William David Lee, ESQ.

I was finally able to just sit down and blow through the first season this past weekend. I went in with a lot of reservations and was surprised at just how much I really enjoyed it. The hotness of Lena Headey and Summer Glau definitely helped. There aren't too many nits I have to pick. Though there are a lot of headaches involved once you sit down and really start to think about the science and the time travel.

SPOILERS AHEAD.



Pilot - The series picks up in 1999 with Sarah settled down and dating Ryan O'Reilly from Oz. She freaks after he proposes and takes off. She and John wind up in a podunk hick town in New Mexico, far away from any technology. A Terminator (Cromartie) tracks John down at the high school, but he's saved by a Cameron ("Come with me, if you want to live."). They wind up in LA where Cameron breaks into a bank vault. Apparently, an engineer was sent back to the 60's to build the vault and put a FRIGGIN' TIME MACHINE INSIDE IT! They shoot ahead to 2007 (circumventing Terminator 3) in the hopes of stopping Skynet.



Gnothi Seauton - Sarah and John are still getting used to the leap forward (time-lag). Sarah learns about 9/11 and that she would have died in 2005 of cancer. She meets up with Enrique from the second film for forged IDs, but he sends her to his nephew who charges $20,000. Cameron leads them to a cell of resistance fighters also attempting to prevent the creation of Skynet. Three of the four have been killed by a Terminator (T-888) which escapes. They grab a hidden stash of money, diamonds, and weapons in a safe and buy the papers. Sarah learns Enrique is an FBI informant and he is shot dead by Cameron.

The Turk - Using info from Miles Dyson's widow, Sarah is pointed in the direction of Andy Goode, a former intern at Cyberdyne. Andy dropped out of MIT and works at a cell phone store. In his spare time, he's built The Turk, a sophisticated AI system designed to play chess. Sarah hems and haws about killing him and in the end just burns his house down. John and Cameron enroll in high school where they witness another girl tormented by graffiti. She ultimately jumps off a roof, an act Cameron prevented John from stopping. Cromartie's head was pulled through the time jump, reactivates its body, and sets about reassembling and repairing itself.



Heavy Metal - While trying to track down Cromartie, Cameron and the Connors discover another Terminator using hired mercenaries to steal a shipment of coltan, a metal instrumental in building Terminator endoskeletons. The Terminator (Carter) is actually stockpiling the coltan in a bunker as most of the metal is destroyed during the nuclear holocaust. They manage to steal the shipment while sealing Carter inside the bunker. Cameron drives the truck off a cliff, but secretly keeps a bar for herself. Cromartie gets plastic surgery to resemble an out-of-work actor named Lazlo. He kills the plastic surgeon, then Lazlo and assumes his place.

Queen's Gambit - Cromartie is now posing as FBI Agent Kester and continues to hunt down the Connors. Sarah meets with Andy again who has rebuilt the Turk and entered it into a tournament against other chess programs with assistance from his Russian partner, Dmitri. The winner receives a military contract. The Turk loses in the finals and Sarah finds Andy shot in the head. She chases the killer who is promptly arrested by LAPD. Sarah visits him in lockdown and learns he's not only the missing resistance fighter, but is Derek Reese, the older brother of Kyle. As the only family they have, the Connors vow to break him out just as the T-888 tracks him down as well. Cameron deactivates the T-888, but not before Derek takes a bullet through the abdomen. Desperate to save his uncle, John grabs Charley save his life.



Dungeons & Dragons - As Derek struggles for his life, we watch flashbacks (flash fowards?) of Derek's struggles in the future. The Reese brothers and their unit are attacked by Hunter-Seekers. Kyle is separated from his unit while Derek and the others are captured by Terminators. They are chained down in a house and one-by-one brought down to the basement for some sort of torture. It's never clear what exactly is happening. One of prisoners reveals himself to be Andy and that he has inadvertantly caused the near-destruction of mankind. One day, the robots are gone and an axe is left in the room for the humans to free themselves. They discover Terminators have attacked their base and killed most of the people. At this point, we're caught up with the continuity of the first film. Kyle has disappeared on a top secret mission for John while the resistance have reprogrammed several Terminators for their own use. Derek tries to shoot Cameron at first sight until another officer stops him. Later, he watches her dispose of a reprogrammed Terminator on a rampage. Sometimes, they just "go bad." There is deep animosity on his part towards Cameron throughout the rest of the series.

The Demon Hand - Sarah and John watch over Derek as he heals. Both he and Charley are uneasy in the presence of their pet Terminator. Cameron is dispatched to track down Dmitri via his sister, a ballet instructor. Dmitri owes a lot of money to Russian gangsters and Cameron says she can help. The sister takes Cameron to meet Dmitri in a hotel room under the assumption that she'll give them the diamonds in exchange for the whereabouts of the Turk. Dmitri sabotaged the Turk so it would lose and sold it to a man named Sarkissian. Cameron simply leaves just as two gunmen rush into the apartment. She continues to walk away unfazed as the gangsters kill Dmitri and his sister. Agent Ellison (who has been tracking Sarah for years) discovers the hand of the T-888. He finds Dr. Silberman living in a remote cabin far away from society and asks him about Sarah. Silberman drugs Ellison and stabs him in the leg to make sure he isn't a Terminator. He and his fellow staff members from the hospital have all drifted away from society, refusing to talk about the events from T2. Silberman sets fire to his cabin with Ellison inside. Sarah (who has also been looking for the hand) arrives in time to save the FBI man.



Vick's Chip - Derek alerts the Connors that Cameron has not disposed of the T-888's CPU. John hacks into the chip, but must be careful not to bring it fully online. They learn that the T-888 was going by the name of Vick and was actually married to a woman named Barbara Chamberlain. Barbara was designing a traffic control program which would go on to become an instrumental component of Skynet. The Terminator was tasked with protecting her and ensuring the program would be completed. Once it was finished and brought online, Vick snapped her neck. John hooks Cameron's CPU into a traffic system to shut it down. Derek warns John that he will be killed by a Terminator, but John insists it won't be Cameron.



What He Beheld - The episode opens with a young Derek and Kyle playing catch just as Skynet launches the missiles to begin Judgment Day. As a birthday present, Derek (who has figured out John is Kyle's son) takes him to the park where they watch an even younger Derek and Kyle playing catch. John's eyes well up with tears as this is the first time he has ever met his father (though he's only a child). The bulk of the season finale follows our heroes search for Sarkissian. Unbeknownst to them, he is looking for them as well, killing several of Enrique's nephew's men. He blackmails them for $2 million in exchange for not turning them into the FBI. He also has one of his men following John and Cameron on a field trip. Cameron kills the man and stuffs him into a trunk.

The Connors find Sarkissian at an internet bar. John sees a little girl in one of the backrooms who is waiting for her father to finish work. He locks her inside for her safety, but gets taken hostage by Sarkissian. Derek grabs the girl and holds a gun to her head. Sarkissian says she isn't his, but Derek puts a bullet in the mobster's head. Agent Ellison leads a well-armed SWAT team to Lazlo's apartment. Cromartie massacres everyone with great ease, but spares Ellison. Hacking through Sarkissian's hard drive, they learn the man Derek killed was a decoy. Cameron starts up their car, notices the real Sarkissian walking away, starts the ignition, and the damn thing explodes.



Final Thoughts: I'll start with the bad. I thought the stuff with Cromartie piecing himself back together again was really cool. However, it leaves a couple plot holes to plug up. I'm not sure how the head made it through the time warp when it's been established that non-organic material can't make the jump. I guess you can assume the head was wrapped in synethetic flesh which decomposed or burned off. Second, it's silly to think that a headless robotic skeleton is just dumped in a junkpile for a decade.

The time jump and the fact the Connors have to play catch up could have been played up more. One episode, John is amazed at the influx of technology in 2007, next episode he's back to being master hacker. I know it wouldn't take him long to figure it all out, but I would have liked to see the in-between steps. Also, I don't know if enrolling immediately into school when you're 10 years behind the times is such a good idea.

There are a lot of loose ends still dangling. Chalk that up to the writer's strike as it truncated the first season to just 9 episodes. Ah, well.



I think the acting has been pretty good and the ensemble cast have gelled together quite well. I think there are some slight inconsistencies with the characters. Cameron seemed like the typical high schooler when we first meet her in the pilot, afterwards she's robot girl unable to comprehend the fleshy meatbags around her. I think Sarah is too mellow. She's not nearly as hardcore as was established in the second film. I could buy into her calming down a bit after it seemed she had stopped Judgment Day. However, being surrounded by Terminators, traveling through time, knowing Skynet could still happen, I'd think she'd go bonkers again. Anyways, I'm totally digging the River Tam Terminator. It seems Cameron has some type of mission that the others don't know about. Whether or not it was given to her by Future John or Skynet, I don't know. She also smashes stuff good. It also appears she's more advanced in terms of learning and adapting to human emotional states.

I'm always happy to see actors from Oz pop up on other shows (Lost, Dexter). Sadly, Sarah Connor Chronicles only has an Oz factor of 1 with Dean Winters (Ryan O'Reilly) playing Sarah's EMT ex-boyfriend. However, they make up for it with the addition of Dani Sofer from The Shield. Then, dammit, they kill her off in the last episode. I did a spit take when I saw Brian Austin Green's name in the credits. Then, I nearly threw a conniption fit when I see the dude from 90210 is supposed to be a badass soldier from the future. But, you know what? He's not too bad. Garrett Dillahunt is now 'that actor I see in everything.' I'm not complaining, he makes a good Terminator. I also liked him in The Assassination of Jesse James and No Country for Old Men.

I really liked seeing past characters from T2 show up even if they didn't get the same actors to reprise the roles. Senator Robert Kelly is no Earl Boen. At one point, Det. Vukovich from the first film was supposed to return for the sequel as an invalid. I'd love to see that picked up again and have him show up in a future episode.

My first concern with the concept of doing a Terminator series were that they'd resort to doing villain (or Terminator) of the week episodes. They manage to bring in other Terminators without doing it the lame-ass way so many other action series do. I love the idea that other Terminators and resistance fighters were sent back. And it really does make sense, why would the humans only send one guy back in time? The second was with John going to high school. I really really did not want to see Afterschool Special crap involving drugs, child abuse, and teaching the Terminator valuable, heart-warming life lessons. It almost looks like they're going that way with the suicide angle, but with the season cut short, I don't know where the writers are going with it.

All in all, this has been a fun show. As a big Terminator fan, I was ready to break out the pitchforks and torches when they first announced the series, but I've been pleasantly surprised. Some fans will still complain, but if you don't like the show, just ignore it. It's existence won't ruin or negate your love of the films. I'm looking forward to the second season and hope Fox doesn't screw this show up the way they did with Firefly. And I absolutely would love to see more of Sarah on her Bruce Wayne journey in between the first and second films. It'd be cool if they built up more of the franchise's mythology by dedicating whole episodes to seeing Sarah and John in their training. Maybe even some Lone Wolf & Cub-type action showing Sarah kicking ass while carrying a baby John.

He-Man played a big part in my youth as a child of the 80's. It wasn't one of my favorite shows though, always playing a distant third to G.I. Joe and Transformers. I never saw The New Adventures of He-Man, but I'm sure many fans had terrible flashbacks to that series when word got out of a remake of their beloved Masters of the Universe. However, Mattel and the animators blew away those same fans by giving them a remake that was actually good and, arguably, better than the original. It's too bad things got bungled so badly.

Mattel was looking to revamp some of their classic toylines and hired superstar sculptors The Four Horsemen to redesign the He-Man toys for the 21st century. At the same time, they hired Mike Young Productions to produce the show which debuted in 2002 on Cartoon Network. Neither the toys or the show managed to win over new fans. The animated series failed to light up the ratings, while the toyline met with success from diehard fans and collectors, but not the kids. I concede these were certainly major factors in the death of the new Masters of the Universe, I lay a lot of blame at the feet of Mattel. The action figures were fantastic, but Mattel decided to ship them out with ridiculous case ratios. You'd get 6 or 7 He-Mans and Skeletors in each box, but only 1 Teela or Orko. Fans wanted the secondary characters, instead they found shelves packed with the He-Mans and Skeletors they already bought. As the line continued, Mattel continued this practice as the line continued. He-Man and Skeletor collected dust and retailers don't recognize that certain characters aren't selling. They just see it as the entire line not selling, thus ordering less and less, making the already hard to find figures even harder. I never did find Zodak, Fisto, or any of the Snake-Men. The Horsemen were able to resurrect the line in part with NECA as statuettes, which they dubbed "Staction" figures.



The look of the new series definitely had a lot more 'oomph' to it. Perhaps, the biggest change was the disappearance of the dreaded stock footage. Filmation, which produced the original show, was infamous for being cheap bastards. They reused many of the same animated sequences over and over to lower costs while increasing productivity. He-Man was originally intended to be much more like Billy Batson and Captain Marvel. He was supposed to be a young boy who transforms into an older, muscular hero. However, Filmation thought it would be less expensive if He-Man and Prince Adam looked exactly the same (except the tan). That oversight is corrected for the remake.



The 2002 version also expanded the history of Eternia and gave origins to He-Man, Skeletor, and other characters as well as delving more deeply into the relationship between the Sorceress and Teela. There was a much richer mythology and I'd like to think it could've come close to Gargoyles-level if time permitted. Like most animated shows these days, Masters had a definite anime flavor to it. It's not nearly as heavy and annoying as G.I. Joe: Sigma 6 or any of the recent Transformers series. The fight scenes are pretty over-the-top with speed lines, endless posing & twirling of weapons, and characters leaping high into the air.

The episodes break down like this:

-Disc 1-

"In the Beginning, Parts 1-3" - The show opens with Randor leading the royal guards against a coup by his half-brother Keldor and his evil forces. During the battle, Keldor throws a vial of acid at Randor which is deflected back into his face. Severely wounded, Keldor calls for a retreat. Eternia's Council of Elders imprison the villains on the dark side of Eternia and transfer their power within Castle Greyskull. Decades pass and Keldor (now Skeletor) breaks through the mystic wall and captures Randor, now King of Eternia. Prince Adam, who's as much a puss as Luke Skywalker was, finally mans up and channels the power of Greyskull to become He-Man.



"The Courage of Adam" - Skeletor captures Prince Adam in an attempt to lure He-Man into a trap. Of course, only Orko and Man-at-Arms know Adam and He-Man are one and the same. By the way, He-Man is just as insanely strong as he was in the previous series, routinely tossing around mountains. It's silly, but does add a touch of poignancy to the fact that Adam can't do crap.

"Sky War" - Skeletor instigates a war between the Avionians (Stratos and his bird-people) and the Andreenids (Buzz-Off and the bee-people).

"The Deep End" - Man-At-Arms is swallowed whole by one of Mer-Man's monstrous fish creatures.



-Disc 2-

"Lessons" - After screwing up again, Orko gets advice from a mysterious old man in Castle Greyskull, while Evil-Lyn attempts to steal the Ram Stone for Skeletor.

"Siren's Song" - Evil-Lyn casts a spell on Ram Man to turn him against the other Masters.

"The Ties That Bind" - Injured in battle, Teela gets a blood transfusion from the Sorceress and inadvertantly gains telepathic powers. She also begins asking questions about her birth parents.

"Dragon's Brood" - Beast Man raises an army of dragons to attack Castle Greyskull.

"Turnabout" - In the goofiest episode of the series, Man-At-Arms invents a belt that electrocutes Skeletor whenever he has an evil thought. Skeletor trying to be a nice guy is hilarious.

"Mekaneck's Lament" - Mekaneck is down in the dumps when he realizes how lame his power is.

"Night of the Shadowbeasts" - Ram Man must overcome his fear of the dark when Beast Man unleashes night creatures known as Shadowbeasts.



-Disc 3-
Most of the bonus features are housed on the third disc. There are video commentary tracks, a highlight reel of the show, animatics, and production art. There are also audio commentary tracks for some of the other episodes as well.

The show is also presented in anamorphic widescreen along with the ending morals. You know about how Skeletor zapping people into another dimension with a magical diamond teaches you a lesson about taking shortcuts in life.

Final Thoughts: This show pretty much rocked and it sucks it didn't last very long. The rest of the first season continues the Masters war against Skeletor and his Evil Warriors. The second season introduces Kiss Hiss and the Snake-Men. If the show hadn't been cancelled the plan was for season two to end Empire Strikes Back-style with Skeletor defeating the Snakes and conquering Eternia with the creation of Faker. The third season would have featured Hordak and the possible (and long-awaited) introduction of She-Ra.

The next volume containing the second half of the first season will come out in May. If you're interested in picking this up, I'd recommend Best Buy as they have an exclusive slipcase that will house each DVD set. It also fits in with the other packages for the original show and She-Ra.