Recap: Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles - S2E1 "Samson and Delilah"

The recaps of S2 are dedicated to my old friend, Joe B.  Happy Summer!


In the wake of the explosion, Cameron is down and not entirely intact.  Sarah and John start outside to see what happened when the two bad guys who just blew up their robot burst into the house.  They capture the Connors, one holding them at gunpoint and generally beating on Sarah while the other searches the house for that hard drive.  Luckily everything inside the house is happening in slow-mo which gives Cameron enough time to drag herself out of the wreckage and limp into the house.  She crushes one bad guy's skull and lurches upstairs as an accidental fire rages on the first floor, heading for a propane tank.  By the time Cameron gets upstairs, the other bad guy is dead: John managed to kill him, saving his mom from certain doom.  It's good that they've freed themselves too: Cameron's chip was damaged in the explosion and now she thinks her orders are to terminate John.  Sarah and her son dive out the window as the propane tank explodes, knocking Cameron down.

Back at the apartment complex, Cromartie decides to leave Ellison alone for now.  Charlie, as EMT, arrives on the scene and is stunned by the carnage.  Then he hears the call about the explosion at the Connors' home and heads there, where he is relieved that the two bodies pulled out of the building are not John and Sarah.  Also, he finds Derek, disguised as a firefighter, who has pulled the mangled hard drive out of the house.  They fret about John and Sarah and then drive off in Charlie's ambulance.  Derek can't help needling Charlie about his continuing feelings for Sarah.  And what about your repressed feelings for her, Derek?

Sarah and John make a run for it, getting into a car accident and then hoofing it.  John's leg is bleeding pretty badly and Cameron tracks them by following the blood droplets.

Shirley Manson, of Garbage fame, is apparently running some big ol' tech company.  She's very sleek and poised.  She takes possession of the Turk computer, having paid some guy oodles and oodles of money for it.  She pets the Turk like it's a cat, then tells her secretary to call all the department heads together for a very important meeting.

Heh: Cameron cleans her torn and dirty face with (a) baby wipes and (b) a staple gun.

Sarah and John take refuge in a Spanish church, asking for sanctuary.  The priest agrees and takes them back into the rectory.  Sarah wants to talk about what has happened to Cameron.  They're freaking out a little since she knows absolutely everything about them: their bank accounts, weapons stashes, emergency contingencies.  They're going to have to kill her, they agree.

Back at the FBI, Ellison gets debriefed and totally covers up what he knows about ruthless killer machines from the future.  Which is probably wise if he wants to stay out of the loony bin.

Cameron tracks the Connors to the church.  The priest tells her that there is no one there but she insists on taking a look around.  Sarah and John have set a trap for her, though, and electrocute her, knocking her out for the two minutes it takes her system to reboot.  John tries to dig the chip out of her head but there isn't enough time.  She starts to wake up and they bolt, stealing another car.  Cameron gets up and resumes her hunt.  Sarah drives like a friggin' madwoman through the city - with a queasy shaky-cam.  Cameron heads them off and Sarah hits something, launching the car which flips and lands on its roof.  Sarah is hurt so she sends John off on his own, with Cameron lurching implacably behind.  For the record, I absolutely adore and covet Cameron's girl biker boots.

John staggers into a warehouse.  He gets into a truck and hot-wires it.  Cameron advances on him ... and then bad-ass Sarah shows up in her own truck, pinning Cameron between the two vehicles.  John climbs up on the hood and opens Cameron's head.  She begs and pleads, crying, saying that she ran a report and is all better now - she doesn't want to go away, she loves him and knows he loves her.  John hesitates and then yanks out her chip.  Cameron collapses.  Good acting on Summer Glau's part, by the way.

Some time later, Derek and Charlie have reunited with the Connors.  As Charlie patches Sarah up, Derek says they'll need to get going soon, due the the swath of carnage they left in the city today.  The hard drive is trashed, unfortunately, so they still don't know who bought the Turk.  John is wicked upset about the 20+ people Cromartie killed at the apartment complex because of him, and also because he doesn't want to abandon Cameron.  He wants to try to fix her chip: "I need her.  She saved my life.  She saves my life!"  Sarah says it's too risky so John steels himself and says, "Then let's burn her."

Out in a junkyard somewhere, they cover Cameron with that phosphorus or whatever they used to flash burn the last one.  John says he's ready to do it ... then pulls a bait and switch and shoves the chip, which he's been working on, back into her head.  Sarah: "No! She'll kill you!"  "There's only one way to find out," he snaps.  Cameron reboots and John puts his gun in her hand, asking if she's here to kill him.  Cameron considers: at first her programming tells her to terminate, then an override kicks in.  "No," she says, "I promise."  She hands the gun back to him and he stares triumphantly at his mother.

Ellison runs into Cromartie at the burned-out Connor homse.  "I'll never lead you to her," he tells the machine, "I won't do the devil's work."  "We'll see," muses Cromartie.

Shirley Manson (that's annoying: per IMDB, her character's name is "Catherine Weaver") announces to the company's department heads that she is plundering their teams for a new project, "Babylon," that will change the world.  The department heads are rather displeased but apparently she's powerful enough that their displeasure means nothing.

The Connors go back to the church to clean up and have something to eat.  Cameron takes Sarah aside and tells her that if she ever goes bad again, Sarah should not let John bring her back.  Sarah's like, well, no shit. Later, Sarah tries to talk to her son about their horrific day (his birthday, on which he got to kill his very first man) but he has locked himself in the bathroom and is cutting off all his hair.

Back at Catherine Weaver's office, one of the department heads bitches to another in the men's room about what Weaver is doing to the company.  When the other guy leaves, one of the urinals suddenly morphs T:2-style into Weaver herself, right in front of the guy's terrified eyes.  "Sorry I piss you off, Mr. Tuck," she says coldly, "but the feeling's mutual."  And then she rams her silvery bayonet of a finger right through his eye socket.

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