Good special effects, but poor writing. James Cameron, we needed you!!

Rating: Null/10 (1 July 2003)

Arnold Schwarzenegger reprises his role as the cybernetic half-human half-machine terminator in this sequel to the 1991 film Terminator 2: Judgment Day. This film begins just like its predecessors, two terminators are sent back through time. One is sent to protect members of the human resistance (Schwarzenegger), and another is sent by Skynet to terminate those who in the future lead the human's against the machines.

Those who saw the first two films may be wondering how Skynet survived considering it was supposedly destroyed, and the global nuclear attack known as Judgment Day prevented. According to this film, Judgment day was only put off by the actions of John and Sarah Conner ten years earlier. This knowledge leads to a predictable story as a now adult John Conner, now played by Nick Stahl, must once again try to stop Skynet from being created while on the run from a more advanced terminator, the `TX' played by Kristanna Loken. Sarah Conner who was played by Linda Hamilton was not in this film, and the writers attempted to fill this void by adding Kate Brewster (Claire Danes), one of John's future Lieutenants and love interests.
The movie did very well in one area: special effects. The chase scenes between Conner and the TX nearly matched the level of intensity present in the second Terminator film. Unfortunately, the hole left by Hamilton, and Edward Furlong (John Conner in T2) was not filled by any of the new talent in this feature. It led to a lack of believable emotion, and for me indifference towards the characters fate.
T2: Judgment Day was well acted, well written, and it contained special effects that were ahead of its time. Much of the credit for that goes to writer and director James Cameron. His absence from the third film hurt it deeply...what could have been another epic blockbuster unfortunately is just another average sci-fi action flick.