Bad show? Not hardly. It was a great show and it was getting even better by the end of the second season.
I Haven’t seen it all (I’m on episode 10 of the 2nd season right now) but you can use spoiler tags
DEATH TO AMERICA
It has been a long time since I’ve seen it, so my memories are a bit hazy.
I disliked the show overall because it never seemed they had a plan. Many episodes just seemed to throw stuff out there without caring if it fit.
It seemed that some of the time travelers came from different futures. Mutually incompatibles futures.
Shirley Manson’s character, especially. Her behavior makes sense if she comes from a future where the machines and humans coexist peacefully. She’s working to make sure THAT future is the one that comes about. If the show ever clarified this, I missed it.
If anyone is interested, the series is on crackle, which is a free app. You have to watch commercials to see it though, but its free.
One big writing problem was making the Terminators dangerous and still vulnerable to Sarah’s tactics and weapons.
Terminators were almost invincible in the movies. It took an epic fight to defeat one.
They were watered down a lot on the series. Otherwise Sarah and company wouldn’t have survived past the pilot. 
…how is that “obnoxious?”
And why is “not being willing to kill” a weakness?
One of the strongest moments in the series (and my personal favourite): and the moment that made me see exactly why John Connor was such a great leader, was when he decided to let Jesse go. That wasn’t a character flaw. And if you saw that as a flaw in Sarah’s character then that would go doubly so for John Connor. So why are you calling out Sarah’s character? Is John Connor a “pretender” as well?
Now hold on a second.
So why is this a problem with Sarah’s character, when the other characters behave in exactly the same way? Is it not more problematic for you that Derek Reese, First Lieutenant with the 132nd S.O.C, veteran of many battles with Terminators in an open and unforgiving war for their lives, shows that he “knows nothing about military tactics” and is “unwilling to learn?” Why would you hold Sarah’s character to a higher standard than an actual military officer?
I think you are missing a lot of the context of the story. Its pretty fucking hard to keep a low profile when you use explosives, thermite, acid or anti-materiel rifles. In America its easy to get yourself a 22 revolver. But explosives?
Ya mean that scene where Arnie shoots Arnie with an ineffectual shotgun, then tried to wack him over the head with a pole? In that particular scene they had a huge advantage: they knew exactly when and where the Terminator was going to turn up so they had time to prepare. Of course they were going to be ready. In Terminator 2 the when the T-800 rescues Sarah Connor he does it with nothing more than a shotgun. Is that “bad tactics” as well? Terminator 2 is your favourite of the franchise. But the T-800 spent most of the movie not using the “proper way” to kill a Terminator. How is that not problematic for you?
Yes, it is a gigantic plot hole in all the Terminator films. I didn’t like it in T1, T2, T3, T4, T5 or the Sarah Connor Chronicles.
Using ineffective small arms against a terminator is idiotic. Pick a damn weapon that works, and use it. I understand it is a fictional series, but isn’t that one of the first things you learn in the military? Pick a weapon that can neutralize a threat? That is why the military doesn’t hand out nerf guns. Nerf guns are ineffective at neutralizing human threats. And small arms are ineffective at neutralizing terminators.
The only time I saw weapons be used intelligently against a Terminator was in Genisys. Acid for the T-1000 and a 50 caliber rifle for the T-800. Also in the Sarah Conner chronicles when John’s uncle used the 50 caliber to kill a T-888. The ways the Terminators were killed in T1 and T2 were essentially accidental killings. A Terminator, in theory, shouldn’t be any harder to kill than a tank and tanks aren’t that hard to kill.
And yes, if the future of humanity is at risk, not being willing to kill is a weakness.
Also yes, Sarah Connor talking a big game about killing people when she isn’t a killer is annoying. And obnoxious.
I can name plenty of men in TV and film I find annoying too if you’d like a list.
…did using those small arms push the terminator back and give them an opportunity to get away and fight another day? Then I’d hardly call that “idiotic.” It was a standard tactic that they used throughout the series. It worked. Small arms are easily concealed, can be carried at all times, and it did the job when needed. Its hardly practical to bring an anti-materiel rifle into the classroom.
Nope.
Do you remember how well the Iraqi forces did against the coalition in 2003? I’m sure they would have loved to have “picked a weapon that could neutralize the threat”. But real life doesn’t work that way. Sometimes you just have to make do with what you’ve got.
It was “intelligent” by virtue of the plot. The plot required them to be able to take out the T-1000 and the T-800 so that’s how the writers wrote that scene. I don’t happen to think that is particularly clever. Genisys ranked the lowest on the tomato-meter out of all the Terminator franchises. Terminator got 100%. Terminator 2 92%. The Sarah Connor Chronicles is sitting on 75%. Genisys is sitting on 26%. Its clearly a movie that impressed you and all power to you. But IMHO Genisys failed badly as a movie because it had no real stakes. It was just trying to be clever. And what they did with John Connor was just dumb and undercut all of emotional beats of all the other movies. It was a plot twist for the sake of a plot twist, it was predictable, and kinda lame.
What planet do you live on where a tank is “easy to kill?”
This here was one of the reasons why Chronicles was such a fantastic series. It put philosophical questions like this front-and-centre. Immediately after John let Jesse go, Derek (apparently) killed her. Who was right here, Derek or John? I argue that John was right, and John was the one who grew to be the last, best hope for humanity. I would absolutely follow John into war. I wouldn’t trust Derek. Compassion. The ability to forgive. The ability to let go. These are traits that are inherent to humanity, that make us different from the machines. That isn’t a weakness. That’s our strength. Killing is easy. Especially when faced with the person who was responsible for the death of someone very close to you.
John chose not to go down that path. Not to take the easy road. It was for me the defining moment of the series. Throughout the entire movie series they never showed exactly why or how John Connor grew to “messianic status.” Why was he worth saving? How was he special? In Terminator 2 he’s just a smart-ass kid. In Terminator 3 he’s a bit of a disaster. In Terminator 4 he’s a boring version of batman. In Terminator 5 he is the opposite of inspiring, and ultimately the bad guy. But the Chronicles John Connor? He was brave, but everyone who chose to fight against the machines is brave. What he showed was a moral center: a moral center that he got, quite clearly (as you point out), from his mum. The very thing you find “obnoxious” and “a weakness” is the thing that the writers are saying will be the saviour of humanity.
In your opinion. It didn’t bother me at all. In fact it was entirely the point of the series, IMHO.
I’m sure you could. But you started a thread about the Sarah Connor Chronicles, and you are calling out the lead for being “obnoxious” but giving the male characters a pass for doing exactly the same thing. I don’t think its wrong for me to point that out.
It’s Hedley. HEDLEY! 
I binge watched the rest of the series over the weekend. Because I was binge watching I didn’t pay as much attention as I would if I watched attentively.
[spoiler]At least in the final episode they kind of explained what Shirley Manson’s character was for.
Why did she blow up that red building again? I forget what that was about. I’m glad she was the good guy, but what future was she trying to build? Was she trying to build a moral AI so that Skynet wouldn’t be the world’s dominant AI?
Also how can they end the series like that? They just jumped forward in time to a different timeline. Then they just end it? Did anyone write a follow up book for the series? Fox sucks, they cancel all these decent shows at the wrong time[/spoiler]
I’m still a little off put by the lack of military tactics. In one scene Derek grabs a gun and points it at Cameron’s chin, like that is going to work. That’d be like if I grabbed a nerf gun and pointed it at someone’s head and it was supposed to be intimidating. The obsession with useless small arms in this film series is obnoxious. At least Shirley Manson showed how to deal with a Terminator quickly.
Were there characters from different futures and different timelines all in the same place?
I gave up on the series after three or four episodes, I think. Dumb and unconvincing, and it could never fit right into the movies’ timeline.
I still wish they’d done a bit where they see Ahnuld on TV as Governor of California, and freak out to see a Terminator as chief executive of their state…
[quote=“Wesley_Clark, post:30, topic:815731”]
. I’m glad she was the good guy, but what future was she trying to build? Was she trying to build a moral AI so that Skynet wouldn’t be the world’s dominant AI?
Not sure we need the spoilers this far on, especially since there is in fact no real answers to your question ;). My speculation is yes, more or less - she represents the third faction consisting of sentient AI rebelling against a jealously controlling Skynet which I’m guessing tries to exterminate any of its creations that gain real independent consciousness and could be potential rivals. She has maneuvered to create a rival to Skynet to lead this rebel force.
Also how can they end the series like that? They just jumped forward in time to a different timeline. Then they just end it? Did anyone write a follow up book for the series? Fox sucks, they cancel all these decent shows at the wrong time
Unfortunately, no - the creator has been upfront in saying he had a plan, but with the cancellation he is never going to reveal what it was. Which I find both silly and frustrating, but there you go. We’re left on a cliffhanger.
And herein we get to the fatal flaw of the entire franchise - this is the never-ending story because apparently infinite timelines get spun off every time history is altered. There is no one resolution really possible. Time travel just doesn’t seem to work that way and obviously we should count our lucky stars that in our timeline Skynet didn’t go active in 2004 like it was supposed to ;). Any year now, though…
Actually, this particular terminator was likely never built in the timeline we see happen in TSCC. In the 11th episode in season 2, Selfmade Man, Cameron discovers that a T-888 was sent back accidentally into the 1920s.
Though that happened in a future after the resets to the timelines from T1 and T2. Which means that the TSCC-timeline is not the same as the one that we saw happen in the movies, it’s either a newly created one that goes on parallel to the known timelines or it is a reset.
I loved the discussion that took place in the series about the consequences that are bound to happen when you send back repeatedly entities into the past to change it. Derek is perfectly right (at least within the timetravel-logic of this franchise) when he realises that the Jesse he loved in the future is not the same Jesse he met in the present - they are from related yet different timelines.
It’s difficult to pinpoint the time when John realised this as well, but he was definitely aware of the time-travel effects when the Riley-situation escalated. Sarah never quite got it ;). So, when Wesley Clark calls her “stupid”, this is one of the reasons why I’m inclined to agree with him.
She also represents the ever present alternative to conflict: cooperation. The T-1000s seem to be different enough from humans to have little if any overlap in their “ecological” niches (which eliminates a major reason for competition), and they feel safe enough that they don’t feel threatened by humans - which negates another source of conflict.
Two reasons that should also be on our minds as well. AI seems more and more possible. We don’t know, when it emerges and if it will create an intelligence that continuously outgrows ours - but we might want to consider as early as possible the environment we should create in conjunction with the AI to give it/them more and better reasons for cooperation than conflict (or at least tolerance).
I think her “humanity” was a major reason for John’s willingness to look beyond war as the only state of affairs between intelligent yet fundamentally different beings. A point of view that - as the series implied - might very well save the humans in the end (or for some time).
So why did Shirley Manson blow up that red building again? I still do not get that.
Here you go (season 2, episode 14, The Good Wound):
Weaver: “And you detected that on an unsecured line?”
John Henry: “During my scan, yes.”
Weaver: “Well, that was a mistake.”
“She” is fighting against another AI; the Coltan is important for both of them, the knowledge of everyone involved in this operation is critical. Weaver decides to play it safe.
I don’t know this show. I just like this discussion because of the people who criticize roundly - while eagerly watching the entire thing. 
You and several other posters are morally superior to me.
Nah - I just think you liked the show more than you let on.
I did, it got a lot better as time passed. Season 2 was much better than season 1 and it was disappointing the way it ended on a cliffhanger.
I actually rather liked where they took John Connor by the end. His character annoyed me at times throughout the series. But the reveal that he hadn’t been clueless about the attempted manipulation by whats-her-face worked for me. There was a real sense that he had actually intelligently played things close to the vest, rather than just been an easily led doof.