I finally got around to watching Terminator Zero (2024) on Netflix. It was very popular when it dropped on Netflix in August and a while after that.
A lot of people talked about it and what not, and I really wanted to watch it but I kept postponing it until now.
And I've just gotta say, I wasn't missing anything. I wasn't impressed with this series at all. The plot flaw here ruined everything for me, and is supposed to ruin everything for anyone who cares about stories adding up.
But before I get into it, as is customarily, let me see if I can find some things I think are nice about the series.
First of all, the idea of the Terminator universe in animation is great! It excites the viewer at first. So that's a good start. Secondly it was nice attempt at a Terminator story without John Connor and other stuff from the old Terminator stories.
There was nothing wrong with the action, the voice acting, setting, graphics, or anything like that, so if you haven't watched it and you can deal with the plot flaw I'm about to mention it would be a good enough watch for you.
The Plot Flaw Proper
This is it, an engineer guy travels back in time to stop Skynet. In the other stories people mostly time traveled to protect the interest of the leaders of the resistance and things like that, but this guy traveled back to build a new AI system that would stop Skynet.
So if the only reason he was creating this AI system was to stop Skynet then why didn't he just create the system and make it's only purpose to fight against Skynet? Why did he go on and make it a system with free will who can also destroy the world just like Skynet?
Isn't it the most unbelievable thing ever that an engineer would do that?
Like, this guy was in the future, he saw what Skynet could do. As an engineer he came up with the plan to make an AI system to stop Skynet and he gave the system the potential to be as bad as Skynet, if not worse. What in the hell?
And in the beginning this guy was in a great dilemma. He had finished creating the system but was scared of launching it because he thought this system might do evil to mankind just like Skynet.
This gave him troubles and sleepless nights when he is an engineer, and he's the creator of the system. Why couldn't he just program it to do the things that would stop Skynet and leave it at that?
Why not put it in the commands that this system cannot harm humans or think past a certain point but the systems only objective is to stop Skynet?
This is very simple, infact too simple that it was so sad to watch this series with a tech guru who didn't know that this is what he is supposed to do, even after witnessing what Skynet could do in the future.
The End
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I think when it comes to sci-fi and AI-related films, a lot of filmmakers fail to realize this major flaw that happens way more times than it should. Why create something and then become frightened of its impact when you can simply curtail its programming to perform a single action. It's so amusing, lol.
Exactly, gurl, you get it. It's a recurring flaw 😅
I had also heard about it from friends and after reading today's review, I have made up my mind to watch it on Sunday as it looks very interesting and uses quite advanced technology. has been done.