Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles began its season tonight with an extension of its first season finale. The action picks up literally the second the finale left off, and the entire episode takes place on the same day as the finale. It was a nice action-packed way to begin the second season, and it was also a good place for viewers new to Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles to pick up the story.
Previously on Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles – Cameron is blown to bits thanks to a car bomb from Sarkissian. Cromartie massacres twenty or so agents, though suspiciously leaves Agent Ellison alive.
We begin the season with a close-up of Cameron, post-explosion. She is not conscious. The car explodes, and John and Sarah rush to see what happens in slow-motion. One of Sarkissian’s men meets Sarah at the door, cold-cocks her. John runs, tries to get out the back door, but is met by Sarkissian himself. They are held at gun point. Meanwhile, Cameron awakens, yanks some shrapnel out of her head, and makes her way, limping into the Connor house.
Sarah is being beaten while John watches. Sark’s henchman finds a computer chip thing under Sarah’s bed, but is taken out by Cameron. A lighter is dropped, kerosene spilled, and Cameron makes her way to the living room as the house starts to light on fire. Cameron reaches Sarah and John, and finds that John has already killed Sarkissian. Cameron’s computer tells her to terminate John – she points her gun, but a blast from the fire takes her out. John and Sarah escape from the window.
The aftermath of Cromartie’s massacre is ugly. Agent Ellison identifies the body of Cromartie – but it’s the human vessel. Ellison and Charley know the truth, but Ellison knows he can’t tell the FBI about what happened.
Sarah, worried about John, runs into another car on the road while driving. They flee the scene – John has an injured leg. Meanwhile, a battered Cameron roams the streets.
Charley goes to the Connor house, sees the destruction. He figures out that Sarah and John escaped. Derek, pretending to be an EMT, is also investigating the area. He has reacquired the computer hard drive. Charley, told about the Turk thanks to Derek, hears an incident report that might lead them to Sarah and John.
Catherin Weaver (Shirley Manson), CEO of ZeiraCorp, purchases the Turk from one Mr. Walsh. He’ll get it to her within the hour.
Cameron finds some baby wipes at the store and cleans herself up. Oh, and she uses a nail gun. She watches as Charley and Derek chase Sarah and John’s trail. Sarah and John walk the streets – Sarah thinks they need to find a safe place.
Sarah and John decide to hide out in a Latino cathedral. A priest asks what Sarah and John need, Sarah simply asks for sanctuary, a place to hide. The priest obliges.
Derek and Charley discuss Charley’s future. He just wants to make sure John and Sarah are OK. Derek is dubious – he thinks Charley may have ulterior motives.
Cameron follows the trail of blood left by John and Sarah.
Weaver finishes off the deal, tells Walsh that the money will be deposited into his account within the half hour. Manson goes on a long monologue about how humans are unpredictable, but computers are not. About how rare it is to find a disobedient computer.
John, in the cathedral basement, says he’s all right, but he’s clearly rattled. He’s terse towards his mother – he doesn’t want to talk about it. Sarah says Cameron has flipped a switch. John is upset – he knows that Cameron knows everything – they have to kill her. John is visibly upset about this prospect.
Agent Ellison gets debriefed. Ellison filled out an incident report. He says he had no idea Lazlo was capable of such things. He can’t answer any of the questions regarding practical issues of the massacre. He is given six months paid leave, non-negotiable.
Cameron finds the sanctuary. She follows the blood inside. She tells the priest that she’s looking for her family, her mother and brother. The priest says no one is there. Cameron says she’s going to look around and she does. Sarah and John have booby-trapped the holy water – they get Cameron to electrocute herself and get two minutes to take her brain thing out. They can;’t get it out in time and start running. They steal a car from an innocent man. Cameron, still limping, tries to follow. Sarah and John end up driving down into an underground tunnel. Cameron is waiting for them when they exit the tunnel, and she sideswipes their oncoming car, flipping it over in a dramatic manner.
John, after the crash, wakes up in the overturned vehicle. Sarah struggles to wake up. She tells John to run, she can’t. John runs away as Cameron limps towards the vehicle. Cameron tells Sarah to call to John. She won’t, so Cameron steps on her wound. Cameron leaves to chase John. John escapes to an abandoned warehouse. He hides, Cameron searches. He gets in a large truck, finds a screwdriver and hotwires the car as Cameron keeps looking. He finally gets the truck to start, but he doesn’t need to go anywhere. Sarah bursts into a warehouse with a truck on her own she crushes Cameron between her and John’s truck. Cameron is stuck, and John shimmies his way up the hood of his truck with a screwdriver to “kill” her. Cameron starts saying that “she’s good now” that she ran a test and she’s OK now. She says that she loves John, and he can’t do this. John, struggling, finally takes her “brain” out and Cameron shuts down.
Charley and Derek find Sarah and John. They tend to their wounds. Sarah doesn’t know who Sarkissian sold the Turk to. Derek and John talk about Cameron. He wants to bring her back. He needs her – he says that she is different. Derek, clearly, doesn’t much agree. Sarah tells John she’s proud of what he did today. She tells John that he can try and fix Cameron. John cold-heartedly says that they should burn Cameron and get the hell out.
Sarah tells John that what Cameron said in her “dying” moments was a trick, that they don’t have feelings, that they don’t know love. John isn’t ready to agree with that. They take her somewhere random and ready to burn her. John reluctantly gives up the brain chip. John asks for the flare so he can ignite it. John, in the heat of the moment, thrusts the chip back into Cameron’s brain. She awakens, and Cameron says that she is not there to kill John. John gives her a gun. We see inside Cameron’s brain – she gets the order to terminate, but that order is somehow overridden.
Agent Ellison waits for Cromartie outside his house. He tells Cromartie that he’ll never lead him to Sarah Connor. Cromartie says “we’ll see.”
Weaver says that she’s creating a new division, a new team. The name of the new group is called “Babylon.” She says it will change the world.
Cameron asks Sarah if she believes in the resurrection, if she believes in Jesus Christ. She tells Sarah to never let John bring Cameron back if she ever goes bad again. Sarah tells John that everything that happened today needed to happen, and they’re alive, which is the important thing. John looks at himself in the mirror, hair freshly cut, broken and beaten.
Weaver’s upset employee is in the bathroom, complaining about the new division. He saddles up to the urinal, and from it emerges Shirley – she’s a T-1000! She promptly kills him.
-Oscar Dahl, BuddyTV Senior Writer
(Image Courtesy of FOX)
Senior Writer, BuddyTV
