I'll be Back to the Future

Terminator. You know, I had never actually seen this in its entirety before this last Thursday. I don't know what I expected, but what I saw certainly wasn't it. I enjoyed it a lot, but I must say that I don't think that it holds up very well. This is really one of those cases where the original film relied heavily on special effects so, as time went on, those effects start to fall flat. The film just FEELS like the 80s and I don't think that it will ever escape that. That isn't to say that the story isn't still very cool, but watching it when there are movies like I, Robot or the Matrix which are just far more FUN to watch these days because of their far more polished effects. Sure, in another decade they, too, will fade, but not yet.

Time travel. One of the most popular topics in all of Science Fiction. In my opinion, however, it almost always fails. Time travel, unless taken lightly, is extremely unbelievable. I must say, however, the fact that time travel is only one way in this film makes it much more believable. The biggest problem when it can go either way is that going BACK to the future is ridiculous. Once you change the past, going back to the future is too dangerous as the world will no longer be the same place.

One thing that I did like was that Reese coming back and fathering John Connor really didn't change anything. As he said, he was just preserving it. In both "universes", he clearly acted the same way. I appreciate when time travel doesn't change anything, it is just another means of transportation. It makes me think that there really was never any way that the Terminator could have succeeded. He obviously had to fail simply because he existed at all. It basically amounts to this being a contained loop in time that should always play out the same way. Had it ever NOT done so, then it could never have been to begin with.

See how stupid that whole paragraph sounded? That's why I hate time travel. You CANNOT sound smart discussing it (unless it is with worm holes and bending light and all of that good stuff... but that is completely different!).