The best thing I can say: It Didn't Suck!

Rating: 7/10 (5 July 2003)

I know that most of us went into the theater with this silent prayer in our minds: "Please don't suck! PLEASE dont SUCK! PLEASE DON'T SUCK!"
First, the good news: It didn't SUCK!
Now, the not so good news: It wasn't great either.
The best I can do for this movie is say it was pretty good. If it were a stand alone movie, that would be enough. But since it follows two of the best sci-fi movies ever made, it's a bit of a letdown, but not much.
This movie is certainly worth watching in the theaters, if for nothing else than the action sequences. Of which there are some doozies! The chase scene with the crane alone is worth the price of admission!
The acting in this movie was well done. Being an action flick, I'm not looking for Oscar worthy performances, but I did start to care about these people. Kristanna Lokken did quite well as the T-X, her performance as such rivals that of Robert Patrick as the T-1000 in T2, and she has a nice butt to boot! Nick Stahl fills in quite well as John Connor, though I still would rather have seen Edward Furlong reprise his role and give the film more of a connection to its predecessors. Claire Danes works well too, though her part seems a bit like a redux of Linda Hamilton's Sarah Connor from the first film, even to the point where John Connor says to her in a scene, "You remind me of my mother!".
Then of course there's Ah-nuld! what can I say? The man was born to play this part! The only problem I had with this rendition of the T-800 (or T-101 in this film) was that for the first 2/3 of the movie, the script relies so heavily on the amusing one-liners (in their defense, they ARE funny!)that the movie threatens to become a parody of itself.
Jonathon Mostow does a good job directing, but I really would have liked to have seen what Cameron would have done with this movie. His absence I think is what stops this movie from being great.
The biggest gripe I have with this movie is its ending. While it does set up a possible T4 movie, it is anti-climatic to say the least, and furthermore in contradiction to the theme of T2.
I give it a 6.5 out of 10.