Good Terminator.....Bad Terminator!

Rating: 7/10 (3 July 2007)

"Terminator 2: Judgement Day" was James Cameron's highly successful, special effects laden sequel to his earlier hit "The Terminator" (1984) which had catapulted star Arnold Schwarzeneggar to super stardom. In that film Arnold was a pure villain. Here he is again the hero.
T2 takes place about ten years after the first film. We find that John Connor (Edward Furlong) is now a smart ass teenager living with and defying his foster parents the Voights (Jennette Goldstein, Xander Berkley). Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton) is now in a mental institution where no one believes her predictions of total Armageddon.
From the year 2029, John Connor, the leader of the anti-machine rebels, dispatches a terminator (Arnold) back in time to protect himself from harm. The machine race also sends a terminator, the new and improved T-1000 model (Robert Patrick) who has the ability morph into any life form he chooses and is virtually indestructible. He is made from "liquid metal" which allows him to re-form any time after he is blown away by Arnold or any one else.
Sarah is unsuccessful at convincing Dr. Silverman (Earl Boen) that she is sane, so she plans an escape. Meanwhile Arnold has materialized and throws a couple of bikers through pool room windows while acquiring his wardrobe, weapons and a motorcycle. The T-1000 also appears and takes on the guise of a cop. Both try to track down the whereabouts of John Connor.
Arnold finds him first and whisks him away from danger on his bike. Their escape from the T-1000 in a semi cab is one of the highlights of the film. Arnold and John go to the asylum and help free Sarah while the T-1000 murders the Voights while trying to trap John. John learns that the terminator is programmed to obey him and instructs the robot not to kill anyone. Bummer.
Sarah is no longer the fearful innocent of the first film, but a hard-nosed freedom fighter complete with an unexplained cache of weapons with which to arm Arnold. Anyway, they soon learn that Miles Dyson (Joe Morton) will be the one responsible for developing the technology that will ultimately cause the final war in which the machines inherit the earth.
Sarah sneaks off to Dyson's home intent upon killing him. She shoots up his equipment, terrifying Dyson, his wife (S. Epatha Merkerson) and their young son. But Sarah in the final analysis, is unable to kill him. Arnold and John arrive on the scene and learn that the basis for Dyson's discoveries is a damaged memory chip from the first terminator. Now convinced that Sarah is right, Dyson agrees to go to his laboratory and destroy all evidence of his work.
The T-1000 is relentless in his pursuit and nothing is able to stop him, bullets, fires or explosions. Finally he corners Arnold and the Connors in a smelting plant and...................................
Producer/Director Cameron gives us an exciting action packed story. It doesn't however, have the originality and believability of the first film. Arnold starts out as the same emotionless robot of the first film but Cameron allows him to develop a "personality" and become more sympathetic. He was much more effective, as the unfeeling villain in the first picture.
Although many of the special effects are indeed spectacular, they are just not believable. The scores of wrecked vehicles and persons thrown about and/or blown up/shot stretches credibility to the maximum. But hey, this is an Arnold film and one expects such things. And Cameron's use of the melting metal effect is over done. There appears to be no working parts in the T-1000 other than this metal. Arnold on the other hand, is a walking computer with explainable parts.
Followed by a second sequel, Terminator 3: The Rise of the Machines (2003) which, to date, is Schwarzeneggar's final film.