Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles


Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles is an American science fiction drama television series. It aired on Fox from January 13, 2008 to April 10, 2009, spanning 31 episodes across two seasons. It is a spin-off from the Terminator film series, disregarding the events of Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines and picking up shortly after Terminator 2: Judgment Day. The series revolves around the lives of Sarah Connor and her son John, who work to prevent the creation of Skynet, an artificially intelligent computer system that will eventually launch a nuclear war on humans.
The Sarah Connor Chronicles was created by writer and executive producer Josh Friedman, marking his television debut. Production companies included Warner Bros. Television and C2 Pictures, the latter replaced by The Halcyon Company in season two. The series was produced by C2 founders Mario Kassar and Andrew G. Vajna, who also produced Terminator 3. Other producers included C2 executive James Middleton and television director David Nutter, who helmed the pilot episode. The show's soundtrack was composed by Bear McCreary.
The Sarah Connor Chronicles was greenlit in 2007 for a thirteen-episode season, which was reduced to nine episodes because of the Writers Guild of America strike. The series premiered mid-season and would go on to receive generally positive reviews, but it also saw low viewership ratings as it progressed through its second season. The Sarah Connor Chronicles was cancelled on May 18, 2009, despite a fan campaign urging Fox to renew it.

Series overview

Background

In the film Terminator 2: Judgment Day, Sarah Connor and her son John infiltrate the headquarters of Cyberdyne Systems to prevent the creation of Skynet, an artificially intelligent computer system. In the future, Skynet will launch a nuclear war on humans in an event known as Judgment Day, and John will later lead a human resistance against Skynet and its arsenal of Terminator machines.
In the present, young John is pursued by the T-1000, a shapeshifting Terminator sent by Skynet to kill him. The future John sent back a re-programmed T-800 to protect his younger self. Skynet was to be created by Miles Dyson, a Cyberdyne employee who, in the present, is convinced to help the Connors. He dies in an explosion destroying Cyberdyne and his research. This is followed by the destruction of the T-1000 and T-800, preventing the latter's technology from being reverse engineered to create Skynet, as in the original timeline. Because of these actions, the future is altered and Judgment Day is seemingly averted.

Season 1

Despite the Connors' earlier effort, they merely delayed Skynet's creation. In 1999, two years after the events of Terminator 2, a T-888 known as "Cromartie" is sent from the future to kill John. Another Terminator, "Cameron", was re-programmed by the future John and sent back from 2027 to protect his younger self. Her exterior appearance is based on Allison Young, a resistance fighter and John's friend in the future, who was killed by Cameron prior to re-programming. Besides Cromartie, the Connors are also pursued by FBI Special Agent James Ellison, who initially believes Sarah is an insane criminal. Sarah is romantically involved with a paramedic named Charley Dixon, but ends her relationship with him to go on the run again. She and John relocate from Nebraska to New Mexico, where Cameron finds them. John soon becomes frustrated with their life of running, so Sarah sets out to stop Skynet again and prevent Judgment Day, now expected to occur in 2011.
During the pilot episode, Cameron and the Connors make a temporal leap to Los Angeles 2007, as Skynet begins taking shape. Cromartie suffers extensive damage while trying to kill them, but begins repairing his endoskeleton and artificial flesh, and continues his search for John in 2007. The Connors find Skynet has also sent other Terminators back in time to support its own creation, and the resistance has sent back fighters to interfere. Sarah also deals with the fear of pending cancer.
The Connors and Cameron seek out an intuitive chess computer called "the Turk", a suspected precursor to Skynet. They also forge an alliance with John's uncle Derek Reese, a resistance fighter. Derek is the brother of John's father, Kyle Reese. The Turk is created by Andy Goode, a former assistant to Dyson. Derek kills Andy, but someone else has already taken the computer.

Season 2

Despite losing sight of the Turk, the Connors continue their efforts to prevent the rise of Skynet. A dying resistance fighter arrives from the future and provides the Connors a list of people relevant to their mission, many of them requiring protection from Terminators. Sarah later learns of a company, the Kaliba Group, which has an apparent connection to Skynet.
The Turk is purchased by Catherine Weaver, CEO of ZeiraCorp. Unknown to others, Weaver is a shapeshifting T-1001. She is posing as the real Weaver, who died sometime prior and left behind a young daughter, Savannah, now raised by the doppelganger. The T-1001/Weaver commissions work on an AI project using the Turk. She also convinces Ellison to work for her, showing him evidence of Terminators in the present and requesting that he find one so they can study it. Cromartie is later deactivated by the Connors, but unknown to them, his body is taken by Ellison and brought to Weaver. She has it connected to her AI project, known as John Henry, giving him a physical but stationary presence at ZeiraCorp. His knowledge grows rapidly after Weaver connects him to the Internet, but he is later hacked by a similar AI originating from Dyson's work on Skynet. John Henry recovers and wishes to learn more about his counterpart.
Meanwhile, Jesse Flores and Riley Dawson have arrived from an altered future where John, as resistance leader, only communicates through Cameron, having become increasingly reliant on her. Jesse, a resistance fighter, recruited Riley in a mission to stop Cameron's influence on young John, by having Riley become his girlfriend. Secretly, Jesse intends for Cameron to view Riley as a threat and thus kill her, making John distrustful of machines. However, Riley deduces the full extent of the plan, and Jesse kills her during an argument; John soon learns of this. Derek, Jesse's love interest, confronts her, although her fate is left ambiguous. Derek is later killed by a T-888 while the Connors are rescuing Savannah from the machine.
In the season-one finale, Cameron is damaged in a vehicle explosion which has negative effects on her programming throughout the second season, occasionally causing her to glitch and engage in unexpected behavior. As the season concludes, the Connors learn of John Henry's existence and believe him to be Skynet. They meet with Weaver, who reveals herself as a Terminator. She says they actually share a common enemy in Skynet, which John is destined to fight with the help of John Henry. Meanwhile, Cameron has already been sent by the Connors to kill John Henry. Instead, however, she allows him to take her CPU, giving him mobility. He then travels to the post-Judgment Day future, using one of Weaver's time machines. John – wishing to retrieve Cameron's CPU and reactivate her – time travels with Weaver to locate John Henry, while Sarah and Ellison stay behind. In the future, John meets alternate versions of Derek, Kyle, and Allison who do not know him. He realizes the future has been altered by his absence in the past, learning he has not led the resistance in this new timeline.

Cast and characters

Main

Sarah Connor is a major character in the Terminator series. She is the mother of John Connor, who will one day become the leader of the human resistance. The authorities, however, see her as a deranged fugitive.
John Connor is Sarah's son and the future leader of the human resistance. He is 15 years old at the beginning of the show, turning 16 in the season one finale, and 17 throughout season two. As the series progresses, John struggles with his feelings for Cameron, who is a Terminator.
  • * John De Vito played as the young John Connor in two episodes "Queen's Gambit" and "To the Lighthouse".
  • Summer Glau as Cameron / Allison Young:
Cameron is a Terminator whom John Connor sent back from 2027 to protect his earlier self. Her model and exact capabilities are not known, but she can mimic human mannerisms better than any previous Terminator and can also consume small amounts of food, a first for Terminators. Later in the series it is revealed that Cameron assumed the identity of a resistance fighter, Allison Young, before being reprogrammed.
  • Richard T. Jones as James Ellison:
James Ellison is an FBI Special Agent pursuing Sarah Connor. At first puzzled by what he initially thinks is Sarah's outlandish story, he later collects irrefutable evidence of the existence of Terminators and gradually realizes the truth. In the second season, Ellison pursues employment with ZeiraCorp, allying himself with Catherine Weaver.
Derek Reese is a Resistance fighter sent to the past by the future John Connor. He is the older brother of Kyle Reese and paternal uncle of John. He knows Cameron in the future, but still does not trust her. He is recurring in the first season but becomes a regular in the second season. Derek has a romantic relationship with Jesse Flores, a resistance fighter who arrives from the future. He is killed by a Terminator while attempting to save Savannah Weaver. Another Derek from an alternate timeline is introduced in the series finale.
Riley Dawson is John's new love interest that he meets at school, much to the consternation of Sarah. John does not reveal the story of his life to her, but as they get closer, he realizes he is endangering her life. Unknown to John, a resistance fighter, Jesse, has brought Riley back from the future to prevent John from getting too close to Cameron, and to get close to John. She appears to develop genuine romantic feelings for John. Jesse later kills Riley after a struggle.
Cromartie is a T-888 sent back in time to kill John Connor in the pilot episode, in which he was portrayed by Owain Yeoman. He takes damage to his biological covering, revealing his metal endoskeleton. In the episode "The Turk", he finds a new biological covering in the shape of fictional actor George Laszlo, then continues his search for John. After chasing John and Riley into Mexico, Cromartie's chip is destroyed and John buries his body in the desert. When John returns later to destroy Cromartie's body, it has been moved. Ellison has recovered the body for Catherine Weaver, who connects Cromartie's body to the Babylon A.I. named John Henry. Dillahunt was a recurring character in the first season, but becomes a regular character in the last season, portraying Laszlo, Cromartie and John Henry.
Catherine Weaver is a shape-shifting Terminator disguised as the CEO of a high-tech corporation called ZeiraCorp. She is a model T-1001 made of a liquid metal that is capable of shapeshifting, like the T-1000 in Terminator 2: Judgment Day. She is focused on developing artificial intelligence using The Turk, the intuitive computer at first believed to be a precursor to Skynet. She targets other Terminators to reverse-engineer Skynet technology in the present, and to prepare for the future war. She plans on using this research to fight Skynet. Despite the revelation that Weaver is an enemy of Skynet, it is still unknown where her allegiance lies. Weaver hints at her motives in the episode "Born to Run" when she asks Cameron, "Will you join us?" through messenger James Ellison. During the episode "Today Is the Day Part 2" Cameron explains to Jesse Flores that John Connor asked the same question of the T-1001 in an attempt to forge an alliance against Skynet.