The typing-error-with-muscles never did it better.

Rating: 10/10 (18 March 2006)

This was one of those sequels - like 'Aliens' - that was superior to its excellent original. Far superior.
For many years it set the benchmark in every aspect of science-fiction special effects and edge-of-the-seat action. Sound engineering aficionados tested their home-movie gadgetry on the basis of its tremendous sound score. Check out the moment when a terminator stamps on a human skull. You hear a heavy, ringing clunk of metal, a reedy crunch of bone, and a thumping impact as the foot hits the earth beneath. The sounds, in almost instantaneous succession, exactly interpret the imagery and the anticipation of the viewer. That's how it's done. It looks simple, but it's an art in itself.
How to begin a movie about machines taking over the world? Simple; You demonstrate that it's already happened, with opening shots of multi-lane highways choked by ever-demanding vehicles. It's just what we'd do with robots - a theme taken up by the later and inferior 'I Robot'.
Those few minutes of opening sequence are alone worth the price of admission. As credits roll we see a fire-storm in slight slow-motion to choreograph with the wonderful theme music. It doesn't sound like music for a horror film; it's a romantic composition that wouldn't be out of place in a Jane Austen period piece. It's a human theme. But slowly and surely, as the hideous muzzle of a cyborg condenses from the flames, the metallic tattoo of the original rises to dominate and usurp, foretelling human overthrow by their creations.
A new terminator is on the case. This one's a shape-shifting mimic called a T1000. The 'Arnie' model is now old-hat. Once again this movie set the standard in CGI morphing techniques. Both cyborgs get to battle it out for the life or death of a child who will grow to destroy them in their future. Script is taut, brief and solid. Directing is flawless. Everybody acts their part with conviction - even the wayward kid. Violence is brutal and hideous. Destruction is magnificent. Trucks are wrecked as a matter of routine. A caterpillar-tracked robot of the future, briefly glimpsed in cameo before going-up in flames was reputed to cost $30,000 alone. It's a blank-cheque movie that deserved every penny.
There's a poignant scene somewhere in the desert, where the heroine - played by Linda Hamilton - is seated in the balm of the evening. A westering sun mantles the world in a golden glow, kids can be heard laughing and playing, a Spanish guitar whispers peacefully. It's a moment of beautiful ambiance. But she slips into a doze and dreams a dream of nuclear holocaust depicted with such terrifying vividness as to be an object-lesson in nuclear disarmament. Everyone at Bombs-Are-Us should see their family depicted in this way.
If you look close you may spot some faults; I didn't. And it's easy to argue about the logical impossibility of it all. But if this movie doesn't make you think and feel and wonder - then you must be a machine yourself.