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Awix (3310 KP) rated Terminator: Dark Fate (2019) in Movies

Oct 25, 2019 (Updated Oct 25, 2019)

Terminator: Dark Fate (2019)

2019 | Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi

7.0

(48 Ratings)

Movie Rating Watch

Expectations for this sixth Terminator movie were so low that even with a breathe-on-it-and-it-collapses plot, this is an startlingly effective sequel. A young girl finds herself the target of an assassination machine from the future, but a cyborg soldier has also been sent back to protect her. But this is not the first time round the time loop, and survivors from a previous version of this story find themselves drawn into the conflict...

So, yes, the plot only just manages to hold together, and the film is saddled with a leadenly reductionist message to put across - but it smartly identifies the one reproducible element of Terminator 2 that was really distinctive (Sarah Connor's transformation into an unhinged bad-ass) and plays that for all it's worth, accompanying it with some cracking action and fight sequences. Arnie doesn't show up until quite late on, but is so effective when he does it really unbalances the film (he plays the comedy inherent in his role as a Terminator who's been living undercover in suburbia for decades with great aplomb). Still not exactly brilliant, but streets ahead of the ones with Christian Bale and Jason Clarke.

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Phil Leader (619 KP) rated The Long War in Books

Nov 20, 2019

The Long War

Terry Pratchett, Stephen Baxter | 2014 | Fiction & Poetry

8.5

(2 Ratings)

Book Rating

Taking up the story a generation after the events in The Long Earth, this book investigates the impact of human expansion on the races that already inhabit the stepwise worlds, in particular the Trolls and Beagles.

As with human colonisation throughout history, mankind has embraced the Long Earth and made the assumption that it is 'theirs' to do with as they want. And as history shows, this usually doesn't end well for the existing natives.

This then is an exploration of this in the context of the Long Earth, the potential for conflict arising from both mankind and the other sentient races and raising questions about how to co-exist. The title is a little misleading as there is no war as such, but it does set the tone.

As with the first book, the main interest in this is with the investigation of the different Earths that can be conceived, and how sentient races could be very different from us not only physically but also in their social norms, philosophy and ambitions.

This didn't measure up to the first book but it's not a bad sequel by any means