Few movie series raise such organized ire as the Terminator movies, and I think that I have a handle on why. It’s an expectations thing.
- The Terminator? Great horror flick. Great horror flick. Science fiction flavored, of course: but they had a classic horror scenario and Schwarzenegger made for an iconic Monster. So far, so good.
- Which meant that when Terminator 2 – Judgment Day came out, everybody was wearily certain that it was going to suck. Sequels often do, when it comes to horror flicks; all the really good stuff was used in the first movie. However, Cameron decided to do a more straightforward action film and spend insane amounts of money on the latest special effects; in other words, It Did Not Suck.
- Expectations were thus raised even higher… and the next two flicks were, well, meh.
It’s the ‘meh’ that causes the most drama on the Internet, methinks.
Moe, I would say the drama originates from the fact that all of the Terminator’s “plot inconsistentcies” are things that only geeks tend to notice, and we tend to be, by our very natures, obsessive over things about which we care (in this case, robotics, future war, and time travel).
Also, I think people mistake Terminator for a sci-fi movie, and the joy of sci-fi is the notion that it all one day might be real. Terminator doesn’t even try for plausibility.