Terminator: Dark Fate improved on Salvation and Genisys, and had a good central idea, but fumbled the ball when it came to executing it. At this point, it’s quite clear that Dark Fate didn’t accomplish what it set out to do. As with Salvation and Genisys, the hopes were that Dark Fate would begin a new Terminator trilogy, which has close to absolute zero chance of happening. Interestingly enough though, it’s not because the film was abysmal. In fact, Dark Fate holds a 70 percent on Rotten Tomatoes, well above the threshold for being “Fresh.”
The problem was that despite the film’s high price tag and marketing centered around the returns of James Cameron and Linda Hamilton, Dark Fate proved to be a mere blip at the box office. The sixth Terminator entry came up well short of profitable in theaters, and naturally, that didn’t leave anyone involved clamoring to continue the planned new trilogy. Like Salvation and Genisys before it, another hypothetical trilogy bit the dust.
Outside of its disastrous financial returns though, Terminator: Dark Fate did have a good amount to offer those who did give it a watch. That included the now infamous decision to kill off John Connor, prophesied savior of mankind, in the opening minutes. This was an inspired move full of potential for a new path, but in the end the same path got worn anew.
Dark Fate Was Right To Get Rid Of John Connor
There’s no doubt that John Connor is an iconic character in pop culture history, and arguably the most important character in the Terminator franchise as a whole. However, his story really should’ve ended with Terminator 2: Judgment Day. While many would assert the franchise should’ve ended there too, that’s a debate for another time. If Terminator movies absolutely had to continue, and Hollywood seemed to think they did, the stories should’ve focused on someone new. By choosing to heavily feature a variation of John Connor in Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, Salvation, and Genisys, the series did nothing but limit itself creatively. John could’ve played a small supporting role, or figured into the plot somehow, but he didn’t need to be a driving force.
Terminator: Dark Fate seemed to realize this, choosing to unshackle itself from the John Connor story arc in the most brutally efficient way possible: retconning everything after T2, and then taking John out for good. Sure, there would always be some diehard fans who didn’t like that choice, but by removing John from the picture, Dark Fate could’ve set off in a bold new direction for the series. Instead, the creative team punted by settling back into the same old comfortable patterns, and completely forgoing the opportunity to liven things up. The Terminator universe has so much potential for fresh stories, but all that potential was shoved aside in favor of milking the same old cow, and hoping it still had anything left to produce.
Dark Fate’s Mistake Was Replacing John With Another Savior
With John Connor out of the picture, Terminator: Dark Fate could’ve done anything conceivable with its story. The possibilities were wide open, for the first time since the T-800 was lowered into the molten steel due to an inability to self-terminate. Yet, instead of doing anything new, director Tim Miller, producer James Cameron, and the rest of Dark Fate‘s creative staff decided to fall back on the familiar. With John gone, a new character named Dani Ramos (Natalia Reyes), was shoved into the position of humanity’s destined savior, this time from an evil AI named Legion instead of Skynet. To be fair, Reyes did fine with the role she was given, and there’s obviously nothing inherently wrong with the idea of a female chosen one. The problem is, why does there need to be a chosen one at all?
Just because all prior Terminator stories have in some way hinged on John Connor, either as protagonist or – in Genisys‘ case – antagonist, doesn’t mean we need to have a John Connor replacement. There’s no reason to limit the story that way, but that’s exactly what Miller, Cameron, and company choose to do, seemingly just because they feel like that’s what a Terminator story needs to be. It’s like they had a shot of inspiration when it came to moving on from the John Connor plotline, only to to not be sure where to go from there, leading to Sarah Connor and a friendly T-800 having to protect another future savior, with the only notable new wrinkles in the assignment being Dani’s race and gender, and the addition of a female protector in Grace.
Terminator Can’t Just Be About Protecting The Hero
The main Terminator scenario, a future-war between human and machine and their time-traveling attempts to change things, could be taken in so many different directions not involving a savior character. Or, a savior-type character could exist, but not be the focus of the story. As evidenced by characters like Grace, who is actually a pretty cool addition to the franchise that sadly will probably never be mentioned again, the potential is there to introduce a whole host of people and/or machines that the fanbase has never before gotten to meet. Some of the expanded universe tie-in material has gone that route, and it’s past due for the movies to as well. There’s a whole pre and post-apocalyptic world to explore, and what’s more, possibly multiple timelines.
Terminator, as a franchise, needs to move beyond nostalgia for Terminator 1 and 2. They’re terrific films to be sure, some of the best ever made, but living in the past does nothing but ensure the franchise can’t truly move forward into the future. The chosen one trope is played out, with John Connor himself being one of the go-to examples of its use. The answer is not to find a new savior, such as in Terminator: Dark Fate, it’s to find a new purpose, a new impetus for the Terminator mythology to grow and change. Maybe then people will get excited about Terminator movies again.
