Cool for the most part

Rating: Null/10 (7 April 2004)

Picking up ten years later, Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton) is now an unstable psychopath committed to a mental institution and her son John (Edward Furlong) is a talented but snotty, effeminate little punk/thug brat who lives with an obnoxious foster couple. What they don't know is that the T-1000 (Robert Patrick) is sent back in time to kill Johnny before he can lead the resistance, and he is followed by the Arnold Terminator we all know and love. The Arnold Terminator has his work cut out for him because the T-1000 is a prototype model made out of "liquid metal", which allows him to turn into "solid metal shapes" (knives and stabbing weapons), blend into his environment and even take on the shape of an object of "equal size", but he can't do bombs on account of their "complex moving parts". Well, they bust Sarah out of the mental institution and head for the border to get Sarah her guns and plot to destroy Sky-Net in the past before it can destroy the world, and in between the chaos and mayhem, little John teaches his new big buddy Terminator - the closest thing he's ever had to a father - how to be more human, staring with making him vow that he won't kill anyone (he was programmed by the older John in the future to obey the young John in the past; and it's also about the value of life).
Stunning special effects, slick action sequences, and a chilling performance by Linda Hamilton highlight this mostly superb action science fiction entry. Arnold is also in great form as the Terminator and Robert Patrick is effectively creepy as the thinner but more advanced T-1000 (it's a shame that he didn't go on to better things after this). The film is marred only by over length and an obnoxious performance by Edward Furlong as John Connor. He simply never engages your sympathy, mostly because he's such a pale, snotty brat to begin with that you don't care about him even if his life has been rough. It's also kind of sad watching big bad Arnold take orders from the overly effeminate Edward Furlong.
My suggestion: turn the mute button on whenever Edward opens his mouth. The rest of the film is too good to get hung up on Ed's unsympathetic performance. Some versions of the film run longer than others; the special edition DVD has lost footage that give the film more depth, including a dream sequence where Sarah is confronted, questioned and ultimately comforted by Kyle Reese (Michael Biehn), the ill fated hero of the original film. This version is highly recommended.