Fixed That For You

When I wrote about Terminator Genisys, I wondered whether the Terminator franchise was still necessary. Ultimately, I think it can be viable, especially if future creators embrace all the sci-fi ideas time travel, A.I., and multiple timelines affords them – like the Sarah Connor Chronicles once did. But that isn’t a question I think needs to be asked in regards to the Jurassic Park franchise. Despite Jurassic World’s embarrassingly high box office returns domestically and internationally, the answer is no. Jurassic Park shouldn’t be a franchise. At least, it shouldn’t be if nobody is going to be any god damn effort into the production.

None of the sequels have been any good, and Jurassic World is actually the worst of them all. Sure, the action set pieces have some impressive CGI behind them, but there’s no imagination in their execution and there’s very little set-up or pay-off in the script. The performances are uniformly broader than a soap opera and the characters are all so very dumb, which is completely at odds with the down-to-earth presentation of very smart people from the original. The Lost World and Jurassic Park III may be uninspired save for a few scenes – the raptor attack in the long grass and the dual t-rexes from the former, and the pterosaur sanctuary and the SAT phone gag in the latter – but at least the characters aren’t so prohibitively unintelligent that their continued survival is a surreal mystery.

Okay, there are the issues with gymnastics and raptor eggs, but two scenes compared to a whole movie of utter stupidity are much easier to cope with. (And, admittedly, the less said about talking dream raptors the better.) Why so serious, bruh? It’s a movie with fucking dinosaurs tearing shit up and eating people! So it’s dumb, what did you expect? I expected the first movie! We shouldn’t praise a movie for its mediocrity, even if we like it. We should demand movies be better. We are paying for them after all.

So, yes, I’ve seen Jurassic World. And, yes, I hated it. During my screening I even leaned over to a friend at one point and literally said: “I hate this.” It’s one big pile of shit. But in the days of Transformers and Michael Bay, shit gets sequels if it the shit looks pretty enough. What could they have done differently?

For starters, they could have considered the actual Jurassic World a zoo and thought through what sort of precautions a zoo would have, and not just what sort of exhibits and rides the visitors could go on. The latter is great, of course, and the movie that was made does show some fun stuff to do at Jurassic World, but those scenes are perfunctory at best and feel padded, because the two brother characters also feel tacked on. The ghosts of Tim and Lex and nowhere near as entertaining or endearing.

Like the first movie was about the invited scientists experiencing Jurassic Park’s test run, this movie should be from the perspective of the guests paying to visit Jurassic World. Of course we meet the scientists and engineers behind the scenes – perhaps in a Cabin in the Woods type of cross-cutting – but they’re mainly there to explain why the precautions are failing when they inevitably do fail. But that’s the point, hubris and greed are characters’ downfalls in Jurassic Park, not their stupidity. It takes the painstaking will of Dennis Nedry to make Jurassic Park fail. Jurassic World fails because the protagonists forget that cell phones can literally make calls from anywhere.

This is where a character like the one played by Vincent D’Onofrio should come into play. For one, he was my favorite part of the whole movie, because he actually seemed like he cared about what he was doing onscreen. But also, the security guy who wants to prove either his precautions can withstand paddocks opening or that the dinosaurs are capable of being more than just zoo animals is exactly the foil a movie like this needs. He sabotages pens and plans at various times, all in the name of his own pride and ego. He may care if people get hurt, but it will be worth it if he proves he’s right.

Naturally, he’d be wrong, and that’s when chaos would ensue. Jurassic World goes the opposite route and makes D’Onofrio pretty much right about everything he says, just a complete asshole. This is the character who should cause every bad thing that happens and whose demise the audience should be craving to see in the final reel. Instead, it’s our heroes who fuck everything up, because they’re dumb, and when the bad guy unsatisfyingly perishes off-screen, we’re left asking, “Oh, I guess that raptor got in because Chris Pratt left the door open?”

You may saying, but Rob, it’s the bad guy InGen dudes who made the super dinosaur that really caused every bad thing to happen, and D’Onofrio represented those interests. Sure, if you want to admit that the super dinosaur outsmarted everyone with its camouflage and the two leads were too dumb to see where the super dinosaur’s tracker said it was before they entered its paddock and then set it free while trying to escape once they were told it was still inside. If you’re fine with that, then Jurassic World is the movie for you. If you’re not fine with that, like me, you’re left knowing that a few more passes on the script should have ironed lazy wrinkles like that.

Fixed That for You: Vacation 2015 (FTfY:V2015)

Vacation, or National Lampoon’s Vacation as I’ve always known it (screw you, IMDB), is a movie I always thought could be successfully rebooted or given a new sequel so many years later. I have a fondness for European Vacation after seemingly endless loops on cable during my childhood, and Christmas Vacation has become a traditionally unconventional holiday classic. Vegas Vacation proved you should probably stop most franchises at the trilogy point, though it’s not truly awful like Christmas Vacation 2. Despite the sudden decline in later entries, there’s no season the Griswolds, or another wacky family, couldn’t be the centerpiece of more movies. Just have them go somewhere else or celebrate a new holiday.

Actually, that sounds terrible. But not as terrible as simply remaking the original movie by way of making a sequel. Certainly the idea that the kids from the first series would be grown up now, possibly with families of their own, could make good fodder for a road trip comedy. But focusing on Rusty and giving him almost the exact same life, and reasons for going on the trip, as his father is exceptionally fucking lazy. A point could be made and a comedy could be mined from trying to live too closely to your parents’ ideal, a situation surely many, many people find themselves in.

But just using the same set up to tell many of the same jokes, or the opposite of the jokes, is, as I said, exceptionally fucking lazy.

Especially when the kids from the original movies were equals. Rusty wasn’t the star over Audrey, why should his story continue instead of hers? Just to make a reference to the first film by having the family member visited being filthy rich rather than dirt poor, and incredibly attractive instead of molestingly grotesque? Again, lazy. If the family was Audrey’s and the Randy Quaid stand-in was Rusty, it would still be fucking lazy. Exceptionally so.

No, if a new Vacation sequel is going to be made in order to kickstart another new franchise, it should be about both Audrey and Rusty. (Or a whole new family, but then why is it a “Vacation” movie?) Perhaps one of the two did try to live up to their parents’ marriage and family, but failed. Now they’re divorced or separated and need something to reinvigorate their life before it totally falls apart. The other sibling could have gone the other way, and dedicated themselves to their passion or work with very little interest in having a family.

Start the movie with the professional sibling receiving a setback at work, perhaps a suspension or firing, and you have two solid, personal reasons for the Griswold children to reunite. When they’re back together, they reminisce, and Rusty tries to remind Audrey how much fun they had in the old family trickster. Audrey, naturally, would scoff at first because she was always an afterthought to their dad, but she would eventually relent because this is a movie and that needs to happen.

So, we have our main characters, we have our reasons for the titular vacation, and we have a plot that isn’t wholly reliant on referencing the original. Maybe their kids can come, too, as part of an extended busting-them-out-of-school sequence. Or maybe it’s just one of their weeks to have the kids. Whatever, they can come, too, if the mandate to make it a “family film” is in play. I loved Planes, Trains, and Automobiles as a kid and there weren’t any children to appeal to my interests in that movie, but whatever. This movie is about Rusty and Audrey.

It doesn’t matter what they’re destination is – certainly not Wally World – because it’s almost never about that. It’s about all the shenanigans that happen along the way. It’s important to remember that the vacation is never the star of any Vacation movie, it was always Chevy Chase. (Once it was Randy Quaid, but that’s a terrible example, so shut up.) So, you can’t cast someone like Ed Helms as the lead of a Vacation movie. The franchise name alone isn’t enough to make most people care, and he just isn’t a leading man.

At least, Ed Helms isn’t a comedic persona anyone is interested in seeing an entire movie devoted to. Chase, in the 80s and 90s, was definitely that comedic persona. On the other hand, Christina Applegate would have been an inspired choice to play an adult Audrey. She isn’t a popular lead actress necessarily, but she’s funny as hell and has a lot of earned goodwill from Marry with Children... and the Anchorman movies. She’s the one thing I think Vacation 2015 got right, just in the wrong part.

That said, it’s too bad Trainwreck already exists and already came out, because Amy Schumer and Bill Hader could have been amazing in this movie as the adult Griswold babes. They’re chemistry as love interests who butt heads could have easily translated to brother-sister rivalry. Of course, then Trainwreck wouldn’t exist and I’m glad Schumer is writing her own original work, so let’s not go that route. But like Ghostbusters before it, what would excite me about Vacation 2015 is a comedian with a passion to put their stamp on beloved material. The mercenary attitude of these comedy reboots is, while understandable, exceptionally fucking lazy.

Actually, with their work on Last Man on Earth (and many other things), Will Forte and Kristen Schaal would be my ideal choices for Rusty and Audrey. I hesitated to dream cast with Terminator, but here, since the comedic voices are so important, I’ll make an exception. What I especially love about their pairing is that, besides playing so well with each other, they’d both be believable as sad sack divorcees or emotionally crippled executives. The ideas of Schaal as a sweet-natured mom playing off a high strung Hader or a nebbishy Hader playing against a ball-busting Schaal already make me smile. 

While we’re at it, let’s get Phil Lord and Chris Miller, co-creators of Forte’s and Schaal’s TV show, to write and direct. Rebooting fondly remembered things from childhood worked out well for Legos and 21 Jump Street thanks to their efforts. They could knock this material out of the park.

Fixed That for You: Terminator Genisys (FTfY:TG)

Is Terminator a franchise that needs to exist? That’s a question that’s been asked a lot in the wake of the latest entry in the franchise – the title of which I’m not going to type more than once for the title of this article, so you’ll just have to know what I’m talking about – but I don’t know the answer. I do know that the franchise doesn’t need Arnold Schwarzenegger, the Sarah Connor Chronicles proved that. But Arnie appears to be the nigh unanimous Best Thing about the new movie, so maybe that isn’t totally right either.

I definitively know that Terminator isn’t like Star Trek, or potentially Star Wars, which is more about ideas, ideals, plotting and world building, and humans generally than any specific human characters. Terminator, on the other hand, is about Sarah Connor. Or John Connor. It’s mostly about the Connors, and occasionally about the Reeses (Kyle and his televisual brother, Brian Austin Green). It’s not about the T-800, which only looks like Arnold in all of the movies because Hollywood doesn’t take risks. So, any remake or reboot must start with the Connors and then extrapolate out from there what kind of story it’s going to be. In terms of story, Terminator can be anything, but the characters must come first.

I hate to compare anything to Shakespeare, because it’s easy and kind of hack, but… it’s easy, so here I go: There’s no reason the story of John Connor sending his father back in time to save his mother from a killer robot, and also donate semen so John can be born in the first place, can’t be told as many times as Romeo & Juliet. You could try to tell the story of the war between humans and Skynet, which I am definitely not opposed to (see again: the Sarah Connor Chronicles), but McG already ruined that for everyone. In this specific case, a full-on rebootening is not without merit. Re-telling the same basic story of Sarah and Kyle being hunted by a murderbot from the future wouldn’t inherently suffer from a new coat of paint. Not a Michael Bayization, but overall the same script with more elaborate set pieces and shot with today’s Hollywood action blockbuster budgets.

This is where character comes in. Starting from just that simple remake premise, you need an actress that can convincingly portray the youthful, inexperienced diner waitress who must quickly adapt to a very new set of circumstances. Emilia Clarke, the Khaleesi and Mother of Dragons from Game of Thrones, is a pretty good choice for that Sarah Connor. Then you get anyone else besides Jai Courtney to play Kyle Reese and you’ve got yourself a stew going. From there, you need to decide what to do about the robot. I’ll get to Arnold soon enough, but let’s presume it doesn’t matter. You could do the T-800 or T-1000 again, maybe with different models, or you could do something new.

This where the idea of a nanite (nano-bot comprised) machine is actually a logical next step for this franchise. It gives you the malleability of the T-1000 with the variety of the Terminatrix from Rise of the Machines without the inherent impossibilities. If you want to get overly complicated and pay tribute to the original series, and that’s not unreasonable, the new murder-bot could make reference to other timelines, and how even if it fails in killing Sarah, another murder-bot will be sent to finish the job – in either this timeline or the next. Meta commentary works best when it’s organic to the narrative.

But, okay, financiers, if Arnold Schwarzenegger absolutely must be in the movie, he could be sent back as assistance for Kyle Reese (or maybe Kyle is his assistance, either way) and immediately get destroyed by the updated enemy. Arnie is almost always fun, but it could be a whole new kind of fun to see two humans facing a seemingly impossible AI enemy on their own. Like if the 1970s Sentinels were ever a threat in X-Men: Days of Future Past. But, say Arnold must be in the thing, then going back further in time to begin training Sarah Connor for the apocalypse at a much younger age is not without good potentialities. I don’t know about “Pops” and all that, but turning Sarah into her Judgment Day-self earlier in the timeline is a winning idea. But Emilia Clarke is all wrong for that. Her co-star in Game of Thrones, Lena Headey, is obviously capable, and Maisy Williams’ Arya Stark would be an amazing choice in a few years. But Clarke, a good actor, just doesn’t have the gravitas for it. It’s not a failing, not every actor is right for every role. There’s a reason why the casting process exists beyond just giving perverts an excuse to get blow jobs.

People like Emily Blunt and Anne Hathaway are gifted enough to play both versions of the character like Linda Hamilton before them, but I won’t try to dream cast the role here. It could be the opportunity of a lifetime for an actress, it’s just too bad the makers of the new movie misused their power and miscast the part. Clarke could have been great, but not in the current storyline. But she’s by no means, according to most reports, the worst part.

Again, literally anyone besides Jai Courtney would be an improvement. I don’t mean that as an insult, because, honestly, Jonah Hill wouldn’t be better – though, definitely more entertaining. I just mean, there’s a reason Kyle Reese is fondly remembered and feels like an integral piece of the Terminator puzzle. Despite his relatively small role in the series, Michael Biehn, who is a bizarrely underrated performer, gave quite the affecting performance as the post-modern romantic hero. Courtney, on the other hand, made very little impression in Spartacus on Starz, and absolutely nobody likes A Good Day to Die Hard. His casting (not to mention also being cast in Suicide Squad) boggles the damn mind. Again, I won’t dream cast here, but surely there’s somebody with a more memorable presence, with at least a dash of world weariness? Someone who isn’t already signed on to Avengers, Star Trek, or Star Wars?

You might have noticed that I haven’t spoken much about John Connor. That’s because I honestly believe that the less of John we see the better. It’s very effective in the first two movies when we don’t see adult John Connor at all, or we only see the fantastically war-scarred hero for a few seconds. He’s great as an idea, he’s not uncompelling as a maturing teenager, and just this side of sufferable as a snot nosed kid… but he’s not interesting as the predestined savior of mankind. By the time he’s leading any amount of resistance against Skynet, his story is basically done. Some sort of bookend with John sending Kyle back in time, and then, as set-up for the Hollywood hoped-for sequel, John reprogramming a robot to possibly also send back in time.

But that’s it. John Connor doesn’t need to be a character beyond what has already been portrayed, and he sure as hell doesn’t need to be the villain. That said, going back to my detail about the murder-bot’s speech, the idea that the timelines need a hard reset (as in, no John Connor) could work if not utterly abandoned. With the acceptance of multiple timelines or universes, all seemingly headed toward the same, you’ll have to forgive me, singularity, ensuring that the future can’t happen by sacrificing John is kind of a mind blowing option. After all, any Sarah from the 1980s would have no emotional connection to a son who hasn’t been born. Who’s to say she couldn’t be the savior, or that it isn’t really her child with another man? Or someone else entirely?

That whole thought experiment about going back in time and killing Hitler to prevent World War II or the Holocaust? It always ends with somebody, anybody, causing the Holocaust anyway, merely as an excuse to send someone back in time to prevent it. But what if you can control who that person is? It’d be worth a shot to see, right?