Terminator: Dark Fate

[The Terminator franchise] keeps doing this over and over again, and I'm tired of it.

"Terminator: Dark Fate" has its problems, but for fans of the franchise who like their action relentless and forceful, it more than holds its own.

This should end the whole Terminator thing, right?

This latest terminator that can be machine-gunned into different puddles of black goo, which can locate its other black goo puddles and then morph back into a carbonite skeleton? Like Scarlett Johansson in "Lucy," and Tom Hardy in "Spawn"? Yawn.

It's a pile of sizzling schmaltz by the final frames, but how better to defeat a black blob of evil? Dark Fate doesn't reinvent the war, but by inflecting the film with a feminine world view, it exploits a new power surge coursing through the body politic

As sequels go, Dark Fate is pretty good, a perfectly fun time at the movies.

The standout ingredient in this film is the return of Linda Hamilton.

In this instance, familiarity doesn't breed contempt as much as it fosters complacency.

a profoundly female-centric action film, one that is committed to flipping the script on action-movie gender politics in almost every way possible, but without doing so in a way that feels forced or didactic

And yet, sandwiched in the middle, the screenplay manages a few deep thoughts about the nature of free will, forgiveness and retribution, much of it channeled through Schwarzenegger's character.