Quick Review: Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles

I’ve watched the first two episodes of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, and I must say that I am somewhat impressed. I don’t know if it’s because of the lack of new shows due to the writer’s strike, and one can only take so much of American Gladiators. The effects are good for a television show. The writing has been pretty good so far, especially how they’ve managed to work much of the existing Terminator universe into the story. I usually have problems with time travel, but the writers seem to have handled any issues fairly well. They start out in 1999 and by the second episode they’ve traveled to 2007. This totally dismisses Terminator 3 as if it didn’t exist, but from what I read the producers like to think of this show as existing in its own version of the Terminator universe. That’s fine with me. They do however hold over the fact that Sarah’s going to develop cancer. Consistency is good.

Summer Glau brings her kick ass attitude to her Terminator “Cameron” model character. But her dead pan performance is, in a word, dead. Thomas Decker, as the savior, John Connor, comes off as a whiney brat. Richard T. Jones shows up as Agent James Ellison, the FBI agent tasked to bring in the fugitive Sarah Connor. I won’t dog the brother for collecting a paycheck, but I will say he needs to either watch The Fugitive or U.S. Marshals and see how much passion Tommy Lee Jones brought to the role of Sam Gerard as a fugitive hunter. If anything, he should watch a few episodes of the original Fugitive series, because he looks like he’s sleeping through his lines. But he does have a few episodes to shape up since Sarah had dropped of the map for 8 years. The bright spot is Lena Headey of 300 fame. She brings a level of complexity to the titular character that echoes Linda Hamilton. She makes the show worth at least giving it a chance.