Commenting on the Critics with Simon Columb….
| The mural on my brother’s wall |
Catherine Gee writes for The Telegraph about the upcoming Terminator 5…
We knew this was due. We had heard the rumours and clearly, with Justin Lin’s (Fast & Furious 6) excitable keenness (though he has since stepped away from the project) there was a story which had legs – a story that could realistically squeeze Arnie back in the mix.
Personally, I pushed myself to watch the four films only recently, during the last four years. After missing Terminator: Salvation at the cinema, and watching Terminator 2: Judgement Day first, I was aware that I was out of the loop (some parents entertained their children with The Terminator and RoboCop… but alas, not my Catholic folk). My elder brother, interestingly, painted a flawless mural on his bedroom wall of the robot T-800 and that image has been ingrained on my mind ever since as it marries together my love for Art and Cinema. These films are embedded in pop-culture and sequel-ising it is not just unexpected but inevitable.
The question remains how Arnold Schwarzenegger can return “as the Terminator” at the grand old age of 65. I imagine the war would’ve finished much sooner had the machines been aging politicians (then again…). Suffice to say, we have a time-travelling story that could, akin to Star Trek, return pre 1984 and change the events. Terminator: Salvation theoretically could’ve been – and should’ve been – the start of a new trilogy with Christian Bale, an acclaimed actor and even a CGI 1980’s Arnie wreaking havoc in the final act … but alas, no time-travel and being based in the future means that it is merely a war-time film that explodes and bangs on the screen in front. Somebody forgot why we liked The Terminator in the first place – something that, at the very least, Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines managed to cater to with too many self-references and parody moments to almost become a Scary Movie-type comedy.
Somewhere in this parallel universe remains a human that The Terminator was based upon (somebody who, apparently, has a Southern U.S. accent according to a deleted scene for Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines … I’ll bet they are glad it’s deleted now!) and a human who, in the world, has aged in the same manner as Schwarzenegger. This man will surely pass the baton to a new, younger model who can then turn to Big-T whenever in doubt. In fact, some good CGI might be able to destroy the Schwarzenegger-shaped T-800’s so that the entire timeline seen since 1984 is erased.
Time-travel, dangerous technology and a world at war is the basis of the series – and a moment with Edward Furlong, Linda Hamilton, Michael Biehn, Sam Worthington or even Claire Danes would be a fun way to respect the previous films. Akin to the Fast & Furious series, handled carefully, the Terminator series could be an epic franchise spanning decades and commenting on our own dependence on technology in an era whereby WikiLeaks and an invasion of privacy is regularly on the news.
Originally published June 30, 2013. Updated April 11, 2018.
