Roxy Bisquaint

I was just browsing through the Allison from Palmdale thread on the Sarah Connor Society forum and I found this post by me from September 30, 2008...

"I still say it's too pervy for a 30-year-old John to be gettin' it on with a 16, maybe 17-year-old Alison even in post-apocalyptic times. UNLESS future!John gets killed and current John jumps forward in time to take his place sometime soon."

O_o

In Born to Run, Cameron tells John that Sarah has lost 11% of her body mass in the last six weeks. By my fuzzy math, that would mean she'd lost about 12lbs. Twelve pounds. On someone her size, it would be impossible for Sarah not to notice that. Yet no more than a few days earlier, in To the Lighthouse, the doctor asked if she'd had "any unexplained weight loss, fever or night sweats". The only thing Sarah noted was feeling nauseated. She made no mention of weight loss at all.

The cancer story has been suspicious since the beginning since all we've got to go on is Cameron's word. She lies when she deems it necessary and what little information she provided in Gnothi Seauton was vague: "You died, December 4, 2005" and "cancer." That's it. That's the extent of the data on the death of Sarah Connor. It might've been helpful if Sarah had actually asked her more, but she didn't and Cameron didn't offer it.

Sarah did, however, ask Cameron about her diagnostic skills — whether she could analyze blood or scan someone. Though Cameron later analyzes John's blood drops on the sidewalk in Samson & Delilah and assesses library boy Eric's cancer in Self Made Man, she tells Sarah no. Actually, she sidesteps the blood analysis question and rephrases the scan question so it's specifically about CAT scans. Then she says no. So I guess she wasn't so much lying as withholding truth.

The only time I felt like we could believe Cameron about Sarah's cancer was in Automatic for the People. It was just a few days after the glitch and her decision-making was clearly impaired. She seemed less calculated, more honest, and it made me believe that Cameron believed Sarah Connor died of cancer in 2005. And when she told Sarah she didn't know if she was still going to get sick or if her exposure at the power plant would be the cause, I believed that too.

That brings me to the title of this post and that little vial Cameron pulls out of the safety deposit box in the bank vault in the pilot.

"What is it?"

"Hope."

I think Sarah Connor did die of cancer in 2005 and I think that cancer was just starting to develop in 1999. Sarah wouldn't know about it for a while yet, maybe even years. But Cameron knew. Based on surviving medical records and some research into cancer, she deduced that 1999 was the best point in time to go after Sarah's cancer and... kill it before it was born. 1999 was the best point in time to hand her that weapon, made by their best engineer, and make sure she exposed herself to a good, strong isotope blast that could target the cancer cells.

Whether or not firing that gun really cured Sarah is unknown. Cameron couldn't be sure if the plan would work and she was keeping tabs on her health all along in case it didn't. But that weight loss she noted in Adam Raised a Cain and Born to Run? That was a lie.

ETA: Updated this because it wasn't "in the last 3 months" that Sarah supposedly lost 11% of her mass, it was in the last six weeks (which makes it even more unbelievable). Also, it's in Born to Run where Cameron gives the percentage. In Adam Raised a Cain, she only says "she's lost weight".

And why did I not think of this before?!

Cameron's chip! That's what the AI was after in To the Lighthouse! Duh. It's so clear to me now. The goons obviously knew Cameron was a machine, which is why they nabbed Derek and only fired some shots at her as they took off. Derek was the bait to lure Cameron into a trap (the water at the warehouse). No revelations there, but I always thought the AI (on the phone) was instructing the goon on how to pull her chip so they could disable her. It never occurred to me that the AI needed a chip FOR ITSELF. And not just any old chip. Cameron is "special". She has the most powerful neural net processor in the world — able to infiltrate entire traffic systems in a single bound! (Also it doesn't self-destruct when you pull it out).

Kaliba has coltan and the AI got endo schematics from John Henry when it hacked him with the worm. It had what it needed to build itself a body, but without a chip, a body would do it no good. Of course, it could've just used Cameron's body too, but y'know, John Henry said it was his "brother" so maybe advanced AIs have gender identity ;) Or maybe it actually needs to look like someone specific that's male.

So why did the AI need to be mobile? Who the fuck knows. It had the worm that could give it control of other computer systems and it had the backdoor access to military systems thanks to Fisher's handiwork. Why it would need to be a walking "human" to initiate judgement day, I haven't a clue. Seems to me everything was in place. Obviously not, though, or it would've already done it. So there's clearly more to be accomplished before the apocalypse can commence.

Onto John Henry...

He had the damaged chip from the Kaliba water cooler terminator that Weaver wanted him to try to gleen info from. I have no doubt that he succeeded in doing so and now has info about Kaliba. Perhaps he knows their targets (Savannah, himself and the whole damn human race!). Perhaps he knows their plans (apocalypse!). And perhaps he knows the current whereabouts of Kaliba (and the AI).

When Cameron enters the room, he shares this information. "My brother wanted your chip so he could [insert Kaliba master plan here]. I can stop him, but I'm tethered to this pretty box with the retconned 3 lights."

"That really is a pretty box." Cameron says. "You can put me in there and take my chip. Maybe Sarah will like me better if I have 3 dots anyway. I should probably leave John a note, though."

And this, my friends, makes my wacky theory of old work: Neither Cameron nor John Henry are in the future. They're both still in 2009. But the writers would probably do a little better with the dialog ;)

Theory, glorious theory!

John Henry's "brother" tried to kill him and also wants Savannah dead. Those are two good reasons for John Henry to want to stop him. So why jump to the future to destroy the AI that's after him and Savannah in the present? Well, I don't think he did. I think John Henry is still in 2009 and after finding out Kaliba's location from the water cooler terminator's chip, he went after him.

Weaver seemed certain he'd jumped to the future, so I'll assume John Henry fooled her by making it look like he'd jumped. He could've messed with the display screen or maybe even sent an empty time bubble ahead to make it more convincing. She had told John Henry that Savannah's survival depended on his but his survival didn't depend on hers. That implies that Weaver was really only concerned about protecting John Henry and I think we can be sure John Henry would want to try to protect Savannah.

If Weaver knew he'd gone off to confront his brother, she'd probably find him and bring him back. She'd already asked Murch about packing everything up, so John Henry knew she was prepared to move him to keep him safe (A "mother" moving her "son" to keep him safe seems rather familiar, doesn't it?). But he didn't want to run away, didn't want to hide and didn't want to leave Savannah at risk. So even though he wasn't yet prepared to fight and maybe didn't know what kind of situation he'd be heading into, John Henry faked-out Weaver. I believe he walked out of Zeira Corp to go have a "computer vs computer" showdown with his Kaliba brother — who meant him harm and meant Savannah harm.

( But wait, there's more... )

Q. What are you cooking up in that brain of yours?

I will post this wackiness later. Heads might explode.

I love TSCC. Love.

I was never happy about the John retcon in "Today is the Day part 2". It just didn't add up. He never acted like he had a clue about Riley until "Ourselves Alone", but that didn't give him any time to follow her around, learn about Jesse or figure out the plot. So that's where I've been stuck for a long time. And believing he figured anything out before that doesn't work for me because it requires the acceptance of too much off-camera cleverness and a ta-da! reveal. For a show that spends so much time on character and plot steps, it felt really false.

Well, I've found a way to make that whole thing work that I really like. It not only works based on what we actually saw, it does so without taking anything away from John's cleverness. And more importantly, it allows me to enjoy his confrontation with Jesse without rolling my eyes. So here goes...

He never did follow Riley around. It was a bluff.

John didn't figure anything out until Sarah told him about Riley's "bleached skulls" breakdown and blabbing about the Mexico trip. He knew he hadn't told her about judgement day, so that's the moment he realized Riley was future girl. He then backtracks through the time he spent with her — backtracks to carrots and apples, how she was in Mexico, etc. It all fits. I also think Sarah saying "I don't believe you" is what makes it the "bad day" John refers to when he later talks to Jesse.

He knew it was unlikely that Cameron killed Riley once he saw the body, which meant her death was either a random crime or she was killed by a co-conspirator. Future girl dropping into his life pretending not to be future girl logically meant there was a plot of some sort. So that's the idea he started running with — there's another future person somewhere who's involved and who likely killed Riley. But who and why?

John talks to Derek, fishing for information and it all comes out. John probably tells him that Riley was from the future and must have been plotting something. He isn't sure what, but suspects it might be an attempt to frame Cameron for murder — maybe an attempt to get him to turn on Cameron. Bingo. Derek makes the connection to Jesse. That also explains why we had to have that scene where Jesse was callous about Riley's death and Derek was all innocent life lost is horrible! It gives Derek something from his own experience to connect into what John has already figured out. Between the two of them, they unravel the whole plot.

John has Derek take him to Jesse, where he confronts her about it all. At that point he does know everything, but he bluffs about having figured it out a while back and bluffs that he gambled with Riley's life so that he could win the game. The reason he bluffs is to intimidate Jesse and prevent her from thinking that it might have worked or that she almost won. He bluffs to win the game right then and there. And he bluffs to make it known that you don't fuck with John Connor.

It works really well for me because it allows John be intelligent, gutsy, clever and not retconned.

After going over the previews for this episode and piecing it together with clips from the WonderCon video, life_on_queen and I brewed up some heavily caffeinated ideas. You know what that means, don't you?

That right, it's THEORY TIME!

( Are you ready? )

Theory time!
No spoilers, just speculation.

I'm predicting that it was Jesse that shot bloody future soldier as he was getting ready to time jump. I figure his coming through wounded indicates that either the resistance's time machine facility was being overrun by metal or one faction of the resistance was fighting another at the moment he went through. I'm opting for the latter. While it could be "the greys" fighting, I tend to think they're more subversive info carriers, not a fighting force. So I think it's Jesse's group that was shooting.

I've been trying to figure out what Riley's deal is. We know she's working with Jesse and it seems her job is to get close to John and get him to reveal something. But what exactly she's trying to get John to reveal is unclear. So I'm thinking that Jesse wants to know if the bloody future fighter made it through time alive and successfully delivered his message (the blood wall info) to the Connors. And perhaps the most significant piece of info that Jesse's worried about is the 3 dots.

--

misc thoughts:

I also have a really bad feeling about John telling Riley about Charley. I don't think mentioning the info about Sarah is a problem, but he sure is quick to whip out the "my mother was in a mental hospital and I had to live with foster parents," isn't he? I think he told Derek that the first day he was up and around after his gunshot wound. And now he tells Riley right after seeing what a manipulative chick she is. Dude, I know you're desperate for some sympathy, but get a clue!

A cool little tidbit I caught about Riley. In Self Made Man, she tells John that her real parents died in a fire. Well, if she's 16 and she came from 2027, that makes her born in 2011. If her parents really did die in a fire, I'm going to take a wild guess and say that fire was judgement day. Someone obviously found baby Riley and raised her (maybe even those hippie "foster parents" who called her "the deviant", though she probably made that up).

On a mostly unrelated note: I really want a tommy gun :D

I don't know if any of you saw the Andy Goode theory I formulated back in March, but the gist of it was that because of his path crossing with Sarah he would not have been the guy who created Skynet, but rather the guy to prevent it. The AI never would have gotten "angry" if Andy had developed it because he had a desire to understand it and communicate with it on a personal level.

Andy's gone now, but I think part of that idea may be coming through in Catherine's story. She picked up where Andy left off in advancing the AI. I'm not sure of her end goal at this point. That eel in the fish tank still screams EEEEVIL to me and her wardrobe is growing darker with each passing episode (started out white and has moved through progressively darker shades of grey). So the likely scenario is that she's intending to birth Skynet... until we factor in Sherman and Ellison.

Sherman prompted Catherine, a machine, to start acting more human towards her daughter while also helping her to understand the AI from a more human perspective. Enter Ellison, who informs Catherine that a thinking machine with no morals or ethics is dangerous. And now it would seem he's going to help in that regard by teaching John Henry the 10 Commandments and more. Regardless of Catherine's original intention, what she may end up with isn't a machine that kills without conscience, but rather a machine that understands the meaning of death and, by extension, the value of life. I think this may be a game-changing moment.

There's been an on-going debate with TSCC about whether or not judgement day can actually be prevented. We've been told the future's not set and that there's no fate but what you make. Yet no matter what Sarah does, the grim future only gets delayed — the AI that leads to Skynet always springs back up. It seems inevitable that it'll develop, be implemented by the military and the apocalypse will follow. Maybe that's because the approach has always been to try to thwart the progress of the technology rather than to try to change the nature of the technology. And I'm starting to think that changing the technology is how the Connors can actually win the war.