Not awful, just pointless and unnecessary. Worst Film Score In Years!

Rating: Null/10 (6 August 2003)

Finally saw T3 (and I didn't pay - don't want to help Arnold in his threatened race for Gov!).
Brings to mind the whole topic of sequels. Expectations play such a large part. Taken on its own, T3 is an OK mishmash of the first 2 films. BUT, coming after a pair of the most influential SF films of the past 2 decades, it's a big letdown. Especially, considering that this wasn't a quickie B-Movie throwaway like in the old days of THE MUMMY'S HAND, HOUSE OF FRANKENSTEIN, REVENGE OF THE CREATURE, RETURN OF THE FLY etc. There, you're expectations weren't as high (as well as the financial stakes, so sometimes you were pleasantly surprised at the outcome - ESCAPE FROM PLANET OF THE APES or FUTUREWORLD being a prime examples).
The money (reportedly over $100M to $150M) is there on screen, but the IDEAS of the first 2 films take a big backseat to MORE Explosions, MORE Action, MORE chases and MORE bad puns. Sorry, but the supposed "wit" I kept hearing about fell mostly flat to me and the audience I saw it with (except for one yahoo who hooted and hollered on cue as if on the payroll of WB). Too much of the script simply plays like a series of "We've got to recycle that" references and a recitation of studio notes to the writers. Boiled down, the film is almost a remake of T2 (the ever changing and expanding future Alternate Universes going along for the ride).
Still, I can't say it was truly awful or terribly boring. Just not essential. And, the so-called musical "score" - horrible, clanking NOISE passing as music. In fact Marco Beltrami's (let's name names here!) score is perhaps the worst you will encounter in a major release in a long long time. Not sure why original composer Brad Fiedel was not retained (his TERMINATOR THEME is used under the end credits and sounds like a breath of fresh air after Beltrami's noise pollution!).