{"id":8596,"date":"2024-11-18T21:50:38","date_gmt":"2024-11-19T02:50:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=8596"},"modified":"2024-11-18T21:50:38","modified_gmt":"2024-11-19T02:50:38","slug":"terminator-2-judgment-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/11\/18\/terminator-2-judgment-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Terminator 2: Judgment Day"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Terminator 2: Judgment Day <\/strong>(1991)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 TriStar\/Action-Sci-Fi\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 152 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (language, strong excessive action violence, criminal behavior by children, brief nudity)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: James Cameron\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: James Cameron and William Wisher Jr.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Brad Fiedel\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Adam Greenberg\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: July 3, 1991 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Linda Hamilton, Robert Patrick, Edward Furlong, Earl Boen, Joe Morton, S. Epatha Merkerson, Castulo Guerra, Danny Cooksey, Jenette Goldstein, Xander Berkeley, Michael Biehn.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: $205.8M (US)\/$520.8M (World)<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: *** \u00bd<\/p>\n

\u00a0In summer ’91, Terminator 2: Judgment Day<\/strong> was the most highly anticipated movie of the season. \u00a0Everybody and their brother wanted to see it. Studios were a little nervous because it was the first time anyone spent $100 million on a movie, $15 million of which went to pay Arnold Schwarzenegger to return as the T-800 model Terminator. With a price tag that high, it better make some serious bread at the box office. It did. It was the summer\u2019s top-grossing movie with over $200 million domestic. It also confirmed Arnie\u2019s status as an action superstar.<\/p>\n

\u00a0While it\u2019s Schwarzenegger\u2019s name above the title, the true star of Terminator 2: Judgment Day<\/strong> is the special effects. It\u2019s the first movie to make extensive use of CGI, mainly for the liquid metal effect for its cyborg antagonist (Patrick, Die Hard 2), a T-1000 model Terminator that can take the shape of anybody and any solid object it touches- e.g. knives, swords, hooks, etc. When blown to bits, the pieces melt and reform into its human form. It\u2019s a lot more difficult to terminate this Terminator. The effects in Terminator 2: Judgment Day<\/strong> are amazing. It took home four Oscars that year including Best Visual Effects.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Just like in the first movie, Arnie\u2019s Terminator is sent from the post-apocalyptic future to deal with the John Connor situation. The boy (newcomer Furlong) is ten years old and lives with a foster family while his mother Sarah (Hamilton, Black Moon Rising) is in a psychiatric hospital. It seems that nobody believes her stories about robots coming from the future to destroy her and the world ending on August 29, 1997.<\/p>\n

\u00a0ANYWAY, Arnie\u2019s mission is a bit different this time. He\u2019s been sent to protect John from the T-1000 sent to kill him thus preventing him from leading the resistance against the machines that will take over the world on Judgment Day. Disguised as a cop, he goes looking for John. It\u2019s a perfect cover given John is something of a juvenile delinquent.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Eventually, both Terminators track down John at the local shopping mall and a big chase involving a motorcycle and 18-wheeler ensues. This is when John finds out what\u2019s going on. He orders his protector to help him break Mom out of the hospital which he does. Naturally, she\u2019s skeptical of Arnie\u2019s good intentions, but goes along with the plan anyway. After the trio obtains a cache of automatic weapons, they set off to stop the computer engineer (Morton, The Brother from Another Planet) who will create Skynet in the very near future. Throughout it all, the T-1000 continues his relentless pursuit.<\/p>\n

\u00a0For all its impressive visuals, I found Terminator 2: Judgment Day<\/strong> somewhat lacking in the story department. I get that nobody wants to see Ah-nuld play a villain anymore. Still, wouldn\u2019t it have been cool to have him play both roles? Don\u2019t get me wrong, Patrick is terrific as the unstoppable, unkillable T-1000. I just wonder how it would have turned out with Schwarzenegger playing a dual role. Now I\u2019ve given this a lot of thought over the 30+ years Terminator 2: Judgment Day<\/strong> has been in existence. Initially, I wasn\u2019t crazy about James Cameron turning the T-800 into a kinder, more humane Terminator. I felt it betrayed the original movie. It didn\u2019t make sense for a cyborg without emotions to develop a bond with John. I\u2019ve changed my mind on this point. I get now that it can be explained by John reprogramming him before sending him to the past-present. AI can evolve, can\u2019t it?<\/p>\n

\u00a0The good thing about Terminator 2: Judgment Day<\/strong> is that is has a lot of big wild action sequences. They\u2019re violent, definitely R-rated material, but it\u2019s not all that graphic. In one sequence, multiple police cars are destroyed, a building blows up and a ton of ammo is expended yet the body count is low. Arnie\u2019s Terminator only wounds because John orders him not to kill. It\u2019s okay, he\u2019s still totally bad ass. Check out the scene in the biker bar shortly after he arrives in the present, once again naked and in need of clothes. Let\u2019s just say it\u2019s a successful mission. He leaves with an outfit and a cycle. Hamilton, sporting a sexy ripped bod, gets to flex her muscles as a seriously bad ass heroine. Furlong is good in his first movie. He\u2019s neither cloying nor annoying. He shows real potential.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Now I\u2019m going to admit something that gets me funny looks from some people. I like Terminator 2: Judgment Day<\/strong> very much. It\u2019s action-packed and visually impressive. Pre-King of the World Cameron directs with his usual skill and panache. The Judgment Day nightmare scene still blows me away. HOWEVER, I like the first movie better. It\u2019s a B-movie that transcended its genre and became an A-list action classic. T2 is merely a B-movie with A-list production values. It\u2019s bigger but not necessarily better. Throwing more money at a movie has no effect on that. Yet a lot of people, including my good friend GY, insist it\u2019s one the best movies ever made. I disagree but everybody is entitled to his or her own opinion.<\/p>\n

SPECIAL NOTE: This review is of the longer extended version of Terminator 2: Judgment Day<\/strong>. It includes extra scenes including a dream sequence where the late Kyle Reese (Biehn) visits Sarah in the hospital to remind her of her pivotal role in the events to come. I think Cameron made a mistake removing it from the theatrical version. It provides a human connection to the first movie.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 TriStar\/Action-Sci-Fi\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 152 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (language, strong excessive action violence, criminal behavior by children, brief nudity)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: James Cameron\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: James Cameron and William Wisher Jr.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Brad Fiedel\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Adam Greenberg\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: July 3, 1991 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Linda Hamilton, Robert Patrick, Edward Furlong, Earl Boen, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8660,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8596","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-kick-ass-actioners","category-sci-fi-fantasy"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/Terminator-2-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8596","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8596"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8596\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8662,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8596\/revisions\/8662"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8660"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8596"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8596"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8596"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}