Trailer Tuesday: Terminator Salvation

I've spoken a bit before about this upcoming Terminator film - which chronicles the first years of the post-apocalyptic battle between humans and Skynet, with its army of intelligent machines.

Honestly, I was never opposed to the idea of films that dealt specifically with what was only glimpsed and discussed in Terminator 1 and 2. And after Terminator 3's ending, well, this new trilogy seemed like a logical progression. However, I will always be of the opinion that a man vs. machine action film is far more exciting and intriguing when it's set in our present day context, as opposed to against the backdrop of a barren, decimated future (which we've already seen onscreen so many times before).

This said, I thought the teaser trailer above was far better than I thought it would be, with John Connor (Christian Bale) starting to doubt his role in saving humanity. Perhaps in meddling so much with the past, victory is no longer assured.

Although Charlie's Angels director McG is helming the project *rolls eyes*, Salvation has managed to round up a decent cast, that includes Lady in the Water's Bryce Dallas Howard (replacing Claire Danes as Kate Connor) and Helena Bonham Carter in a mysterious but important cameo role. And, of course, anything starring Christian Bale can't be all bad...

Speaking of Christian Bale, here's the first released still from the film, with John Connor dishing out some punishment on a T-600 terminator.


There have been a lot of rumours flying around the Internet in regards to Terminator Salvation, including that John Connor dies at some point and is replaced by a "good" Terminator who continues to fight for humanity as Connor.

As for Arnold Schwarzenegger making an appearance in the film, apparently fellow Austrian bodybuilder Roland Kickinger (who some of you may remember from saucy Baywatch spoof, Son of the Beach), will be the T-800. Interestingly, Kickinger has played a young Arnie before in a made-for-TV movie about the actor.

There's a good Aint It Cool article here on the Terminator panel at this year's San Diego Comic Con. The article features a scene by scene description of footage screened, offers some tidbits on the film (it may be R-rated after all) and has McG claiming that the film studio has been embarking on an online misinformation campaign to hide the film's real plot... although personally I think they're trying to hide the fact that some of the big surprises have already been revealed.

Terminator Salvation is set for release in May 2009.