Terminator-214 "The Good Wound" - Discuss/Grade <SPOILERS>

[Reverend]

Well, given that Sarah and Kyle had so little time together in T1, I would expect her delusion-infused memories would be comprised mainly of the words they said to each other over the course of the movie.

That was supposed to be like 17 years ago, though, right? Can you remember exact phrases someone said to you 17 years ago? To this level? Word for word and every phrase? I'd find it more believable if she had forgotten his face seeing as she only knew him for a couple of days, but I'm probably expecting too much in terms of being realistic. It would be much more impressive to me if she did forget.

For a normal memory, sure. But those few days were an extremely intense and traumatic experience, so it's not unlikely that the details of it have been seared into her memory. Plus in the intervening years she's probably gone over and over every moment in her mind, recording those tapes for John, telling John herself and later in the institution. I'm sure that after all that she couldn't forget any of it if she tried.

As for the vision of Kyle, I really liked how they mimicked the costume from the first film, down to the stolen sneekers! Plus of course the idea of a Kyle vision is taken from a deleted scene from T2, which is a nice touch.
The more I watch this show, the more I appreciate just how much the writers are retaining from the films, with nary a liberty taken.

 

[mirandafave]

I missed all the november episodes...somehow Kromartie is John Henry (and likes bionicles) and there's an asian woman with the good guys.

Actually, beyond that I don't think I missed much.

Trip dies on every show he appears.

You've missed roughly eight episodes (and 2.5 is going to focus heavily on them).

Here are the basics (starting with Mister Ferguson is Ill Today).

- Cromartie was destroyed by the Connors at a church in Mexico with the assistance of James Ellison. After the Connors buried him Ellison snuck back over the border and recovered the body.

- Ellison delivered Cromartie's deactivated body to Catherine Weaver in the following episode. John is revealed to be suicidal in the same episode, but he claims to have forgot to check to see if the 9mm was loaded. Sarah entered into counseling along with John because John wouldn't talk to her anymore. John also grew closer to Riley.

- Derek was revealed to have been tortured by a man named Charles Fischer in the future, but has no memory of it. Jesse Flores - a woman he had a relationship with - is the woman who came back. She is an Australian member of the Resistance with a plan of her own (unrevealed). They realized there are alternate timelines intersecting with that of the show.

- Sarah and Cameron pursued the Three Dots from Sarah's dreams trying to tie them with Cyberdyne/Skynet. They went to Dakara systems but this was a red herring.

- Ellison was introduced to John Henry by Catherine Weaver. John Henry killed the psychiatrist who was working on his development. Ellison took on this task.

- Riley was revealed to be from the future. She is working with Jesse on trying to keep John and Cameron apart.

- Cameron was described as having an interest in military history. She averted a Skynet plot to assassinate the Governor of California.

- The Connors rescued another family that Skynet wanted dead. The mother was pregnant with a girl would would mean the survival of the human race because she was immune to a Skynet bioweapon. The mother was killed during delivery and her daughter took the baby and fled.

- We learned Derek was suicidal in the future after learning about Kyle's being MIA. We also learned how he met Jesse.

- John nearly killed a high school classmate while at a party because he tried to hurt Riley.

- Sarah's quest for the three dots took her to a UFO convention where she met a woman who was a man who was pretending to be a woman. She learned that the man/woman was working on a secret project.

- Riley attempted suicide.

- Sarah was shot after infiltrating the base. She killed the man who shot her and crawled out of the building. While she was laying there she watched a Skynet Hunter Killer fly overhead.

Did we not discover via Cameron in the library that the three dots are star points used by the Terminators to determine what 'time' they are in and so the dots might be the time of J Day or some rather important event? Maybe I read too much into that!

 

[nx1701g]

^ The meaning of the three dots is still yet to be revealed.

Interpretations of the dots:

- Dakara Systems Logo
- The three brightest stars in the Northern Hemisphere
- The engine assembly of an Hunter Killer Aerial Attack ship

 

[mirandafave]

Well I thought that it was revealed but in a subtle way. Otherwise that episode did not impart too much other than we all should till be around by New Year's to see in 2010 if the Terminator was awaiting to kill forget his name.

I suppose it would be less fun to have that mystery resolved so soon but Cameron definitely did look up at the three stars to determine the time and it looked awfully like the three dots. I just imagined it meant when those stars aligned in a certain way we'd know it's J Day or some date equally important.

 

[nx1701g]

Here are the possible interpretations so far (interestingly the stars aren't listed):

- Sarah's blood pattern from when she attacked the Dakara's was three dots
- Tumors Sarah may have from melanoma
- The Skynet Drone
- T-888 Neural Net CPU Housings (they have three located on the skull)
- Pawnshops formerly used a similar logo universally
- They could be meaningless
- Cyberdyne subsidiary CRS in Terminator 3 had three dots in their logo.

 

[Ryan8bit]

Well, given that Sarah and Kyle had so little time together in T1, I would expect her delusion-infused memories would be comprised mainly of the words they said to each other over the course of the movie.

That was supposed to be like 17 years ago, though, right? Can you remember exact phrases someone said to you 17 years ago? To this level? Word for word and every phrase? I'd find it more believable if she had forgotten his face seeing as she only knew him for a couple of days, but I'm probably expecting too much in terms of being realistic. It would be much more impressive to me if she did forget.

For a normal memory, sure. But those few days were an extremely intense and traumatic experience, so it's not unlikely that the details of it have been seared into her memory. Plus in the intervening years she's probably gone over and over every moment in her mind, recording those tapes for John, telling John herself and later in the institution. I'm sure that after all that she couldn't forget any of it if she tried.

The tapes are a good idea, but nevertheless, even after insane events have happened to me in my life, I cannot remember exact dialogue of how those events went down. It's usually fragmented and more memory emphasis is on sights and smells. There was one point where I did journal my life, but I still couldn't be bothered to write down tedious amounts of dialogue of the important things, but just a synopsis. Additionally, adrenaline usually sufficiently clouds matters.

The more I watch this show, the more I appreciate just how much the writers are retaining from the films, with nary a liberty taken.

There's been several liberties taken throughout the course of the show. They'll take a liberty with something like Sarah signing over her motherhood on the day they escape, but retain what Kyle wears and have him spew lines from T1? It's fanboy appeal, plain and simple.

 

[Tim]

Cromartie playing with action figures kicked ass.

I particularly liked how he explains them to Weaver and she slowly looks them over with a vague "WTF" look on her face.

Did we not discover via Cameron in the library that the three dots are star points used by the Terminators to determine what 'time' they are in and so the dots might be the time of J Day or some rather important event? Maybe I read too much into that!

I hadn't noticed that. Great observation!

 

[Aragorn]

This was a good episode, except that the Kyle Reese looks so young I just couldn't get comfortable with it.

Jonathan Jackson is only two years younger than when Michael Biehn played the part. I wish he were in Salvation instead of Anton.

 

[LutherSloan]

I think the 3 dots are going to have something to do with her cancer. Especially since it has been established on the show that she dies in less than 5 years or so of cancer. I don't see how that's going to be preventable, unless she gets access to future medical technology (which may not be enough either).

 

[mirandafave]

Did we not discover via Cameron in the library that the three dots are star points used by the Terminators to determine what 'time' they are in and so the dots might be the time of J Day or some rather important event? Maybe I read too much into that!

I hadn't noticed that. Great observation!

Thanks I thought so too! However, it might just be me who sees it that way but I swear when I saw theat seen it was like a revelation and I hopped up out of the couch looking to share this insight with somebody. Sadly, no one was listening. Thank god for the internet! Or maybe not considering T3,

- Cyberdyne subsidiary CRS in Terminator 3 had three dots in their logo.

Didn't know that. Though probably your other theory nx1701g that they're meaningless - aggh

 

[nx1701g]

^

 

[nx1701g]

Terminator Blog

Good news: Terminator kept the same averages of the core demos as previous timeslot holder Are You Smarter than a Fifth Grader and saw double digit increases in male viewership.

How to get a Season Three:

- Watch it live
- DVR and watch within Three days
- Watch online at Fox.Com (HULU NO LONGER COUNTS)
- Buy at Amazon or iTunes
- Introduce the show to like minded fans (Battlestar - several members of the BSG writing staff have expressed an interest in joining the writers of TSCC - Firefly).

 

[chardman]

Earlier in the year, Shirley Manson's character entered a scene after having been disguised in the form of a men's room urinal. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OE6EFotzBoY

In the latest episode, they sort of hinted at the same thing, by showing us a long lingering shot of a urinal... a freshly used urinal at that... complete with foreboding music... immediately prior to Shirley's appearance at the warehouse, as if the two things, (the urinal and Manson's t-1001) were again somehow related.

I'm seriously starting to think that at least one of the powers that be behind this show has some sort of bizarre sexualized fetish about urinals and/or women as urinals. (Yuck!)

I haven't followed the show all that religiously, and yet I've already spotted two examples of the same general imagery, and there may well be other examples in eps I've missed.

What gives? Anyone else notice this?

 

[nx1701g]

^ The producers admitted that was intentional. We were meant to assume that Weaver was going to emerge from the urinals (why it was flushed actually) and start killing. That was why the music and imagery were much the same. It was supposed to lead us into a false sense of security when the boss also left the restroom to rejoin his staff that nothing was going to happen.

Then we see the T-1001 walk by and people just start falling dead after her attack. It was supposed to confuse us and make us believe that everything was safe when it really wasn't. It was mainly shock value.

Also, there was a study recently posted on Yahoo that listed places that people fear the most. Public restrooms were number one.

 

[Guy Gardener]

I thought it was "Hey! Look how predictable we are! We're going to do this again, and only you are smart enough to figure it out! You're a smart bunny! Wait for it, wait for it and all your massive ability to out guess our predictable storytelling will pay off and you can call us idiots... PSYCH!"

 

[Ryan8bit]

^ The producers admitted that was intentional. We were meant to assume that Weaver was going to emerge from the urinals (why it was flushed actually) and start killing. That was why the music and imagery were much the same. It was supposed to lead us into a false sense of security when the boss also left the restroom to rejoin his staff that nothing was going to happen.

This was my favorite part of the episode actually. It was the one part about it that wasn't really cliche and seemed original.

Stentz has said that the explanation for the three dots was originally written into Earthlings Welcome Here, but was cut out. He said it will appear soon, and that it's not just some bizarre coincidence or mystical happening.

I'm curious, nx, where did you hear about a reference to Project Angel in that upcoming episode? Or was that just inference?

 

[Wouter2]

Here is what Stentz posted, verbatim:
"There was originally a scene in "Earthlings Welcome Here" that showed very clearly where the three dot obsession sprang from in Sarah's subconscious, but it didn't play onscreen the way we wanted it to. But by the end of the season, it should be pretty clear that the three dots didn't spring out of nowhere or represent some psychic intuition, but were much more a case of Sarah's subconscious telling her that a symbol was something important that she should be going after-- much how her subconscious used the image and memory of Kyle to reorganize her brain into thinking clearly and strategically even while in pain and under duress. "

I thought the restroom scene was really well done, and that Weaver's nonchalant "walk-by killing" was quite cool.

 

[nx1701g]

I'm curious, nx, where did you hear about a reference to Project Angel in that upcoming episode? Or was that just inference?

I had read it on Terminator Wiki under the episode connections for season two.

 

[Tim]

Very glad to hear that the ratings are up. I hope it's more than a blip due to the show coming back from a long hiatus.

- Watch online at Fox.Com (HULU NO LONGER COUNTS)

That stinks. I'm not keen to install Fox's player.

 

[nx1701g]

^ I think Fox's player is made by adobe and comes with the upgrades of Adobe Acrobat.