At the beginning of "Terminator Genisys," you might be forgiven for thinking that you've somehow stumbled into a remake of the original 1980s sci-fi classic rather than a sequel to it, mainly because the set-ups to both films are virtually identical to one another.
As with the original, we have a character (Jai Courtney) from the 21st Century traveling back to the year 1984 in order to try and alter the outcome in the future. Only here, the mission is to SAVE Sarah Connor (Emilia Clarke) - mother of future freedom fighter John Connor (Jason Clarke) - NOT to destroy her. Further complicating matters - as much for the audience as for the characters - is that, once Courtney arrives at his destination in 1984, he finds that the mission itself has greatly changed due to the fact that he has somehow entered into some kind of alternate timeline where Sarah is no longer a helpless victim but a kick-ass fighter who's been raised by a friendly Terminator guardian played by an Arnold Schwarzenegger who gets a second chance at youth courtesy of the magic of CGI (at least for part of the film). Then it's off to 2017, when the alternate-reality rise of the machines and the destruction of mankind is now set to take place (in the original tale, this epochal event occurred in 1997).
If all this sounds super confusing, don't let it get you too frustrated, for that's pretty much par for the course when it comes to these head- scratching, time-bending scenarios - though I do think the screenplay may have bitten off a bit more than it can chew here, piling up irony upon irony to the point where even die-hard "Terminator" fans may begin to feel a mite affronted and manipulated by it all (and non-fans may just throw up their hands in confusion and give up on the whole thing entirely).
All that being said, "Terminator Genisys" turns out to be a considerably better action film than the majority of critics have given it credit for. The storyline, though confusing at times, is, at least, clever and imaginative; the adventure is fast-paced and the special effects reliably state-of-the-art.
But the real reason for watching "Terminator Genisys" is that it affords us the opportunity of once again watching Arnold engaging in the kind of deadpan comic shtick he perfected in this series before he ran off to serve as governor of California for a couple of terms. It's nice to have him - and his poker-faced quips - back where they belong.
As with the original, we have a character (Jai Courtney) from the 21st Century traveling back to the year 1984 in order to try and alter the outcome in the future. Only here, the mission is to SAVE Sarah Connor (Emilia Clarke) - mother of future freedom fighter John Connor (Jason Clarke) - NOT to destroy her. Further complicating matters - as much for the audience as for the characters - is that, once Courtney arrives at his destination in 1984, he finds that the mission itself has greatly changed due to the fact that he has somehow entered into some kind of alternate timeline where Sarah is no longer a helpless victim but a kick-ass fighter who's been raised by a friendly Terminator guardian played by an Arnold Schwarzenegger who gets a second chance at youth courtesy of the magic of CGI (at least for part of the film). Then it's off to 2017, when the alternate-reality rise of the machines and the destruction of mankind is now set to take place (in the original tale, this epochal event occurred in 1997).
If all this sounds super confusing, don't let it get you too frustrated, for that's pretty much par for the course when it comes to these head- scratching, time-bending scenarios - though I do think the screenplay may have bitten off a bit more than it can chew here, piling up irony upon irony to the point where even die-hard "Terminator" fans may begin to feel a mite affronted and manipulated by it all (and non-fans may just throw up their hands in confusion and give up on the whole thing entirely).
All that being said, "Terminator Genisys" turns out to be a considerably better action film than the majority of critics have given it credit for. The storyline, though confusing at times, is, at least, clever and imaginative; the adventure is fast-paced and the special effects reliably state-of-the-art.
But the real reason for watching "Terminator Genisys" is that it affords us the opportunity of once again watching Arnold engaging in the kind of deadpan comic shtick he perfected in this series before he ran off to serve as governor of California for a couple of terms. It's nice to have him - and his poker-faced quips - back where they belong.