When I ran into “Terminator Salvation: The Machinima Series” animated short, I instantly thought back to the “Animatrix” and “Batman: Gotham Knight” animated shorts, which were exceptionally well done and offered some very talented animators the opportunity to play in the worlds of The Matrix and Batman. “Machinima” was offered via On Demand, at a slight discount, so I pulled the trigger on the purchase. While I won’t be getting my money back for that decision, I can certainly use the power of my 5 million hits a month, to make sure you don’t make that same mistake!

“Terminator Salvation: The Machinima Series” is a segmented computer animated series that follows Moon Bloodgood’s character Blair Williams as she looks for a “ghost” that is screwing up communications. What follows is a repetitive mundane story that literally put me to sleep. Frankly, if a hot chick gunfighting with robots can’t hold my attention then you’ve seriously got a problem!

What burns me most about this animated series has nothing to do with the writing. While watching “The Machinima Series” I couldn’t help but wonder why the animation was so exceptionally poor. The CGI looked like a video game. So, I got online and did a little research, and what do you know; it was created using the same graphics engine that the “Terminator: Salvation” video game used!

So, what we have in “Terminator Salvation: The Machinima Series” is an insult of the highest order; a poorly-written visual wreck offered to steal your money. If these episodes were given to the public as a free bonus, or part of a viral campaign, then I’d be the first guy to positively acknowledge the gesture. But this is a flagrant attempt to remove you from your hard earned money and both the creators of “Terminator: Salvation” and the executives of Warner Brothers should be ashamed of themselves.

While I can save you from wasting your money, the only thing that will truly square things with the Beefboy is a date with Moon Bloodgood. I don’t think that’s too much to ask.

If you’ve read The Beefboy Rants for a while you know that I’ve been riding James Cameron for making Titanic then taking a dirt nap for twelve years while he boned model Suzi Amis and did deep sea dives and put his vacation footage on screen. So, it’s nice to see a return to FILMMAKING after a decade-plus absence.

Why do I care if that guy wants to sit on his millions of dollars and slam models for a living? Simply because, before Cameron cursed us with Titanic, he was instrumental in moving sci-fi forward three times in the 80’s and 90’s. Terminator forever changed the action and horror genres by giving us the multiple “death” scenes of the villain and taking us on a wild ride in the process. With Aliens, Cameron took a horror franchise and made it into one of the best action films of all time. Directors are still copying the scenes from Aliens after nearly 25 years. Finally, Cameron moved both sci-fi and the action film forward again with Terminator 2. People forget how amazing and revolutionary (and expensive) the morphing liquid metal Terminator was at the time. So excuse me for getting upset that someone with that track record made a sub-par romance movie for 13 year-old girls, and then fucked off for half a generation.

So… finally (FINALLY) Cameron returns to sci-fi movie making with the much anticipated Avatar. Friday night was “Avatar Night” at several IMAX theaters where the 3-D experience was in full effect with a number of clips from the film. Reaction is mixed, although it seems mostly positive. From looking at the trailer (below) I have two thoughts. It’s tough to pull off a realistic looking computer animated character who runs around with flesh and blood actors, and I think we’re still not there yet. Even Cameron can’t pull it off.

With that said, Avatar looks like an incredibly ambitious film and potentially a lot of fun if you can just get lost in the moment (most people who have seen the 3-D version say the experience is immersive). We’ll know for sure later this year when Avatar is released. Until then, enjoy the trailer, and tell me what you think below.

Summer Glau has made a career out of sci-fi and the Beefboy is down with that! She’s been in Firefly and the movie Serenity, but her break out role is clearly as the Terminator Cameron, in The Sarah Connor Chronicles. Here’s some of Summer’s best photos available on the web.