Well, I've seen the new Terminator movie ("Dark Fate") ... ... ... I'm not even sure if I can say it was the "least naff" of the four most recent films.
I liked some elements/ideas - obviously to have Sarah Connor back was good (e.g. when she first turns up firing that massive shotgun), but I despised the opening scene:
I also liked another idea that related to Arnie's T-800:
But Christ on a bike, the whole 'Carl the drapery man' idea was asinine and just silly for the sake of being silly. Have him be a mechanic/repairman for crying out loud. All that drapery talk was stupid, verging on "talk to the hand" (T3) at times. Enough with trying to undercut the T-800 with silly 'humour', alright?
The Rev-9, or whatever it was called, was kinda interesting - particularly that idea of it being able to split into two parts, the base endoskeleton and the sort of liquid metal part - but they made it too silly at times (all those tentacle spikes).
There wasn't so much of the 'super Terminator' bullshit (e.g. when the T-800 gets its arm ripped off), but the new bad Terminator was basically a super villain. The last few movies just seem like they're too lazy to write situations which simultaneously give the humans a fair chance while also providing enough tension and challenge.
I couldn't be doing with the 'augment' idea, either ... just felt too silly, especially with this metabolism weakness they chucked in ... not much cop if it can only fight for a brief time before collapsing, eh? That's who you send back to protect you? Hmmm...
There was also some unnecessary wokery going on, too - the attempt to 'hide' who Dani was 'because she wasn't ready to know yet' was lame as all get out, and you could tell almost immediately that she was a resistance leader (and you certainly knew it was her during that flashback where they're getting her brought in on a stretcher). Indeed, the "She's John" bit was thuddingly clunky and cringe as hell, as was the whole thing of Sarah just assuming that Dani was another mother of a MALE resistance leader (low-key "yuck, men" tone drizzled in for good measure by the writers). It was a pretty pointless attempt to hide something from the audience that we could already guess quite quickly, and there was no proper reason to hide it from any of the characters in the film.
Another thing that irked me - the opening action sequences - so the Terminators aren't even bothered to keep a low profile? And another thing - both drop in from a high point, for what reason? To look cool? They managed to drop them in at ground level before, so why can't they manage it now? Stupid. And to do it so publicly as well. Why? I liked the 'freezing of the area' just before the arrival idea, but beyond that it was cringey.
Also, a lot fo the set pieces just felt like a case of 'what big shit can we do now?'. It just felt like a lot of stuff happening. None of it really gelled together, for me at least. The whole movie kinda felt a bit redundant. It threw away all of the previous franchise history just so it could, what, do almost the same exact thing again? But with a gender-swapped resistance leader and different designs for this "Legion" A.I. junk.
T2 is where it actually ends. They won. The end.
You could have done a future war movie that tied into the continuity, in a Rogue One-like fashion, (e.g. the smashing of Skynet's defense grid and the mission to send Kyle Reese back in time), or you could just have a general future war-set movie that doesn't include any references to the established good guy characters (Sarah and John Connor) and getting caught in that loop. It's an impossible place to put yourself. Make no changes and you're just beholden to the established narratives of previous (and superior) films. Make changes and you'll inevitably shit all over what came before.
You've got this big scale future war and there's what, no other really important people who Skynet could seek to snuff out? It was only John Connor ... he had no super important hierarchy of supporters with a range of skills who attacked Skynet in different ways?
So yeah ... a couple of good ideas, but far too much CGI, too many dodgy physics moments, a poor story filled with stolen and re-heated ideas that come out mis-shapen and unappetising. There's no twice as many naff Terminator movies as there are good Terminator movies! 
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Originally Posted by Neil
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