One of my favorite movies as a 13 year old kid was Terminator 2: Judgement Day.  I was still a little young when it hit theatres (11) but when it hit video and I was able to get my hands on a copy, it pretty much rocked my world.  That’s the thing about both James Cameron and Terminator movies: they’re designed to blow away the sensibilities of 13 year old boys.

This is not a bad thing.

The only thing with movies like that is that you can’t expect Shakespeare.  Or even incredibly intelligent stories.  Or scripts that make sense.

What should you expect?

Well, you should expect some bad acting.  I was surprised how silly Christian Bale was.  And you should expect some silly story.  I was surprised by how paint by numbers the script was.

But I didn’t care.

This was a bad movie, but I enjoyed every minute of it.  I laughed, a lot.  That wonderful deep belly laugh that only a bad movie can provide.  I really wish someone arrogant enough to be credited solely by a lame nickname would be arrogant enough to make a great movie, instead of a bad movie with some great action sequences.  But, you know what?  This movie is tailor made to make 13 year old kids go out of their minds and that’s the point, isn’t it?

The older me laughed, but there were a few moments in the film that captured the spirit and attention of the 13-year-old-me.  In fact, there was one moment in the film that was truly spectacular and took my 13-year-old’s breath away.

There’s a spoiler of sorts here, because I’m going to reveal that moment and I’m glad I didn’t know about it.  (Maybe you do…  I’m not hip.)

But seriously, when Schwarzenegger shows up as the T-800 at the end…  Young, CGI Schwarzenegger…  It was truly worth the price of the admission for that moment alone.  A naked, 28 year old Schwarzenegger in all of his Mr. Universe’y glory shows up to beat everyone down at the end of the film and then, at that moment, it really felt like a Terminator film and it made me very, very happy.

The other thing I was happy about was the amount of homage that was paid to the original Terminator film.  From specific shots of an endoskeleton’s feet clanking up the stairs to Sarah Connor’s ridiculous taped confessions to her son, it’s all there and it’s wonderful to see.

So, go in expecting this movie to be bad, but don’t forget to enjoy the hell out of it.