xkcd

by **mosc** » Tue Mar 17, 2009 8:07 pm UTC

thatguy wrote:I liked it purely for Summer Glau in her undies. Otherwise, it got annoying about halfway through.

You're the reason we get those ridiculous adds before Terminator/Dollhouse.

by **thatguy** » Wed Mar 18, 2009 12:42 am UTC

Whaddya mean? I'd have watched the show regardless, that was just that episode's one redeeming factor.

by **Ati** » Sat Mar 21, 2009 3:26 am UTC

Whoa. Is it just me, or did John Connor suddenly grow a pair and become a badass? Well, not quite, but he was much more convincing as the savior of humanity than he's been before. I would have preferred that he'd killed Jesse, but you can't allways have what you want.

A note on the Cameron/Sarah interactions:

I think John didn't send Cameron back to get her away from him. When he pushed the 'send' button, the timeline he was in (any everyone in it) ceased to exist. Or, at least, that was one possibility. The only people who would have survived would be the people who were sent back. Future John wasn't trying to get rid of Cameron. He was saving her.

by **thatguy** » Sat Mar 21, 2009 5:53 pm UTC

Ati wrote:I think John didn't send Cameron back to get her away from him. When he pushed the 'send' button, the timeline he was in (any everyone in it) ceased to exist. Or, at least, that was one possibility. The only people who would have survived would be the people who were sent back. Future John wasn't trying to get rid of Cameron. He was saving her.

Hey, thats interesting. My pet theory is that Cameron has been sent back multiple times, getting more refined each time. TSCC picks up on one of the last times it'll happen.

by **Ati** » Sun Mar 22, 2009 12:06 am UTC

Also, was it just me, or were most of the "sub" sequences in this episode a homage to The Thing?

by **thatguy** » Sun Mar 22, 2009 1:09 am UTC

I dunno, never having seen the movie, but that whole sub-plot was definitely that type of story.

by **stolid** » Sun Mar 22, 2009 3:49 am UTC

I liked this episode (not completely, but much more than some of the previous ones). I think having the box (T-1000 or whatever) on the sub was a test. It was testing the people on the sub and clearly they failed (mistrust), which led to the answer.

by **thatguy** » Sun Mar 22, 2009 4:06 am UTC

I thought it was really interesting that the machine would consider switching sides.

I guess that does come with sentience, though. I mean, they're not all one brain a la The Matrix. It also help us understand why Cameron could override the termination order on John.

by **Ati** » Sun Mar 22, 2009 4:16 am UTC

thatguy wrote:I thought it was really interesting that the machine would consider switching sides.

I guess that does come with sentience, though. I mean, they're not all one brain a la The Matrix. It also help us understand why Cameron could override the termination order on John.

I seem to recall hearing that Skynet and the T-1000+ line were allways on uneasy terms, mainly because Skynet didn't have any practical way to defeat them. It's possible that by the time that scene rolled around, Skynet and the 1000 line were no longer on speaking terms, and the 1000's were off doing their own thing. John offered an alliance, and they turned it down. Which tends to imply that the the stone cold metal lady in the present timeline is not affiliated with Skynet, or the resistance, and is pursuing aims totally unrelated to the war.

Any thoughts on her motivations?

by **thatguy** » Sun Mar 22, 2009 4:30 am UTC

I honestly think she's trying to build a more "complete" SkyNet, one that still takes over everything, but is doesn't just go "KILL TEH HOOMANS!!!1!!!11!11!1one"

by **stolid** » Sun Mar 22, 2009 7:24 am UTC

Yeah. It has to count for something that she bothers keeping her "daughter" amused and cared for. She could've got rid of her in an "accident" or something.

by **Nath** » Sun Mar 22, 2009 11:12 am UTC

Ati wrote:Whoa. Is it just me, or did John Connor suddenly grow a pair and become a badass? Well, not quite, but he was much more convincing as the savior of humanity than he's been before. I would have preferred that he'd killed Jesse, but you can't allways have what you want.

I'm glad he didn't, given that he'd just made a speech about the value of human life. I'm surprised that Reese did kill her. It's a gutsy move to make one of the main characters of your show a murderer, especially when he's been portrayed as a good guy.

by **ArgonV** » Sun Mar 22, 2009 12:00 pm UTC

He already was a murderer to begin with. He killed Andy Goode in his first appearance. Besides, Jessie wasn't all ponies and flowers herself.

by **Princess Marzipan** » Sun Mar 22, 2009 12:28 pm UTC

John killed Sarkazian, Sarah killed the guy from the factory that kidnapped her, and as mentioned Derek killed Andy Goode before he was a known character.

But we don't know whether Derek changed his mind or missed. It's been left open. (Grr.)

by **Nath** » Sun Mar 22, 2009 1:14 pm UTC

Princess Marzipan wrote:John killed Sarkazian, Sarah killed the guy from the factory that kidnapped her, and as mentioned Derek killed Andy Goode before he was a known character.

The first was self-defence, IIRC. The second and third were more ethically dubious, but still understandable strategic targets, given the war and all. Jessie was a revenge killing of no strategic importance. True, she wasn't ponies and flowers, but her one known kill was also a strategic target.

by **Princess Marzipan** » Sun Mar 22, 2009 1:33 pm UTC

Sarah and John both made the conscious decision to KILL. John went totally fucking ripshit. And Sarah visibly debated pulling the trigger.

Reese's may have been a bit more calculated, though. I would call it less revenge and more making sure she can't fuck anything else up. She's flat out stated that she's not here to STOP the war. And her plans have killed an innocent and fucked with his nephew quite a bit. She's done shit they can't afford to have happen again. And that's assuming he DID kill her, because we don't know. Which REALLY pisses me off. Questions like that don't feel right in this series.

by **thatguy** » Sun Mar 22, 2009 8:47 pm UTC

Princess Marzipan wrote:... And that's assuming he DID kill her, because we don't know. Which REALLY pisses me off. Questions like that don't feel right in this series.

Second. There's already enough "what-if"s and "howthefu...?"s without showing if we're down a character or not.

by **mosc** » Mon Mar 23, 2009 9:01 pm UTC

Eh, dare I say this about the show that I love but it was almost lazy writing. The character had served her purpose so they killed her off. They wanted the door somewhat open because they had no compelling reason for killing her. It's just sad because that character had potential.

by **Emily St Aubert** » Tue Mar 24, 2009 10:08 am UTC

I honestly don't think she died. I can totally see Jessie coming back. Maybe even as Derek's timeline Jessie?

I thought this was a great episode. I wanted to be cross because I hadn't picked up any hints, if there were any, about John's suspicions of Riley, but at least he gave reasons we'd seen already. And I liked the thoughtfulness of the real-time sections compared to the cool submarine flash forward sequences. OK, it wasn't Das Boot, it could have been a bit more paranoid and claustrophobic, but I like the way the loyalties get murkier all the time.

by **Lirri** » Sat Mar 28, 2009 3:30 pm UTC

Has anyone seen this news? Found it on Hulu.

Spoiler:

by **stolid** » Sun Mar 29, 2009 5:50 am UTC

I hope that's not the case or that they'll revive the show later. I don't watch very many shows already, I'd hate to lose this one. It has a lot of potential.

by **mosc** » Mon Mar 30, 2009 3:08 pm UTC

Seems like standard season-over type stuff to me and overly presumptuous to say the show is canceled. Eh, maybe I'm just in denial.

by **Ati** » Sat Apr 04, 2009 5:56 pm UTC

What? DEREK!

by **Neuman** » Sat Apr 04, 2009 9:16 pm UTC

I know, they didn't even do the "tonight someone dies" advertising.

by **Ati** » Sat Apr 04, 2009 9:54 pm UTC

I'm of two minds. On the one hand, it was definitely interesting to see a show kill off a major character in a reasonably unique way. Fast, without fanfare, for no good reason. The way it usually happens in real life. On the other hand, I really liked the Derek character, and I feel he deserved a better end.

by **McLovin** » Sat Apr 04, 2009 11:35 pm UTC

Just watched last night's. And. -Twitch- Holy shit.

On one hand, I'll be upset if the series does end with this season. On the other--from last nights events, and the trailers of the finale? It looks like they could quite easily wrap it up nicely. This is the reason I like anime--finite storylines, with things not being run into the ground (with a few exceptions--I'm looking at you, DragonballZ and Naruto).

by **Princess Marzipan** » Sun Apr 05, 2009 2:17 am UTC

If next week truly ends the series, when I get the DVDs I think I'm going to scratch out all the episodes where they're blindly following leads about the three dots.

Take those away and every fucking episode this season is amazing.

by **Nath** » Mon Apr 06, 2009 12:02 am UTC

Ati wrote:I'm of two minds. On the one hand, it was definitely interesting to see a show kill off a major character in a reasonably unique way. Fast, without fanfare, for no good reason. The way it usually happens in real life. On the other hand, I really liked the Derek character, and I feel he deserved a better end.

Derek wasn't an unlikable character, but I didn't think he was particularly likable, either. He seemed one dimensional -- not in the sense that he was lazily written or unconvincing, but in the sense that the character himself wasn't all that interesting. He was almost all business, rarely did anything surprising, and always had the same facial expression; he might have been the most mechanical character on the show. What did he do in his downtime? He probably sat in a chair, staring straight ahead. This all fit with the character, but made him hard to identify with. Still, his death was well done, and I liked the way they tied it into his brother's. I was expecting him to die last week (when he got kidnapped), but this was better.

I won't mind if this show wraps up next week, as long as it wraps up most of the major loose ends. It's written like a novel; you're expected to keep track of several threads. Stories like this don't work well if they are too long. This'll be a good show to watch beginning-to-end on a DVD at some point.

by **Princess Marzipan** » Mon Apr 06, 2009 4:41 am UTC

I honestly think this is my favorite main character death of all time. No buildup or any of that usual tropey crap. (Unless it's already a separate and rarely used trope.) And the only lingering was a second long shot of blood around his head to confirm that yes, that thing you thought you saw happen did in fact just happen.

It fit in really well with John stating "Yeah, well everybody dies for me, right?" It appears that yes, *everybody* does.

I'm also plenty intrigued how John went from a girlfriend of sorts with a mother and uncle to only having Cameron by his side, in the space of three episodes.

EDIT: Looks like the trope is "anyone can die." But that still doesn't fit exactly right, since Charlie is an example of that, too, and you had to pretty much be blind to not call his death once you saw John on the boat.

Can anyone else remember such an unceremonious death like Reese's in other series? (use spoilers plz)

by **Nath** » Mon Apr 06, 2009 5:13 am UTC

Princess Marzipan wrote:Can anyone else remember such an unceremonious death like Reese's in other series? (use spoilers plz)

I can think of a couple in movies. I can also think of a couple of equally abrupt, but more ceremonious deaths/near-deaths in BSG (and equally abrupt, equally unceremonious supporting character deaths). I've heard that Whedon is fond of this as well, but (not having seen all his work) I've only seen one similar death there.

What I liked about this scene was that it reinforced the fact that terminators are, in fact, extremely dangerous. We've seen the main characters face a lot of terminators, and sometimes defeat them without breaking a sweat. In TV, you see people in dangerous situations, and go 'bah, they've gotten out of worse, no sweat'. Reese's death showed that it doesn't need to work that way.

That said, not all character deaths need to work this way. Having someone get unexpectedly shot is shocking, but that's only useful insofar as it builds tension for the next dangerous situation; you know it could happen again. The post-death ceremony I could do without, but build-up is usually good.

by **Brooklynxman** » Mon Apr 06, 2009 5:48 am UTC

I liked how they just had to kinda keep going for the rest of the episode. They couldn't stop and mourn even for a moment. They couldn't even see to it that he got a proper burial.

However this death isn't as good as 24 season 1 finale. Teri Bauer. Out of nowhere, you think its all over. They even visually suggest Nina left her alive. After the entire season Jack has spent protecting his family, in the last moment she dies, and it ends with him crying over her body.

Mother. Fucking. Intense.

by **Princess Marzipan** » Mon Apr 06, 2009 6:15 am UTC

Dude I was so fucking happy when she was dead. I couldn't stand her character.

by **ArgonV** » Mon Apr 06, 2009 9:38 am UTC

Princess Marzipan wrote:Can anyone else remember such an unceremonious death like Reese's in other series? (use spoilers plz)

Firefly comes to mind. In the movie Serenity

Spoiler:

Or Farscape: The Peacekeeper Wars:

Spoiler:

by **mosc** » Mon Apr 06, 2009 3:18 pm UTC

How can the end this show? Best thing on Television and this week proved it.

by **Brooklynxman** » Mon Apr 06, 2009 3:26 pm UTC

Princess Marzipan wrote:Dude I was so fucking happy when she was dead. I couldn't stand her character.

Nina or Teri?

by **Princess Marzipan** » Mon Apr 06, 2009 9:36 pm UTC

Well thanks for the spoiler; I've only seen season 1. =P

Teri.

by **stolid** » Tue Apr 07, 2009 2:54 am UTC

mosc wrote:How can the end this show? Best thing on Television and this week proved it.

Seriously, it wouldn't be terribly difficult for them to ramp up the action somewhere close to like these last 2. They really shouldn't have spent so much time on the 3 dots BS. And the show is really interesting since John Henry.

by **Neuman** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 1:53 am UTC

Found it. They Dropped a Bridge on Him. That's what it's called.

by **Princess Marzipan** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 4:03 am UTC

Neuman wrote:Found it. They Dropped a Bridge on Him. That's what it's called.

I don't think so...it didn't feel awkward or undeserved or anything. It just happened. And they dealt with it in a way such things usually aren't dealt with.

by **thatguy** » Thu Apr 09, 2009 1:21 am UTC

Yeah, I did not see that coming. That combined with the fact that they didn't mourn at all was perfect.

I'm interested to see how the Sarah/Weaver meeting plays out. Given how Weaver seemed a bit spooked at the Cyberdyne SkyNet showing up, I think she's rouge and working to build a counter-SkyNet, if you will, and as such will not kill Sarah.

Also, are Cameron's twitches gone? I didn't see any mention of them..

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