Just a few quick thoughts about the Fox premiere of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles since I’ve already discussed it at length.
The original 70 minute pilot was condensed—although not in any noticeable way—and I believe the scene with Sarah and her fiancé was an addition (does anyone know, was that character recast?). Regardless, the scene between them was a few appreciated moments that showed Sarah had the capacity to care for someone other than John, even if his survival ultimately takes precedence.
What really struck me upon this second viewing was the minor details—and I think they stuck out because a friend and I re-watched T2 last night to prepare for the premiere.
Thoughts
— It’s truly an evolved Sarah. She’s still the resilient, quick-thinking, focused and resourceful warrior of Judgment Day, but she’s trying to also be “Mother.” She’s damaged, haunted by nightmares, but does little things that attempt to make life normal– painting the walls (in which she’s hidden weapons, of course), and making pancakes (before going on the run again).
— When Sarah, Cameron and John visit the Dyson residence to ask if anyone else knew about Cyberdyne or had access to Miles’ work, Mrs. Dyson tells Sarah, “No. You destroyed it. You destroyed everything.”
This confrontation mirrors the scene in T2 where Sarah rants to Miles:
“Fucking men like you built the hydrogen bomb. Men like you thought it up. You think you’re so creative. You don’t know what it’s like to really create something; to create a life; to feel it growing inside you. All you know how to create is death and destruction.”
Like the name, Cameron, it’s an homage to the films of her namesake, which are themselves filled with parallels. In Aliens, it was the alien Queen and Ripley, in Terminator it was Sarah and the Terminator. In that movie, the machine, as played by Schwarzenegger, learns to be more human, while Sarah becomes ever more like the single-minded Terminator. Dyson’s remark reminds Sarah of this, and that she must struggle to reconcile what she almost became, with that which she must do. Hence, little touches like pancakes.
— Another parallel: Sarah confides in Cameron, as John had done with the T-800. She says to the machine, the one that will always listen, “We can’t keep running . . . I’ll lose my boy . . . He’ll leave me.” It’s an interesting twist. Where John adopted the T-800 as a father figure (and like the Velveteen Rabbit made him more real through his love)Sarah needs a friend–It’s probably been a long time since she had one.
— Finally, I wonder if Cameron has knowledge of the “present.” Just a thought I had when she told John and Sarah to stay away from the vault door. John asks “Why?” and when the door quakes Cameron says “That’s why.” And she said it not as if she knew the Terminator had followed her there, but like she had prescience.
Perhaps we’ll find out tonight when the second part of the premiere takes place (at 9:00 on Fox).