terminator: salvation

Time travel can be confusing stuff.

In the original Terminator film, the terminator in question was sent back in time to try to kill Sarah Connor. The basic jist for anyone that doesn't know (is there anyone?) is that in the future, Skynet, a military computer, had started a nuclear apocalypse, in order to wipe out humanity.

Humanity had been nearly wiped out, but the survivors were rallied into a resistance that, led by one John Connor, had turned the tide and were winning. On the very eve of their victory, Skynet had therefore sent back the terminator - an 'infiltrator' unit that was a humanoid machine clad in real human tissue - to try to kill Sarah, the mother of John and thereby prevent its defeat.

The problem with this of course is it could potentially create a paradox. Paradox's are the big problem with time travel. I mean, if Skynet only sent the terminator back in time because it was about to be defeated by John Connor, then if it succeeds, John Connor doesn't exist and it doesn't loose, so it doesn't have any reason to send back the terminator.

But there was an ace in the hole - it was a James Cameron film. So he did two things. First off, he focused the film on the relationship between Connor and Kyle Reese, who was the guy Connor sent back to protect his mother. So despite being a science fiction, action-heavy chase movie, it was also pretty much a love story.

Second, he made it so that the terminator was actually part of the original past. So, for example, it turned out that Kyle Reese was actually John Connor's father. Now really this is still paradoxical, but it's sufficiently plausible that you don't mind.

And then, in a sense, the problems started. The terminator was a hit and so a sequel was made.

Luckily, the sequel was again made by Cameron, so it worked, but the problem was, the first film wrapped itself up so well that they effectively had to tweak the story of the first in order to fit the second in.

The best example of this is that we're told at the beginning that oh, no, actually Skynet sent back two terminators - one to try to kill Sarah, the other to try to kill the young John Connor. And so the paradoxes start to eat your brain. I mean, why didn't Skynet send back a veritable army or terminators, or both terminators to kill Sarah Connor, if it could send 2 back?

But those aren't the bigger questions, the bigger question is that now, where the first film wrapped itself up by saying that the events of the film were integral to the events of the future, the second changes that. It's revealed, for example, that Cyberdyne systems got hold of the remains of the first terminator and, by retro-engineering it, they've gotten much further ahead than they were before.

Similarly, you get a weird contradiction that John Connor sends back a T800 to protect his younger self, because that's what he as an adult remembers happening. And yet, at the same time, things are being changed. Indeed, the whole end of the movie depicts them properly changing things in order to prevent the whole holocaust.

And yet it works because again you've got Cameron helming it, and there's a deft focus on the relationships of the characters as well as the action and the chase.

But T2 was an even bigger hit that the first and there was therefore a desire to make a third film. And Cameron wasn't to be involved because, quite rightly, his take was that he'd wrapped up the story he wanted to tell in the first two films.

So what to do?

Well, what they ended up doing was a kinda "re-instate the original future" film. And things get very confused, to say the least. One of the big problems of course is that the sequels are often trying to either retro-fit the preceding films or twist the story so that they can exist. But in doing so they break both the previous films and themselves.

So now, for example, even though the future was changed, the Skynet of this, presumably alternate future, must still send back the original two terminators, even though it presumably has access to information that proves these two attempts failed. But it also sends back a new terminator to try to wipe out the heads of the resistance.

I mean, when you really sit down and think about the plotting, it's really messed up, and yet I actually thought the third film worked on some levels. It maintained the central ideas of time travel, terminators, chase films and also, crucially, the focus on the relationships between the characters. So, although it doesn't make sense, it still basically works.

Wow, that's a hell of a lot of words already, isn't it? And I've not even mentioned the fourth film yet :/.

So, what did I think about the fourth film?

Well, it was okay.

One of the problems of course was that at the end of the third film, they left it so that judgement day was happening. In other words, the franchise had now effectively caught up to its own future. So one of the basic plot mechanisms of the previous films - time travel - wouldn't really make any sense in the fourth one.

Also, it's a little difficult to introduce new relationships, because they've already fixed John Connor's and Kyle Reese's relationships. As such, they introduce a new character, and, indeed, it's really this new character who is the central character in the film. And unfortunately, while they do give him a sort of romantic relationship and a sort of person to protect, it's just plain not as well done in the previous films. For one thing, of course, they're separate people, so it's diluted.

Well, kinda, there's also a lot of focus on Connor, but in a bit of a weird way. I mean, there's a suggestion from some of the taglines and plot summaries that some people don't believe he's really going to be this great leader. However, no one during the film actually says that to him.

At one point he meets the heads of the resistance, but although they're pissed off at him, it's for a perfectly sensible reason, not because he's some supposedly Christ-like saviour and they don't believe it. Indeed, they actually end up trusting him with a really important mission.

And that kind of oddness pervades the movie generally. Towards the end, Connor ends up going toe-to-toe with the

There are plenty of plotholes too. At one point the machines capture the younger Kyle Reese and put him in a prison cell. Why they simply put him in a prison cell and don't just kill him is not explained.

I mean, okay, they need Connor to think he's captive, but they don't really need him to be alive, do they? Or at least, once Reece's presence has lured Connor in, they could kill him straight away. But they don't - they wait until much later.

And it's not even clear why they're collecting humans. They effectively capture Reese by accident, because they're collecting humans, but there's no explanation as to what they're doing with them.

But despite that it's still okay as a film. There's some really good action stuff, the effects are good and it has a frenetic pace that pulls you along despite all the stuff that doesn't make sense on further inspection.

That really is a lot of words just to come to the point that it's "okay", isn't it?