Last Saturday, we discussed how the social commentary the writers wanted to present overshadowed the plot of Terminator Genisys (2015). Basically, there were a number of things they could’ve done to provide the audience with an interesting story. But because they were so focused on turning Sarah Connor into a “strong” woman, they did not recognize the fact that she has always been a strong woman. And they never bothered to ask the question: what made Sarah Connor strong to begin with? As a result, the audience is forced to endure a disjointed and confused script.

After John Connor is revealed to be the main villain—which essentially cuts the emotional stakes of the film in half—what follows is a long and tedious series of chase scenes. They bleed together, making for a tedious rather than an exciting story.

Kyle, Sarah, and Pops run from John and the cops. They lose them for a while. Then Sarah takes them to an underground bunker, which she claims was her father’s.

But honestly, this is a multi-million—if not -billion—dollar bunker, and it makes absolutely no sense for him to have it. If Sarah’s dad was rich enough to buy this bunker, then there is no way she would’ve been a waitress in the first film.

Anyway, John finds them, and there’s another chase scene. They flip a bus. It’s cool.

Sarah, Kyle, and Pops are arrested again. JK Simmons lets them go because he knows they’re time travelers.

Then the trio goes to destroy Skynet, which is now called Genisys. After another chase scene, this time in helicopters, Sarah and Kyle reach the Genisys building, where John meets them . . . again.

Then Arnold Schwarzenegger throws a helicopter blade at John, pinning him to the wall, and guides Kyle and Sarah to the lower part of the building, where they plan to rig some charges and blow up Skynet . . . again.

Sick of their own movie?

Just as an aside, to show the profound laziness of this movie. Before the scene where Arnold pins John to the wall, the Terminator lands in a lake, after hitting a helicopter and causing it to explode. Not only is the Terminator undamaged after hitting the helicopter, Arnold isn’t even wet. I swear, at this point, the writers were sick of their own movie.

Once the trio reaches the lower part of the complex, they come across a surprise: another time machine. That’s right. Another time machine! First of all, why? John Connor, who has been sent back in time to protect Skynet after being turned into a vampire robot, has no reason whatsoever to want to build another time machine. And what does Skynet want with it? They’ve already got John Connor. All Skynet needs to do is kill Sarah and Kyle in this timeline, and the war is over. A fifth time machine is just another item the humans can capture. This makes no sense!

How many time machines?

Let’s count the number of time machines in this story so far. You have the first time machine, the one the good John Connor captured, that Skynet shouldn’t even know is captured. You have the second time machine, the one Skynet has been using to send the other Terminators back. You have the third time machine, where some unknown party has sent at least one robot back in time to protect Sarah Connor. Then you have the fourth time machine that Sarah and Pops made. And finally, there’s the time machine Skynet is building for no apparent reason. That’s five—five time machines in one movie! Where are they coming from! The fifth one isn’t finished, but conveniently the field that reacts poorly to metal is working. So guess what’s going to happen to John?

John Connor has also created pools of the liquid metal used to create the T-1000s. Again, I don’t know why he’s doing this. After a long and tedious climax, Pops and John fight. Then Pops traps John with a wrist magnet he made while the trio was staying at the conveniently affordable military bunker and carries John inside the fifth time machine.

Kyle turns on the machine, and it looks like Pops is going to sacrifice himself by holding John in place while the machine’s field activates. Sure enough, the machine explodes. But just before Pops can meet his end, he’s jettisoned from the time machine and lands in T-1000 goo. John isn’t so lucky. He’s killed in the explosion.

Kyle and Sarah, who have hidden themselves inside some kind of safe room, survive the blast but are trapped; however, Pops survived as well, only now he’s part T-1000 . . . for reasons.

I did appreciate this twist, not because it was good, but for the sake of simple novelty. It was nice to have at least one of these robots survive their mechanical altruism.

After Pops helps them escape, Kyle visits his younger self so he can tell himself that Genisys is Skynet, completing the time loop.

Then Pops, Sarah, and Kyle drive away in a rusty truck, and the movie ends.

Questions remain unanswered

I can’t get over how none of the questions raised in this film are ever answered. I mean, none of them! Only one word comes to mind to describe this: gall, pure, unadulterated Hollywood gall! Who was the third party that sent Pops? Don’t know! Who told Skynet that John had found their time machine? Don’t know! How did Skynet and the third party learn the events of the original 1984 timeline? Don’t know! Absolutely nothing is explained.

The perils of time travel

Don’t watch this movie. It’s nonsense. In my review series about the first Terminator film, I warned about the perils of using time travel in storytelling. This movie is a prime example. The Terminator franchise went from having two—maybe three—time machines for four movies to having five time machines in one. Now, the timeline is complete chaos, and I honestly have no idea how the writers of the next film were supposed to fix this.

What Terminator Salvation did to fix the third movie’s problems was brilliant, but I don’t think those writers could do anything with this. And the writers of the next one, Terminator: Dark Fate didn’t even try. Terminator Genisys was simply removed from the canon, and for good reason. Frankly, I wish more franchises would make this choice. Star Wars, anyone?

Let’s look at Dark Fate next Saturday!

Here’s last Saturday’s segment of my extended review of Genisys:

Terminator Genisys Review Part 9: When writers hate a character. Essentially, the writers hated John but knew the audience loved him, so they tried to hide their attitude; however, their contempt leaked into the script. Deprived of the natural motivations they started the story with, the characters become carbon cutouts of clichés that people have seen over and over again.

Terminator Genisys Review Part 8: The Evil Child Murders the Film The screenwriters tried to adapt the Evil Child theme from horror films without allowing enough time to build the needed suspense. Making John Connor a villain also removes Sarah’s motivation to fight Skynet. Without that, she’s just another generic tough girl fighting an army of robots.

The earlier columns I have written on Terminator Genisys (2015) are all linked here:

Terminator Genisys Review, Part 7: Now John Connor is the Bad Hat. Why don’t Hollywood screenwriters understand the importance of what the audience thinks is at stake? The way writers make fantasy engaging — and sci-fi is a form of fantasy — is by anchoring the hard-to-grasp concepts with familiar ideas.