Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles – Season 1
Reviewer: Jordan Brown
Issue 106 August 2008
(1 votes, average: 4 out of 10)
click on the stars to submit your rating
Loading …
Come with me if you want to live…
The Lowdown: Having stopped the events of Judgement Day, Sarah and John Connor are living an almost nomadic existence on the run from the government. Their cover is blown when they once again find themselves targets of a terminator assassination. Luckily, help arrives in the form of advanced female terminator named Cameron.
Review: In 2003, Terminator 3 split audiences. Here was a film that had some superb action sequences, tremendous special effects and was in parts quite funny. Sadly, while these ingredients tend to go together to make an enjoyable movie, it’s hardly what we’d come to expect from a Terminator flick.
After the serious tone of the first two movies, gags like Arnie putting on Timmy Mallett-style shades and the Terminatrix’s inflating tits were just a step too far for many fans. A once great franchise now reduced to action-comedy silliness, it was enough to have some viewers seething. If you count yourself among that group, then The Sarah Connor Chronicles could be exactly what you’ve been waiting for over the past five years.
Shoving the events of Rise Of The Machines under the rug, the show picks up where Judgment Day left off. The Connors have been on the run since slamming the breaks on Skynet’s plans for world domination and have been moving from town to town ever since. Government agents are hunting them down with regards to the “murder” of Miles Dyson, while there’s that ever-lurking danger that a maniacal cyborg is going to show up again to try and relieve them of their lives. So yes, things are pretty tense. Of course, it doesn’t help matters much when the inevitable happens and a terminator does show up.
So is it a decent enough alternative? Well it’s nothing astounding but it is pretty good. Even with a darker and more sombre tone than ROTM, The Sarah Connor Chronicles still lacks the magic that made the first two Terminator films so timeless – namely James Cameron’s flair for gung-ho action and Linda Hamilton in the title role. Instead we get a slow-paced yarn with a lead (Lena Headey) who isn’t tough enough to lace up Hamilton’s vacant boots.
Other than that, there’s not a lot to moan about. Sure the Governator is notably absent, but with Summer Glau stepping in as the obligatory good breed of robot, you’ll soon forget about the Austrian Oak. As sexy cyborg Cameron, Glau is easily the show’s biggest draw. Beautiful, sweet and every bit as deadly as her renegade ass-kicker River Tam from Serenity, the lethal Cameron will be the reason you’ll keep watching the show.
Elsewhere, Owain Yeoman provides a good dollop of menace as terminator Cromartie, while Thomas Dekker does a bang up job as John Connor. In terms of action, when the series does kick it into gear, the result is a kinetic, adrenaline-pumping spectacle that’ll appease any fan of the franchise. There’s just not enough of it to keep you really hooked. Unfortunately, it’s not as if the extras will have the disc flying off shelves either, seeing as the only bonus loot is a handful of ‘terminated scenes’. Still, it’s early days and while it’s a heavily flawed release, the first season of The Sarah Connor Chronicles is an okay start to a potentially stunning series.
FILM: 7
EXTRAS: 3
DVD Info:
Certificate: 15
Release Date: August 11th
Starring: Lena Headey, Thomas Dekker, Summer Glau, Brian Austin Green, Richard T. Jones, Owain Yeoman
Directed By: Various, 2008
Distributor: Fox
Audio: Dolby Digital 5.1
Visuals: 16:9 Anamorphic Widescreen
Running Time: 400 mins
Price: £29.99
Special Features:
Episode Selection
Terminated Scenes
September 17th, 2008 at 11:17 pm
Always found spin-offs to be a cop-out from the original. But this show has taught me otherwise, the action and the story line expands from what the movies could do. And introducing a female terminator on the side of the good guys was a smart move, and not just because of how she looks. Downside to the series on dvd is the lack of decent features.