There’s no denying that the "Terminator" movie franchise has been a resilient beast, and there was plenty of reason to expect a lot from the newest chapter, "Terminator Salvation." The first installment made the careers of Arnold Schwarzenegger and director James Cameron. The second reinvented Hollywood special effects with the liquid metal killer sent back from the future. And the third movie wasn’t as good as the first two, but it still had Arnold and one heck of a demolition derby chase scene.

In "Terminator Salvation," Batman himself, Christian Bale, straps on the guns and ammo as the grown-up John Connor, resistance leader against the machine menace and rampaging robots of the future. It's a post-apocalyptic, post-"Judgment Day" future that was foretold in the earlier Terminator installments, but only briefly seen.

The future in "Terminator Salvation" is a bleak place that looks a lot like New Mexico, where the movie was shot, but with a lot of heavy-metal killing machines thrown into the mix.

Bale’s buzz-cut Connor is leading small groups of ragtag fighters against the nefarious Skynet’s best and baddest. He doesn’t have the same charisma here as he does behind Batman’s mask, but that might have something to do with the script he was given.

The biggest twist is the introduction of a mysterious figure named Marcus Wright, played by newcomer Sam Worthington, who will be the star of this season’s "Avatar." There’s another big twist in the film, which is pretty cool, but the fun of the previous films in the franchise is missing. Maybe they still needed Arnold, or maybe they just needed to lighten up.

Now for a look at what else is new on DVD: in "Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince," Harry and company find out the evil origins of Voldemort; in "Public Enemies" Johnny Depp plays legendary bank robber John Dillinger; and in "AK 100" Criterions releases a monster box set of 25 films by Japanese director Akira Kurosawa.