2-Part Season Finale Discussion

[Derek Reese]

Discuss the end of the first season here after it airs.

[Erika]

Hee hee hee! Alright so I had 2 clues dropped at me in the last week here that had me stewing on things. In my conference call w/ BAG and Josh they were discussing episode 10 and Josh said that "it was a wonderful episode (but a terrible season opener)" and BAG immediately said, "Yeah it was great."

BANG - I knew that Derek wouldn't bite the dust! *Inserts happy dance*

Then in the new Lena interview that was sent to me today Lena said someone was going to die tonight. Charley showed up at the end and I was like "CRAP! CHARLEY'S TOAST!"

Nope. Ellison's sorta partner croaked - that was sad

The final scene...they had shown that Jeep blowing up in one of the pre-season previews and I was like - "Oh here we go...FINALLY" Cameron goes KABOOM!

LOL! Damn, seriously? SERIOUSLY??? Ok there is NO way that Fox can even think of canceling the show now, there's just NO WAY. If they did, do you think anyone would even tune in to DOLLHOUSE next season? All of the Wheadon fans would just revolt against Fox.

;D Brilliant job guys BRAVO!

I'm glad that they paired Vick's Chip w/ What He Beheld - Vick's Chip was good but people would've seen it as a filler episode on it's own.

I do have to give my second bravo for the evening - gratuitous wet BAG shower scene! WAHOO! Now see THAT'S what we're talking about w/ getting the older 18-49 ladies attention to watch the show. Hee hee - sorry Brian, you're a sweet guy, didn't mean to objectify you


Alright things that were just awesome:


Sarah taking down the 2 guards w/o hesitating in the tunnels just ROCKED!

John really stepping up and becoming the brains and heart of the whole operation also just rocked.

Loved Cameron allowing John to take her chip out and telling him that it wasn't the first time that they'd done it. Summer's delivery was wonderful because for all that she's not human, there was a trace of something that resembled love in her reassuring him.

Also liked that saving Vick's Chip allowed them to get onto the path of Skynet.

Cromartie thanking the guy for accessing his records after he killed him was hysterical. Dillahunt just has this perfect split second too late to be considered socially acceptable to be human delivery down to a science.

Using the friend to cover for John was great. It was also really funny considering the guy looks NOTHING like John - totally different ethnicity and everything and yet Cromartie still had to wait for his processors to examine everything in detail to make sure it wasn't a match.

There were some really great, everyday, oddball stuff in these episodes that were wonderfully real and funny. Sarah's annoyance at Derek for using her toothbrush had me giggling. I loved Sarah being so proud of herself that she knew it was pizza day and it was, in fact, the wrong day. John just shaking his head and not correcting her was really sweet. I think more than anything it's little moments like that that really sell me on their relationship. Same as how fiercely Sarah hugged John after Derek killed the guy holding him hostage.

The best, most unexpected moment had to be John and Derek watching Kyle and Derek playing ball together and Derek's wonderful lines "Every time I look at you, I see him. Besides, your Mom is Kyle's type." Seriously? Seriously? How can anyone NOT just love Derek after that? I'm telling you, I'm so happy I never watched 90210 and that Josh and the gang hired Brian for this part - he's just bloody brilliant. He's so wonderfully understated and yet can bring out this scary intensity when it's needed.

In that park scene the look of wonder, longing, and disblief that Thomas pulled off - I'm now really ticked off that he didn't get nominated for a Saturn Award. That young man can pull out more emotions than anyone I've seen on tv or film in eons.

I guess we should finally get to Ellison - I love how his faith was just shattered even before deciding to go after Cromartie. His closing his eyes, accepting God and his faith that he was going to die was beautiful. Killing the non-confrontational FBI agent wasn't Cromartie's misson though and he let him be. Methinks after this Ellison is going to be owing Sarah one GIANT apology.I also think after Ellison got a whole squad of SWAT guys killed that he's going to be on the FBI's least wanted agent list. He might as well side w/ Sarah - his support in the office will be gone.

I have to say that the scene w/ body after body falling into the pool w/ Johnny Cash playing in the background had to be one of the coolest scenes that I've seen on TV in I don't know how long. It was so great because just when you think - it's got to be done now....nope 4 more bodies got thrown in.

The Man Comes Around - Johnny Cash

Opening Introduction (Spoken part)

And I heard as it were the noise of thunder
One of the four beasts saying come and see and I saw
And behold a white horse
Song
There's a man going around taking names and he decides
Who to free and who to blame every body won't be treated
Quite the same there will be a golden ladder reaching down
When the man comes around

The hairs on your arm will stand up at the terror in each
Sip and each sup will you partake of that last offered cup
Or disappear into the potter's ground
When the man comes around
CHOURS
Hear the trumpets hear the pipers one hundred million angels singing
Multitudes are marching to a big kettledrum
Voices calling and voices crying
Some are born and some are dying
Its alpha and omegas kingdom come
And the whirlwind is in the thorn trees
The virgins are all trimming their wicks
The whirlwind is in the thorn trees
It's hard for thee to kick against the pricks
Till Armageddon no shalam no shalom

Then the father hen will call his chicken's home
The wise man will bow down before the thorn and at his feet
They will cast the golden crowns
When the man comes around

Whoever is unjust let him be unjust still
Whoever is righteous let him be righteous still
Whoever is filthy let him be filthy still
Listen to the words long written down
When the man comes around
CHOURS
Hear the trumpets hear the pipers one hundred million angels singing
Multitudes are marching to a big kettledrum
Voices calling and voices crying
Some are born and some are dying
Its alpha and omegas kingdom come
And the whirlwind is in the thorn trees
The virgins are all trimming their wicks
The whirlwind is in the thorn trees
It's hard for thee to kick against the pricks
In measured hundred weight and penny pound
When the man comes around
Close (Spoken part)
And I heard a voice in the midst of the four beasts
And I looked and behold, a pale horse
And it's name it said on him was Death
And Hell followed with him.

Interesting thing to note - I have to credit this to my boss today when I told him about these lyrics having something to do w/ the finale - he pointed out that Michael Biehn said this line in TOMBSTONE:

Johnny Ringo: He was quoting the Bible, Revelations. "Behold the pale horse". The man who "sat on him was Death... and Hell followed with him".

How's that for things going round and round and round?

[dhfreak]

Okay I love this episode.

The network can't leave us like this. They can't just leave use after they blew up Cameron. I don't she is gone, it take a lot more to take a terminator down.

The first hour was just awesome. I really love the interaction between John and Cameron. (I know it's the weird ship side. Forgive me. ) But it was interesting how John was seeing Vick's chip and kept protecting Cameron.

The way he said, she is a robot and she will never have a soul. That one got me. It feel to me that he really wants her to be human. She is one of the only persons well things that could understands him.

Derek kicked ass in the second episode. He just freaking rocks. I love his birthday present to John. OMG.... seeing the little Kyle and Derek was just awesome.

I love the angst in this episode. OMG. I was in the edge of my seat.


Erika I am right there with you. I was also "CRAP. CHARLEY" LOL..

I love JOHNNY CASH. THE SONG WAS AWESOME.

I think that Ellison is going to be one of the main bad guys in the future. Man Cromartie would have let him live if he would have help John in the future.

THEY BETTER BRING BACK A SECOND SEASON.

I WILL NEVER SEE ANYTHING IN FOX AGAIN. ONLY IF IT HAS TO DO WITH JOSS WHEDON. I am interested in the DOLLHOUSE show. I can't wait how it turns out.

The Cast all did and awesome job in everything I love them. Summer and Brian kicked ass I so love Brian character Derek now, he is just so freaking awesome.... and Thomas was awesome I love the angst the he showed. He did it brilliantly...



PS. Erika you misspelled Whedon

[rossbondreturns]

Cromartie didn't Terminate Ellison because it wasn't his mission.

Simple.

Lovely 2 hours.

Fox are morons if they don't renew this.

[oneye]

I really hope there are more seasons coming.

Any petitions to sign?

I will have to get this on DVD when it comes out.

[rossbondreturns]

Whoa Oneye!

Give Fox time to process this information first.

My best guess is that yes Season 2 is forthcoming...as the Turk Said in a PM to me...I'd Love to see Fox cancel it now they'd have 8.5 million fans threatening to burn down FOX H.Q. (Any embellishments to TheTurks quote are mine...but it is at least 97 percent accurate).

[snarkycole]

Thought I'd add my two-cents about the episode:

Wow, that was a pretty darn good episode. And, personally, I thought it was a great cliffhanger....for a midseason break finale, not a season finale. Wish they could have gotten the back nine they would have gotten had they started in the fall and there hadn't been a writer's strike, and then we would have gotten a proper finale. That being said, I think it was still a pretty stolid episode, and I definitely hope it gets renewed for next season.

Lots of great moments in the two-parter. My shipper heart fluttered during the first episode of the night. Especially during that Cam/John scene where he puts her chip back into her head; the way he stroked her face, and then when his arm sandwiched her on the bed and quickly moved it away when she was rebooted.

Derek/Brian in a shower scene = HOT

Speaking of Derek, I loved that he knew John was Kyle's son and that he took John to see young Kyle in the park. I thought it was cute when Morris asked Cameron to the prom and how excited he was after she said yes.

I hated that scene where Derek had the little girl as a bargaining chip, but at least he had enough decency to cover her eyes when he shot the dude. The little girl was adorable by the way, and a pretty good actor for a little kid.

I have other thoughts/things I liked, but my brain's too tired to think of them.

If/When the show gets renewed for a second season, Summer Glau as Cameron better return because I don't know if I'd be as interested if she wasn't there.

Last thing: Are there any Veronica Mars fans here? I ask this because I swear in the scene where the FBI goes to confront Chromartie, the apartment complex they used is the same one that Veronica and her dad lived in. Anyone else notice that?

[ReeseDN38416]

admin said:

Interesting thing to note - I have to credit this to my boss today when I told him about these lyrics having something to do w/ the finale - he pointed out that Michael Biehn said this line in TOMBSTONE:

Johnny Ringo: He was quoting the Bible, Revelations. "Behold the pale horse". The man who "sat on him was Death... and Hell followed with him".

How's that for things going round and round and round?

That's so cool.

Well I'll just echo what's already been said.

PART ONE
It was just wonderful to open the episode with humor. Cromartie with the snow globe and the comment about never smoking weed was so were both so funny. Cromartie's quest for John Connor was classic Terminator. It was simply wonderful, very suspenseful.

I love the domestic scenes. I'm starting to see Sarah, John, Cameron and Derek as an odd little dysfunctional family. ;D

I enjoyed John Connor's active role throughout the finale. He got to use his wonderful computer skills.

Sidenote: I continue to discover John Connor's beauty. Those eyelashes, those eyes, that fringe. *dies* I'm so ashamed of myself. *giggle*

Seeing through Terminator 888's eyes and taking the chip out of Cameron's head to save the day are fascinating firsts for the show. Just wonderful.

The moment where John says: She’s a machine. She doesn’t have a soul and she never will. You don’t have to trust her you can trust me.

That look in his eyes, the firm tone of his voice. Oh I was in heaven.

The marriage between the Terminator and Barbara made an eerie parallel to the ample chemistry between John and Cameron during the first half of this episode. It was kinda sexy and kinda creepy at the same time.

...

Make that really creepy.

I was happy to see Cheri (John's chemistry partner) again. I hope to see more of her next season.

Derek and Sarah are a fun team. I just love all of the quiet character moments. This show is wonderful.

PART TWO
Did anyone else recognize 15 year old Derek? He was the kid that played Ryan on Smallville Seasons 1 and 2. I eat up all the flashbacks to the future. It was so sad to see Derek and Kyle witness the end of the world. They were so young.

That British guy... oh he was a slime ball. Interesting to have a human villain. The cat and mouse, the shifting of power... it was so exciting and very fun.

Again I love the quiet character moments, the moments of Cameron awkwardly trying to be human, all bonding with Derek.

John Connor sees Kyle Reese. I felt like it was a present for all the fans. THANK YOU! That may be my favorite moment of the series.

I have so many little highlights from both parts: Snow globe, smoking weed, roast burning, Derek vs. Cameron, John defending Cameron and having faith in her, foreshadowing future John, Cameron's doe eyed looks at John when she admits to lying "sometimes" but I refuse to ship John and Cameron, 7-11, Terminator POV, Cheri, Crowmartie searches for John in classic Terminator style, "Do I look fat?", The Automated Real Time Traffic Information Exchange, Sarah/Derek teamwork, the "touching her lips" moment between Cameron and John, John: "That's the understatement of the century," John: "She’s a machine. She doesn’t have a soul and she never will. You don’t have to trust her you can trust me." The suspense of Cameron's chip being out of her head when 1) Cromartie is still out there and 2) Derek REALLY wants to destroy it, the suggestion that a Terminator will kill John in the future, John reactivating Cameron. I think John might be a little bit in love with Cameron.

PART II Highlights: Seeing Ryan as a young teen, Derek joking about Sarah, future flashbacks, the suspense of whether Charley would die, beautiful and silent Latina, Sarah/Charley, guy in trunk, prom date, FBI falling into the pool and it's like poetry, John's reaction to getting a birthday cake, Cameron blows up.

I love this show!

[Big Brother]

Others have said much of what I wanted to say, so some random thoughts as usual...

1.) When the guy with the Armenian name showed up with an Australian accent, I knew it was too much to be true. That is simply too much ethnic badassitude for one man to handle. Still, at that point I was half expecting the big cliffhanger to be the question of how Our Heroes would deal with this formidable human enemy, or the possibility that this guy was a Terminator who'd been in the past so long he'd picked up an accent (or else his geography-challenged vox programmer had gotten confused when ordered to program a robot with the usual Austrian accent).

2.) Lesson for the week #1: criminal threats don't work on people who KNOW that the survival of the entire human race depends on their own survival and success.

3.) Lesson for the week #2: Never hold a hostage with your gun to his head in a FOX-TV Sci-Fi series starring Summer Glau which is in the last-aired episode of a tragically short first season. It never works.

4.) I now 'ship Morris/Cameron. Watching Cameron at the Prom will be hilarious.

5.) So...Terminators are "fully functional", as Data would say, after all? There goes my theory that the John/Cameron 'shippers would be thwarted by her being as anatomically incorrect as a Ken doll.

6.) What moron plugs a Terminator CPU into his laptop without first disconnecting it from the internet and any other communications devices? Heck, I'd burn the laptop afterwards in case Vick left a virus or copy of his personality matrix inside it.

7.) Anyone else notice that even Cameron's CPU chip is significantly skinnier than the usual for Terminators? Or is it simply that, like humans, female brains tend to be physically smaller yet still function faster and better than male ones?

8.) I now seriously suspect Scary Silent Latina Chica is a terminator, possibly the same base model as Cameron but with a different outward appearance. I suddenly have a hilarious mental image of her reporting the murder of Enrique's nephew and his henchthugs by speaking in the nephew's voice and saying "He killed me with a sword...how freaky is that?"

9.) The slow-mo SWAT-team pool party was Pure Art on a par with the bit in In The Beginning where Londo narrates the last half of the Earth-Minbari War in five minutes. But beautiful/funny rather than beautiful/tragic. I had a hilarious mental image of Cromartie chasing the last few SWAT guys on the motel balcony and grabbing them one by one and tossing them one-handed into the pool, going for the T-888 model record for most Railing Kills in a day.

10.) HOW did Cameron learn Armenian? Flip through an English-Armenian dictionary? Does she come pre-programmed with every known language (including Welsh)? Or did she plug herself into the internet and hack Berlitz's website?

11.) For a show that is supposedly ignoring T3, they sure give it a lot of shout-outs. Someday, one of these will kill you, indeed.

12.) At first I thought it odd that a woman would seriously get into a long-term sexual relationship with a terminator...but I guess she wouldn't be the first middle-aged career woman to get into an ill-advised and ultimately fatal relationship with a large, emotionally-unavailable man. Heck, at this point, that's MY only hope of ever getting laid. The middle-aged career woman with bad taste in men, I mean. Not the Terminator.

13.) So the question we are left with is...did Real!ArmenianCrook know enough about Cameron to put the right sort of charge under her car seat? Or is she merely going to have to unseal a couple of ziploc bags full of VickSkin to re-cover her buttocks after the fragmentation charge under her seat blows off her derriere?

[tzigone]

These episodes - well, they were okay. Not season finale quality, though, unfortunately. Vick's chip was especially boring in the beginning (at least for someone as uninterested in Terminator psychology as I am).

Did anyone else the impression of the devil on your shoulder with Derek whispering in Sarah's ear?

I didn't love the part where Derek said he knew about Kyle - I wanted him to find out, not have realized before. It was anticlimactic to me.

Also anti-climactic was Sarah realizing Derek killed Andy. I hoped for confrontation, for something great. Instead it was just put off until later.

Sarah and John totally need to be more honest with each other. He doesn't tell her about Cromartie or Derek knowing about Kyle and she doesn't tell him about Derek killing Andy. They really need more communication.

Okay - anyone think Cameron's dead - yeah, me neither. But explaining away the exploding car and not drawing attention could be fun.

High point of it all to me is definitely Charley realizing just what one of these things can do. Realizing what they are up against.

Unfortunately, other than that, I didn't find the eps particularly memorable.

Anyone work out the timeline? It's now February 2008 (presumably, since it's John's birthday). They jumped to 2007 (September, according to the roadwork sign). We know all the eps through "Demon Hand" happen in quick succession. So, where does all the time pass? Derek's healed in "Vick's Chip" it seems, but his toothbrush hasn't been opened yet, so does that happen right after Demon Hand and there's space before What He Beheld or is the space before Vick's Chip?

Oh, btw, where do we go to talk about promo stills that didn't show up in the episode?

Derek's phenomenally popular, it seems, but I don't like him (not as a good guy, anyway). I even dislike the warmer relationship with the Connors because I found the colder stuff interesting and because it makes me afraid they are going to white-wash his actions - say Andy told him to kill him or somehow make it justifiable or something. Which I would hate. As it stands, for me he's an example of what John shouldn't become - someone willing to murder innocents, someone who doesn't (to me) generally care about the lives of individual people. So contrary to what I see in John and loved in John in T2 and what I thought the moral lesson there was.

I'm not sure. I hope John doesn't keep it a secret from Sarah that Derek knows Kyle is Dad - I don't really see a logical reason for him to. Growing closer is a definite possibility. I definitely think it's intentional that John thinks Derek's better than he is. Believes he didn't know about the other soldier's surveillance. Doesn't know he killed Andy. Doesn't know about the almost shooting the guards. And I hope it culminates in John condemning his methods instead of accepting that "people are flawed" or, heaven forbid, embracing them.

John really stepping up and becoming the brains and heart of the whole operation also just rocked.

I agree. I like that. I liked that he was creative, too. Not the sort of idea I'd have thought of. And despite Cameron saying they'd done it before, it didn't seem to me like she told him the idea, but like he thought of it all on his own.

How can anyone NOT just love Derek after that?

Very easily. He murdered an innocent man and lied about it. Continues to lie about what he and his crew were up to. Showed a willingness to kill other innocent people who were no threat. I find him very easy not to love. Also, as I said earlier, I found it a very anti-climactic scene.

7.) Anyone else notice that even Cameron's CPU chip is significantly skinnier than the usual for Terminators?

I did notice that it was different. I actually expected John to comment on it.

11.) For a show that is supposedly ignoring T3, they sure give it a lot of shout-outs. Someday, one of these will kill you, indeed.

I noticed, and hope that means we might get Kate.

[Big Brother]

A few more thoughts on Vick's Chip now that the eps are up on Hulu so I can rewatch them easily...

1.) Mrs. Vick says she "knows it's been tough for you hanging around at home since your car accident". Is she talking about the damage he got in the fight at the safehouse, or did he, like a good Terminator, not look both ways before crossing the street?

2.) "Isn't Pizza Day tomorrow?" I half expected him to say that Mom must have left out Leap Day in her counting.

3.) What "weird robot symbols" kept coming up? And why were the visual records not in the Terminator-vision we've come to know and love?

4.) When they took the wallet from the body of the woman left in the woods, I half expected them to find it was Chandra Levy.

5.) When they called the Traffic Lights program "ARTIE", I immediately wondered aloud, "Chrome Artie?"

6.) In the event of a full-scale nuclear war such as Judgement Day has always been described, LA City Hall and any tunnels under it would likely be utterly destroyed, as LA is likely to be hit by literally dozens or even hundreds of nukes.

7.) A citywide traffic control center would be exactly the sort of place that would be manned 24/7, as traffic in a big city does not sleep. There should have been some sort of graveyard shift of technical staff there.

8.) At least when they uploaded the virus, they didn't use a Mac Powerbook capable of interfacing with anything, even alien motherships. But wouldn't a city traffic-control mainframe run on Linux or Unix or some proprietary system, not the sort of standard Wintel system you can upload standard virii to with a USB Jump Drive?

9.) Why do I get the feeling that no special-effects wizardry was needed to come up with footage of LA streets and highways choked by gridlocked traffic not moving at all?

[tzigone]

7.) A citywide traffic control center would be exactly the sort of place that would be manned 24/7, as traffic in a big city does not sleep. There should have been some sort of graveyard shift of technical staff there.

I completely noticed that. I was like "What - the place is totally empty?"

And apparently no one locked their computer so that you had to have a password before doing anything.


BTW, on the prom thing - does this mean Morris is a junior or senior? Only juniors and seniors had a prom at my school.

[t101]

Great episodes overall. Among my top favorites in the season (and I could never rank them). Everything has pretty much been said. So just a few things.

I loved all Cromartie scenes. They are great fun and the actor delivers perfectly.

Also liked Ellisons plot. IMO, he wasn't fully a believer until he confronted Cromartie. I though you could see it in his expression that he knew it was going to go bad, but at that point he wasn't ready to admit it.

John and Cameron. Whatever their ultimate relationship is going to be. They have the chemistry and the tension to make a lot of people 'squee'.

[rossbondreturns]

I've mentioned this about Vicks recordings..at Terminator Files

Not all things shown from the Terminators POV are always in Termovision.

And it is possible that thought it sees in Termovision the CPU records it without the Infrared coloration...in in Tru Vision as I like to call it.

[t101]

It's not like a machine would need a HUD display in any case. That was purely invented for the viewer.