Wack To The Future: Arturo vs. Terminator Salvation!

Forget the easy “No wonder Christian Bale was mad” jokes, just believe the hype: this is the anti-Trek, in all the wrong ways.

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD

Actually, director McG does a good job setting the table in Salvation, which takes place after the events of Rise Of The Machines, with Los Angeles and the rest of the west coast devastated and the human resistance forced, literally, underground. And here's where this new series could've set itself apart from Trek: As a war story with sci-fi trappings, showing John Connor and the human Resistance trying to hold on to their morality while battling for survival, we might have gotten a good, gritty couple of films out of this “tentpole,” the no-frills alternative to Trek's iPod shinyness.

Instead, trapped by a PG-13 rating – little blood, no cursing and no much-needed gallows humor – McG and writers John D. Brancato and Michael Ferris have to build a “blockbuster” out of cherry-picked bits from other franchises and increasingly forced shout-outs to Salvation's predecessors.

The set-up, such as it is, isn't horrible: Connor's mission is to ensure the beginning of the movie timeline (namely, his mom getting knocked up) comes to pass, so that he can grow up to be Marty McFly Neo the spiritual, if not actual, leader of La Resistance. And the key to that happening is lost in the badlands of Los Angeles – from the lack of upkeep and basic supplies, I'd guess somewhere in Orange County. Christian Bale tries to give us a glimpse into Connor's increasing desperation, but the script doesn't let him do much but be Action Hero Guy, all gruffness and Jack Bauer-like pronouncements of doom, even when he's broadcasting an inspirational message via CB radio.

Hope arrives on two fronts: the sudden discovery of a means to win the war, and the arrival of Marcus Wright, who we meet in the past as a Death Row inmate and, to be honest, is a bit of a d-ck. Yet somehow, Wright re-emerges being able to hotwire cars that've been out of commission for years, and instantly battle-ready, not even needing to stop for food. And none of these Hardened Resistance Fighters even raises a finger of suspicion against their new friend Marty Stu.

Of course, the trailer already spoiled it for us – Marcus is a Cylon Terminator built to infiltrate Connor's forces and set them up for defeat. Wouldn't you know, though, Marcus is still convinced he's human, thus revealing that Skynet is not a sophisticated form of cyber-intelligence; it's actually a Bond villain with a higher screen resolution. And the moment Connor and co. find out what we already know, the "plot" accelerates past plausibility and off the deep end. In a little more than an hour, Marcus gets the girl, confronts his masters, renounces his origins (complete with “throw the chair through glass in anger” slo-moment) and helps save the day.

The problem with this character arc, though, is that it's undone from the get-go. We never find out exactly what he's in for, and we never see the moment where he decides, “Okay, I guess I won't be a douche.”

Like Bale, Sam Worthington is asked to be as plastic as an action figure, more robotic than Summer Glau ever was on The Sarah Connor Chronicles -- which, this film inadvertently(?) reminds us, doesn't "count" in movie canon. And that's all the sadder, because between that show's cancellation and this film's lack of ... well, humanity, Salvation is exactly the opposite: it's the death-knell for a series that used to offer us a lot more.

Detour To Springfield: TIC vs. The Sarah Connor Chronicles, Ep 2.2

We were hoping to call this review Johnny Come Lately, but we'll probably have to wait, as Team Manic Depressive split up this week while the series kept laying the groundwork for the next year.

Finally, John decided to sort-of act like a teenager, and picked up a suitably random female companion to bring home to his family's new home (which they managed to get in one day. I know this is sci-fi, but that's some especially crazy shit.) Mom, of course, didn't approve of John straying from The Mission To Preserve The Future Until Christian Bale Takes Over The Role, but John held his ground. Sadly, he didn't justify his behavior by explaining he wanted to start building his army for the future the old-fashioned way (wink wink nudge nudge QUIT C-CKBLOCKING ME, MOM) but there's always next week, right?

While John made time, Sarah, Cameron and Uncle Derek raced against it, as they tried to stop a nearby nuclear reactor, destined to become a key battleground in the upcoming wars, from melting down. What with inter-network crossovers becoming more popular these days -- seriously, CSI and Two And A Half Men? -- you'd think there was room here for Fox to acknowledge its' most famous power plant. But despite the presence of its' own incompetent, bald owner, the ep muddled on through Crisis of the Week territory.


Along the way, Sarah becomes "crapped up," slang for contaminated with radiation ... maybe. She's forced to undergo a humiliating full-body scrub by power plant staff, and also has to consider Cameron's prediction last year that she'll be dead within two years. But here, the series' relentless mopeyness undercuts this development, rather than underscore it. Sarah's seemingly done nothing but kvetch the entire series. How is this any different? At this rate I'm going to bail on this series, again. Man, I hope Heroes picks up the pace this year. But we'll talk about that later.

Photo 1 courtesy of ign.com

Schwarzenegger, Please!: TIC vs. The Sarah Connor Chronicles, Ep 2.1

I'm trying to enjoy The Sarah Connor Chronicles. But it didn't do itself any favors during its' first season, and last night's season premiere didn't show signs of stopping that trend.

What should've been the show's best moment was instead a depressing clue as to the series' wrong direction: the follow-up to Cameron's seemingly blowing up in the truck and subsequent turn on John and Sarah Connor should've been a BANG-BANG-BANG/quick-cuts/high-tension score/BOOM sequence, careening into the credits or the first break. Instead the scene slogged by in a slo-mo morass, dragged down even more by -- and I can't believe I'm writing this -- a horrible song by My Beautiful and Beloved Shirley Manson, something more appropriate for those tearjerking not-endings we get on Smallville. In "humanizing" the story, the creators neutered it, instead.

If this show is going to make headway, it's going to need one thing: humor. I don't mean the played-out "Cameron learns humanity" jokes from last year. One of these people has to bust out a joke every now and again, please. Don't get me wrong, Lena Headley and Thomas Dekker are good in their roles, but their roles seemingly have no dimension but Angry, Hurt, Sad or Scared. Wouldn't Sarah Connor be at least a little confident in her and her son's abilities by now? Strength without swagger a dull character makes, especially when everybody in the ensemble seemingly left their sense of humor in the Days of Future Past. You've got Brian Austin Green RIGHT THERE, for criminy's sakes.

The result of all the heroic moping is, the most "human" characters in the show are still not the Connors. Cameron's struggle to stay on John's side ("If I go bad again ... don't bring me back") is more compelling than the millions of furrowed brows John and Sarah throw at us every week. And I'm pleased to report that Ms. Manson is already classing up the show as new Big Bad Catherine Weaver; her character's twist led to my only pleasant "oh SHIT" of the seemingly interminable hour. And she got to keep her accent! Here's to hoping she gets more refreshingly cool evil shit to do this year. In fact, here's to hoping somebody gets to do something cool this year.

Photo 2 courtesy of zachklein.com