Arnold Schwarzenegger is the perfect example of "The American Dream". He came to America in 1968 as an immigrant with basically nothing, only a dream to become the worlds best bodybuilder. 44 years later his resume includes being the world's best bodybuilder 7 times in a row, being one of the biggest superstar actors in the world during the 80ies and 90ies, being one of the most wealthiest people in Hollywood, marrying into the Kennedy family (the one from which one of them became president and was assassinated) and off course the Governator! 2 terms in a row being the 38th Governor of California. To say that he has had an impressive life so far and that he has reached the absolute top in his many careers is an understatement.

Terminator 2: Judgment Day is without a doubt the undefeated masterpiece on Arnold Schwarzenegger his (acting) career. And not only from Schwarzenegger, but also from Linda Hamilton, Robert Patrick and (most likely) James Cameron.

The story is brilliant, simple at first sight, but complicated when you look deeper, and visually stunning. Skynet is still happening and John Connor is still the leader who is fighting a guerrilla movement against the robotic overlords who's only concern after it became "self-aware" is to wipe out every human being. Its a little bit like the Matrix, except humans are not inside an artificial environment used as batteries but instead in the real world as canon fodder. In order to prevent the resistance from gaining the upper hand a robot is send back in time to kill John Connor and the resistance sends back someone too in order to prevent it from happening. This time they send back a reprogrammed T-800 Terminator (Arnold Schwarzenegger) to protect his younger self.

Robert Patrick plays the role of the bad guy perfectly. He is emotionless, ruthless and unrelentless on his path to find and kill John Connor (Edward Furlong). That and his physical abilities (like changing his form into someone else and invulnerable to most weapons) make him without a doubt one of the best villains i have ever seen in a movie.

When it comes to time travel and time paradoxes this movie tries his best to explain it all, and surprisingly comes with a very good answer, yet very much in the style that is Hollywood (meaning that anything is possible, as long as it happens in the movies). From the first movie we already knew that Kyle Reese (the guy that stopped The Terminator from the first movie) is the father of John Connor. Meaning that if Skynet never send someone back into the past to kill Sarah Connor, Kyle Reese would never have been sent back into to the past to prevent the murder in the first place and John Connor would never have been born. But in this sequel James Cameron tries to explain that Skynet is basically its own creator. In the first movie the Terminator was destroyed in a hydraulic press, but a part of the machine survived and was recovered by Cyberdyne. The unusable remains of the Terminator were than used as inspiration and as a catalysator to radically change and speed up the process of computer development to the point where it eventually would become Skynet.

For its time this movie and the story was revolutionary and legendary. A little bit of CGI (computer generated images) doesn't mean a fart in these days since practically every major blockbuster movie is (over)doing it, but in the early 90ties it was still unheard off. You have to realize that computers back than were not mainstream, not fast and DOS was still one of the most used programs at the time. Internet (as it does right now) did not yet exist. Basically computers were still almost only for in the office at work or for geeks and nerds. But Terminator 2 showed for the first time to a large public what computers are really capable off.

Anyone who likes to watch movies and never saw this movie should put this one on the top of their movies to watch list. Even if you are not a fan of James Cameron or Arnold Schwarzenegger, i can guarantee you that your opinion on both of them will be (slightly) changed after seeing this movie. I won't go so far as to say that this is the best action movie of all times, because in my opinion that wouldn't do justice to other sublime movies like the first Matrix movie, or The Lord Of The Rings Trilogy, or the latest Batman Trilogy. But it comes pretty damn close.