A fantastic and underrated movie

Rating: 8/10 (19 August 2010)

To be frank, I'm completely and utterly astounded at the amount of vicious reviews that I've seen meted out to this film - whether it's IMDb user reviews or professional critics, it seems that very few people liked this movie. I suppose I can understand that, I just can't wrap my head around the why.
The film is an excellent sequel to the Terminator franchise, and it's certainly a refreshing step up after The Terminator 3.
Christian Bale cuts an imposing figure of leadership, heroism, and sacrifice that any longtime fans of the series would expect from an older John Connor. Sam Worthington's dark portrayal of Marcus Wright draws very deep and unsettling questions about humanity as a whole, and in the end I feel that many people couldn't appreciate the emotional plot depth of the film.
The atmosphere - standard post-apoc washed out grey - is very nice, even if it's a bit overdone; though I can understand how a future where humanity has been driven to the brink of extinction and is mercilessly hunted by machine overlords wouldn't be all that vibrant.
While I felt that the plot of the film was its strongest suit - as it should be - the action in the film left absolutely nothing to be desired. It was tense, pulse-pounding, and virtually bled masculine military procedure, which I'm a huge fan of.
All in all, I saw the film before it received all of this negative press, and I'm completely dumbfounded at why this excellent film, worthy of being a sequel to the Terminator franchise, has been snubbed on such a ridiculous level. I hope the poor critical reception doesn't completely kill the possibility of McG producing another sequel some time in the future!