My Judgement Day : A HUGE Disappointment. Review on Terminator 3 Movie

There's a solid reason why James Cameron wanted to stay away from T3. He said ''I have already told the story''. Well, those words sum up T3. Rehash of what's been already told. It's but natural Linda Hamilton, the central and very powerful character of first two installments and now also Mrs. Cameron, followed her husbands suit. All that remains is Universal and fading actor (!?!) and aspiring-to-be-Governor Mr. Shwarznegger to cash in on the popularity of this franchise.

It joins the company of previous ultra-successful franchises that came down with a whimper in take 3 .. GodFather & Jurassic Park.

The impending doom is evident right from the title roll. Earlier Ts set the tone right before the credits. Remember the devastating night-mare sequence that opened T2 which blew up the play area, with it's swings and roulette and a human clinging to the fence charred to skeleton as nuclear blast wake hits her. Well, thats what is a Terminator opening. Here title roll is so meek, you instantly re-adjust your expectations rock bottom.

Also missing ,along with Sarah Connor, is her voice-over (and her nightmares) telling the story behind the action. Now we realise how effective it was to success of earlier model Ts.

One more casualty is music. Terminator series was equally famous for its signature tune as well as a solid metal sound-track. That aspect has fell to deaf ear here. You can't even hear the menacing 6 beat drum as terminator approaches.

So, in T2, Sarah and James Connors saved the world, averted the Judgement Day by destroying the T1 proto. Somehow, machines still will rise now on a new JD, the day of T3.

The human resistance will also form and new Anti Terminator Terminator (AT&T anyone ?) is sent to nip the future human soldiers in bud. She, the T-X, doesn't even outsmart the previous T1000, even after being raised to the power of X, with chromosome Y also thrown in with eye on Box Office. Richard Patrick in T2 convinced us that playing robot is not playing dead man walking. Here, T-X is cold as a turkey, even in her sizzling leopard leather outfit.

Good and really really old T1 is also back to protect James. Sadly, he is mostly used to seek comic relief in his cliched one liners and his fetish for sunglasses. And he's had a brain wash, can't remember a thing and is really dumb, even by Arnie standards. To make the matters worse, his spanish subroutine is missing so he can't even say 'Hasta La Vista, babe'.

Much of the same T2 then unfolds. We go through the motion of endless destruction, murder and mayhem (Movie is rated R for a reason). The only new twist comes at the end just to assure successful bridge to T4. Possibly T4 will star Vin diesel if Governor Arnie has his political ways.

The machines in T3 look so jaded and obsolete. The only new tricks the machines have learned is to control fellow machines. Huh, so much for the evolution! Cine-goers have now moved ahead of nuclear wars and killing machines into more sophisticated stuff like pre-crime and parallel matrices. T3 takes us 20 years back in world of mindless and mind numbing action flicks.

It's said that Arnie funded the much touted crane chase sequence so that it could happen in california. After seeing the on-screen destruction it sponsored, I dont have much hopes about my cash strapped state :(

To deepen my disappointment, I am now seeing T2 on USA channel and still loving it. Guess, in light of this I wish to give a zero star rating to T3.

Terminator fans, You are now terminated.