Not as sharp as the original two films - SPOILERS!

Rating: Null/10 (31 January 2004)

Terminator 3 was probably set to not reach the same heights as the two previous entries. James Cameron, Eddie Furlong and Linda Hamilton were not involved with it - a shame :(. Also - I thought that they rapped the series up nicely at the end of the second film (destroying the last remnants of the Terminators to prevent Judgment Day from happening).... However in Hollywood - when anyone is on a good thing - they will milk it to get a few bucks out of it. Thus a few plot holes were exploited and... surprise-surprise - the machines live on. Terminator 3 opens up with John Conner (now 20-something) who is a drifter - not wanting to be connected to the system. We learn that Judgment Day was only delayed from T2 - not preventing. Of course - they send two terminators from the future to hunt and kill all the future leaders of the human resistance. This film isn't all that bad - I just don't think it reaches the high heights of the first two. Cameron (when making sequels) - tends to follow the same rules of the first movie - while giving it a whole new fresh appeal. Sadly - T3 doesn't feel as fresh as the first two and it tends to bend the rules a bit for its own devices. Nor does the movie follow the basic plot lines of the original two films. The Terminatrix is a good idea (to be female) - but doesn't reach the same levels of brutality as Arnie in the first movie and the T-1000 in the second. Plus - it doesn't feel that radically different from the T-1000 (which was just a pleasure in T2)... all the shape shifting aspects are still there - but she just seems to have a few bells and whistles attached for fun (eg: controlling other machines / can fire off weapons). I don't think they play off the Terminatrix's powers off to full potential - which was a shame. Overall - I don't think it is a bad movie - its just that it tries to be a different movie from the first two - without succeeding.