“The Day After Judgement Day” arrives in the brand-new trailer for Terminator: Dark Fate. The action-filled footage arrived in the middle of the night, just as the calendar flipped over to August 30, which just so happens to be the morning after Judgement Day in the Terminator universe.
The trailer opens with Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton) holding the hybrid cyborg human Grace (Mackenzie Davis) at gunpoint, with their roles soon reversed. Sarah then talks about preventing the events of Judgement Day. Dark Fate is a direct continuation of 1991’s Terminator: Judgement Day, so the events of that movie will play a key role in the upcoming sequel.
Judging by the Dark Fate trailer, the film is really committing to exploring the ramifications of Sarah’s decision to destroy Cyberdyne in Terminator 2. It also adds an intriguing wrinkle to the humans vs. machines conflict in the form of Grace, an “enhanced” soldier-assassin from the future who travels back in time to protect Dani. Dark Fate will return the franchise to its R-rated roots and there are glimpses of the bloodier action scenes here. Gabriel Luna’s Rev-9 (a new Terminator with a solid endoskeleton and mimetic poly-alloy “skin” that can split in two) is even reminiscent of Terminator 2‘s T-1000, in the way he comes across as a slasher villain. Schwarzenegger, meanwhile, is playing a variation on the “old T-800” he portrayed in Terminator: Genisys, but it looks like Dark Fate takes the concept more seriously and gives Arnold a dramatic role to sink his teeth into.
Directed by Tim Miller and produced by James Cameron, Terminator: Dark Fate stars Arnold Schwarzenegger, Linda Hamilton, Mackenzie Davis, Gabriel Luna, Natalia Reyes and Diego Boneta. The film opens Nov. 1.
