Review of Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003) by Victor T — 09 Jul 2014

After an epic first instalment and an amazing sequel that really concluded the story of the human resistance battle against Skynet, audiences thought that they have seen the end of The Terminator franchise, until 12 years later "Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines" arrived. With only one of the main actors from the last two films returning, without Cameron's involvement and having the feeling of an unnecessary sequel, this film had all the odds against it, but despite all that, here we have Terminator 3.

15 years after John and Sara Connor supposedly prevented Judgment Day, Skynet sends a new Terminator model T-X to eliminate a lists of John Connor's men including John's future wife Kate Brewster, but not to kill John Connor himself because he now lives "off the grid". Future John sends back another Terminator model T-800 to protect himself and his future wife and assure their survival of the "inevitable" Judgment Day.

Having already witnessed the real ending of the battle against Skynet, this film story actually doesn't make sense when we connect it with the last two films and it even negates T2's entire objective of stopping Judgment Day, just because Hollywood wants more money from this franchise. The direction is not memorable at all, it fells like a generic action film. The acting is mediocre at best: Arnold's performance here is not as good as the last two films, Calire Dames really is forgettable, Nick Stahl is really bland in this role and the new T-X sometimes is cartoony instead of being scary and dangerous like the first T-800 or T-1000. Along all this, the film has pacing issues that they think will be resolve with mindless action every 10 minutes and this sequences are really not effective and painfully long.

After 2 incredible films, this is really an abysmal downfall for this franchise. Some parts are enjoyable, some people may actually like it better than I did. As a generic action film it could had been okay, but being part of the Terminator franchise, it really is big let down.