Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles (Bonus)

Welcome to the 50th post of Retro Reviews & More! Last week, I promised something special. When I launched the blog over two-and-a-half years ago, I did so with five posts on the Terminator film series, first, a four-parter on timeline theories, 1 The Terminator | T2, 2 T3 | Salvation, 3 Genisys, and 4 Dark Fate, and then finally, "+/- Reviews of the Threequels". In that fifth post, I mentioned potentially revisiting the other "threequel", the television series, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, and for both theory and review purposes, which I always intended as a promise, as well. But before we get to that, I wanted to mention two things I have worked on to prepare for this 50th post. First, I recreated the original four timelines and updated those posts with the new images (it always bothered me that the screenshots had the markup for spelling and grammar "errors"). It was recreated faithfully, aside from a few better grammatical choices. Second, if you choose to revisit any older post, you will find them all to be fully linked, which I plan to continue. This applies to the teaser for each following post, some of which I had to add a teaser blurb. One last ado, I am going to write the first part like it is a true fifth part of the timeline series, and the second part like it is a fifth segment of the threequel reviews post.

Terminator: Timeline Theories (Bonus)

The Sarah Connor Chronicles

Abbreviations used are as follows: 

T1 = The Terminator (1984)

T2 = Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)

T3 = Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003)

TSCC = Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles (2008-2009)

TS = Terminator: Salvation (2009)

TG = Terminator: Genisys (2015)

TDF = Terminator: Dark Fate (2019)

JD = Judgment Day

TDE = Time Displacement Equipment

Recapping both the previous four posts and the basics of my Terminator Timeline theories, T1 and the beginning of T2 occur on what I call Timeline Prime, which includes a loop in which Kyle Reese always fathered John Connor, Skynet was always developed from the wreckage of Sarah's would-be assassin T-800, and Sarah's future knowledge always motivated her to train John for his destiny. When Sarah, John, and the reprogrammed T-800 encounter Miles Dyson, a time branch is created, one which JD hopefully never occurs. But since all points in time exist simultaneously, Timeline Prime with its loop does not cease existence. T3 and TS occur on a branch from a parallel Timeline Prime with similar events, some occurring earlier and an additional loop on the time branch. TG begins on the original Timeline Prime with a single ripple that has Sarah born one year earlier and creating a second branch. TDF also begins on Timeline Prime. I left Sarah's hopeful future alone in favor of a separate branch where the events involving Dani Ramos occur.

The history of TSCC has some differing dates, indicating a time ripple. These are that Kyle arrived in 1983, John was born on 14 November of the same year, and the encounter with Miles Dyson occurred in 1997 ahead of JD. In T1, Kyle arrived in 1984, John was born 14 February 1985, and T2 occurred in 1995. For this reason, these events with their loop occur on an alternate parallel Timeline Prime. As in T2, after destroying Cyberdyne and Dyson's research, a branch was created, on which TSCC begins. However, when the Connors, Cameron, and Cromartie's (a T-888) head jump forward to 2007, it creates a second branch to which Derek Reese, his resistance team, and other T-888s including Vick pass through, arriving just prior or around the same time. Eventually, John Henry (Cromartie's restored body as an interface for a different A.I.), Weaver (a T-1001), and John Connor jump ahead to 2029, creating yet another branch. Another item of relevance, I noted one instance of evidence of a time loop, and there may be more. But a new loop did not make the theory, as it could be dismissed as coincidence.  

The top figure is an unlabeled crude diagram of the T1/T2 Timeline Prime with its loop, its branch, and the alternate TDF branch, plus the TG branch shifted downward to allow space for the TDF branch. The middle figure is an unlabeled parallel T3/TS Timeline Prime with its branch and loops. Finally, the bottom figure is today's subject, the labeled alternate parallel Timeline Prime (APP) with its loops and branches (APA, APB, APC).

For those who want to know how dates were calculated, much of it is established through onscreen text and dialog. One major one that required calculation is John's birthdate. He was to turn sixteen on 14 November 1999. Those that are truly conjecture do have a basis. Cameron's original mission is related to Cromarite's, as is the mission of Derek and his Resistance Skynet Hunting Party to Vick's. Since the films often had time travel arrivals occurring even the same day, it only seemed right to continue that established practice.

Final Thoughts (again): A) This was the toughest one yet. I really had to trim down from my watch notes. The format of a television series with overarching continuity certainly fosters depth in storytelling, but for the purpose of a timeline I had to eliminate many things of great importance. Those were the hard decisions. B) Originally, I was only going only to include TSCC timeline but decided to include all the previous ones as before, both for consistency and to illustrate just how convoluted the timelines truly are. C) Lastly, while I do not regret mapping out the timelines, Michael Keaton's Bruce Wayne explains them differently in the 2023 film The Flash. Using uncooked spaghetti, he explains that a change on one timeline is a fulcrum on another, which then places the time traveler on the new one. A bowl of cooked spaghetti he likens to the multiverse, multiple timelines (some parallel), fulcrums, etc., "one hot mess," which is a fair assessment of these. Another plot point to the time travel of the movie is fixed points, events that occur on all timelines no matter what. The Terminator franchise definitely has those, at least Kyle fathering John, the wreckage of the T1 T-800 leading to the creation of Skynet, and of course JD.

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Terminator: Reviews of the Threequels (Bonus)

Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles (2008-2009)

+Cameron (T-900): If there is one dynamic that had not been explored, or since, it's the one of a terminatrix reprogrammed to assist the heroes. Cameron, portrayed very well by Summer Glau, strikes a great balance between ultimately being a machine, holding her own programmed directives close to the proverbial chest, and showing at least a potential to have developed a facsimile of human emotion. For example, one upgrade to the infiltration faculties of the T-900 is the ability to cry, and a tool of manipulation at that, something the T2 T-800 expressed as impossible for him. (Honorable mention to the T-888 for being the "go-to" antagonistic terminator, including Cromartie and Vick. The idea that the CPUs are interchangeable between the T-888 and T-900 and at least backwards compatible is a potentially overlooked tiny detail with potentially large ramifications.)

+Casting: It is a tall task to recast characters when previous actors are nearly synonymous with the roles. And yet, Lena Headey is great as the titular Sarah Connor, Thomas Dekker is easily my second favorite John Connor after Edward Furlong (and believe it or not, even that's a difficult choice), I already mentioned Glau excelling as Cameron, and Brian Austin Green is fully responsible for bringing to life the character no one knew we needed, Kyle's older brother Derek Reese. (Ironically, he would go on to portray the cyborg John Corben / Metallo on Smallville.) Shirley Manson joins in the second season as a T-1001 who is living as Catherine Weaver and appropriately communicates an air of steely emotion and mystery. It is worth noting that casting remains a "+" even with Arnold Schwarzenegger not involved at all, though I would argue his influence is seen in the mannerisms of the terminators.

+Room for Depth: There are thirty-one episodes with a runtime of around forty-five minutes each. So, that allows for a lot of detail, more development, and more characters. The series mostly does not flitter this time away showing, as examples, a history that is much earlier than previously shown, Skynet stockpiling raw material to build terminators later, and inventions that were later used to develop Skynet.

-Convoluted Timeline(s): The high amount of runtime also allows for the opportunity to create more timeline complications, and even potential discrepancies. This opportunity gets a serious shove into reality by having two time jumps forward, though most of the series takes place after the first. It makes the same mistake as T3 before it, not staying with established dates, particularly John Connor's birthdate.

-Broken "Rules"? When Kyle Reese explains the rules of TDE in T1, the primary one is "Something about the field generated by a living organism. Nothing dead will go through," and in response to Dr. Silberman's pointing out the cyborg is metal, Kyle replies, "Surrounded by living tissue!" (emphasis mine). In the 1999 to 2007 time jump in the pilot episode of TSCC, only Cromartie's head, with exposed metal, jumps. When the head arrives, the flesh has been stripped from it, which may very well be the danger of the exposure. The writers should have made this blatantly obvious as to what happens, or at least a character's hypothesis, because it just appears to be a broken rule as is.

-Incomplete Story: In what became true Terminator tradition, the story was abandoned before completion. It ends on the "just plain cruel" cliffhanger of John Henry (supposedly A.I. meant to counter Skynet), Weaver (a T-1001 whose motivations are not clear), and John Connor jumping ahead to 2029. Derek, Kyle, and Allison (a human John knew in one future and whose tissue model was used for the T-900 known as Cameron), who were all previously dead to John's knowledge, are alive and well, part of a resistance, and do not even know the name "John Connor". John Henry, who jumped first, is nowhere to be found, and Weaver slips away. Sarah stayed behind in 2009, as did Cameron, who is physically damaged to the point of exposed endoskeleton and deactivated after gifting her glitching chip to John Henry, when he asks her to "join us". John Henry's programming and A.I. are downloaded to the chip. The show was canceled after only one half-season and one full one.

Next up...Into the Fray: Ending Scene!