Terminator: Dark Fate (2019)
James Cameron returns back to the franchise he created by producing and co-writing the original story upon which Terminator: Dark Fate is based. Although technically the sixth feature film in the franchise, this entry ignores all of the sequels that Cameron was not involved with, meaning it picks up sometime after the second film, Terminator 2: Judgment Day, takes off. That makes this somewhat of an alternate timeline, ironically, to those other films which have generally killed off or recast the Sarah Connor character due to Linda Hamilton’s lack of involvement.
As with the other films, a protagonist and antagonist are sent back to the modern-day from a dark future using a time-travel device. The protagonist is a technologically augmented human super-soldier named Grace, who lands in Mexico City in order to try to act as a savior for humanity in the future. The antagonist is an ultra-powerful Terminator model called a Rev-9 (Gabriel Luna), whose mission it is to terminate a young female autoworker living in Mexico named Dani Ramos. Lending assistance to the resistance is the return of Sarah Connor, who sees kinship in Dani because she has been thrust into the same position as key to humans surviving the A.I. onslaught of the future. Arnold Schwarzenegger makes an appearance in the second half of the film as a T-800 model Terminator named “Carl” who has assimilated into human society after completing his mission. He helps the cause after realizing humanity is indeed worth saving.
The biggest problem with Terminator: Dark Fate is its inherent derivativeness. It’s merely a recycling of plot elements that have already been rehashed all through the Terminator franchise. The only room for originality comes from how Linda Hamilton and Arnold Schwarzenegger would be incorporated into the storyline, adding a layer of nostalgia to the otherwise rigidly mechanical plotline. The rest of the movie is a mishmash of ideas that came from the first two films, only with many more CG elements to bring the franchise into modern times from a visual effects and editing standpoint. Humans go on the run from an unstoppable killing machine looking to kill a key member of the future human resistance, and one savior comes back simultaneously to protect that human asset.
The premise was much more terrifying in the 1980s when much was not understood about artificial intelligence and the internet, wondering whether putting our fate in the hands of technology the world over would be a good idea. Now that we currently live in a wholly global network environment that permeates much of what we do, such fears are more realistically understood. The makers of Dark Fate concentrate less on making thematic statements about the future so much as just delivering the thrills and action for the fans of the original films.
While the action is impressively put together from a technical standpoint, it also feels far less weighty or significant than it did from the first two films. Those Cameron-directed originals offered a heap of practical effects and stunts to go along with the CG, enough to keep it feeling real. Dark Fate‘s visual effects are so all-consuming and occasionally blatantly obvious that the set pieces often come across like we’re watching a well-rendered video game more so than something that might happen in real life. As a consequence, we’re less rooted in the action, as every punch seems digitized and every scrape manufactured by a computer. The storyline and characters lack much in terms of depth, keeping the drama on a superficial level throughout, with none of the emotional stakes that made the two Cameron-directed films continue to hold fans over several decades.
Tim Miller, who would gain a small claim to fame as the director of the first Deadpool movie, plays it all mostly straight, only injecting attempts at humor when Schwarzenegger comes into the picture. Alas, the jokes, when they do arrive, are stale and uninspired, lost in the noise of the film’s narrative. The best we can say is that Schwarzennegger offers a comforting presence, a more talkative version of his good-guy turn in T2. Meanwhile, Linda Hamilton has continued to be hardened and grizzled by her experience, turning her into a full-blown warrior with an interior that is as tough as the one she projects outside. Emotional beats lay dormant, as members of Dani’s family get laid to waste without much effect in terms of outcry or anguish as the plot moves on.
While the older characters get a pass due to the momentum of seeing familiar faces, the only new character that isn’t forgettable is that of Grace, the augmented human, mostly because of Mackenzie Davis’s committed performance; she’s the best thing about the film, even if her character is offered little in terms of depth to keep us rooted in her plight. Dani is not interesting at all as the future savior of humanity, and the Rev-9 is a fairly generic rip-off of the T-1000, except played by a Latino actor in Gabriel Luna instead of Robert Patrick.
While it has been a long 28 years since Cameron returned to the franchise that put him on the map of creative Hollywood visionaries, it’s a disappointment that an effort he produces and had a hand in guiding would be no better than the other efforts that tried and failed to recreate the magic of The Terminator and T2. It’s just as pointless as the others, with a plotline just as convoluted (my biggest question is how the T-800 could come to exist if Sarah and John Connor had already stopped Skynet’s existence). Reality echoes the plot of the film, as the more technologically advanced the Terminator the less chance humanity has a chance of emerging in the end. As with all Terminator films, humanity wins the day, at least until the inevitable sequel, spinoff, or reboot, where we can dance the same dance one more time.
Qwipster’s grade: C
MPAA Rated: R for violence throughout, language and brief nudity
Running time: 128 min.
Cast: Mackenzie Davis, Linda Hamilton, Gabriel Luna, Natalia Reyes, Arnold Schwarzenegger
Small roles: Edward Furlong
Director: Tim Miller
Screenplay: David S. Goyer, Justin Rhodes, Billy Ray