With the recent arrival of the Terminator Dark Fate trailer, there’s going to be at least of few people wondering what is it about. Things have gotten way more convoluted since the arrival of Genisys back in 2017, and there are a few more new additions with the sixth entry in the series, so the thread’s a little illusive – if indeed there’s a genuine thread left for the iconic action films.
For most fans of the original, things haven’t been quite right with the Terminator franchise since T2 back in 1991. With a story part created by James Cameron, who was the co-writer, director and producer for Judgement Day, Dark Fate had a lot of expectation. However, fans are a little more critical now that they’ve seen the trailer with a lot of comments picking holes in the CGI, casting and story.
What is it all about ten-point what we know for sure (including some scene setting info for total noobs)
1. Skynet is a computer program that attains sentience and spawns a master race of robots that wreak havoc on the world.
2. It’s opposed by John Conner and his forces in the future, so Skynet has been sending Terminators back in time to prevent this from happening either by trying to kill his mum Sarah (Linda Hamilton) in the first film, or the young John, who was played by Edward Furlong in Terminator 2.
3. The timeline got messed up pretty badly after Genisys came out with an altered reality in which Sarah Conner was Raised by a rogue T-800 called Pops. However, everything seems to indicate that Terminator Dark Fate will be disregarding this and acting as a direct sequel to Terminator 2, so there was no Pops and things are back on track with the timelines of the first two films, which you should definitely watch if you haven’t already.
4. Dark Fate is set twenty years after the events of T-2: Judgement Day.
5. It sees yet another time-travelling quest, following the formula that sits at the heart of the franchise. This time around a cyborg (part human, part machine) called Grace (Mackenzie Davis) has been sent back to protect Dani Ramos (Natalia Reyes) from being killed by a new Terminator that combines both the robot form of the T-800 with the liquid metal form of the T-1000, played by Gabriel Luna.
6. Grace and Dani are joined along the way by Sarah Conner who sees herself in Dani, having been in the exact same situation 31 years earlier.
7. Somehow, she’s also able to recruit a tame T-800, played by Arnold Schwarzenegger as ever.
8. John Conner will be in the mix too with British actor Jude Collie cast in the role, although there’s no sign of him in the teaser trailer.
9. There’s no word as of yet in terms of why Skynet is hunting for Dani in this story, but you can check out my view on the options in the section below.
10. This looks like a turning point in the Terminator series that delivers a new direction for its future. Both Linda Hamilton and Arnie have put in a pretty long stint in their roles and they appear to be handing the mantle over to Mackenzie Davis and Natalia Reyes with new characters to take things forward. Obviously it will all depend on the success of Terminator Dark Fate and its new characters, but if it does any better than Genysis then it could spawn a whole new branch for its future.
Terminator Dark Fate trailer
You can see more on Terminator Dark Fate with the official Twitter page at https://twitter.com/terminator.
Why might Skynet be interested in Dani?
There are plenty of options for the film to go down in term of the rationale for Skynet’s interest in Dani. Maybe she goes on to be a scientist that develops the time travelling technology that allows it all to take place and ultimately write Skynet out of the equation from the past, or maybe she’s John’s inspirational wife in the future. Or his successor at the head of the resistance, or the tactician that helps give him the edge. Or maybe she’s the robot expert that helps him reprogram protector bots to send back in time. Either way, she’s clearly going to be instrumental in the fight against Skynet in the future.
