T2: nDreams’ Judgment Day
by Bonzo, HSM Editor
It’s been over two decades since the sequel to one of the most memorable science-fiction movies ever made: Terminator 2 — Judgment Day.
James Cameron is a modern-day master, our generation’s Stanley Kubrick. He doesn’t just use a bunch of special effects to polish a bad movie like other directors who overuse explosions and CG graphics (we’re looking at you, Michael Bay); James Cameron usually has a very good story to go along with amazing visuals. I wasn’t even a teenager yet when Terminator 2 came out, and it warped my mind; it is one of the movies I still watch now, and revisit time and again — and it still hasn’t lost any of its impact.
Terminator, conceptually, was a lot of things (due in no small part to Harlan Ellison): a survival movie, a prophetic movie, and mind-bending, thought-provoking film about the dangers of technology and what we do with it. And it was one more film in a recurring theme of storytellers going back to the original myth of Prometheus: how the knowledge we develop will bring about our own end. We ourselves are the biggest threat to our species.
So Terminator wasn’t just a kick-ass movie; it held a deeper message, and James Cameron’s work is a rarity. There are thousands of people out there making movies, but sadly very few are good at the art of subtext. It is the subtle language of narration through visual storytelling, and underlying messages within the bigger story. Sequels as a rule generally suck; there’s no polite way of saying that. Rare exceptions are memorable because they can surpass the original when they happen. James Cameron has done this with two franchises: Aliens and Terminator 2. I am holding out hope he will pull it off with Avatar’s sequel as well.
Despite the age of the source material, this is a huge license for nDreams to acquire, and the outfits are damn cool. I can already see an army of metal skeletons showing up in Home as the most popular outfit. But perhaps they will be for the first week, and then you’ll see them regularly but probably not en masse, much as the Storm Trooper outfits from Star Wars came and went fairly quickly. Price may have a huge impact on how often we see them, but they have my money for sure. This is an outfit I must have. At least the metal T-800 endoskeleton. But, who knows, maybe one of the T-1000 models too.
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I am a nerd.
(So are we. –Ed.)
The film may be older than some of Home’s users, but I bet you most of them have seen it at one point in their lives. Subsequent sequels have unfortunately been a disappointment, but T-2 retains its place as the apex of the series. Licenses like these are important because they break the fourth wall of Home; it moves content from being exclusively Home-developed content to a larger extension which includes pop culture icons of real life. Home itself isn’t intended to be a substitute of reality, but an extension of our social networks.
Once you take a look at these outfits, keep in mind they are Home items. Leave all expectations at the door; it seems no matter what comes into Home, it is never good enough. Don’t expect the T-1000 to morph or animate its hands into spears. Memory restrictions are still an issue in Home; the outfits are in different stages of the main male T-800 and T-1000 characters. It wouldn’t be right to exclude Sarah Connor, so the ladies will have her available in full military gear. You may notice John Connor is missing, but who wants to dress as John Connor? He was also a teenager, and while he was the central figure in the movie, the real stars were the Terminators and Sarah Connor. Portraying a teenager is also pretty difficult, as the avatar outfits are all based off the same character rig, and trying to fit a teenage body to that skeletal rig wouldn’t really work. We also don’t know if the license included John Connor, but there’s already an emo outfit so if you really want to be John Connor it wouldn’t be hard to fake one.
nRage will be updated in a Terminator 2: Judgement Day theme, which hasn’t seen an update since it launched. Home has seen other movie franchises before — some were limited edition, like Aliens Vs Predator, and some weren’t even seen in North America. This is an exciting franchise to introduce to Home because it is so iconic, and memorable for all of us who had a chance to see this movie in the big screen, and anyone who is a fan regardless of where you saw it. Films have a tendency to grab us, and stick with us for years after we see it. They make items, outfits, words and phrases iconic and embedded into our pop culture.
Home itself is an extension of our pop culture, like Facebook or the old school days of MySpace. It is a place where we congregate, and seeing staples of our fascinations is a way we chose to identify ourselves by displaying for everyone to see the things we like. Our interests don’t identify us directly but hint at who we are, and signal to others with similar interest that we think as you do. It triggers our tribal instincts to associate with others like us. It may be just a movie, and arguably among the most iconic movies of all time, but it also denotes our personal interest in a genre, a movement, and social mentality that may invite other like-minded individuals to interact and communally pay homage to a modern-day pop culture classic.
October 30th, 2012 by BONZO | 8 comments
BONZO is an editor and artist for HomeStation Magazine.
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I may be mistaken here Bon, but in the video the T-1000 is in two different states. First we see him with gun shots to his chest (and a slight peek at his arms which look rather silver near the wrists) then the next shot of him is without the gun shot wounds. I’m just going to make an assumption here that we could maybe have two costumes?
I know, I’ll try not to have a nerdgasm at the idea we might have a T-1000 costume that lets you morph the hands into spikes…
This what they should be doing with film (sorry -- movie) content in Home all along. I’ve never understood why Sony bothered coaxing what little they could from Lucas Arts (and probably paying a ransom fee in royalties) instead of looking at their own film lists. Sony (that also own Columbia Pictures) has an absolutely massive amount of resources to pull from to put into Home. I hope this is just the start…
To be fair, Sony LOOT — which is located at Sony Pictures itself — *has* actually leveraged Hollywood IPs for Home: Ghostbusters, Men In Black, et cetera. They probably have a somewhat easier time of it than SCEA or SCEE do.
Sure would love to see a hell of a lot more Hollywood promotional tie-ins with Home, though — and not just ubiquitous t-shirts. VEEMEE’s Total Rekall tie-in was fantastic, and nDreams bringing T2 to Home is pretty darn awesome.
Yeah Krazy actually i think there are three different versions of the T-800 and at least two versions of the T-1000 and looks like only one version of Sarah Connor.
Yeah, I just found the EU pricing list with all the costumes and their components, it’s looking very accommodating with individual parts (such as the Terminator eye), whole costumes and value packs.
Norse, good point about Loot bringing us a fair amount of film stuff, I think you’re right about it maybe being easier for them to acquire various film rights than the two divisions of SCE in Home. Here’s hoping that the nRage line can bring us more film related content like this on a more frequent basis.
yeah the girls get shafted again… LOL. Well you know I am not badass enough to actually play this anyway but I would love some Hollywood segways for more fantasy oriented films like say -LOOPERS Or HIGHLANDER or AVATAR or THE PRINCESS BRIDE or CLOUD ATLAS or LOVELY BONES or INCEPTION or etc. Terminator was a good series. Something I actually liked but you know then if I want to join this thing 1. I can only be Sara Connor 2. I can only go around shooting people -i.e. there is no “adventure” aspect of this game- like say a Mercia… I know I am bloody windger but I am talking about spending my money and time on what here?
Its not a game Riff, its just outfits.
Even worse! Only one tough girl costume? I want to be the Linda Hamilton Sarah Connor with the Cool hair… you know James Cameron actually married her -she was so damn hot. But no just this little baseball cap thing with glasses… booo hiss booo.
I want those really cool buffed arms and all that too.
Heh.
Thanks for clarifying Bon…
Speaking of movie tie-ins, I just read that Disney is buying Lucasfilm for 4 billion dollars and plans to start making new Star Wars movies in the next few years. Not sure what this has to do with Home but interesting news nonetheless. I wonder if Sony was in on the bidding for this deal.