ALT.SF4M

  Timeline Musings on The Terminator

   • j********o@***.com
     18/04/1999 00:00:000 UTC

     I've meant to post these thoughts for a while, and although they tie in
     with my

     contemporaneous post on The Matrix, they do not contain spoilers, so
     I've put

     them here. I'm almost sure that I haven't ever posted these before...

     First, a quick aside on the Time machine of the Terminator: most smart
     people

     were bothered by the apparent contrivance of the rule that prevented
     Reese from

     bringing back a weapon, etc.. Thinking about it, that may be unfair.
     Neither

     party that used the machine may have had the time to tinker it to
     perfection:

     Skynet was on its last legs and may not have even expected the machine
     to work.

     Skynet didn't design a general time machine, it designed one for its own

     purpose, specifically, to send an infiltration unit back to kill an
     ordinary

     civilian in a peaceful time. It so happened that the best infiltration
     unit it

     had was covered in human flesh - perhaps this simplified some
     engineering

     problem. It could conceivably have hidden weapons inside the T-800, but
     even

     had it the time, why bother? A T-800 is all the weapon it needed to
     send. If

     Skynet had designed the machine for John Conner, maybe it would have
     built it

     to send a fully-armed squad back to pursue the assassin! John Connor was
     stuck

     with what he found, and pressed for time: T2 brings this into question
     with

     its multiple trips, and so...

     T2 should have resolved the issues of free-will that T1 brought up (I
     forget

     the name of the pretentious French movie both The Terminator and Twelve
     Monkeys

     evolved from). Was Reese destined to father his own savior and die
     before his

     own birth? The end of T2 implicitly rejected fate (even without the
     wisely

     amputated scene where old Sarah Conner swings her grandchildren in a
     futuristic

     Washington D.C. and explains that her son has grown up to be a
     politician and

     "fight in the Senate for mankind's future" (puke!)). If everything is

     predestined, then the entire effort and sacrifice that constitutes the
     second

     half of the movie is a farce! I have a take that would have done this
     while

     providing a less awkward explanation of T2's elements.

     T2 should have started with the final assault on Skynet (c. 2027?). John

     Connor's army is really bashing the machines: he's got tanks and stuff
     by now,

     and HK's are getting bogged down and blown away right and left. In

     desperation, T-800's are being rushed off the assembly line incomplete
     (no

     skin, no flesh, missing limbs) to get mowed down by the human onslaught
     (this

     explains the use of endoskeletal units as main-line battle units in T2,
     despite

     their obvious design compromises for infiltration!) Connor is escorted
     into a

     newly captured research bunker: techs are already at work at the
     consoles and

     one explains that this is indeed Skynet's crazy time-machine project and
     it

     actually worked! The instruments show that they have only ten minutes
     before

     the new timeline reaches and erases them: only enough to be sure of
     sending

     one unarmed, naked man (something about conductivity) to try and save
     Sarah

     Conner. We see Reese clutching the scorched remnants of her photo before
     he

     volunteers. As he climbes into the spherical capsule, the tech promises
     to

     send him some weapons (and clothes) if they can figure out a way! Connor

     wishes him luck as the capsule is clamped shut and Reese is engulfed by

     blackness.

     Cut to 1984 and the end of the first movie: Sarah Conner is wheeled away
     and

     FBI types are seen poking at the wreckage of the terminator. Cut to a
     scene

     where computer technicians (including a young Dyson, if I recall Joe
     Morton's

     character's name correctly) examine the components and observe that
     "This is

     really going to give us a head-start!"

     "Thirty-five years later..." It's the fall of Skynet again, but we see
     new,

     more advanced robots getting smashed up, including endoskeletal units
     with

     liquid metal joints and components. Once again, John Conner is led into
     a

     bunker, but it's a different John Connor (with a greater resemblance to
     Reese)!

     "Just like Mom said..." he muses. The techs are baffled that they
     actually

     found the crazy experiment he sent them to find and explain that Skynet
     has

     sent back an experimental liquid-metal terminator to kill his mother,
     etc..

     Again, Resse volunteers. "Not this time, son," responds Connor, and
     gestures

     to the men behind him, from which steps Arnold the T-800 (possible a
     T-900 in

     this chunk of timeline). The movie carries on from there, except that
     when Joe

     Morton's computer scientist character remarks "We would never have
     thought of

     this stuff," the terminator corrects him: "Yes, you would have."

     This gets you two pairs of trips while retaining time pressure, poor

     preparation, etc., and explaining the way-too-advanced T-1000 appearing
     as if

     from a monkey's butt. It also validates their concern that all future

     technology be destroyed.

     Ok, now back to the Matrix...

     Gorno

     Speaking of cartoons: Mad Jack the Pirate is pretty keen.

       • Michael Paris
         18/04/1999 00:00:000 UTC

         If the article sent back in time had to be covered in living
         flesh........

         T1000? Liquid Metal?

         Michael

         If life made sense they would ban it