in an excellent example of why over-imaginative first-graders shouldn’t be allowed to watch scary, science-fiction thrillers, for the entirety of a summer, I required my dad to speak a previously-agreed-upon password every time he came to pick me up from camp to ensure that he was not in fact a terminator in disguise.
My reservations with a second television series and a filming regimen scheduled to amass a total of seven movies in the Terminator collection just in time for me to produce my own child to terrify stems from what has taken place in the twenty-two years since the release of T2. August 29, 1997 came and went without incident (believe me, I had it marked on the calendar) but in a typical big-budget Hollywood money grab – and probably also an attention grab in anticipation of Schwarzenegger’s governor campaign – 2003 brought us Rise of the Machines, a third and unnecessary chapter in the story. The sense of finality and accomplishment present at the end of T2 - the mother protecting her son, the scientist choosing the ethical route by abandoning his work, the T-800 sacrificing itself to save the future of humanity – was all but obliterated by the mere premise of another edition that takes place in the future, let alone one that falls significantly short of its [admittedly lofty] expectations. “No fate but what we make” is a recurring theme in Judgement Day, the thought that the future is yet to be written and mankind possesses all sorts of potential for good. T3, on the other hand, tells us that mankind will use that potential to blow itself up anyway.
Tonal reversal and mediocre product aside, Rise of the Machines does take a far more realistic, albeit darker, approach to a narrative heavily entrenched in time travel. Destroying the technology that produced the terminators doesn’t erase the future; it simply alters it. We don’t need to go down the rabbit hole of time travel theory and cause/effect relationships, but suffice to say, when the capacity to move forward and backward in time is an integral part of a story – and thus the alterations that take place in the past could (in theory) completely change the future or (in theory) create a different timeline altogether – the ensuing plot can be taken in pretty much any direction.
And therein lies the problem. When a story can go in multiple directions, inevitably some of those directions lead to pieces of crap.
Where both Rise of the Machines and subsequently Salvation fall flat is in their attempts to hit all the points on the blockbuster checklist – large explosions, chase sequences, special effects, recognizable leading actors, obligatory love interests – while skimping on virtually everything else. The first two movies build up the characters as people and stress the difference between the human spirit and the soulless machine, but the latter two feel so formulaic that they may as well have been created by a Skynet script-writing algorithm. They lack the sense of fear present in the original films, the juxtaposition of desperation and hope that seems essential for the characters’ survival. They feel…mechanical.
The Sarah Connor Chronicles, on the other hand, was unsuccessful for reasons that were almost completely the opposite of that of the recent films. I personally enjoyed the short-lived TV series thoroughly; the casting was great, the format allowed for character development that isn’t possible in the movies, and despite a few lulls early in the second season, there was a surprising amount of emotional depth throughout the series. Unfortunately, there are only so many ways to kill a terminator, and for all of the positives it had in the writing department, The Sarah Connor Chronicles did not have the ability to sustain the high ratings needed to hold down a primetime spot on a major network. The enthusiastic cult following was there, but the move to the Friday night death slot came nonetheless, and despite an excellent second season finale, it was Fox that said, “Hasta la vista, baby.”
So what do we have in this newly-proposed series? For one, the main writers and producers this time around are veterans of the previous television edition as well as Fringe, not to mention the well-received Thor and X-Men: First Class on the big screen. In other words, the chops are there. Because the television and film versions are supposed to “intersect with each other in surprising and dramatic ways”, one could argue that the star power and box office success from the movie trilogy could very well help boost the ratings of the TV show in a sort of symbiotic relationship. One could also argue that the movies will suck, that having a nearly-septuagenarian Arnold reprising his title role will end similarly to Harrison Ford in the latest installment of Indiana Jones. There’s already been contention from the peanut gallery that having the terminator protect Sarah Connor as a young woman disrupts the chronological continuity of the original film, but again, folks - this is a time travel story. There are a variety of directions it can go and still “make sense” in the paradoxical way that only hypothetical time travel philosophy can.
In which direction will this series go? Let’s just say I’m cautiously optimistic.
About Andrew Rose
Andrew Rose is a writer and editor for Rookerville. He also manages a travel blog for his friends and family. His book, “Seizure Salad”, is a work of fiction - not in that it is a tale of fantasy, but in that it does not actually exist.