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Episode Studies by Clayton Barr enik1138 at popapostle-dot-com |
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In 2027, John Connor, Kyle Reese, and Captain Perry lead the final assault on Skynet.
Read the story summary of the game at the Terminator Wiki
Notes from the Terminator chronology
For some reason, the game opens in 2027, and plays into the human resistance to victory over Skynet and Kyle Reese being sent back in time to protect John Connor's mother, Sarah, in 1984. But in The Terminator, these events took place in 2029 instead. I suppose this can be explained as just another anomaly among the many alternate timelines of the Terminator universe caused by time travel. Despite being published in 2002, the game only references the events of The Terminator, ignoring Terminator 2: Judgment Day, and also has John giving orders to Kyle to make the trip back to 1984 to protect Sarah, rather than Kyle volunteering as he states in the film. It's possible this is an earlier timeline than any of the others presented in licensed stories in the Terminator universe. This is why it appears in Timeline 1 in the PopApostle Terminator chronology.
Didja Notice?
During the introductory segment of the game, a collapsed freeway sign indicating exits for Glendale Blvd., Los Feliz Blvd., and Colorado St. is seen. These are all actual streets that cross the I-5 freeway in Los Angeles.
No Model 101 T-800s are seen in this game. Apparently the developers did not have the rights to Arnold Schwarzenegger's likeness.
This game introduces us to Captain Perry, Reese's commander when he served in the 132nd from 2021-27, as stated by Reese to Sarah in The Terminator. Perry appears to be a Caucasian man with a (possibly Central American Indian style) tattoo on his face. In episodes of The Sarah Connor Chronicles, Perry is a black man, sans tattoo.
The game introduces the underground enclave of human survivors called Haven. Haven is not mentioned in any other stories of the various Terminator timelines so far.
At times during the game, the humans refer to the Terminators as "fakers" or "fakies".
Kyle Reese spends a fair amount of time protecting John Connor from invading Terminators. What are dads for?
Part of the action takes place in the Federal Reserve Bank of Los Angeles building. This is presumably a reference to the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, Los Angeles Branch.
Skynet appears to be able to teleport Terminators to enemy locations. This is presumably through the use of the time travel mechanism, as also seen in An Evil Hour.
The game introduces Initiates, humans that have defected to the machines and have external implants on their bodies, notably on the head and neck, to receive commands and information from Skynet. During Level 7 of the game (the asylum) onscreen displays refer to the Initiates as I-950s, which happens to be the same designation as the Infiltrators bred from human slaves by Skynet and implanted with internal microcircuitry in the T2 Trilogy of novels.
Level 9 of the game opens as Connor leads the human resistance in an assault on the Cheyenne Mountain headquarters of Skynet at NORAD. From the images and dialog, it appears the resistance is mounting its attack at the North Portal entrance of Cheyenne Mountain.
Reese's commscreen shows the date of the assault on Cheyenne Mountain as 6-1-2027.
In the storyline of this game, it appears that John Connor gave Kyle the picture of Sarah at some point in the past, telling him to memorize the face, but did not tell him who it was until the assault on Cheyenne Mountain, at which point he also gave Kyle orders to use Skynet's time travel equipment to go back to 1984 to protect Sarah Connor if the resistance forces were unable to stop Skynet from sending back a Terminator.
In its Cheyenne Mountain fortress, it's implied that Skynet has perfected the use of cold fusion as a power source. Cold fusion is the theorized ability to achieve a nuclear reaction at room temperatures instead of the millions of degrees needed for currently accepted fusion processes such as those in the sun. Cold fusion is generally considered a fringe science by mainstream scientists.
As Luna enters the time displacement chamber, she says, "Dios mio!" This is Spanish for "My God!"
Luna remarks on Skynet sending a Terminator back in time 30 years to kill Connor's mother. It's actually over 40 years, from 2027 to 1984.
Near the end of the game, Reese faces off directly against Skynet's brain (or something) at close range, destroying it. In other timelines, Skynet's defeat happens differently. At this range, Skynet somehow has the ability to take control of a human mind given enough time; this ability is not seen in any other version of Skynet in other timelines.
At the very end of the game, it's revealed that Skynet had a backup of itself in the onboard computer of an orbiting satellite.
Unanswered Questions
How did Skynet gain the ability to control a human mind at close range?
Memorable Dialog
the needs of the living outweigh the needs of the dying.wav
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