Late start, Goblinites, my bad. School and a sick girlfriend, plus shoddy internet threw me back a step.

That being said, call the fire department, because the flaming is about to commence in my review of The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor.

This movie was terrible. If you want to avoid spoilers, quit here, but YOU AREN’T MISSING ANYTHING BECAUSE IT’S TERRIBLE.

Ok, just a little info… this movie takes place 10-20 years after Mummy Returns, and somehow Rick and Evelyn O’Connell haven’t aged any, even though their kid has gone to college. Now, of course, by ‘gone to college’ I mean ‘discovered the lost tomb of the first emperor of China.’

Now, that’s all fine, but the historical distortion is pretty awful in my opinion. But you know what? It’s my site, you CAME here for my opinion. Stuff it.

That temple wasn’t discovered by some half-brit, but by Chinese farmers, and the tomb DOESN’T look like they portrayed it. Also, no one is currently allowed inside, because they believe it to be booby trapped.

In the Emperor’s back story, the emperor sought immortality (true) united China (true) commisioned the Great Wall of China (true) and buried his enemies beneath it (also true), he then fell in love with a witch (untrue) who turned him to stone (untrue) because she loved his admiral (untrue) more than she loved the Emperor. She also decreed his army would be turned to stone, even though she did this to be with the GENERAL, a member of his army. (All untrue, btw.) Fortunately, the emperor kills the General, hopefully to prevent later plotholes or something.

So, supposedly having finished the wall ages ago, China then finishes uniting itself, elects the second emperor, and carries all the terracotta soldiers to the tomb out of respect for the insane madman who never even got to lead. (Do I have to say this is untrue?)

Jet Li then accidentally resurrects and seeks out Shangri-La, from Tibetan lore (uh…what?) fights some Yeti, loses a gem he needs to proceed and still makes it there, an avalanche goes un-triggered by multiple rocket launcher strikes, but happens thanks to a couple sticks of dynamite.

Now, Rick COULD have destroyed multiple things to stop the emperor, like a golden altar (having hours to do so before the guy shows up) a rope bridge (which would have given them enough time to SMELT the altar and reforge it, only to break it a second time.

Either way, they soon find a pool of immortality (also destroyable, but isn’t) and Shangri La, but they never GO to Shangri La, Jet Li turns into a dragon and flies to the border of China, they resurrect the people beneath the Great Wall (including the General, even though he died AFTER the wall was finished)  because for another reason, if the Emperor makes it past the Wall, he will be unstoppable, because he isn’t immortal, yet. But he is, because only one knife can kill him. And they have it, but they fight him with guns a lot instead of using that.

He can also turn into a demon bear thing. He does that twice, but not so much that they can’t stab him with two halves of the broken knife in some random temple thing they didn’t ever explain, from my knowledge, since he was SUPPOSED to be going to Shangri La, then accross the wall, and ended up off track.

In the end, father and son team up and manage to BOTH stab him in the heart with half the knife at the same time, killing him, even though he has magical mastery over metal… but just missed it there. Also, he uses magic like, five times, dragon once, demon twice… and it all feels terrible and made me want to die.

GG gives Tomb of the Dragon Emperor a 0 out of 10.

Ah, Zombieland. For the two of you don’t know, I love me some zombies.

That being said, when a friend of mine handed me free tickets to TWO preview showings, I nearly peed myself.

So last week, my lady friend and I journeyed to the nearby metropolis to enjoy the cinematic marvel of a brand new undead story.

Spoilers in green, my little goblinites.

Zombieland isn’t actually a traditional zombie movie. No, more than that, it’s a coming-of-age teen romance that happens to include zombies as a central theme.

The movie has many central themes, my favorite of which is ‘The Rules.’ The main man of the film, referred to as Columbus (nicknamed after the city, his hometown, as are all the other characters), has a simple set of rules that help him to survive. These range from ‘beware of bathrooms,’ to ‘cardio,’ to his newest rule, #32 (if memory serves) which is ‘enjoy the little things.’

Now, as a point of criticism, the newest advertisement run also sports rule #48, ‘hygiene.’ But Columbus only writes down one new rule, and it’s no were close to #48.

As another small point of amazing, Bill Murray is actually in the movie, and is simply amazing. They even get high and pretend they’re the Ghostbusters.

So, as you can see, I loved this movie. It’s straightforward and to the point, even if a tad anti-climactic. See it. Love it. Obey the rules and survive.

Glitchy Goblin gives Zombieland a 9 out of 10

Hey guys, Monday is upon us again! You know what that means…

Now, put simply, this movie is really really cool, but it was meant to be experienced in 3-D, and it feels a tad lacking if viewed otherwise.

That being said, it presents itself in a fresh, new style, using music you’d never hear in a movie now a days. The plot is interesting, the style is unique, and the message in wonderful. All in all, Coraline presents a suprisingly deep plot (and some dark themes and images) to audiences young and old alike.

See the movie. It’s an eerie-themed, oddly comforting movie coated in a kid’s movie candy coating and eventually winds up as a wonderous work of art that we can’t completely comprehend with our meager technology.

Glitchy Goblin gives Coraline an 8/10 for being wonderful and making me regret missing it in theaters.

Hey guys, I’m back. After a long and terribly trying weekend, I have returned to you.

Even if only three people are reading this.

In light of that fact, I’ve decided to keep things short and sweet from now on.

That in mind…

I love zombie movies. They’re wonderful and everyone should love them. If you are surprised that I typed either of those facts, turn off your computer and leap to your death, because you OBVIOUSLY don’t know who’s blog you’re reading.

That being said, this movie is a wonderful Spanish film shot in the first person*, and it was easily the finest zombie movie I’ve seen in the past three years. It was so good, it immediately inspired an American remake, called Quarantine, which was wonderful right up until the last scene. Spoilers in green.

In Quarantine, they find scientific equipment and a slowed down tape recorder, a couple news articles mentioning a vague cult, and are killed by an old woman that you never get to see, because instead of watching what might KILL THEM, the cameraman instead chooses to look at the GIRL THE ENTIRE TIME.

In REC, they find a maniacal half-scientist half-preacher facility, a lot of information about the first case thanks to a WORKING tape recorder, and are then killed by a terrifying half-woman abomination in the eyes of God that the cameraman can scarcely pull his eyes away from, in terror and wanting to make sure he knew where the thing was, for crying out loud.

If you only see one zombie movie before Zombieland comes out, see REC. You can skip Quarantine, if you want.

*Unlike Cloverfield, the cameraman is a PROFESSIONAL, so the camerawork won’t make you nauseous. Much less shoddy camera here.

Glitchy Goblin gives REC a 10/10 for originality and for actually scaring me.

GG gives Quarantine a 7/10 for knowing a good thing when they saw it, but missing the point and showing the ending in the trailer.

Woohoo! Welcome back, loyal readers, my geeks and nerds and all the rest. It’s good to be here on GlithcyGoblin.com, away from wordpress and ready to indulge in my own, unhindered blog.

That being said, sorry for the long wait, I was sick, my girl was sick, she was sick AGAIN, it goes on and on.

Anyhow, this week, I’m reviewing a movie most people hated and fewer people actually watched, a little diddy called What Love Is.

Pictured: a mediocre movie with a lot of truth and snappy dialogue. Also, it has TERRIBLE 80's movie posters. This is the NICEST one.

Now, my friend Jamal shows me a lot of good movies and shows. This one is no exception.

What Love Is is a movie starring Cuba Gooding Jr. (no, I don’t mean that I flutter my eyes and my heart races when I watch Pearl Harbor) that was only in ten theaters and made less money than a McDonalds in India.

That being said, the movie is very impressive, and does many things well that most movies wouldn’t DARE try. Spoilers in green, readers.

First off, the movie takes place in two rooms, a bar for less than five wordless minutes, and a front porch for less than five minutes.

Nextly, the movie takes place in three segments, one all guy segment talking about how women work, one all women segment talking about men, and a co-ed section that compiles the plot, shows you how it all works, and resolves the entire ordeal.

The dialogue has realism and truth to it, ringing true in the minds of all relationship-having viewers. It also references its own dialogue nicely, holding the movie together with it. It also uses smart segues from scene to scene, and has a wonderful message.

That being said, at movie’s end, you feel a little let down, being left hanging as to how it all resolves. But it doesn’t matter, because how it ends up isn’t the point. Is it the best movie ever? No way. Is it full of sexual jokes and cursing? Yup. Is it worth the watch? Absolutely.

It’s gotten tons of terrible reviews. Now, go watch it.

Glitchy Goblin gives ‘What Love Is’ a 6/10.

Hello, my goblinites! After a night in the hospital, I have returned!

So, tiredness aside, I bring you the oh-so-familiar Movie Monday!

This week, I’ll be reviewing the movie I watched with my step-father on Father’s Day: Valkyrie!

Pictured: Eyepatches make guys look hardcore. End of story.

Spoilers in green, as always.

Valkyrie is a movie about Colonel Claus von Stauffenburg, a German soldier during WWII who conspires with some of his fellow soldiers to assassinate Adolf Hitler to protect Germany from his tyrannical regime.

As the movie is based on a true story, they didn’t succeed. If you just thought to yourself, ‘that’s a spoiler, that should be in green!’ then you should leave my site and never return, because you are an idiot. That wouldn’t even be INFLUENCED by a true story. They’d have to say ‘loosely inspired by a fake story we heard one time while drunk’ to get away with that noise.

Anyhow, I watched it with my step father and uncle, both of whom are war nuts, and know their history quite well. They really loved the historical accuracy of the film, and constantly commented on the make and model of various planes, weapons, cars, and even a couple personal experiences in Germany.

Now, a point of interest. When the assassination attempt begins, the explosive is placed near Hitler’s feet, inside Stauffenburg’s briefcase, and it is knocked over and replaced on the other side of a table leg. From various sources, including my uncle the history buff, it was this six inches of movement that saved Hitler’s life. In addition, had the meeting been held in the originally planned location or had Stauffenburg not lost one of the explosives, it still would have taken Hitler’s life. You read right. Hitler was saved by a table leg and six inches of movement.

Now, according to the internets, the movie has its share of historical inaccuracies, which are as follows. (courtesy of IMDB)

1. Hermann Goering is not wearing his “Blue Max” WWI medal. It should have been around his neck, with his Iron Cross. Another character is correctly shown wearing his Blue Max.

2. When von Stauffenberg is recruited in the church, the camera pans up to show the bombed-out ceiling. Nuns and priests removed the stained glass windows from churches and buried them outside cities before the Allied forces began bombing Germany. If the ceiling was bombed out, the stained glass windows shouldn’t be there.

3. The building the German army barricades in Berlin is identified as the Ministry of Interior. It was actually the Reich Air Ministry. Today, it is the German Finance Ministry.

4. The aircraft Hitler rides, and which the plotters attempt to blow up, is a Ju-52 trimotor. In reality, Hitler’s aircraft at the time was the four-engined FW-200 “Condor.” None survived, so they couldn’t be used for filming.

5. In a number of scenes, Colonel Stauffenberg is seen wearing red stripes on his trouser legs. Only German Generals wore the red stripes.

Other than that, though, the movie had most all of its facts right as far as I can tell.

A number of people had problems with this movie, claiming it was boring and that is had poor acting, some even claim it just isn’t historically accurate.

However, I have yet to hear one good argument as to the lack of historical accuracy, the movie’s acting was fine, using the common babelfish ploy (where the viewer can understand other languages as their own) and the acting really pulled me in.

In fact, I think that most people who complained about this movie were simply misinformed by advertising. The commercials made this movie out to be a hardcore, run-n-gun action flick, which it is not. It is very much so a historical piece that centralizes on an assassination attempt.

The long and short of it is, in my opinion, that people need to stop seeing a man in a military outfit with an eye patch and assuming he’s Solid Snake. Stauffenburg isn’t gunna call Mei Ling, he isn’t gunna fight Vulcan Raven, and he isn’t gunna listen to J-Pop as an old man punching crazy women.

That being said, the advertising really did make the movie out to be more of an action movie, and that’s a shame. Valkyrie really was good, and you should watch it.

Glitchy Goblin gives Valkyrie a 7/10.

If the Director’s Cut tweaks the pacing a little, it would deserve higher.

Until next time, Goblinites, long live sacred Germany. -GG

Let me just start by saying how much I hate timed posts on wordpress. For the life of me, I can’t figure out how to get them to come out on time, so my attempt at a long weekend with no worries that Movie Monday was covered were shattered.

That being said, Here’s Movie Monday for Taken.

This movie was released on DVD just a few weeks ago, but I’ve captivated by it ever since the trailer first came out. Liam Neeson’s iconic lines as Bryan Mills stick in my head so easily that now, having only seen the movie twice, I know them by heart.

As two people out there might have somehow missed EVERY commercial and not want to hear the lines, they’re in spoiler green.

I don’t know who you are. I don’t know what you want.

If you are looking for ransom, I can tell you I don’t have money. But what I do have are a very particular set of skills; skills I have acquired over a very long career. Skills that make me a nightmare for people like you.

If you let my daughter go now, that’ll be the end of it. I will not look for you, I will not pursue you. But if you don’t, I will look for you, I will find you, and I will kill you.

That’s all the plot synopsis you need for Taken. Those few lines are so ingrained in my mind that I recite them over and over to myself, just to get myself pumped up.

Pictured: The next poster I want to hang on my wall.

The movie is a no holds barred, baby punching, dragon choking, by the power of greyskull, knowing is half the battle fight to the death, and I loved every minute of it.

Spoilers in green, as always.

The movie starts out just a tad sluggish the second time through, but after the first fifteen minutes, it’s all the good parts of the Bourne movies without the crappy love interest in-between to fill time. It’s the spy action of Bond without feeling so ridiculously over the top that you can’t relate.

In essence, it’s one of my new favorite movies, and if you readers are who I think you are, you’ll love it too.

At the movie’s beginning, Bryan is re-establishing a relationship with his daughter Kim and dealing with his terrible, obnoxious ho of an ex-wife. Kim reveals she wants to go overseas with a friend, and hides the fact that she wants to follow U2. Why U2? She’s a teenager and doesn’t realize they suck yet. Fifteen minutes in, Bryan’s daughter Kim gets kidnapped, and the ride begins.

For the rest of the movie, Bryan is on the ball like a circus seal on crack. He’s in pursuit in a way that would make James Bond cock an eyebrow, and so amazingly epic that Jack Bauer would have to give this guy respect. 24? Try 9, you pansy. You got CTU to back you up Jack? Wuss. I got three guys with PCs and more info than Brittanica that I dug up with MY OWN TWO HANDS.

Also, unlike other movies in this genre, Bryan doesn’t lug dead weight. He gets his info and sends them on their way. He needs no backup. He needs no help fighting these guys. He needs no authority or authorization except his own and by gum if he isn’t the baddest dude in the world.

See the movie. I know you’re all comfy, relaxing and surfing the web. PUT DOWN YOUR COMPUTER AND GO RENT TAKEN.

In fact, Taken is indeed a terrible title for this movie. It should have been…

Pictured: Liam Neeson is more awesome in Taken than he is here, fighting Hitler's Lion and aliens, saving a puppy from an explosion, stomping children and dual wielding lightsabers.

Made that with google image’s help and it still pales in comparison to Taken.

Rent it or I will find you… and I will kill you.

So, for a fast paced plot that isn’t another rehash or remake that made me gasp, got me emotionally involved, and kept me guessing…

Glitchy Goblin gives Taken a 9 / 10.

That being said, I STILL dunno how the remake will work…

Until next time, readers, good luck. -GG

Alright. Lemme start this nonsense off by saying two things.

1.) I am NOT a sixteen-year-old girl. So, unlike those squeeling masses, expect my opinions to be rational.

2.) I watched this movie with rifftrax to make it enjoyable.

For the ten of you who DON’T know what rifftrax are, google it. It’s a separate audio file of heckling commentary recorded by the guys who used to do Mystery Science Theatre 3000.

Now, without further ado… I unfortunately present to you…

Her face: My look of upset disdain going into the movie. His face: My boiling hatred coming to the surface in violent disbeleif as the credits rolled.

Yup. Twilight. Spoilers in green. Heckling in black.

The movie starts out slow, Bella is moving from Pheonix (cause it dies and rises from the dead, LOL!!!) to Forks so she can spoon. or because it was barely a Fork in the road. It sucks. Hate the town’s name.

Anyway.  For some reason, everyone in school IMMEDIATELY wants to date Bella. From the fans I’ve talked to, it’s a mysterious gift that attracts EVERYONE to her, and makes her super delicious to “vampires.” I put that word in quotes for a reason. Read on.

So, a couple months or less into school, Bella has four (or more) guys all trying to date her, including a “werewolf,” two “vampires,” and an asian guy. All of which are impossible to me, because she’s food to the first three, and the last guy seemed much more into the football team, if you catch my drift.

And they’re all terrible stalkers. Edward constantly throws off such winning lines as “I’m VERY protective of you,” while pinning her to a rock alone in the woods two weeks into their relationship. Another great example is uprooting trees and threatening her alone in the woods. The Native American dude also confesses that he only wants to take his dad over to their house to spend more time with her and watches her creepily from the woods. Even the “normal” guy is constantly asking her questions for an ‘article.’ Yeah right. continue to decorate your shrine, Romeo.

Anyway (again). The movie is full of terribly awkward moments where no one says anything and they don’t even try to make small talk, making it feel very cliche, like a bad soap opera. Or a Mary Sue Story. Which it is. Both.

“Vampires” fight and petals keep falling off Bella and Edward’s romanticly flowery “romance.” Lots of people watch angrily from the distance. It seriously happens like a dozen times.

By the end of the movie, Edward has saved Bella (who, incidentally, continues to endanger her father, somehow, and STILL treat him like crap at every possible turn).

That being said, endure my rant for a second here.

The Vampires of Twilight aren’t even Vampires. According to the Twilight Wikipedia article, the “Author” did no research of Vampires before writing the books and based the entire terrible affair on some ridiculous dream.

Now, I’m sure you noticed at leas one set of quotes in this article. There are three. Three things that Stephanie Meyer, author of Twilight, often spews gibberish about. I plan to tell you what she gets wrong, classically, about these archetypes.

1. Vampirs (classical) followed by Meyer’s version

- (burned/destroyed by sunlight) Sparkle like glitter in the sun.

- (sleep during the day) Never sleep. EVER.

- (Feed on blood, usually human) Feed on food, then vomit. Drink any type of blood, but human is best. The type of blood they drink changes their eye color. Human blood turns their eyes dark crimson. If they drink animal blood, they turn golden and shiny.

- (enhanced strength and speed) She got this right, at least.

- (weakness to holy items, possibly ignored by alternate faiths or stronger vampires) nope. Nothing here.

- (weakness to garlic) nope.

- (Vampires have no reflection) They do. How ELSE could they do their hair?!

- (Vampires rest in coffins, usually with soil from their homeland) No need, they live in a window-laden mountainside villa with daybeds! Yay!

- (Vampires can transform into familiars, such as a bat, bat swarm, fog, poison gass, etc.) Wait… nope, that’s the not werewolves.

- (Inability to cross running water) but… but but but… they need their own cruise ship!

- (flight) kinda. They can jump stupidly high.

- (Cannot cross portals when unwelcome, ignored by stronger vampires) Nope. They can sneak in and stare at you while you sleep every Single NIGHT.

- (must count scattered pieces, such as scattered rice, rarely used) nope. Not here.

- (in rare cases, weakness to silver) none at all.

- (Killed by a stake through the heart, or sometimes dismemberment) Here,even the classic constant stake is gone. You have to rip off all limbs and burn them.

- (Mind reading, rarely) it’s there, in one case.

- (Seduction) it’s there, even if it doesn’t make any sense.

- (???) They also have random super powers, varying from individual to individual.

Meaning that a terrible car crash could kill a vampire. Which could happen, because they drive, even though they can fly and carry people easily.
Plus, without any exploitable weaknesses, even if you ASSUME they hide in fear of persicution, they have no need to live in secrecy. They aren’t some exploitable second class seeking to do evil, living in constant weakness. They could conquer the world in mere hours. So… why do they hide in this series? Cause they claim to be vampires.

2.) Werewolves – The werewolves are just as bad. Firstly, they simply, at will, may transform into a wolf. Not a wolfman, not on the full moon, but anytime. Also, no weakness to silver or wolfsbane or anything.

Plus, they’re all Native Americans. Yay racism in teen targeted books. Not to mention it’s displayed positively.

3.) Authors – Lastly, Stephanie Meyer has another serious misconception she thinks she knows everything about. She thinks she’s an Author.

Authors write books that make sense. In my opinion, if your book is a total failure and makes no sense and lacks coherence, you cannot claim to be an Author. You may call yourself a writer, Meyer, but until your book makes sense and isn’t pandering to 16-year-olds who want every perfect boy in school to drool over them, you’ll never be an author to me.

Anyway (last time, promise). The movie was just as terrible and has all the problems I’ve just stated. However, if you can overlook this, go enjoy Twilight.

If you’re in the other 90% of the population (reasonable people) then only watch this if it has the Riff Trax. Nothing better than hearing the guys say ‘Line’ every ten seconds, when dialogue should be happening, or heckling the creepy, metrosexual, rapist-esque comments pouring out of Edward’s mouth.

However, it was a friend who got the movie and the riff trax, brought it to my house, and even after having my entertainment brought to my house and played in front of me, I still felt slighted and wanted to demand my money back at the end of this movie. DO NOT WATCH THIS STUPID, FANGIRL SQUEAL OF A FILM!!!

As a Movie, GG gives Twilight a 2 / 10 for cool effects.

As a Paranormal Series, GG gives Twilight a 0 / 10. Don’t call superpowered zombies Vampires, Meyer.

With Riff Trax, Twilight Gets a 6 /10, because as funny as it was, I still wanted to vomit uncontrollably.

Oh, if you’re a fangirl and are angry, leave a comment for me to laught at. I’ll be nice to your face and will debate with you, if you are civil and don’t type in all caps.

Alright, well, my girlfriend was really excited about this one. I was too, because I, like her, loved the first Night at the Museum movie and am actively pursuing buying the book one day.

That being said, for those of you who who frequent Fox News, let me restate the movie in question, as you are accustomed:

Pictured: A worthy sequel. Also, take that, Bill O'reilly.

Well, I went into this movie with my reservations, having seen many mediocre reviews and heard that the movie was almost unbearable from the critics.

However, I found the movie really enjoyable! The movie held true to the themes included in the original, made more sense than ninety percent of sequels, and didn’t exclude any of the characters from the first film.

Again, spoilers in green. Watch that, if you are so inclined.

The movie starts with the entire original cast intact, from Stiller as the night guard turned business man Larry Daily, his son, and all of the exhibits, including Robbin Williams as Teddy Roosevelt, Owen Wilson as Jedidiah, a miniature of a wild west cowboy, the list goes on and on.

The movie starts with Daily having made it big with the inventions he had made to make his job as night guard easier.This is especially cool because it shows exactly how much bearing the first movie had on the plot of this one.

Then, shortly after, we receive a helping of character story, filling in the gaps between the movies and showing how the characters interact at this point in time.

Instead of being hokey, the plot plays by the laws of the first movie, as well as introducing new characters to the set, such as the brother of the Pharaoh from the first movie, expanding on the powers of the life-giving tablet and further drenching the movie in historical references and cultural art.

I have a couple of problems with the movie, the most prevalent being the next few points.

1. At the end of the movie, a huge stained glass window has been destroyed and in no way repaired, and it isn’t explained whether the Smithsonian even notices or cares.

2. It’s never clear whether Kah Mun Rah, the pharaoh’s brother, is a wax exhibit or an actual mummy, like the pharaoh from the first movie was.

3. The movie uses one very cheesy, over used line of the hero besting the villain in combat and the villain asking “Who ARE you?” to which the hero gives an anti-climactic answer (in this case, “I’m the Night Guard.”) which I could have done without.

4. Lastly, I came up with some very good jokes that the movie missed out on, like the miniatures lecturing Napoleon about how he has no right to feel small next to them.

Other than those points, other than a couple of quirky continuity moments, the only real problem I had was that the trailer used clips I found quite amusing that didn’t make the final cut, which I was annoyed by.

Of course, I won’t blame the movie for that. That’s marketing’s fault.

In the end, GG gives “Night at the Museum 2″ a 8 / 10

Let it be said my girlfriend wanted me to give it higher. She’s a history nut.

Until next time, may greatness be thrust upon you. -GG

Pictured: The most boring Terminator I've ever seen.

So, like with Star Trek, I went to a Wednesday preview showing of Terminator Salvation, and like most Terminator fans, I was salivating for Salvation. Then the movie started. As always, if you don’t want spoilers, just avoid the green paragraphs.

This movie sucked. I can actually say with certainty that the only real enjoyment I found in the first two-thirds of the movie came from me and a friend mocking Christian Bale every time he said anything. Every time John Conner said anything, we added how it was distracting, and how he and that actor/robot/vehicle were done, professionally.

(For the two people who didn’t get that joke, it’s about Bale yelling at a guy for walking in his light and being, in his words, “@#$%^%ing distracting.” It also spurred a five minute yelling session from the angry crybaby actor. Youtube “Christian Bale freak out.”)

Not that John Conner was the main character. Yup, you heard right. The previews have lied to you. The main character is the interesting, yet totally gypped, due to editing, Marcus. That being said…

The entirety of the first half of the movie is terribly predictable. From the very first shot, I predicted a majority of the movie. With proper editing, the movie’s suspense could have been top notch and the plot could have actually flowed. An hour in, I actually nearly fell asleep and asked my girlfriend if she was just as bored as I was. She was. Now, time for the spoilers.

In the first scene, we learn about a guy on death row who sells his body to Dynacorp, so we are instantly like, Terminator, lulz. If that wasn’t enough, we then see him emerging from a burning Skynet tower in Conner’s adult time. So, most everyone puts two and two together and realizes he’s a Terminator.

However, the movie then beats us over the head with it, making him do impossible things, time and time again. He hits a flying machine with a four-way and destroys it in a single hit, people break their fists on his face, he hits rocks at a couple hundred miles an hour to no damage. At this point, I’m yawning, knowing he’s a Terminator for an hour now, and THEN they play it off as some big shock, showing you his inner workings.

In addition, they overplay a hook on the back of a tow truck for the better part of five minutes, as well as a scene where the Terminator, named Marcus, is gunned down by the resistance, finally trying to make it seem cool that he suddenly shows battle damage.

Now, if the movie had started with Marcus yelling in a burning ruin, then the title, then his introduction and battle, underplaying his super-heroism, and then suddenly showed the flashback just before revealing his half-machine nature, it could have been really dramatic.

But those problems are passable, even if it IS a simple editing fix that could have saved the movie and made it interesting. The real two problems I had with the movie, that were BLOODY DISTRACTING, were the lack of a soundtrack and poor pacing.

The soundtrack was more than minimal. If I read the ending credits correctly, there were only FOUR SONGS. They play a Guns ‘n Roses Song for six seconds or so, as well as an Alice in Chains song for the same duration. In addition, they play (according to the credits) the theme from Terminator 1 and 2. They still released a soundtrack, but of the ten people I saw it with, no one remembers the songs playing during the movie even once past the opening credits. Also, for no reason, they say the title twice in the opening. Why? Who knows.

The pacing was bad. REALLY bad, going from a scene where someone was talking peacefully with a girl to INSTANT ACTION with no transition. No wipe, no music, just a scene switch that makes my highschool home movies look like gems.

Also, by the end of the movie, nothing has happened, at all.

They destroyed one Skynet tower, with hundreds left, or so they say, meaning NOTHING HAPPENED. In fact, the only enjoyable part was the Arnold impersonator showing up near the end and the final fight sequence.

In the end, I feel like I spent 2 hours feeling like I had watched a boring 3 hour movie. Skip this nonsense.

GG gives this mess 3 / 10

(4 with Bale’s freak out lines inserted.)

Until next time guys, we’re done professionally. -GG