Review of Terminator: Dark Fate (2019) by Kai82 — 27 Mar 2021

For itself a good movie despite some flaws. What destroys the movie is that it is a hard reboot of the franchise. Yes you read it correctly. All previous movies are meaningless in less than 5 minutes even the good first 2 (Rest is spoiler free).

Many people have quit watching the movie here and will give a 0/10 and I will not deny that they have a valid point. It was a mayor complaint by some critiques and most fans. Often it is credited as “The Last Jedi” of the Terminator franchise.

I would give a 8/10 without it. In hindsight we could have predicted it as there was a certain character missing in the trailers and no one in the shown cast could fill the role. Increasingly there were rumors that it will ignore the divisive former movies and continue the story from Terminator 2 which is technically accurate.

It was an insane decision to pull this off and the box office and fan reactions prove it. I must again say that it is a good movie with characters that I enjoy but it is hard to get as much invested as to the other characters we cared for decades.

As remark: People always like long established characters more than new once especially when the new characters could not shine before such drastic events. After the reboot inducing events the story starts after a time gap in Mexico City 2020.

A new Terminator is send back in time to kill Dani Ramos and a female soldier is send back to stop him. It is the standard formula for the franchise and the story develops as before with a few twists.

Again I say I like the story but it has a few logical flaws that I cant go into details because of spoilers. Lets say the first 2 movies of the franchise made clear what would happen as follow up of a certain event that happened here at the beginning (And it did not happen).

It lacks the consequences and with that weakens the menace. For the actors I have only praise and I blame the flaws on the script. Arnold Schwarzenegger returns in his signature role and gets some new facets.

I really like the development but be warned it confused some fans and became a WTF moment for them. Linda Hamilton returns as Sarah Connor and delivers the best performance in the movie. Mackenzie Davis as Grace comes close to the best performance.

Sadly the script weakens her performance but like I said I wont hold it against her. Natalia Reyes as Dani is good and delivers her role. Gabriel Luna as Gabriel / Rev 9 is excellent. Menacing and ruthless as he / his role has to be.

A great cast and it is sad that they wont get the credit they deserve as the reboot overshadows everything by far. The visuals and special effects are as always remarkable. It is a thing each movie in the franchise does right.

The action sequences are great too and I like how they use Graces special condition to get more out of it;-). Overall this enters the realm of good movies were a single (really stupid) plot choice ruined the experience.

After the reboot inducing element you cant enjoy it as fan as you just feel the loss and potentially anger. It is a shame but cant be changed. I don't know how this could be accepted as the backlash would be unavoidable and clearly foreseeable.

I think they need an idea checker that stops such wasteful mistakes.