Why The Terminator Movies Are Better Without Arnold Schwarzenegger

Despite the actor playing the title role, The Terminator franchise is better off without Arnold Schwarzenegger. Released in 1984, the original Terminator was a tense and gritty sci-fi horror which saw then-rising star Arnold Schwarzenegger take on the title role. The Terminator was the first film’s villain, a lethal android assassin sent to kill Sarah Connor and her young son.

It’s a terrifying sci-fi slasher that has lost little of its visceral impact in the years since its release, but unlike most sci-fi films and indeed most movies in general, The Terminator is a rare flick which is widely considered to have been bested by its sequel. 1992’s Terminator: Judgement Day made Schwarzenegger the hero, now allied to an understandably distrusting Sarah Connor and her son as he’s sent this time to save the pair from a more lethal, stronger Terminator, Robert Patrick’s unforgettably chilling T-1000.

However while many agree that the second installment was the Terminator franchise’s peak, the series has been subject to the law of diminishing returns ever since. Schwarzenegger returned to the role in 2003’s Rise of the Machines, a noisy-but-neutered effort that introduced a female Terminator, but featured too much campy humor and too little intense action. Despite the film’s surprisingly bleak ending, the franchise brought back the actor for 2015’s Terminator: Genisys and 2019’s box office dud, Terminator: Dark Fate, a humorless outing that wasted the considerable talents of Deadpool director Tim Miller. Both films fared better with critics than the fourth installment, Terminator: Salvation—which didn’t feature Schwarzenegger—but hard as it may be for fans to hear, the franchise would be better off retiring Arnold from the titular role.

The Actor Has Outgrown The Role

Some critics have argued that the aging Schwarzenegger should retire the Terminator role to make way for a younger actor, but this demand is a little unfair given how many action actors are continuing in iconic roles despite their advancing age. Liam Neeson’s Taken franchise, as well as Tom Cruise’s Mission Impossible and Top Gun sequels, proves that there’s plentiful demand for older actors holding onto their action hero status. The reason Schwarzenegger needs to let go of the role is more complicated than simply age. Much like DeNiro couldn’t play abrasive Johnny Boy in his seventies, it’s hard to envision Schwarzenegger as the once-terrifying and humorless killer. With each passing Terminator installment the once-imposing emotionless android’s character has been softened and humanized a little more, resulting in gradually worsening reviews for the series.

This tone shift was an initially positive development, as the titular villain of 1984’s intense horror became the stone-faced but ultimately well-meaning stoic of Judgement Day. His cringe-worthy attempts to assimilate to nineties culture aside, the Terminator’s softer side made him easier to root for in the second movie, and the character development was a necessary change for the film’s tone to work. However, by the time Dark Fate rolled around, the once-formidable robot assassin had become a retired family man (or family android, as it were), a surreal sight which some critics noted seemed more suited to a Terminator parody than an actual franchise installment. The problem isn’t Schwarzenegger’s acting, as everything from True Lies to the post-apocalyptic Maggie has proven the actor has depth and range. The problem is that the Terminator is a killing machine who doesn’t need depth, and humanizing him too many times neuters one of sci-fi’s once-scariest figures.

He’s Too Iconic (& Too Parodied)

This problem leads to another issue faced by the franchise, one which the Terminator films accidentally addressed by relying on the catchphrase “I’ll be back” so much. The once-witty line has been turned into a limp and predictable gag by the sheer force of repetition, losing a little of its initial impact every time another Terminator movie revisits it. Similarly, the Terminator himself has been parodied to death, with the character becoming too recognizable for new viewers to take him seriously as either a hero or villain. After all, Mad Max: Fury Road proved that recasting an iconic character can reboot an ailing franchise even decades after its last on-screen outing.

But much like casting Mel Gibson as the title character and dwelling on Mad Max’s backstory would have detracted from Furiosa’s film, the immediately recognizable figure of Schwarzenegger’s character leads each Terminator movie to shoehorn in references to the iconic series catchphrase, and reminds audiences of a character so iconic he was parodied as far back as American Pie’s Sherminator 21 years ago. The franchise has the potential to be a great, dark sci-fi series if it’s not bogged down by self-referential humor, but it’s hard for any director to achieve this when the very sight of their leading man prompts cries of “I’ll be back” and anticipation of the inevitable meta in-jokes. The franchise has retired characters to avoid staleness before, with Robert Patrick’s icy, terrifying T-1000 never returning to the Terminator franchise after his first appearance so as not to blunt the villain’s impact. It’s time to do the original Terminator the same favor.

No Schwarzenegger Could Mean A Whole New Cast

Speaking of Fury Road’s massive success, the George Miller film could provide a blueprint for the Terminator series going forward. The franchise has already almost managed a reboot, but McG’s promising Terminator: Salvation was cut to ribbons by a nervous studio who demanded a PG-13 rating, to the movie’s detriment. The film had potential and a cursory glance over Salvation’s original, uber-bleak ending proves that this series can still hit hard if given enough creative freedom. Fury Road’s R-rating was instrumental to its success, but while Dark Fate may have been violent and intense enough to be granted the same, adults-only rating, the presence of Arnold in the title role ensured that the audience was assured at least one main character would survive to appear in the next outing—and the next after that—no matter how seemingly dark proceedings became during the film’s run-time.

Seeing Schwarzenegger’s name in the credits of a Terminator installment is a guarantee that the title character will survive into another movie and means that, while Sarah Connor and company are still technically at risk, viewers are never too invested in the new cast. They’re always aware that many of them will be offed so that the returning hero can be relied on to save the day in the end. Dropping the actor from the iconic role, however, could bring back the anyone-can-die intensity of Salvation’s first draft and would reinvigorate the franchise, returning The Terminator series to its gruesome and hardcore original roots as an unsparing, scary sci-fi dystopia where anyone could die and nothing was safe.

About The Author

Cathal Gunning
(1446 Articles Published)

Cathal Gunning has been writing about movies and TV online since 2020. His obsessions include The Simpsons, Stephen King, the Scream series, and the horror genre in general. He has spent more time thinking about Stranger Things than the writers of Stranger Things, and he has never seen a Star War.

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