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Post by allergygal on Jan 8, 2009 1:36:03 GMT -5
I wouldn't lose any sleep over it, JET_Fusion. I think the Kyle stuff is just what we already know from the ep14 promo — that Sarah interacts with Kyle. Thomas never says in this interview that John meets Kyle, the interviewer only inferred it (and I think, incorrectly).
One thing I do think Thomas implied pretty clearly is that Kyle is not physically there. he said Kyle is in the present "yes and no" and he also said no one time travels in the upcoming 9 episodes. Well, the only way for adult Kyle to physically be in 2008 is to time travel. If he doesn't, then he's what most people have already assumed — a dream or hallucinationg in Sarah's head. And that also means John doesn't meet him (unless Sarah dreams it).
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Post by vicheron on Jan 8, 2009 17:44:11 GMT -5
Or a more plausible explanation is that Kyle Reese has risen from the grave to command an army of zombies to fight the machine menace.
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cyadon
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A Random Sci-Fi Geek
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Post by cyadon on Jan 8, 2009 17:52:18 GMT -5
Or a more plausible explanation is that Kyle Reese has risen from the grave to command an army of zombies to fight the machine menace. Suddenly you have my attention. |
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Post by allergygal on Jan 8, 2009 17:52:41 GMT -5
Or a more plausible explanation is that Kyle Reese has risen from the grave to command an army of zombies to fight the machine menace. Kyle and Sarah fighting zombiepocalypse together would be... well... pretty freaking awesome  |
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schmacky
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Post by schmacky on Jan 8, 2009 18:30:25 GMT -5
Or a more plausible explanation is that Kyle Reese has risen from the grave to command an army of zombies to fight the machine menace. Kyle and Sarah fighting zombiepocalypse together would be... well... pretty freaking awesome I wonder if we would ever get a weird funny episode.. scifi dramas before SCC's time has done such things.. X-Files, Buffy.. it would be AWESOME if SCC did some weird off-the-wall episode. Maybe if we get a 3rd season? |
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Post by littleb on Jan 8, 2009 20:29:12 GMT -5
Kyle and Sarah fighting zombiepocalypse together would be... well... pretty freaking awesome Musical! A chorus line of Cromarties. We already know Summer can dance... Weaver could certainly hold a tune... opportunity not to be missed methinks... |
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Post by JET_Fusion on Jan 8, 2009 23:05:18 GMT -5
An episode where al of the characters are just sitting around; they just don't have anything to do and we get to watch the whole thing. Nothing on TV. No one wants to play a game with anyone else. They try to do some work, but they can't focus on it. They periodically watch the clock only to find seconds have gone by, not half-hours. Even Cameron gets into the act. She gives trite, un-interesting observations-or stuff she's learned from the late night trips to the library-until they all tell her to just keep quiet. Maybe there's a reason for staying in the house like it's raining or something. Perhaps a holiday where not much happens in public. Or maybe for some crazy reason had to go to a cabin and they're stuck or perhaps a day or two too early for some meeting. The twist is that we get to learn how their minds (or programming) works.
---JET_Fusion
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Post by bowman on Jan 9, 2009 19:12:00 GMT -5
Did anyone really think Riley as dead? Are we going to see a lot more cyborgs coming back or a lot more people—it seems like there's a revolving door on the time machine. Dekker: I think that the writers are tired of that. I think that initially, when we started the second season, kind of one of the requests of sort of the powers that be was that we did more singular episodes, less serialized. ... That's why they invented the wall with all the names on it so that we would be able to do a mission an episode. But that involved a lot of Terminators coming back, and to me that's always irritated our writers. And now they have permission to be more serialized again, and more science fiction, so that's happening less. Because that started to bug me. I was like, "Yeah, this time machine's busier than freaking JFK airport." ... This makes me very very very very happy.  Fox executives are to blame. Again. I bet they caused the credit crunch too. AWESOME! |
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Post by masterz1337 on Jan 9, 2009 21:02:57 GMT -5
I thought a girlie for John was always on the cards, the PTB just forced her into the show earlier than was planned. I've liked how Riley's turned out; that she's not a typical lurve interest and that she has a point and a mission. I pretty much liked her from the outset, she had me from "carrots and apples"  I like Riley, but I don't get any sense of chemistry, and I can't really buy her as a girl from the future. They dropped tons of hints through the episodes, but there have been things like the high school party which totally are not something I would expect anyone from the future to be able to be socially developed enough to act the way she does. I really liked the girl and the mystery from the high school in Season 1. Shame that storyline got plugged. As much as I hate teen dramas, it was fun to see John and Cameron in a normal environment and the ability to exploit Cameron's machine behavior. (The scene where she tells the other girl the dress makes her look fat in the bathroom for example.) |
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Post by richardstevenhack on Jan 19, 2009 22:31:31 GMT -5
That was the main reason I never believed Riley was from the future until the proved it - she simply reacted way too normally for somebody who grew up in tunnels eating garbage.
Oh, well. As I've said here before, consistency is not the writers' strong point.
I was really happy to read Tom say that he thought the time machine was LA airport - I always called it "Grand Central Station" - but I'm originally from the East. His comment that the writers were irritated by the demand from the Fox execs for more stand alone episodes pretty much validates the complaints the fans have made throughout the season. It also invalidates those fans who declared that it was all good - clearly the writers didn't agree.
I was also happy to read Tom saying that John reveals he's a lot smarter than they've shown him to be up to now. Tom's comment that John is "on top of it" is hopefully true.
And based on Josh's clip from the next episode, it's clear to me that the scene with Sarah and Kyle is some sort of dream - because they can't be passing notes back and forth in that box with her picture in it from T-1 if it's in the present. Because John has that picture now - he got it from Ellison when they assaulted him.
So unless Sarah somehow went to the future, it can't be the present or the past, it has to be a dream. The whole foggy atmosphere also pretty clearly indicates a dream. Kyle also seems sort of remote and distant, like a dream character frequently is.
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cyadon
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Post by cyadon on Jan 21, 2009 15:07:26 GMT -5
That was the main reason I never believed Riley was from the future until the proved it - she simply reacted way too normally for somebody who grew up in tunnels eating garbage. Actually, they hinted at it with things like the 'apples and carrots' comments followed by her curious 'They don't say that?' comment. A lot of the initial speculation on her being from the future centered around things like that and were ultimately proven correct. I have a real problem with this second sentence. Fans have the right to dislike/like an episode as they see fit. No one needs to have their opinions or their tastes validated by the writers, showrunner, or anyone else. If someone likes every single episode of Season 2, then good for them, I'm glad they enjoyed their experiences. Basically saying they're wrong for liking it is not something you're going to see a lot of agreement with from anyone. People, audience and writers/producers alike, will like and dislike specific episodes of a show for their own, personal, biased reasons. If the writers say that they felt like the serialized episodes were their weakest and that having to produce so many irritated them, I can understand that. And I'm sure they did their best to still make those episodes as good as possible. I know they did, because I've spoken to plenty of members of this board that still enjoyed such episodes such as Automatic for the People, Alpine Fields, and Self Made Man. In saying that, it shows that there is at least some value even in those episodes not universally loved and that value will speak to other people in different ways, making them enjoy that episode more or less, depending. In the end, you can't validate an opinion. Nor invalidate it. It's just an opinion. |
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Post by jaquio on Jan 21, 2009 15:20:06 GMT -5
in regards to the 'standalone' eps, i think they couldve worked them into the serialized plot so that everybody wins. for example the mission in automatic for the people should have been spread out over a few eps to highlight the importance of serrano point (it comes up again, and who wouldnt want to see another bar scene with sara/cam/derek?). the main problem is doing one mission per episode. introducing and killing a terminator in a single ep trivializes them. of the several theyve killed this season, several of them didnt even have names. they sorta did the same with carter, but at least they took the time to name him and show his importance to the show as a whole (stockpiling coltan, a bar of which cameron squirreled away for a rainy judgement day). also, they way they squeezed all the plot into one ep and didnt show the lasting effects of that episode didnt help. it made it seem like everybody woke up the next day with no memory of the day prior. john and cam not talking about the aftermath of allison from palmdale was the one that got the biggest WTF from me
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Post by richardstevenhack on Jan 21, 2009 23:58:07 GMT -5
My point in saying what I did is that the writers agreed with those fans who didn't like the stand-alone episodes because they interfered with the development of the overall story arc - not that the fans didn't like the episodes themselves per se. I think most fans did like the stories on their own merits.
I personally enjoyed ALL the episodes with the sole exceptions of the introduction of Dr. Sherman (I thought all the scenes in his office with the Connors were slow and uninteresting and unimportant - but the fight scene with Cameron was cool) and "Alpine Fields" which I thought was badly directed and inconsistent with some of the characters previous attitudes, although in most other respects it was well done (Brian was great in it.)
In other words, it validates the fan's negative opinions of the overall concept of stand-alones because the writers didn't like them either. Which by definition invalidates those fans who wanted more stand-alones (if there were any such fans.)
And it also invalidates the Fox execs who wanted more standalones. I think it's clear most of the fans didn't like them, and it had no apparent effect on the number of viewers (although I'm not sure how you'd measure that.)
The jury seems to be in and they've decided not to do many more stand alones.
Don't get hung up on the word "validate", it just means that one set of fans came out on the losing end.
As for working them in better, that is one reason the "Heavy Metal" episode worked for me, even though a number of other people didn't like it. The Connors started out trying to take the fight to Cromartie and suddenly discovered Terminator Carter instead. That was a decent setup. It adhered to one of the two main action components of the franchise: protect John Connor and stop Skynet . In this case, it was protecting John Connor by taking out Cromartie when he was vulnerable. The fact that it didn't turn out that way is irrelevant. By using that concept to set up a stand alone, it made the stand alone plausible. It also introduced the notion of Terminators doing something other than just hunting John and killing humans, which is obviously important for the rest of the series.
In season two, almost every episode was a standalone except "Mr. Ferguson Is Ill Today" and perhaps "Brothers of Nablus". However, in many of the episodes some effort was made to move the overall story arc along.
"Samson and Delilah" was important because it massively moved along the characterization of John Connor and of course was directly about the issue of protecting John Connor because his protector went rogue.
"The Mousetrap" was good because it adhered to the same action concept of protecting John Connor using Cromartie's elaborate scheme.
"Automatic for the People" was pretty much a pure standalone. It was reasonably well done.
"Allison From Palmdale" was a standalone that was important because it revealed background information. If you're going to do a standalone, that's one good justification.
"Goodbye to All That" was a standalone. Its strength again came from Brian's acting and to some degree from more character development of Sarah. It was reasonably well done.
"The Tower" episode was one of the less interesting standalones. While the Cameron fight was cool, it was a very slow episode. And the fact that it introduces Dr. Sherman, who is then killed off shortly thereafter with no Connor followup, basically emphasizes its lack of coherence.
"Brothers of Nablus", another standalone with little to recommend it as far as moving the overall plot along except for Cromartie's closing in on the Connors and Cameron's execution scene. But it wasn't badly done.
"Mr. Ferguson is Ill Today" was not a standalone. It moved the plot along by getting rid of Cromartie, setting the stage for John Henry, all of which fits under both the categories of protecting John and stopping Skynet (except in this case, the end result advances rather than stops Skynet). It also did some character development with many of the characters. Probably the best episode of the season.
"Complications" was another standalone focusing on Derek and Jesse. While well done, it didn't move things along much, other than Ellison retrieving Cromartie's body. However, it the setup about the "greys" proves to be followed up on in other episodes to come, it will be stronger than it seems. We don't know what Fischer's efforts were meant to achieve.
"Strange Things" was another standalone, Again, well done - but only did a little to move along the "stop Skynet" track. The problem again is that it actually moves along the lack of a coherent Connor strategy to stop Skynet. At least it moved along the subplot of Jesse which is related to the protect John track.
Sarah's "three dots" obsession could be considered adhering to the "stop Skynet" track, but the problem is she and the Connor team have been ignoring more significant issues that might be far more fruitful in stopping Skynet. So the excuse doesn't wash.
This illustrates the biggest complaint I had with the standalones, which is that in ignoring the two main tracks, they damaged the characterization of the main characters by basically letting them ignore everything going on around them in favor of dealing with events that are irrelevant to the two main concerns of protecting John and stopping Skynet.
In other words, the standalones diverted the attention of the Connor team so much that it began to make them look incompetent. This irritated a number of fans.
"Self-Made Man" was another standalone. The only reason it worked at all was because it developed some Cameron characterization and because of the focus on Cameron and Summer Glau's acting (and the acting of the actor she played against.). It did almost zero to move along the overall plot, depending on what the end goal was for Terminator Stark. Again, if this is followed up on later, it might make the episode more important.
"Alpine Fields" was another standalone. Although Brian's acting was excellent, the entire show did nothing to move the overall plot along, and in fact slowed the pace of the previous episodes. At least the fact that Sarah was pursuing the Fields because there was a possibility that one of them might be instrumental in creating Skynet (and we still don't know what the father's illegal deals with the computer company were actually all about), it at least had some plausible claim to being part of the :"stop Skynet" concept. Except it turned out not to be about that at all.
And finally "Earthlings Welcomed Here" is another standalone. It was well acted and strong, and moved the Jesse/Riley subplot along significantly. But again it had nothing to do with either protecting John Connor (except to the degree that the Jesse subplot is actually about that) or stopping Skynet. OTOH, Sarah's chasing after the three dots seemed to end up actually discovering something significant, which might or might not have to do with stopping Skynet. Final judgment on that episode has to wait for the back nine.
All in all, the season was comprised of mostly very good shows. But constrained to try to produce more standalone episodes forced the writers to slow the overall pace, slow the development of the overall story arc, and unfortunately damage the "hero' aspect of the main characters. If they had tried to fit the standalones into the overall arc better, the shows would not have been standalones - a basic dichotomy.
Contrast with "Fringe". Virtually all of those shows are standalones. But in pretty much every episode, something happens to move the overall concept along and it's woven pretty well into the episode. So most episodes don't feel like standalones.
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