Techtite.com Editorial : My Two Bits, V2

Let's cut to the chase: the finale of Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines SUCKED. Is it worth its own editorial, to say so...? Actually, no. Yet the hype it has inspired does. It seems as if every fanboy from here to Silicon Valley not only loved this ending, yet insists it was "necessary" and "makes total sense". That's where the need for an editorial comes in. Not only was this finale stupid; It's not sensible, logical, coherent, or even acceptable. In fact, it piffles away the value of the whole film series. That's dumb.

Yes, there are those who disagree. Lots of people. Well, a good share of people. Some people. People who measure their action movies based on the size of the explosions; those people. Such people are too busy looking at a few nuclear mushroom clouds to realize they've been duped. This is a trilogy that took 20 years to complete, totaling nearly 6 hours in all, only to be ended like...that?!? It's appalling. That's my opinion, and I'm stickin' to it.

However, a truly bad finale is not flawed just because of opinion. It's flawed because of 1) a lack of cohesion, 2) factual errors, 3) technical issues, 4) a lack of logic, and of course 5) snubbing its nose at fans. Let's pursue each of these flaws, one at a time:

1) Cohesion.

These are errors inconsistent to the prior films. Consider: the terminatrix is killed by combustible power cells within the "good" terminator. Huh...? If this is the same model terminator from the prior film, how did he fall into a vat of molten metal in the last movie, yet not explode when doing so? Sarah and John should've been killed in the blast, if he had such power cells in him when dipped into molten metal. If these cells were the energy source damaged by the Terminator-2 in battle, then they should've detonated then, during the fight. This film wants us to believe that he suddenly has such power cells, yet didn't then. Sorry: I'm not buying it.

2) Factual Errors.

John narrates that Skynet was never held in a supercomputer, though instead was a virus, "in the internet," and therefore could never be stopped. In other words, an artificial intelligence --that we were told needed a state of the art CPU to exist at all-- is now a mere virus, on standard Pentium PCs, somewhere in cyberspace. This is the sort of concept that would only make sense to someone who knows nothing about computers, nothing about program size, nothing about artificial intelligence, nothing about computer viruses, and yet probably saw Virtuosity 20 times. In short, it's wrong.

First of all, Skynet could not have survived on the internet after a nuclear blast; a military bunker, yes, not the internet. Second: no standard CPU could lead to a "new order of intelligence," no matter how good the programmer was; the technology just isn't there. Last yet not least, there's the belief an artificial intelligence could be a mere virus, somewhere in cyberspace. Sorry: NO. Virus programs are by nature very small and incongruous; artificial intelligence programs, by stark contrast, require a supercomputer to store them. Are we to believe this Skynet "virus" contained the blueprints of all terminators (and a time machine!), the launch codes of all missile silos, the intelligence to hunt down John Conner if the need arose, and yet was small enough to play hopscotch on an internet of mostly 56K modems, so it could never be found...?

3) Technical Errors.

For the purpose of this editorial, technical errors are "facts" that we merely think we know; namely, theories about time travel. Consider how John Conner narrates that the future could not be changed, at least not permanently. Oh, really...? Then answer me this, genius: how did the terminatrix succeed in killing four of your lieutenants? Killing four people is a pretty permanent way of changing the future, dude. If the future is set, then how could she kill soldiers who will, in this timeline, never be soldiers? No, the future isn't set yet, dummy.

Techno-geeks deny this. They claim that the future must suck, or else Kyle Reese will never go back in time, and furthermore, John will never be born. Sorry, there is simply no way to prove (or disprove) this theory. After all, the past is the past. In John's case, the original future is his past, even if it was originally the future. If future A led to John's birth, it matters little if John uses this knowledge to create happier-future B, because the unhappy future was his past, and the happy one, his future. If this makes no sense to you, maybe this will: Terminator-2 had a better ending. Okay, Einstein?

The problem with believing the "future is set" is simple: if that were true, then why worry about a terminator at all? If the future cannot be changed, then John Conner should have no worry about death in the past. He could sit on the terminatrix's super weapon and spin like a top for all it would matter, because the future is set. He's alive in the future, the future is set, so he can't be killed in the past...nyah, nyah! Even if this was true, it's a stupid concept for a thriller because clearly, there's no thrill value.

It's the hypocrisy that gets me the most, however. You cannot have the terminatrix change time (by killing lieutenants who will never become lieutenants), only to have John Conner imply he cannot change time, just for the sake of shock value fluff. That's dumb.

4) Logic.

I rarely look for logic in fiction, even science fiction. However, is common mathematics --or at least common sense-- too much to ask? How does a man born in 1984 suddenly become "in his early 20's" in 2003? If the two young teenagers the terminatrix killed really were "lieutenants from the future," how did they originally survive a nuclear bomb, if they were throwing a house party at the time...? The list goes on...

Worst of all is John Conner in this film: he's a wimp! How can this guy be a born leader? In the epilogue, a born leader should narrate that he is now filled with the rage and desire for revenge that will help him defeat the robots, as his destiny demands. Instead, John gives a natty little monologue about how Armageddon was inescapable, boo-hoo. Gee, way to be a leader, pal. The desire to fight back just drips right from the man, don't it? Sarcasm aside, there's no logic in presuming that this imbecile is a born leader. None at all.

5) Snubbing its nose at fans.

Fans are a forgiving lot. Just about every plot inconsistency can be forgiven if the theater audience is simply given a good ending. Consider the ending of the original Star Wars. Did it make sense that a death star, that could destroy any planet, needed to encircle a planet to get to the rebel moon? No; they would've destroyed the planet, and presuming it's still around, destroyed the rebel moon behind it. Problem solved. Furthermore, star destroyers could've destroyed the X-wings --and even most of the base-- long before they even reached the trench. The ending was cool, though, so why nitpick?

Which brings us to this film. It has factual errors, yes, though that's the point. If you're going to give us a sucky ending than you'd better have a good reason for doing so. Don't tell us "this ending sucks but it makes sense" only to have some film junkie with his own web site shut you down, listing error after error after error. This was not just an unhappy ending; it was a total disregard for the film series' fans. There just was no need for it. Period.

1+2+3+4+5 = ...garbage.

Some people will disagree with me here. There are fans of everything: every story, every movie, and yes, every finale. No surprise then, that some people are heralding this finale as "ballsy" and therefore, it's a good ending. Such people are not jerks or idiots or morons or even the enemy. They're just wrong. I'm sure there is a child somewhere, trying to convince his mother that his bag of Chee-tos has nutritional value, because cheese has calcium in it and therefore, so do Chee-tos. I have the deepest enjoyment of kids like that, trying to defend their beliefs against an adult world that knows better. However, there's no denying it: the kid's wrong.

Agree? Disagree?

...or perhaps just agree to disagree? Feel free to give your own "two bits," via Techtite's Letters page. Editorial Submissions are also allowed. Editorials do not have to agree with the views of other editorials at Techtite.com, though they must be relevant to entertainment topics of this web site (movies, TV, games). Thanks.