James Cameron Announced His Return to Terminator

Ditto. Time to let this franchise end.

 

I prefer to have the choice to watch, or not, than have fans telling people to not make a movie, leaving no opportunity at all. You're not required to go see it or pay for its production.

 

It's still my damn opinion. I'm sorry if you cannot deal with the fact that my favorite TERMINATOR movie isn't yours. Then again, I guess I'm really not that sorry.

 

True but after three failures in a row its obvious more are choosing to stay home.

 

I find the destructive mindset more dissatisfying than creative failure.

 

Not about your opinion. And why are you making this a personal attack? You misunderstood what somebody said and I tried to clear it up for you.

 

Because you attacked first and disguised it with humor.

 

No I did not. I think you're confusing me with the poster who used the famous film quote. You're getting so tied up in your anger you can't see that I was trying to help you out.

 

Here's the easiest way to wrap up Terminator once and for all:

Kill whoever invented time travel, before they can invent it.

Since Skynet's entire existence is dependent upon time travel, that would cause the whole house of cards to come crashing down. If time travel never exists, then Skynet will never exist, and Judgment Day will never happen.

You can tell that I preferred the Future Coda ending to T2.

 

The Terminator and T2 are two of my all-time favorite movies, so my heart is saying *in Arnold's voice* GIVE IT TO ME... NOW!! Especially with Cameron involved in 'any' way. But my brain is saying that maybe the ship has sailed for the Terminator franchise. The domestic box office returns Genisys were terrible, and if it weren't for the world-wide returns, the movie would have flopped. My point, I'm just not sure there's any interest in Terminator anymore. At least not as far as being a blockbuster franchise goes. I kind of feel like the only way to make it work would be to return Terminator to it's roots of lower budget, sci-fi action/horror. I'm not saying a $6 million budget like the original The Terminator (which would be about $14 million today), but maybe something closer to $50-$60 million, similar to Deadpool or the Resident Evil movies, at least as far as the production goes. Just my thoughts.

 

Well, I don't know if that refers to me. But I have to say, that if they really do feel they have to make another Terminator movie, that they take a page from Salvation. I really liked what they did with that movie. They set it far enough into the future as to give it a different angle and the feel was more militaristic, as it should be if Skynet has more control. I know people have their problems with Salvation, but I think one way to avoid many of the problems that keep being revisited is to set it further into the timeline to move things forward. The past 3 movies all hinged on revisiting the same problems, which in itself I felt was a problem that got them into a creative rut. You can only reinvent yourself so many times. Genysis was an interesting concept executed poorly and felt too fankwankish. I think the key lies in going beyond.

Oh and btw, I never did end up seeing it in the theatres. I saw it months later at home. Never had much high hopes for it, but it still managed to disappoint. I thought I'd heard that they didn't want to touch the franchise for awhile after those disappointing returns. I just don't see where they could go creatively without repeating what's already been done, unless they make it such a departure that many complain that it doesn't look like the Terminator they know and love. So, you see, they're in between a rock and a hard place with that one.

I think Ralphis' ideas of going back to its roots to give it a similar tone to the first movie is an interesting idea. I'd love to see a return to the imminent danger of these Terminators running rampant all over the country in a Skynet controlled world.

 

I think I am one of the only people that really liked Part 3, with its shocker ending that yet still made sense and completed the time loop, and still felt like a Terminator movie, and really disliked Part IV and everything they did in the future.

Salvation just coudln't compete with the mentals generated in fan's heads for decades after the introduction scene of the first Terminator.

 

If I recall right, it was Skynet itself that invented time travel (being the only existing intellect at that point capable of it). And as seen in both the movies and the various other media, Skynet has no problem with using time travel excessively to change the rules and move the goalposts, both to ensure its' own creation (sooner or later) and to ensure it survives the human resistance (at least long enough to develop time travel, at which point the goalposts get moved again). It's a loop that seems impossible to break at this point - without breaking the space/time continuum itself in the process.

 

I thought that T2 just changed the date of judgement day, but had nothing to do with its initial happening. The residual terminator chip from the future caused skynet to happen sooner. When that was taken out of the equation, the timeline (and original date of judgement day) was restored. I don't remember a "Future Coda" ending ? other then them thinking judgement day had been avoided, only to find out in T3 that it was merely postponed.

I don't think time travel had anything to do with Skynet's initial existance.

 

The alternate Future Coda ending (to T2) explained flat-out that Judgment Day never happened and that Skynet never existed. In this timeline, John Connor was a U.S. senator.

 

Here ya go, T2's deleted ending (though you might want to pop a few painkillers first; it's awful):

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That's certainly my understanding of T3's plot, at least. I once made a handy chart for the series through Salvation:

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I generally believe, as a matter of artistic theory, that fictional worlds can be extended in interesting ways forever. Which isn't to say we should have endless stories about any given character, but if you expand and switch things up enough, and aren't beholden to a particular character of even genre, you can find interesting stories anywhere. The MCU is the perfect example of this - we start with Iron Man, then meet his father in The First Avenger, then follow his friend Peggy in two TV seasons, neither of which have anything to do with the story of Iron Man 1. (And, of course, that's just one branch-off of many.)

The Terminator franchise, however, strikes me as the notable exception to that rule. No, I don't want to see any more of the Connors - and I'm a guy who unapologetically loves T3 in its theatrical form. No, I don't want to see more future war/time travel shenanigans. No, I don't want the Sarah and John Connor Chronicles, with its teenage John crushing on a sexy female robot and maybe vice versa, and a Dr. Silberman that's not Earl Boen. Do not want, not one little bit.

... Of course, in his original T2 script, Cameron figured the future human Resistance would be largely South American, as there would have been comparatively few nuclear targets/strikes in the Southern Hemisphere. So now that I type this, I can actually start to picture a movie about a badass woman growing up in the jungles of Brazil or what-not, and enlisting in a suicidal trip to North America for an assault on Skynet, ending with the original T-800 being sent back to T1. (Just how the T-1000 was sent back, and why it wasn't also sent to 1985, strikes me as best left completely unexplained. In other words, such a movie needn't directly reference T2 at all.)

Damnit - guess I thought of a possible one last film in spite of myself. Although, to be fair, I've more or less had this idea in some form since before Salvation even came out.

 

^I instantly see a problem with that timeline chart. It seems to indicate that the "original" timeline was altered by the events of T1, except John Conner existed in that timeline, as did the photo of pregnant Sarah in her jeep, forming a causal loop. If one also takes into account the "Cyberdyne" deleted scene from T1 the same applies to the development of Skynet, which seems thematically appropriate as it means both Conner and Skynet created themselves and each other at the same time.

It's in T2 where things seem to veer off course, though it's not clear how or when the exact point of divergence is. If I had to guess, I'd say it was Sarah's "No Fate" dream, where she decided to go after Dyson. If you listen closely they're talking about crossing the border into Mexico to go into hiding and in T1, Reese mentions how Sarah and John were both in hiding before the war. So it seems originally they all ran and waited out Judgement Day and the T-1000 either never found them or they took it out under different circumstances.

Note: It can't be Skynet sending back the T-1000 as per the unfilmed extended future war prologue scene in T2, it and the original T-800 were supposed to have both been sent back at the same time and "Uncle Bob" got sent back immediately after Kyle. Indeed, logically speaking the T-1000 would have been the first as it was more advanced and targeted specifically at John. It's failure would mean the second attempt is earlier in his causal timeline, at Sarah. Of course the second "shot" is what prepared them to be ready for the first one. More causal loops!

 

I figure there has to be an unseen original timeline where John's lineage is unimportant, and he's just a guy who stands up and fights, and is about to lead the machines.... T1 has to be a later iteration in the time loop.

 

^ Halfway agree... in my original, pre-T1 timeline, John is still Sarah's son, but not by Reese.

 

That's tough to support going by Cameron's scripts. Granted it's merely implicit in T1 that John knew full well who Kyle was when he sent him back, but in the T2 script it's explicit.

Spoiler: T2 unfilmed sequence

I know they never filmed this, but I see this mostly as a matter of authorial intent and this is what Cameron wrote.

I also rather think it's thematically vital in order for Sarah's decision in T2 to attempt to stop the war to be meaningful. "No Fate" means they have free will: "the future is not set". What better way to express that if Sarah simply chose differently, even though all of the external factors were 100% identical. Across infinite versions of this moment within the mobius loop of causality, Sarah Conner chose to cross the border and go into hiding...until she chose otherwise for no other reason than because she has free will.