Recap: Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles - S1E3 "The Turk"

Sarah pages through the SkyNet intel retrieved from the dead freedom fighters' safe while John and Cameron go off to school.  They have to walk through a metal detector to get in, which of course Cameron sets off; John tells the guard that she's got a metal plate - a big one - in her head.  Here's an issue I have: in E1, Cameron was a very natural-acting girl but now, just a couple of episodes later, she's way more stilted and Terminator-like.  What's that all about?

Sarah visits Teresa Dyson at Miles's grave, showing her some photos to see if she recognizes anyone who might have been interested in Miles's Cyberdyne work.  There's one guy Teresa knows: Andrew Goode, who interned at Cyberdyne some years ago.  Teresa asks if Andy's going to have to die too and, when the answer is "maybe," tells Sarah to make it count then.

The reassembled and masked/hooded Terminator breaks into a hospital and steals a lot of blood bags.  Later, it breaks into the apartment of a British-accented scientist and gives him a complicated formula.  Once he gets over his fright, the British scientist is fascinated and thinks that yes, yes, he just might be able to grow muscle tissue and skin from this.  The Terminator tells him to get on it.

Sarah finds Andy Goode working at a cell phone store.  She buys three phones from him and he asks her out.  Sarah has zero sense of humor and can barely flirt, but she agrees to dinner and even shaves her legs before heading out on the date.  In another part of town, Agent Ellison pays Carols (Enrique's nephew) a visit to ask about why he and his uncle spoke on the phone three times the day Enrique was killed.  Carlos isn't interested in talking to the feds, however.

After dinner at Andy's apartment (who does that, goes to a guy's house for dinner when you only ever talked to him in a cell phone store? Bad ass Sarah Connor does, I guess), Andy proudly shows Sarah this fancy computer he's built, "The Turk," which is a chess-playing computer that sometimes seems to think for itself.  Andy thinks it's pretty damn cool; Sarah, of course, is slightly disturbed but plays it cool.  She does notice movement outside the window but when she runs out to check, she can't see the guy hiding in the trees watching her.  We can't really see this guy either but he does have a barcode tattooed on his forearm (like the dead freedom fighters did) so I'm thinking this is the fourth guy who got away.  Later, John interrogates his mother about the Turk, although she can't answer all the technical questions he has.  John, computer genius/hacker that he is, is frustrated.  Cameron, ever practical, notes that Andy will have to be killed.

At the British scientist's apartment, the tissue growth solution is ready.  The Terminator disrobes down to his metal chassis - which the scientist takes in stride remarkably well, considering THAT'S A FRICKIN' SENTIENT KILLER ROBOT THERE IN FRONT OF HIM - and climbs into the bathtub full of the red goo.

Flames fill the night sky and Sarah watches from a hiding spot in the tree as Andy watches his house - and the Turk - burn to the ground.  She has a small smile because she thinks she's solved the problem without having to kill anyone.  Time will tell, I think.

Ellison and the cops are investigating at the British scientist's apartment: the scientist is dead, his eyes torn out, and there is blood (or bloody solution) all over.  And then EEEEEUUUUWWWW!  In a flashback (?), the Terminator rises up out of the tub, dripping with the solution and covered in new flesh.  And the British scientist guy watches excitedly, then helps to slice the Terminator's eyelids open.  The machine's decidedly non-human eyes glow red and now we know how the scientist ended up losing his.

Previously on T:TSCC / next time on T:TSCC