Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles - a First Look

With the premiere of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, the Machines are back. But will they (and their Fox television series) succeed?

Let me begin by explaining that I am a huge fan of Terminator and Terminator II, Rise of the Machines, that rare movie sequel that outdoes its predecessor. Terminator III was more of a disappointment, having just enough Terminator flavor to justify the expense of a movie ticket. The Sarah Connor Chronicles seem to take place between Terminator II and Terminator III, at least at first look.

With the introduction of the Sarah Connor Chronicles, we are introduced to John and Sarah Connor in 1999. John meets a strange girl, Cameron, at school who attempts to befriend him. Things rapidly get worse when their substitute teacher, a Terminator, slices his own leg open, removing a pistol, and attempts to murder Connor, who is rescued and taken away by the strange girl.

Meeting up with Sarah, they encounter the Terminator again at the Connor home before fleeing. The strange girl, herself a Terminator of an apparently different design, leads the Connors to a bank vault, where someone else, having been sent from the future human resistance, has apparently left behind weapon parts as well as a working time machine. The trio uses the time machine to travel to 2007, intending to try again to stop the rise of Skynet. This, at least, is where the premiere episode leaves us.

The Good: Lena Headey of 300 fame does a good job portraying Sarah Connor. Summer Glau is acceptable as a teenage-female Terminator model, although we will likely learn more about this as the series progresses. I was pleased to see that Fox had the courage to air the scene in which John is first attacked, with the Terminator posing as a substitute teacher and attempting to shoot John in his science classroom. I would have expected Fox to bow to those who would and will argue that this was inappropriate, given the series of school shootings in the United States, but it was a very Terminator-like thing to do, and I'm glad they used this scene.