by Melissa Voelker
It’s another week, and another chance for Cromartie the evil terminator to continue rebuilding himself after the wreck the Connor crew made of him. And it is another chance for John Connor, one day savior of mankind, to pout.
Still smarting after the suicide of Cameron’s “friend” who he was not allowed to try and save, John pushes his mom away while she tries to console him. The one he really wants to push away is Cameron, but she has bigger things to worry about than one sulky teenage boy. She knows Cromartie has jumped into the future with them, and once Sarah believes this too she wants to run again. The sulky savior manages to convince Sarah that they can stop Cromartie, as they know where he should show up next, so it looks like field trip time instead of road trip time for the Connor crew.
Sarah and company sneak into the warehouse where they believe Cromartie will show up and set out explosives. They are all more than a bit jumpy, as none of them have a clue what face their opponent will be wearing when next they meet. After attacking a human by mistake, they realize that there is more going on around them than they realize, and this mission may require more than just a few bombs to complete. Soon they are spying and trying to suss out what is going on at the warehouse. Cromartie still hasn’t shown up, but another cyborg makes a surprise appearance. While they are busy being super spies, their intrepid FBI agent follower is busy on Cromartie’s trail. Seems another doctor bit the big one and while nothing should tie him in with six other recent deaths, the fact that his weird “blood” that is “not blood” has shown up at each scene creates some big questions.
Dissension shakes the Connor crew when Sarah decides it is time to leave the warehouse but John doesn’t want to go. Cameron tries to convince him they need to head out and regroup, but he is not in the mood to listen. He escapes from them and heads back into the warehouse. It is not terribly shocking when he pulls a less than genius move and ends up locked away in a truck with a shipment of alloy intended to make cyborg parts. Sarah and Cameron aren’t able to get to him before the truck drives off with its sulky savior cargo in tow.
Cameron and Sarah work to track their missing boy scout down using the tracking device in his cell phone, but that doesn’t last long as it quickly (and conveniently, I have never seen a phone smash that easily) gets broken. Sarah freaks out a bit over losing John, while the terminatrix tries to console her. Meanwhile Agent Busybody thinks he has caught someone involved with the freaky not-blood murders, but since Cromartie stole his face from another guy, it is possible the man who has been picked up is more than he seems. Though creepy music plays and builds up to a possible cyborg revelation, in the end the guy Agent Busybody nabbed is just the human whose face Cromartie borrowed, and who will later end up dead once the terminator decides to take his entire identity.
[nms:terminator,1,0]
Catching a lead by kidnapping a worker from the warehouse, Sarah and Cameron are on the hunt for John. And John (or at least the truck he is locked away within) has arrived at its destination, which could be disastrous for him. So far he has managed to avoid detection by those around him, but how long can that last? Especially now that he is in yet another warehouse where he probably shouldn’t be.
Sarah and Cameron leave their abducted tour guide in a minefield and continue on toward rescuing John. He is still locked away in warehouse #2 and after witnessing the murders of two people by the cyborg that led him there, he seems to have realized he is in deep dog poop. Can Sarah and the terminatrix arrive in time to save him? Possibly, as they too have arrived at warehouse #2 – which it turns out is the factory where Cameron and many other killer robots will be born in the future.
They have shown up to the party none too soon, as John has figured out the terminator he is trapped with is on standby mode after completing his programmed mission, so there may be a chance of escape. He calls Sarah on her cell phone and she tells him to open the doors and run for it as soon as he can, which he agrees too though it is obviously not making him happy. A cyborg fistfight ensues when the terminator wakes up and Cameron starts wailing on him. John and Sarah try to drive off in a truck but it turns out the sulky savior can’t handle a stick. Eventually he figures it out, the terminatrix knocks her opponent down for the count, and the entire crew manages to escape.
Though this episode was as well done as the last few, there were a couple of plot points that really bothered me this time around. At one point Sarah tells Cameron it is her fault John took off without them and ended up trapped with a terminator in an army warehouse/bunker. She remarks that if Cameron had allowed John to save the suicidal teenager at their school, or at least feel like he had the choice to save her, he wouldn’t have rebelled so much against them. I have a hard time siding with Sarah on this point, when she has spent all of her son’s life making all of his choices for him and tearing him out of schools and homes time and again because they have become too much in the spotlight and could be found by their enemies. She never gives him a choice, just tells him what they are going to do and demands his obedience. Sure it is supposedly all for his own good and done to make sure he will be around in the future to be the savior he is destined to become, but that doesn’t make it better. Sarah is being very hypocritical blaming Cameron for John’s behavior.
[nms:terminator,1,1]
The other thing that irks me, and has done so since the very beginning, is this constant desire of Sarah’s to stop Judgment Day and the robotocalypse from happening. For a show based around this future war, and fighting enemies from the future, and raising the great savior of the future, it seems like the writers are cheating by skipping over the fact that if Sarah Connor manages to stop SkyNet from taking over the world, John Connor will never be born. He only exists because in the future he sent Kyle Reese back in time to impregnate Sarah. If there is no Judgment Day, then there will be no war and no robots building time machines, and no reason to send Reese back in time. Why does Sarah never, ever, consider this? She spends so much time in voiceovers pondering so many different things, and yet this never comes up? It is an omission that irritates me, and puts a damper on an otherwise regularly interesting and entertaining viewing experience.
Never miss an update. Subscribe to Pink Raygun by Email or subscribe via RSS
About Melissa: By day a mild-mannered tv station receptionist, by night a fighter of crime and corruption in the dirty streets of Spokane, WA . . . or maybe not so much. More like a hyperactive, anal-retentive daytime receptionist and a melodramatic, hyperactive nighttime fangirl who only wishes she could be a fighter of crime and champion of justice (except that would lead to getting my super costume all dirty and I hate doing laundry.) Though my intent has always been to write bestselling novels and live a life of wealth and luxury, putting my talents for snarkiness and word doodling together while letting my geek flag fly suits me just fine – for now.
Related Stuff:
By day a mild-mannered tv station receptionist, by night a fighter of crime and corruption in the dirty streets of Spokane, WA . . . or maybe not so much. More like a hyperactive, anal-retentive daytime receptionist and a melodramatic, hyperactive nighttime fangirl who only wishes she could be a fighter of crime and champion of justice (except that would lead to getting my super costume all dirty and I hate doing laundry.) Though my intent has always been to write bestselling novels and live a life of wealth and luxury, putting my talents for snarkiness and word doodling together while letting my geek flag fly suits me just fine - for now. 
