TERMINATOR - SALVATION - COMPLETE BASE SET (90 Cards) - TOPPS - 2009
Terminator Salvation is a 2009 American military science fiction action film directed by McG and written by John Brancato and Michael Ferris. It is the fourth installment of the Terminator film series, and stars Christian Bale and Sam Worthington, with Anton Yelchin, Moon Bloodgood, Bryce Dallas Howard, Common, Michael Ironside, and Helena Bonham Carter in supporting roles. In a departure from the previous installments, which were set between 1984 and 2004 and used time travel as a key plot element, Salvation is a post-apocalyptic film set in the year 2018, fourteen years after the events of 2003's Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines. It focuses on the war between Skynet's machine network and humanity, as the remnants of the world's military have united to form the Resistance to fight against Skynet's killing machines. Bale portrays John Connor, a Resistance fighter and central character to the franchise, while Worthington portrays cyborg Marcus Wright. Yelchin plays a young Kyle Reese, a character first introduced in The Terminator, and the film depicts the origins of the T-800 (Model 101) Terminator.
After a troubled pre-production, with The Halcyon Company acquiring the rights for the franchise from Andrew G. Vajna and Mario Kassar and several writers working on the screenplay, filming began in May 2008 in New Mexico and ran for 77 days. Terminator Salvation was released on May 21, 2009 by Warner Bros. Pictures in North America and by Columbia Pictures internationally, and grossed over $371 million worldwide and received mixed reviews. The film should have been the first installment of second Terminator trilogy, set mainly in the future war. However, the sequels were canceled and a reboot of the film franchise, Terminator Genisys, was released in 2015.
In 2003, Dr. Serena Kogan of Cyberdyne Systems convinces death row inmate Marcus Wright to sign over his body for medical research following his execution. One year later, the automated Skynet system is activated and becomes self-aware; perceiving humans as a threat to its existence, it starts a nuclear holocaust to eradicate them in the event known as "Judgment Day".
In 2018, John Connor leads an attack on a Skynet base, where he discovers human prisoners and schematics for incorporating living tissue to a new type of Terminator, the T-800. John survives an explosion on the base, which is destroyed. Following John's departure, Marcus emerges from the base's wreckage and begins walking towards Los Angeles.
John returns to the Resistance headquarters located aboard a nuclear submarine and is briefed by General Hugh Ashdown that the Resistance has discovered a hidden signal containing a code protocol which they believe can initiate a shutdown of Skynet's machines. Working on this intelligence, the Resistance plans to launch an offensive against Skynet's headquarters in San Francisco. It is decided among the Resistance that the offensive will commence in four days, due to an intercepted kill-list created by Skynet, which plans to terminate the Resistance's command staff within the same time frame. John learns he is second on this list, following Kyle Reese. The Resistance leaders are unaware of Kyle's importance, but John knows that Kyle will eventually travel back in time and become his father (as seen in The Terminator), and realizes that Skynet has learned of this fact.
Arriving at the ruins of Los Angeles, Marcus encounters Kyle and a mute child named Star during a skirmish with Skynet's machines where Kyle and Star are subsequently abducted and taken prisoner by Skynet. Two Resistance A-10 airplanes are shot down while trying to intercept a machine transport. Marcus locates downed pilot Blair Williams. They then make their way to John's base, where thereafter, Marcus is wounded by a magnetic land mine. Attempting to save his life, the Resistance fighters discover that Marcus is actually a cyborg, with a mechanical endoskeleton and a partially artificial cerebral cortex. Although Marcus believes himself to be human, John and his wife Kate think that Marcus has been sent to execute him and orders him to be killed. Blair helps Marcus escape. During the pursuit, Marcus saves John's life from Skynet's hydrobots and the two make a bargain: Marcus will enter Skynet's headquarters in San Francisco, to help John rescue Kyle and the other prisoners, if he lets him live.
John pleads with General Ashdown to delay the offensive so he can formulate a plan to extract the human captives, but Ashdown refuses and relieves John of his command. However, the Resistance disobeys Ashdown's orders and instead, await John's signal. Marcus enters the base, interfaces with the computer, and disables perimeter defenses so that Connor can infiltrate the cellblock and release human prisoners. Marcus learns from Skynet (which assumes the form of Dr. Kogan on a screen), that he was resurrected and built into a machine to lure John to the base; when the Resistance launches its attack, John will be killed, achieving the goal that Skynet had failed to accomplish in the past. The hidden signal that the Resistance received earlier is revealed to be a ruse, and Skynet uses it to track down and destroy the command submarine with the Resistance leaders aboard.
Marcus tears out the hardware linking him to Skynet and assists John in battling the new T-800 (Model 101) Terminator. Marcus is soon outclassed in strength and temporarily disabled until John comes to his aid. Marcus eventually defeats the T-800 by tearing its head off, while John destroys the base by rigging together explosives. John, Marcus, Kyle and Star are airlifted out. John though was seriously wounded during the assault with a life-threatening injury to his heart. Marcus offers his own heart for transplantation, sacrificing himself to save John. As he recovers, John radios to other Resistance fighters that, although this battle has been won, the war still continues.
Christian Bale as John Connor. Director McG, deemed Bale "the most credible action star in the world" during development. McG wanted Bale for Marcus, but the actor—even though he "can't really remember why"—wanted to play John, and that led to the character's role getting expanded in rewrites of the script. Bale was the first person to be cast and signed on for the role in November 2007. McG talked extensively with Bale in the UK about the role while the latter was filming The Dark Knight, and they both agreed to proceed. Although a fan of the Terminator series, he was at first uninterested until McG convinced him the story would be character-based and not rely on special effects. They kept working on the story every day, along with Worthington. McG said Bale broke his hand punching a Terminator prop during filming. Bale spent six to eight hours each day with McG in the editing room to advise the finished product. In January 2018, Bale revealed he rejected the role three times before accepting it, in part to prove people who told him not to take the role wrong.
Sam Worthington as Marcus Wright, a human-terminator hybrid experiment. Worthington compared Marcus to Dorothy (The Wonderful Wizard of Oz) and Alice (Alice's Adventures in Wonderland) due to being "this person waking up in another world [who then] tries to find himself". Terminator creator James Cameron personally recommended Worthington (whom he directed in Avatar) to McG. Russell Crowe also recommended him to McG. The director decided Worthington looked tougher than the "great many of today's young male actors". Worthington recalled Cameron told him "the Terminator to make is the one with the war". Worthington tore his intercostal muscles during the first weeks of filming but nevertheless insisted on performing his own stunts. McG once expressed interest in casting Christian Bale, Daniel Day-Lewis or Josh Brolin in the part. Brolin did talk to Bale and read a draft of the screenplay, which he found "interesting and dark; ultimately, though, I didn't think it felt right".
Anton Yelchin as Kyle Reese, a teenage refugee and admirer of John Connor and the Resistance. As portrayed by Michael Biehn in The Terminator, he was sent back in time to 1984 to protect Sarah Connor to ensure the survival of the human race, and fathered John with her. Yelchin said he wanted to portray Kyle as Biehn did and not make him appear weaker because it was a younger version of the character. The difference in his portrayal lies in showing Kyle as intense, but not concentrated until he joins the resistance proper. Yelchin tried to convey Kyle's intensity by focusing on how fast Biehn appeared when running in the original film.
Moon Bloodgood as Blair Williams, a "no-nonsense and battle-hardened" pilot of the Resistance who suffers from survivor's guilt and serves as a romantic interest for Marcus. McG characterizes her as continuing the feminine strength that has been prominent throughout the franchise.
Bryce Dallas Howard as Kate Connor, John's wife. Charlotte Gainsbourg was originally set to play the part, but left due to scheduling conflicts with another film. As portrayed by Claire Danes in the third film, Kate was a veterinarian; but in this film, she is now a physician. Howard suggested, as part of the character's backstory, that Kate studied medical books and interviewed many surviving doctors after the events of Judgment Day. The film's subject matter reminded her of developing countries, devastated by war and lacking basic supplies such as clean water, which "reflects things that are going on currently in this privileged world that we are living in where there hasn't been an apocalypse and robots haven't taken over the world. I think that's something definitely for us to reinvestigate and that we continue to make choices for our own future to take that into consideration". Howard focused on Kate "being accustomed to fear and loss" because the character was a military brat.
Common as Barnes, John's right-hand man. Common stated the character was not overly developed, being "only just a bad-ass character, you know, really the big heavy of the movie", before McG's intervention. Common agreed with this, as "I didn’t want to just be the big, bulky guy there" and worked on the emotional side, "thinking about how it would be in a world that’s post-apocalyptic, a world where, you know, things have been destroyed and we’re really fighting for survival."
Helena Bonham Carter as Dr. Serena Kogan / Skynet: an ex-Cyberdyne scientist who convinces Marcus to donate his body for her research. Her face is later used by the Skynet computer to communicate with Marcus. Tilda Swinton was originally considered for the part, but Bonham Carter replaced her before filming. She accepted the part because her then-domestic partner, Tim Burton, was a Terminator fan. Her role was a "small but pivotal" one and would only require ten days of shooting. However, on July 20, 2008, Bonham Carter delayed filming by a day, and was given an indefinite leave due to the death of four of her family members in a minibus accident in South Africa.
Michael Ironside as General Hugh Ashdown, the leader of the Resistance.
Roland Kickinger as T-800 "Model 101": the first Terminator covered in living tissue. Bodybuilder and actor Kickinger, who previously portrayed Schwarzenegger in the 2005 biographical film See Arnold Run, was his physical double on set. When asked about his role, Kickinger said it is "Arnold's character in the first Terminator. That's basically my role, but 20 years before, so it establishes how the Terminator came about." Polish strongman athlete Mariusz Pudzianowski was also considered for doubling Schwarzenegger. If Schwarzenegger had decided not to lend his appearance to the film, then John would have shot the T-800s face off before the audience got a good look at him.
Jadagrace Berry as Star, an 8-year-old girl in Kyle's care. Born after Judgment Day, Star is mute due to the trauma of the post-apocalyptic world. Therefore, this has given her the unnatural ability to sense when a Skynet unit is approaching.
Brian Steele as the T-600.
Linda Hamilton as the uncredited voice of Sarah Connor. In the two scenes of the film, where John Connor played Sarah's recording tapes.
In 1999, two years after C2 Pictures purchased the rights to the franchise, two Terminator films' premises were mapped out and were supposed to be developed simultaneously. Tedi Sarafian was hired to write Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, which he eventually received shared story credit for, while David C. Wilson was to write Terminator 4. Before any revisions were done, T3 initially took place in 2001 and revolved around the first attacks between Skynet and humans. T4 would follow immediately afterward and centered primarily on the war seen in the first two films. Warner Bros. gave the film the codename "Project Angel".
Following the release of Terminator 3 in 2003, producers Andrew G. Vajna and Mario Kassar contracted Nick Stahl and Claire Danes to return as John Connor and Kate Brewster in another film. Director Jonathan Mostow helped develop the script, written by John Brancato and Michael Ferris, and was set to begin production in 2005 after completing another film. It was known by then that Arnold Schwarzenegger's role would be limited, as he had assumed office as Governor of California. The producers sought to have Warner Bros. finance the picture as they did for Terminator 3. In 2005, Stahl said John and Kate would be recast as the story jumped forward in time. By 2006, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (a successor to Orion Pictures and current owners of the Hemdale Film Corporation library, distributor and producer of the original film, respectively) was set to distribute the fourth film as part of the new CEO Harry Sloan's scheme to make the studio a viable Hollywood player.
On May 9, 2007, it was announced that production rights to the Terminator series had passed from the feuding Vajna and Kassar to the Halcyon Company. The producers hoped to start a new trilogy based on the franchise. The purchase was financed with a loan by Pacificor, a hedge fund from Santa Monica. By July 19, the project was in legal limbo due to a lawsuit between MGM and Halcyon subsidiary T Asset. MGM had an exclusive window of 30 days to negotiate for distribution of the Terminator films. When negotiating for Terminator 4, Halcyon rejected their initial proposal, and MGM suspended negotiations. After the 30 days were over, MGM claimed that the period during which negotiations were suspended did not count and their exclusive period was still open. Halcyon asked a court for an injunction allowing them to approach other distributors. Later, the lawsuit was settled and MGM got a 30-day right of first refusal to finance and distribute the fifth Terminator film.
Finally, Warner Bros. paid $60 million to acquire the United States distribution rights of Terminator Salvation; Sony Pictures also paid just over $100 million to acquire this film's distribution rights in all international territories.
McG signed on to direct as the first two films were among his favorites, and he had even cast Robert Patrick (who played the T-1000) in his films. Though he was initially unsure about "flogging a dead horse," he felt the post-apocalyptic setting allowed the film to be different enough so as not to be just an inferior sequel. The idea that events in Terminator 2: Judgment Day and Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines altered the future allowed them to be flexible with their presentation of the futuristic world. McG met with the series' co-creator James Cameron, and, although he neither blessed nor denigrated the project, Cameron told the new director he had faced a similar challenge when following Ridley Scott's Alien with Aliens. He maintained two elements of the previous films; that John is an outsider to the authorities, and someone of future importance is being protected, and in this film, it is Kyle Reese.
The first full screenplay for the film was written by Terminator 3 writers John Brancato and Michael Ferris, who received full screenplay credit. Paul Haggis rewrote Brancato and Ferris's script, and Shawn Ryan made another revision three weeks before filming. Jonathan Nolan also wrote on set, which led to McG to say, "I would have to characterize Jonah as the lead writer of the film." In response to whether or not Nolan would receive a writing credit for his contribution, McG went on to say, "I don’t know how the WGA rules work, but honest to goodness, we did the heaviest lifting with Jonah.” Nolan contributed to the film after Bale signed on and created Connor's arc of becoming a leader. However due to the 2007–08 Writers Guild of America strike, Nolan had to abruptly leave the project due to another commitment. Anthony E. Zuiker contributed to the script as well. So extensive were the rewrites that Alan Dean Foster decided to rewrite the entire novelization after submitting it to his publisher because the compiled shooting script was very different from the one he was given beforehand.