Terminator: Dark Fate Review - 5 Ups & 5 Downs

2. It's Got The Most Consistent Tone Since T2

Ever since T2, the franchise has struggled to maintain a handle on its tone: Terminator 3 was rife with cringe-worthy comic relief, Salvation was a depressing, humourless slog, and Genisys was back to the goofiness of T3.

But Dark Fate is without question the most tonally well-calculated Terminator film since T2, keeping things mostly serious with just occasional dashes of dark humour to accompany, usually by way of either Linda Hamilton or Arnold Schwarzenegger.

It's just a shame that tonal through-line isn't hung on a more compelling story, because it's one of the film's most undeniable successes, to finally find an entertaining middle-ground between silliness and somberness.