Stay tuned for "Terminator: Assignment: Miami Beach": "Terminator Salvation"

No question that when I first heard of this and even saw the teaser trailer, I thought, "Really? This isn't played out? I mean, the story already has moved to TV, right?" But hey, I watch that show, and subsequent trailers looked decent. Throw in a respectable cast -- oooh, Michael Ironside! -- and the need for the noisy escapist summer fun, and yeah, I'm there.

After a brief scene from 2003, our story takes place in 2018, after -- you know the basic story, right? -- Skynet has attacked the human race and wiped out most of it during Judgment Day. (Sidebar: What I love most about any new technology is making references to the "man vs. machines" battle and how something has become "self aware." Blackberry, iPod, toaster ... never gets old.)

John Connor (Christian "Newsies" Bale) is a mid-level officer in the Resistance, butting heads with not only wicked machines that kill or capture humans but also his higher-ups (namely Ironside) on a sub. Meanwhile, some civilian named Marcus (Sam Worthington) survives a battle, learns it's the future (as far as he's concerned) and hooks up with a couple of kids in L.A., including teen Kyle Reese (Anton Yelchin). Yes, the guy who will travel back in time and become Connor's daddy.

While the Resistance thinks it has a way to finally stop Skynet, Reese gets captured, Marcus meets John -- via a smokin' Resistance fighter (Moon Bloodgood) -- and tensions mount. You get the picture: action scene, talky-talky, action scene, talky-talky, action scene, action scene, climax. All with plenty of flying things and silver skeletons with red eyes.

Decent action here, with a bunch of different types of killing machines running around. Definitely not something you want to think about too much -- shocker, I know -- but pleny of bang-bang-kablooey. As for the acting ... eh. Bale is happy to do a bunch of yelling and brooding. Worthington has the better role and is OK, but man ... he could not hide his Australian accent. It was pretty bad. Yelchin is better than in "Star Trek" but still a little annoying. Only a little, though. Bloodgood is hot. Ironside is Ironside. Bryce Dallas Howard, Common, Helena Bonham Carter(!) and Jane Alexander(!!) also are around.

While I liked the way the movie handled the Marcus character, the whole time travel/course of events stuff got a little muddled. Then there was the convenience factor when it came to battling Terminators. Hey, here's something heavy to drop on it! Hey, here's some molten metal! But who are we kidding? This is about the action, and "Terminator Salvation" should satisfy anyone's "blow sh!t up" jones. Big flying thing go boom!