Recall that “Burn to Run” (originally broadcast April 22nd, 2009) ended with Cameron giving John Henry her super duper terminator chip so he could walk and talk and become a real boy. He somehow then travels into the future. Weaver and John follow suit, leaving Sarah in the past/present to try to prevent the rise of Skynet.

When he gets to the future John meets Derek (who was killed in “Adam Raised a Cain”) but good ole Derek doesn’t know who John Connor is. He probably doesn’t care, either, except for the fact that this John Connor is wearing his brother’s jacket. John then finds himself face to face with Kyle Reese — his father. Behind Kyle is Cameron, or is it Allison?

It was an intriguing ending. John is no longer the savior of humanity. He’s just another member of the Resistance (if that) and who knows what Sarah will be doing in the past to rectify the situation. Unfortunately, we’ll never know. And SCI FI Wire’s brief interview with James Middleton didn’t shed much light on any plans for a third season.

One theory about the ending is that by leaping to the future, John Connor never grew up to become the leader of the human resistance. That would free him of the burden of saving humanity.

“I think that that’s the right interpretation, because in the actual footage of the show, we see that Derek doesn’t recognize him,” Middleton said. “So, by jumping into this future, he has erased his existence in a certain way, and we see that. We see that nobody recognizes him.”

Middleton added that leaping to the future changes John Connor’s fate. “We would have to have explored that if we did get a third season,” he said. “If we had gotten a third season, I should say, we definitely would have explored what it all meant, but I think there’s a great moment where we see Allison [Summer Glau], and John’s look to her is very meaningful. I think that also would have been a great thing in terms of dramatic potential. Like I said, the show has ended, and it would all be speculation, and I really don’t want to raise anybody’s expectations.”

That’s pretty vague. Perhaps Middleton didn’t know anything specific or maybe he just didn’t want to spill the beans. Either way, fans can continue to wonder what would have happened without knowing one way or the other.

And what an audience we found: passionate, intelligent, kind of nuts in a good way. My only complaint about the T:SCC fans is that there aren’t ten million of them. But I prefer to be happy for the ones we had instead of lamenting the ones we didn’t.

[...]

Thanks to a brave and talented cast, a feature crew working on a TV schedule, and everyone else who I could list but won’t because they know who they are. Mostly I’d like to thank those of you who’ve supported us and fought for us and given up hours of your life to watch our show. At the end of the day, that’s what it’s about. The watching.

Finally, the futon critic has some quotes from FOX entertainment chief Kevin Reilly about the cancellation:

“‘Terminator’ has completed its run,” FOX entertainment chief Kevin Reilly told reporters in a conference call this morning. “And I think it had a nice little run. It was a good show. It was not [a question of keeping either 'Dollhouse' or 'Terminator']. We did see it tailing off a bit. It had a nice creative core, but ultimately we made the bet on ‘Dollhouse’ for the night. We had some other shows we thought would make a better profile for the night. So that’s it for ‘Terminator.’”

Judging from the response we’ve had here at Lower Decks there are going to be a lot of unhappy people. Our poll asking if Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles should get a third season drew 111 responses (a record!) and 95 of them said yes. Unfortunately for them, it just wasn’t meant to be.

Read all about FOX’s 2009-2010 schedule at the futon critic, Variety and The Live Feed. Hit the comments with your thoughts. Will Dollhouse sink even lower in the Nielsen ratings in its second season? Should FOX have renewed Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles instead? Can Fringe survive without additional boosts from American Idol?

And there it was.  I write this review with a bit of a heavy heart because I know there is a (perhaps very good) chance that I have watched the last episode of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles.  Say what you want about ratings or expectations, movies or action…this became one of my favorite shows over the course of this season.  I agreed to review it because I was the most interested, but I fell in love.  And if that was the last episode of the series, I am really going to miss it.

Let’s start with the obvious question and get it out of the way.  How does “Born to Run” serve as a finale?

As a season finale, it is great.  It combines all of the elements of the season, getting everyone in the same place.  It features drama, excitement, and tons of revelations.  And it features a cliffhanger that would keep you going through a long summer.

As a series finale?  I’d argue that it would be a terrible series finale.  Absolutely horrible.  Because this wasn’t just a finale that ended on a cliffhanger…it’s a cliffhanger that puts the entire Terminator universe in jeopardy.  It changes everything that we’ve ever known about the entire series, and if that’s how the series ends…I think it went too far.

Because…think about it.  In the future we saw, John Connor didn’t exist to anyone.  He wasn’t able to unite humanity to strike back at Skynet, and while someone might’vestepped up and taken his place (perhaps Kyle or Derek), it points out one simple truth.

Skynet won.  It removed John Connor from the equation.  Because the machines didn’t care if John Connor really died…they simply wanted to remove his leadership.  And without John Connor, perhaps Skynet won’t be destroyed.  Maybe the machines win.

And I don’t like that.  The Terminator universe is dark enough without the knowledge that we do win.

So, for the sake of the series’ legacy, I’m really hoping the show gets renewed.  Or at least picked up by another network.  Because let’s face it…this series ain’t getting a feature film to wrap it up.

The episode begins with Sarah in prison, interrogated by an agent (played by Joshua Malina of West Wing fame).  He and Ellison try to get Sarah to give up John, and she doesn’t budge.  The agent even admits to Sarah that he believes her story, but it doesn’t work.

Meanwhile, John is concerned with saving his mother.  Cameron refuses to help him break out his mother, but he wants to know if Cameron is damaged.  Because if she’s damaged, perhaps that’s what’s giving his mother cancer.

Sarah asks to see a priest (the same one from the season opener in a nice bit of continuity).  She offers an explanation for what happened (in that opener) in exchange for a favor.  He meets with John, giving him some money and arranging for a couple of passports.  Sarah also has a message for John and Cameron – don’t come for her.

Meanwhile, John Henry and Weaver are both very interested in Sarah, and Weaver is interested in meeting with John.  John Henry is also acting a little funny (the technician claims they switched out a wire and it changed him) – he continually says things at the same time as Weaver.

She sentsEllison to meet withJohn, and John refuses to meet with Weaver.  Before he leaves, Ellison passes along a message to Cameron – “will you join us?”

This is a pretty big revelation.  I’ve read the theory online that Weaver was the T1000 from the submarine, and I thought it made a lot of sense.  But this almost certainly confirms the fact that Weaver isn’t working for Skynet – she’s her own force working under her own agenda.

And you have to wonder how that happened.  How did a machine gain the ability to think for itself?  We know that terminators don’t really think for themselves – they simply do what they’re programmed to do.  Cameron doesn’t protect John because she cho0ses to – she protects John because she was reprogrammed to do so.

And, as Cameron admits, deep down she’s programmed to kill John.  And without the reprogramming, that’s what she’s do.

We almost have to assume that Skynetcreated Weaver – after all, they created Robert Patrick’s T1000 from T2.  Did they create Weaver with the ability to make her own decisions?  Or did Weaver somehow overcome her programming?

And if Weaver is truly fighting against Skynet, why would she refuse to join John Connor?  Was it because she knew she was going to carry out this “John Henry” plan?  Did she think that, maybe, Connor wouldn’t go along with it?

Either way, John was right – Cameron was affected by the question.  And you have to think that the question itself changed her entire mission – she knew from the second that she heard the question exactly who Weaver was.  And I think she knew that she’d be handing over her chip to John Henry.

Because she had already said that she wasn’t going to allow John to save Sarah.  Not only does she change her mind, but she brings John face-to-face with a machine that is more-than-capable of killing him.

What does Cameron know that we don’t?  How does handing her chip over to John Henry and then sending him into a post-Judgment Day future help defeat Skynet?  And, specifically, how does it protect John (which, as we said, was her primary mission)?

See, as a season finale…this episode pushes the storyline in interesting new directions.  As a series finale, there are simply too many questions that need answering.

So the terminator comes after Weaver, and it tries to kill her.  Weaver reveals herself as a terminator, and she easily destroys it.  But when she tries to recover his chip, she finds that it has been destroyed – it was programmed to self-destruct if it ever hit the air.  They are unable to use it, and they’re forced to throw it away.

Meanwhile, Cameron wakes up staring at John.  She claims that they need to understand her body and her chip.  This quickly dissolves into an examination of her systems to make sure she’s in working condition.

The way it is done is extremely sensual, though.  Cameron takes off her shirt and her bra, and she has John climb on top of her and feel her breastplate.

As much as I love Cameron’s character (and Summer Glau), I’ve always been weirded out by the idea of a John/Cameron relationship.  I just think its too strange, and I’m glad they haven’t really gone in this direction so far.  All in all, it added up to an interesting scene.

John and Cameron arrange for the priest to re-visit Sarah, who warns her that “she is coming.”  With that, Cameron shows up and uses a lot of non-lethal force to break Sarah out.  She is heavily damaged (about a third of her face is removed, revealing her metal endoskeleton), but she’s assisted by John Henry, who opens doors and monitors her progress.

As soon as they break out, Sarah checks on Cameron because Sarah still plans on visiting ZeiraCorp and destroying John Henry.

And this was the first time, for the whole series, that the show felt rushed.  I realize that Sarah wanted to make sure that Skynet is destroyed, but it seems like she moved a little too quickly on Weaver.

And it made me wonder if, maybe, all the episodes spent on the “three dots” were a good idea.  If an entire episode about a “terminator lost in time” was a good idea.

If the show is renewed, I’d say yes – those episodes offered a lot of very insightful/helpful information on our characters.  It is part of the reason why the show is so great – even though its about the war between humans and machines, this series was about characters.

If the show is cancelled, those might’ve been a waste.  Because I’d rather know more about the fate of Sarah Connor than her inner workings.  Just sayin’.

So John and Sarah go up to meet with Weaver, and Cameron attacks the basement to meet with John Henry.  He welcomes her into his room, and Cameron pulls out a knife.

Meanwhile, Weaver basically outs herself as a terminator to the Connors.  She acknowledges that they’re fighting a common enemy (even referring to it as Skynet), but they’re only able to talk for a few seconds before a drone (from the warehouse) flies into Weaver’s office.  It causes a great deal of damage, but Weaver morphs into a shield to protect John, Sarah, and Ellison.  They all escape and retreat to the basement.

Sarah claims they’re trying to kill her son, and Weaver says they’re trying to kill herson.  That John might save the world, but it won’t be without John Henry’s help.  That she isn’t working for Skynet – she’s working to destroy it.

I have to say that the Connors and Ellison react surprising well to the fact that Weaver is a T1000.  Ellison should’ve been extremely surprised to know that his employer was a machine, and he didn’t know it.  And the whole “liquid metal” idea should’ve been a huge surprise in itself.  And the last time Sarah saw a T1000, it almost killed her and her son…you’d think she’d be a bit more defensive around it.

Reaching the basement, they see that Cameron didn’t kill John Henry.  In fact, she’s deactivated, her chip is missing, and John Henry is gone.  Weaver reveals that Cameron gave her chip to John Henry, and that he travelled in time.  She quickly sets the device to time travel  again, and the room begins to shake.

And Sarah tells John that she can’t go.  That she”ll stop it.  And she steps out of the range of the time travel device, leaving Weaver and John to travel alone.  When John opens his eyes, he realizes that they’re in the future, and Cameron is gone.  Weaver and John walk through the corridors, but John is captured by the human resistance (Weaver disappears).

Emerging from the shadows to defend John is Derek Reese.  John is happy to see Derek, but the soldier doesn’t know John.  In fact, he doesn’t even know the name John Connor.  Kyle, however, shows his face, and John is able to meet his father face-to-face for the first time.  He also sees Allison Young (the human that Cameron is based on).

And Sarah Connor whispers, through time, that she loves her son.

And that’s it.

Let’s break that down again with some more questions.  I have to assume that John Henry needed a terminator’s chip for some reason, but I can’t imagine what that reason could be.  Perhaps John Henry and Weaver believe that Skynet can’t be defeated in the past, but it can be defeated in the future.  That plays into a lot of Terminator themes that Skynet cannot be stopped.

And let’s not forget that John travels to a war-torn world.  That means that Judgment Day happened, and that means that Sarah failed in stopping it.  And since Derek never heard of the name “Connor” – it means Sarah probably isn’t relevant in the future either.

It was an interesting way to bring Brian Austin Green (Derek Reese) back onto the show, but I’m not sure that his character can bring the same impact.  And I’m not just talking about the fact that we’re dealing with, for all intensive purposes, a completely different character.  Derek was an important character because he made the future real.  If John can see the future for himself, that part of Derek’s character is rendered obsolete.  Derek’s connection to Kyle is also irrelevant if Kyle is there in the flesh.

So it’s cool to get his character back, but I’m not sure it would bring the same emotional impact.  And that’s, of course, if the series is renewed.

Withthat, we basically know what the third season would deal with.  John would be with the resistance, learning a lot about the wartornworld he’s supposed to lead.  He’d also be searching (with or without Weaver’s help) for John Henry and Cameron’s chip.  I’m guessing we’d learn a lot about Weaver, her history, and her mission.

Meanwhile, Ellison and Sarah would work together in the past to understand what happened at ZeiraCorp and prevent Judgment Day.  I’m guessing Cameron would be in some kind of limbo, but Summer Glau would be able to appear as Allison Young.

It could certainly be cool, but I was really hoping that the show would’ve ended with some kind of resolution just in case.  I realize that shows have to continue with their plan, whether the show is on thin ice or not, but I also feel like they have a responsibility to the fans to give as much resolution as possible.  And the Terminator writers have known all year that the show might get cancelled…and they wrote this kind of ending.  The Terminator of Cliffhangers.

And I’m not sure it was necessary.  If they wanted to go in this direction, they easily could’ve done that in the season three premiere.  They could’ve ended withJohn and Sarah speaking with Weaver, revealing that she’s helping to fight Skynet.  Maybe end withthe cliffhanger of John Henry gone with Cameron’s chip.

End with uncertainty – that’s fine.  Every Terminator movie has ended with uncertainty, and we’re used to it.  But this was different – they ended with a cliffhanger that put everything we know in doubt, and I just don’t think it was the right thing to do.

I hope I’m wrong, and the series is renewed.  Because if it’s renewed, all of my negative points are null and void.

Because, in the end, this was a great episode.  It was a great season finale to a great season.  Season one showed a lot of promise, and season two banked in on a lot of the promise.  If there’s a season three, it will no doubt build upon that promise.

If the show isn’t renewed, it will still be a great show.  I will still buy the DVDs, and I’ll recommend that my friends watch it.  But if this was the end, it will certainly leave a distaste in my mouth. 

Hopefully it wasn’t the end.

With that, I wrap up the season.  I want to thank FOX for putting on a great show, whether they cancel it or not.  I want to thank the Terminator writers and producers for putting together a great series.  And I want to thank the Terminator cast and crew for bringing the show to life.  All of the above did a great job, and I hope to see more of it in the future.  They took a show with a limited premise and made it spectacular, and that should be commended.

And I want to thank the staff and readers of lowerdecks.com for allowing me to do this.  I had a great time, and I hope you enjoyed my reviews for the season.  If there’s a third season, I hope to be back to review every episode again.

We’ll know soon enough.  Cross your fingers.

In the time when this show desperately needs everyone to watch live, I decided to stop being a hypocrite and tune in on a Friday night.  It might be too little, too late (although maybe not…more on that inside), but it is probably something that I owe the show and its creators.  So, for the first time all season, I present you a review of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles…on time.

I can’t believe it.

No, scratch that.  I absolutely believe it.  I knew it was going to come, and I have been subconsciously preparing myself for it all season.  The cast is simply too small and yet the Connor face too much danger to get through an entire season without a casualty.

Even when Jessie and Riley and Cromartie died, I knew that the inner family was going to face a death.  It wouldn’t be John, obviously, and it probably wouldn’t be Sarah.  And while it could be Cameron, Summer Glau has  become the face of the show.

That left Derek.  In a lot of ways, my favorite character.  He was going to die, and it was just a matter of time.

I loved Derek’s character because he was the connection to the future.  To Judgment Day.  To Kyle.  To Future John.  Sure, Cameron can give John and Sarah an example of the dangers of the future…give raw statistics and information on Skynet and all the chaos it will bring.

But Derek gave the future a soul.  He lived it.  He experienced it.  He breathed in the future, bled in the future, and loved in the future.  Whenever John and/or Sarah wondered what the fight was about, Derek had the scars to prove it was real.  That it was dangerous.  And that it was coming.

Derek was such a great character that it didn’t matter that freakin’ Brian Austin Green was playing him.  I grew to love him anyway…that’s the kind of character he is.  And now he’s dead.

If the show is over, it makes sense.  It makes things real, and it makes things matter.  If the show is over, it will miss Derek’s presence.  I promise you that.

And for it to happen the way it did was just shocking.  It wasn’t some big battle between Derek and a machine to allow John a safe escape.  Where Derek, using some of the old tricks he’d learned, found a way to compete with a terminator one on one.  He killed the machine, but it got him too.  And he fights with the machine, battling to hold on longer than the other.  And, knowing he’d won, Derek smiles and dies.

No, it is just a random occurence that Derek wasn’t ready for, and a terminator did what it does best and shoots him in the head.  Derek probably didn’t see it coming.  Probably was talking to Kyle before he knew what happened.

He didn’t die like Kyle saving John or Sarah.  He didn’t die like Miles Dyson, saving the world a few more years by delaying Judgment Day.  His death had no meaning, and it had no purpose.

Part of me thinks that Derek deserved a cool death.  And yet part of me knows that heroes don’t always die heroically.  It doesn’t always come down to the protagonist and the antagonist in a mano-y-mano death match.  Because, most of the time, heroes get out by the skin of their teeth.  Most of the time, they get lucky.

But when that luck runs out, death could come at any minute from any direction.  Derek had probably been in that same situation a hundred times, and he probably turned that corner every time with a second to spare.  Enough time to jump out of the way or fire the first shot.

This time, he was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

You might think that 600 words is probably too much to devote to the death of a character, but readers will probably know what I think Derek meant to this show.  And I hope you agree with me.

We probably should’ve seen it coming, though.  The episode opens with a shot of the graveyard where Kyle is buried, and the first person we see is Derek.  A couple minutes later, John utters the words “everyone dies for me.”

He meant Charlie.  The writers were foreshadowing Derek’s death. 

Even John Henry discusses death with Ellison, wondering why the human brain doesn’t have the capacity to download itself somewhere after death.  The two discuss the idea of heaven, even though John Henry doesn’t seem to fully understand the concept.

Anyway, other than Derek’s death…this was a major episode.  Finally, after an entire season, Ellison’s story and the Connor’s story merge.  I’ve thought that the Weaver/Ellison story has been slow, but it’s certainly built up to a great place.

The catalyst for all of this was the discovery of a phone (carried by one of the attackers at the lighthouse) with Savannah’s picture on it.  John surmises that whoever was after him would soon be after the girl, and they travel to the Weaver house to find/save her.

And just like that, a terminator shows up to grab Savannah, but he is unable to find the girl because of the Connors (and a little bit of help from John Henry).  Derek actually dies as the heroes are escaping the house (Cameron lost the one-on-one battle with the terminator that allowed him to escape to kill Reese.  Bah.).

A couple of interesting points here.  First, why would a terminator be after Savannah?  Is this the first major clue that Weaver isn’t working for Skynet?  Or did Weaver actually send the terminator to kill “her daughter” – sacrificing her in the way she mentioned so many times in this episode.

It might be a combination of the two.  Weaver tells Ellison later in the episode that she believes Savannah’s survival (and Ellison’s for that matter) would depend on the survival of John Henry.

Now that could be the big clue.  We’ve been led to believe, since season one, that the Turk (and, thus, John Henry) was Skynet.  But last episode revealed that the real Skynet might be John Henry’s brother.  If that’s the case (and the Cain/Abel comparison is accurate), John Henry might be the one to finally defeat Skynet once and for all.  He might be a cyborg John Connor, if you will.

Now why would Weaver want to destroy Skynet?  For the benefit of humanity?  Maybe, but she hasn’t shown a great respect for human life.  But it doesn’t seem like she’s doing anything to pave for the coming of Skynet – in fact, quite the opposite.

So, here, the Connors learn about John Henry.  John Henry learns about the Connors.  The Connors learn about Ellison’s connection to Weaver and John Henry.  And Weaver learns about the Connors.

Or does she?  Weaver seemed surprised that Sarah Connor was alive, but was she faking it?  As a machine, she’d almost certainly have to know about John Connor, but she doesn’t seem all that interested in finding the boy.  Since all Skynet machines have the “kill John Connor” order hardwired into their programming, that’s another piece of evidence that Weaver is working on her own.

All of the John Henry/Weaver/Ellison stuff is pretty interesting to me, as John Henry fights to identify with both of them.  He obviously has a connection to Weaver, but he also has an admiration for Ellison.  I’m still wondering whether John Henry would fight to defend Ellison if it came down to him or Weaver. 

I almost think he’d die to save the man if that’s what had to happen.

Because it seems like John Henry has learned that human life is “sacred” – even if Weaver doesn’t seem to think so.  He definitely has an attachment to Savannah, working most of the episode to make sure she’s returned safely.

A side story in the episode dealt with the LAPD investigating the break-in at the Weaver estate.  The detective in charge is immediately suspicious of Ellison, openly discussing the possibility of his involvement with Weaver herself.

One thing leads to another, and by the end of the episode, Sarah is arrested outside of a movie theater.  Ellison had arranged the meeting to give Savannah back (as leverage for a meeting between Sarah and Weaver herself) – and Sarah was taken into custody immediately after Ellison took the girl back.

John immediately blames Ellison, threatening to kill the man before finally running off with Cameron.  The agent promises that he didn’t know about the police, and the terminator from earlier watches the arrest take place.

That whole scene seemed a bit funny to me, and I almost wonder whether or not Weaver had come in the guise of Ellison.  It seemed like an odd plan to send Ellison for the girl, promising to arrange another meeting later.  I may be looking into it too much, but something seemed off about it.

In either case, was Weaver behind the police’s tipoff?  Maybe she wanted to make sure that Sarah Connor was kept under control?  I’m not sure what other reason she’d want for John’s mother to be in police custody.

Of course, maybe they were after Ellison…the detective wanting to take the agent into custody?  But they didn’t seem terribly interested in taking him into custody as soon as he showed up on the scene.

Speaking of Sarah, what an ominous quote from Cameron about her condition.  Cameron, in talking to John, says that Sarah’s plan was to give him to Charley – and with that,  she tells him about the lump in her breast.

Cameron tells him that she assumed that it was cancer, and John seems to think that it was a reasonable assumption.  But then Cameron tells John that Sarah has lost weight – something that certainly implies that Sarah might actually be sick.  Ominous, indeed.

So at the end of the episode, John is left alone.  As an eerie connection to his future self, he’s simply left in the care of Cameron (seemingly his own companion in the future).  Derek is dead.  Charley is dead.  And his mother has been arrested and might be sick.

I guess everyone does die for him.

Where do they go from here?  John is obviously going to move to get  his mother out of jail, and Sarah is going to continue to want to talk to Weaver.  Next week might even be a rerun of Terminator 2…with the Connors breaking Sarah out of a high-security facility to go to a major corporation and fight a liquid-metal machine.

And if next week is the series finale, I’m going to desperately miss this show.  And if it is, I hope FOX allowed us to have a great finale.

But there’s hope!  In the preview, it specifically said “season finale” – and I think that’s reason to get, at least, a little excited.

Because they could’ve simply said “finale” – leaving both options open.  And, of course, they could’ve simply come out and said “series finale” if the show was definitely going to be cancelled.

I’m going to go ahead and be the optimist and think that they included “season” finale because the show is coming back.  Derek dead or not, I want this show to continue.

But I’m sure I’ll have a lot to say about that, season or season finale, next week.  I hope a lot of you joined me and watched the show live tonight.  Because if we want this show to continue, it’ll need as many fans as possible to tune in live.

See you then!

Quinn – Yes, It Should

I review this show here at Lower Decks, and so I’ve seen and analyzed every episode of this season. And this show is good. Not just in an “exciting” way – it is written well, acted well, and it has been planned well. There is inner continuity and emotion that you don’t find on “action” shows. Like I’ve said in my reviews and on the Observation Lounge, this isn’t “24 with Terminators” – it’s a lot closer to “LOST with Terminators.”

And, yes, it can be that good at times.

And while it wouldn’t be a surprise for FOX to cancel a good show, I think it deserves another season to grow. This is a show with a lot of potential, and I think it should get another chance. Heck, another great FOX show, Arrested Development, got three seasons. Sliders got three seasons. Let’s give Terminator three seasons. At least.

Yes, the ratings aren’t great. But this is a show that moved from Monday to Fridays without much fanfare, and Fridays are a death trap. I review the freaking show, and I don’t watch it live on Fridays. I don’t even get around to watching it until Sunday, and I’d consider myself a pretty solid fan.

And if I’m not watching it on it’s night, I can imagine that a lot of people aren’t either. But FOX knew what it was doing when it moved the show there – it knows that it was sending it to its death. And I hate it when networks send a show to get bad ratings, and then it cancels the show for getting those bad ratings.

But let’s see if the new movie, Terminator Salvation, stirs up a bit more interest in the show before we cancel it. The movie is getting a lot of hype, and it should be at least fairly successful. The show’s writers have already agreed to tie the show to the movie…so you’d have a connection right there. Wouldn’t FOX love the idea of leeching off the success of a summer blockbuster?

So I believe the show should be given a little more time to find some success. It has a hot young cast (Summer Glau and Lena Headley for men and Thomas Dekker and Brian Austin Greene for women), it has action and it has drama and it has heart. It is more than just a show about terminators – it is a show about family and survival. It is a hundred times the show we were all expecting, and I think we all need to give it another chance.

forst – No, It Shouldn’t

For better or for worse, when Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles premiered, most viewers were probably under the assumption that there would be fights and explosions and gunplay and lots and lots of Terminators running around trying to kill Sarah and John.  And there have been fights, there have been explosions, there has been gunplay and there have been a fair number of Terminators running around trying to kill Sarah and John.

After 30 episodes and only one left to air this season, it’s safe to say that Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles didn’t live up to those assumptions.  The show has been a character study more than a all action, all the time.  It has probed the depths of Sarah Connor’s mind, depicted her fears and motivations, shown how far she’ll go to protect her son and more.

Looking strictly at the numbers, I can’t help but notice that after drawing 18 million viewers for its premiere, the show has averaging just 3.5 million since it moved to Fridays. And yes, there’s been a slight uptick these past few weeks but that’s all it is, a slight uptick. It wasn’t doing all that well on Mondays during the first half of the season and it isn’t doing well at all now.

Talk of how Terminator Salvation will draw new viewers to the series is meaningless; the show goes off the air next week and the movie opens on May 21st.  Are those movie goers expected to wait around for four months until September, still excited, and tune in en masse for the Season Three premiere?  I don’t think so.  Like every television show, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles has its core fanbase.  Unfortunately, it isn’t a very big one.

What doomed the show was its connection to some very popular movies and mismanaged expectations.  Viewers thought they were getting one thing while the writers and producers were intent on providing another.  Does that mean it’s a bad show?  No.  But it had a chance to attract viewers and it couldn’t.  Renewing it for a third season won’t change that.

Now hit the comments to let us know what you think.

I’m sure in the middle of the “Is Sarah Crazy?” arc, viewers of this show were wondering where things were going.  Wondering if any of that stuff was going to matter, or if the show would ever get kicked back into gear.  To those people, I have a question for you.  Are you satisfied now?

I never really thought the show was rudderless.  In my opinion, it’s simply too well written for there to be several episodes of nothingness.  The show, like LOST in a way, throws things out there and almost everything comes back at one point or another.  It has exceptional continuity, and every move seems to have a payoff.

And, as was the case with poor Charley, most loose ends are eventually tied off.

I was really sad to see that Charley was dead.  I thought the scene between he and Sarah was great, and I think that he was one of the few connections that she has to her old life.  Remember that, to Sarah, her relationship with Charley wasn’t that long ago.  He might’ve moved on, but a part of Sarah didn’t.

And, considering his value in Sarah’s life, I found it odd that they’d kill him off.  It almost seems like the writers realize that the end might be near, and they’re closing out as many arcs as possible.  If the show’s over, they will have tied up as many loose ends as possible, but if the show continues, they’ll be able to move in a new direction.

I just can’t imagine that, if the show is supposed to go on for several more seasons, why they’d kill Charley off so soon into the story.  It’s just too bad if you ask me.

It does go to show you why Sarah is so paranoid to isolate herself.  So many people that she’s been around have died.  From Kyle Reese to Charley.  Enrique to Miles Dyson.  John’s foster parents to Andy Goode.  Even the T800.  Everyone seems to die in the effort to save John.

Not a good sign for Cameron and/or Derek.

Speaking of them, ”To the Lighthouse” ends on one of the biggest cliffhangers that you’ll see on the show.  John is missing, last seen in Charley’s now-missing boat.  Derek and Cameron were both kidnapped by people who know that Cameron is a terminator (although she saved them both).  And Sarah, herself a target, must find her lost son before he’s killed.

It’s funny/ironic that Sarah didn’t trust Cameron or Derek to know about the lighthouse, but if they’d been in on everything, I bet the situation would’ve ended differently.  Perhaps Charley would’ve survived, and almost surely, John would’ve been in capable hands.

And then there’s John Henry and his mysterious “brother” that is somehow connected to Miles Dyson.  ”He” seems to be masterminding everything, telling that one man how to disable Cameron’s chip and attacking John Henry itself.  In addition, John Henry explains that the AI is “in a significant percentage of the world’s computer systems.”

Sounds a whole lot like Skynet if you ask me.

And if it is Skynet, it’s another sign that the show is worried about its own fate.  Because it seems a bit early to be bringing on Terminator’s greatest villain, in any capacity, and I wonder how it came to be.

I almost thought the original problem with John Henry was going to be the idea of learning about “changing the rules” – most of John Henry’s lessons with Ellison and Weaver have been about staying within rules and laws.  I thought, just maybe, that the idea of going outside the rules had corrupted his programming.

But, the way things worked out, these two stories are getting closer to coming together.  John Henry is now cognizant of Sarah Connor, and they each seem to have a common enemy in this Brother character.  With only two more episodes left, things are certainly coming to a head.

I loved the banter between John and Sarah in the car.  Things have been so serious this year (and their relationship has weakened) that they haven’t had a lot of fun together.  In a lot of ways, you seem to forget that they’re mother and son.  And I thought it was refreshing to see them play together in the car, even for just a few seconds.

Cameron tells Derek about Jesse’s miscarried baby, and all signs seem to point to the fact that Derek did pull the trigger last week.  He seems somber when talking about her, and he’s kept her jacket.  It’s odd that they left us on a cliffhanger and then only subtly referenced it this week.  I wonder if we’ll get the scene in it’s entirety at some point?

Then there’s the lump in Sarah’s breast.  Sarah, in this series, seems to realize that she’s running on borrowed time, and she has to teach John everything he needs to know before her time runs out.  She seems genuinely happy to know that the lump insider her breast isn’t cancer, and it seems to rejuvenate her enough to take care of the attack on her.

And like I said, I thought the scene between Charley and her was extremely well done.  I don’t think Lena Headley gets the kind of credit that she deserves, and so I’ll do that right now.  Excellent acting.

The transmitter is interesting, though.  I wonder if the people that Winston is working for have been watching the Connors this whole time, and their exodus is what caused all of the attempted kidnappings?  It just seems like odd timing if you ask me.

The fact that it wasn’t cancer is good, though.  If they’d introduced Skynet and Sarah’s cancer in the same episode, it would seem like surrender in a lot of ways.  I’m glad they’ve saved some things for season three and beyond.

I really like the dynamic between Cameron and Derek – I don’t think there’s a whole lot of love between the two, but I think there’s a sort of mutual admiration.  Derek obviously doesn’t like the machines, but I think he realizes that she’s a valuable member of the team (as long as she’s functioning properly).

And I think Cameron has some kind of respect for Derek’s ability to take care of the Connors.  She realizes that she’s the superior fighter, but I think she respects his ability to stay alive.  She might even respect his ability to fight alongside her.

I also like that she rescued him.  Derek isn’t really a part of Cameron’s overall mission to protect John, but she knows that he has value to John as a person.  And even though she almost gets herself destroyed, she still risks it all to save him.  Its one of Cameron’s decisions that is based on the greater good than short-sighted strategy.

But Cameron’s final words of the episode seemed important – she claims she rescued Derek because he could’ve given up John’s location under torture.  Derek claims that he would never give in to torture, but Cameron says that he’s done it before.

Is she referring to something from Derek’s past?  We know that Derek has been captured by Skynet a couple of different times (possibly in different timelines) – did he break during one of them?  Perhaps giving up the location of John?

Like with most things on this show, I don’t think it was meaningless.

Then there was the shootout on the docks.  I had a feeling that all of Charley’s preparation (explosives on the dock and at the beach) would come into play at some point – but, again, I had no idea that it would happen so soon.

I thought it was pretty interesting that we never really saw the attackers.  There were obviously several people coming for John and Charley, but we didn’t really know the numbers.  Just like most things on this show, it was done in a subtle and artistic way.  Which is pretty much what separates this show from the Terminator movies.

So that’s it.  Things have certainly cranked up in the past couple of episodes, and things seem to be leading to a combination of the Connor/Weaver storylines.  I can’t wait to see how they sort themselves out, and I hope you can’t either.

John Connor is a lot of things in this episode.  Despite never being seen in the future scenes, he’s probably the most influential person in the story.  In the “present” scenes, he’s also orchestrating everything that happens, but we get to see several different sides to him.  But the final scene shows the most important part of him: he’s just a kid…in way over his head.

I love this show.  It’s an episode that features Jesse’s main motivations for her mission, but it features a lengthy scene of her swimming at a community pool.  It’s an episode that deals with death, Hell, and humanity’s darkness…and it ends with a little boy crying.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again.  This show just isn’t what you think it will be.

We finally know what happened on the last voyage of the Jimmy Carter (more on that at the end) – and I still wonder what Jesse’s motivations are.  Is she really there to save John Connor…or is she there to kill him?  At different times in the episode, I was sure it was one…and then the other.

But this is a woman who, in a matter of hours, completely changed her opinion on metal allies.  There’s obviously a good chance she’s not even sure what she’s doing.

I thought the scenes on the submarine were very well done, and I thought Jesse’s change in heart made sense.  Because living on a submarine in metal-infested waters would have to be scary to begin with.  If you’re living on one with a member of the enemy who could kill you at any moment?  That’s the kind of situation that can change your mind in a matter of seconds.

So what was her main motivation?  Is she mad at Connor for sending them on the mission in the first place?  Is she mad about his trust in the machines, hoping to change Young John’s opinion so that he won’t be as trusting in the future?  Or does she blame him for her lost child and the loss of other members of her crew?

The big deal in the episode, at least for me, is the package and the answer to the question.  “Will you join us?” is the kind of question that can really make you change your thinking about the Terminator universe.  And, in the end, that’s what this episode does the best.

Because John Connor asks the question, assuming that the machine can make a choice.  As if the T1000/1001 is a neutral force in the war that can choose to go against Skynet.  It makes you wonder if these machines weren’t built by Skynet, and it makes you wonder if there are other “neutral parties” in this war that we don’t know about.

Specifically, it makes you wonder what Weaver is up to.  The T1000 on hte sub chose against joining Connor’s resistance; is there a chance that Weaver said yes?  There have been indications over the course of the series that Weaver isn’t on Skynet’s side, but I also doubt that she’s on the human side.  I’m still willing to bet that she’s on her own side, but we should find out soon enough.

Then there’s future John Connor, who isn’t quite as beloved as we were led to believe.  This is something that I think is very important…because I don’t think humanity would simply unite as one…even at the threat of extinction.  People would still be people, and they’d still disagree and kill each other.

And no matter how great John Connor is, people will still disagree with him.  And let’s face it, the show has it right…Connor’s strategy of using machines would be extremely controversial.  Because, as crazy as that crewman seemed, he’s voicing a legitimate concern – how do the humans know that all the machines aren’t equipped with some kind of “sleeper agent” program.  Or, at the very least, some kind of self-destruct mechanism to destroy the resistance from the inside?

But here’s my question – what is John doing in the future?  It seems that he has cut himself off from human connections – giving orders directly to machines (Cameron and the submarine captain) and (seemingly) refusing to let humans in on the loop.

It makes you wonder if Connor is even alive in Jesse’s future – it would certainly explain why the machines seem to be in so much control.  Maybe they’re continuing the fight against Skynet…making the war metal vs. metal.  Hopefully we find out soon enough.

And I think John’s conversation with Derek was very important – he needs to know that he’s important.  But he also needs to know that he isn’t perfect, and he isn’t expected to be perfect.  I think that will go a long way to helping him live with the burden of being John Connor.

I also loved that John knew it all along, but he simply didn’t have the heart to tell Riley.  It shows that John is much more intelligent than we’re giving him credit for; he’s not a boy who will grow up to be a great man.  He’s a great young man already.

And I also like that he tells Jesse that he wouldn’t have killed Cameron…even if she killed Riley.  I’m not entirely sure that I believe it, but it has to be a kick to the gut to Jesse.

Speaking of Jesse…did Derek kill her?  I don’t think that he did, but I loved that scene.  The whole Andy Goode story is the kind of thing that I love about this show because actions on this show have consequences.  People do the hard thing because it needs to be done, but the pain from those decisions doesn’t go away.  Andy Goode changed everyone’s lives…in the present and the future…and I’m glad that he hasn’t been forgotten.

If this were the season finale, I would probably be more convinced that Jesse was dead.  But I think Derek listened to John Connor…realizing that our John is a lot closer to his John than he originally thought.

I think Jesse still has work to do on the show, but I wouldn’t be surprised (not for a second) if the show killed her off.

The rest of the episode dealt with Ellison, Weaver, and John Henry.  John Henry seems interested in painting model figures, but it seems like his main concern is the soul.  However, I found it odd that Ellison didn’t seem more interested in discussing the soul with the machine.  Because you’d think that teaching John Henry about the soul would go a long way to teaching him about the value of human life.  Because I believe that John Henry understands that the soul, if he believes in it, is what separates the machines from the humans.

Then, of course, there’s the discussion of Ellison’s letter of resignation.  Weaver likes Ellison, obviously, but she’s also prepared to get rid of him if she needs to.  And did I sense a bit of disappointment in John Henry’s voice?  Is there a chance that he’d side with the human over the machine if it were to come to that?

Because a lot of the Ellison/John Henry scenes seem to be John Henry trying to impress Ellison.  A lot of the John Henry/Weaver scenes seem to be about John Henry digging up dirt on Weaver.  So which side do you think he’d fall on?

That’s about it – another fantastic episode from this show and another step to the season finale.  I really, really hope this show gets renewed for another season because it’s quickly becoming one of my favorite shows on television.  The writing is clever and interesting, and there’s a whole lot of layers to it.  They found a way to make the Riley story interesting, and they’ve creatively darkened the show in a lot of ways.

And while I think the Ellison/Weaver/John Henry storyline is going a bit slow, I might just think that because I’m genuinely interested/anxious in seeing it develop.

So watch the show.  Buy it on iTunes.  Maybe even go buy the DVDs of the first season.  This is a show that needs to continue, and we all need to do our part.  I could probably do better by 1) watching it live or 2) getting a review out earlier – but this is hopefully my part.

And, yes, I know that the episode is also called “Last Voyage of the Jimmy Carter” elsewhere on the Internet – but my TV called it “Today is the Day”.  And since it’s my review, that’s what I’m calling it.  Sue me