Terminator Salvation and Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian: All Things Sequel The latest Terminator cheapens the franchise, while Stiller's schtick only gets better.

In Terminator Salvation, the year is 2018. The sky is ashen; there’s only a smattering of humans, and a resistance is afoot. “Resisting what?” a new guy asks. “Machines!” he’s told, with approximately the same tone normally reserved for “duh.”

That’s the simplified synopsis of this fourth installation in the Terminator franchise, the one that nobody wanted, that Charlie’s Angels helmer McG certainly should not have been chosen to direct, and that everyone eventually got excited about anyway. The full story, of course, is much more complicated. The first film set up the gist: In 2029, a corporation’s worth of evil robots have become self-aware and would like it if humans no longer existed. But word on the circuit is that a guy named John Connor is organizing people for a fight, so the machines send a killing machine back to 1984 to murder John’s mother, Sarah, before he’s born.

Didn’t quite work out that way, though, and now the prophesied nuclear Judgment Day has arrived, and John Connor (Christian Bale) is an adult. Earth is a desaturated wasteland. Connor and his scattered troops—including pregnant wife, Kate (Bryce Dallas Howard), and photogenic soldiers Blair (Moon Bloodgood) and Barnes (Common)—are trying both to destroy the ’bot manufacturer, Skynet, and find Kyle Reese (Anton Yelchin), Connor’s father. See, if Reese, currently younger than Connor, is killed, then John won’t be born and history will be reset, and...as Sarah herself says, “Thinking about this can make you crazy.”

Throw in an ambiguously human stranger, Marcus Wright (Sam Worthington), and you’ve got one dull sequel. From its leisurely start, during which we sorta see where Wright has come from (alongside a distracting—and bald—Helena Bonham Carter), Terminator Salvation feels like it’s building up to something, with small pockets of action punctuating otherwise low-key interactions between characters you’re not familiar with.

Alas, the climax never comes. And can we really be surprised? Because Batman + Hype alone does not a blockbuster make—at least not a good one. For all of Bale’s public insistence that McG is more talented than his dumb stage name suggests and that even the father of the Terminator franchise, James Cameron, directed crappy movies back in the day, this is still the guy who gave us Full Throttle. Screenwriters John D. Brancato and Michael Ferris might have been natural picks considering they worked on 2003’s Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, but the duo went on to pen Primeval. And Catwoman! And besides Spider-Man 3, has Howard ever been in anything that didn’t end up a huge disappointment?

The sum of these parts is a story that is too muddled upon analysis (try not to zone out during the Headlines of Explanation near the film’s end) yet too simplistic at its surface (basically, Connor trying to rescue Reese). Bale can unleash his Gotham Growl all he wants, but he can’t inject life into his sullen, one-note character, nor his similarly sleepwalking co-stars—though to be fair, it’d be downright laughable if the actors tried to deliver lines such as “You have a strong heart. I like that!” with too much verve.

McG borrows heavily, with scenes that seem straight out of Salvation’s predecessors. The real stars of the film are the machines, black and silver skeletons with those strong jaws and freaky eyes, repeatedly rebooting and often dragging themselves, legless, toward their targets as if crawling straight from hell. But it doesn’t matter how cool the bad guys are: Without a compelling drama, an ounce of humor, or even a character to sympathize with, Terminator Salvation may as well be the next Transformers.

It’s clear that Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian was crafted with kids in mind, just like the franchise’s original 2006 blockbuster. But if you aren’t enchanted and a little thrilled by the sequel’s setting—much of it takes place at the National Gallery and Air and Space Museum—well, you probably hate puppies and sunshine, too.

In the hands of returning director Shawn Levy and writers Robert Ben Garant and Thomas Lennon (Reno 911), the conceit of the first movie—that after the tourists are ushered out museum exhibits come to life—still applies. And so a Dégas ballerina bows to a reanimated Amelia Earhart (Amy Adams). A woman in a Roy Lichtenstein painting weeps. Earhart and Larry Daley (Ben Stiller), the heroic night guard of both films, even enter the black-and-white world of that V-J Day kiss. “Wow, four bars in 1945!” Larry says, checking his cell.

Battle of the Smithsonian’s effects may not be as remarkable as Terminator Salvation’s, but what makes this sequel immensely entertaining is its humor. Stiller, Ricky Gervais, Robin Williams, and Steve Coogan reprise their roles, bolstered by a galaxy’s worth of comedic stars: Bill Hader, Hank Azaria, Christopher Guest, Jonah Hill, and Owen Wilson.

Garant and Lennon may be the official scripters here, but the improv is obvious as each actor delivres a signature stroke: Hill’s single appearance as a guard is sarcastic and breathlessly hilarious. Hader plays Gen. Custer as a vain goofball. (He’s once caught brushing his hair, counting, “98, 99...bingo! Ah, my golden fleece!”) Azaria, though, gets the most screentime alongside Stiller and Adams, and his ancient King Kahmunrah lisps like Family Guy’s Stewie while delivering Simpsons-worthy one-liners. He easily steals the show, with Stiller graciously watering down his own sarcasm, often playing the straight man.

The plot, too, is respectable: Larry is now a successful gadget-inventor and has left his position at New York’s Museum of Natural History. But when he comes back to visit, he’s told by the museum’s curator (Gervais, brilliant even in a small role) that many of the old exhibits are being shipped to the Smithsonian and will likely remain crated or be destroyed. So Larry hightails it to D.C. and finds that he not only has to make sure his pals are safe, he has to battle the freshly resurrected Kahmunrah, who has all sorts of evil in mind. Earhart tags along snapping ’30s-era slang, both because she’s a little sweet on Larry but mostly because, she says, “I smell adventure, and I want in!”

Adams’ Earhart is as good as viewers’ own eyes, excited by the exhibits she sees and the technological progress of humans. The film’s climax takes place in the Air and Space Museum, with everyone in the history books itching to take a ride. It’s an exhilarating sequence, and reinforces the movie’s light message about dedicating your life to whatever brings you joy. Battle of the Smithsonian may be a blip on your radar in terms of how you spend your time, but it’s nearly two hours of happiness worth pursuing.