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Posted by Omega (Member # 91) on :

OK, I just want to get this down so as to get it all straight in me head. I THINK this explains all the apparent contradictions in the Terminator timeline.

I will refer to the timelines by capital letter, and the movies with bold print.

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This was the original timeline. We never saw this one. We will begin with Sarah Connor.

Sarah Connor was born in approximately 1965. At some point, she has a child, whom she names John Connor. We don't know when, but we'll assume it was around 1995, which would make Sarah around 30. We will also assume that Sarah is not married at the time, due to the fact that she and her child share the same last name. Sometime around 2010, someone, we don't know who, invents AI technology, including a system called SkyNet. SkyNet eventually turns on its creators, leading to machines taking over the planet. A human resistance arises, lead by the now grown John Connor. Eventually, the resistance succeeds, but the machines send a T-800 class Terminator back to 1985, in an attempt to kill Sarah Connor long before her child is born. They include a margin of error, because the machines do not have exact records of when John was born. The Terminator is sent through the portal, and a soldier (who's name escapes me) is sent by Connor to stop him.

The Terminator
A T-800 and a soldier appear c.1984. The Terminator attempts to kill Sarah Connor, while the soldier attempts to defend her. In the process, Soldier tells Sarah that she will have a son named John Connor, and then impregnates her. The Terminator is destroyed, leaving a minor amount of technology behind, and Soldier is killed. Sarah Connor proceeds to assume that her child is the John Connor that Soldier knows from timeline "A," when this is not the case. There are, in fact, TWO completely seperate John Connors. They simply fall into the same role in life.

Cyberdyne corporation obtains the left behind technology, and creates AI technology around 1998. Judgement Day occurs shortly thereafter. Sarah Connor's child John becomes the leader of the resistance, as another of her children by the same name did in "A." The war has the same outcome, with the exception that the machines have more advanced technology, and send a more advanced Terminator to do the same job as the T-800 tried to do from timeline "A." This is a completely seperate event, as the SkyNet from "A" sent the T-800, and the SkyNet from "B" sent the T-1000. Thus, the same computer did not send two assasins two two points in time.

C:
Terminator 2: Judgement Day
A T-1000 appears, along with a T-800, in or around 1994. The T-800 destroys the T-1000, and in the process destroys the technology that was used by Cyberdyne in "B" to create AI and SkyNet in 1998. However, it is still likely that someone will invent AI technology on the same schedule as in "A," namely in 2010. Thus, Judgement Day may still occur, and a John Connor will still be there to fight it.

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The crux of this theory is that there is not a loop. There is simply a third timeline that we never saw, with major, but sometimes superficial, similarities to the ones we did. For instance, in both "A" and "B," there is a man named John Connor, child of Sarah Connor, who leads a resistance against AI machines, who were created at approximately the same time relative to John's birth. Thus, the same events happen in both timelines, but at different times. The John Connor that first fought the machines is not the John Connor that was in T2, as they had different fathers. Sarah Connor simply had another child named John, which wiped out the existance of the first John. However, this is possibly a good thing, as without her impregnation by Soldier, John Connor "A" would have been three years old when the resistance "B" began in 1998, instead of in his late teens.

Another side effect of this is that now, if Judgement Day does indeed occur, it will occur around 2010, when John Connor will be in his mid twenties. This may alter the balance one way or another, as in both "A" and "B," he was around 18 when this happened.

Questions? Comments?

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"Still one thing more fellow-citizens--A wise and frugal Government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government..."
-Thomas Jefferson

Posted by Lee (Member # 393) on :

WHOSE name. Kyle Reese.

And why bother, unless this is some attempt to explain how they can have a third movie when August 29 1997 came and went and was nothing more than another boring working day? And if so, still why bother, since you can be sure they won't even try to explain it all in Terminator 3?

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Luke Ford: "What's it like having a dick in your ass?"

Zoe: "Imagine taking your bottom lip and pulling it over the top of your head. You get used to it but it does hurt."

Posted by Aethelwer (Member # 36) on :

"who's" is a valid application of the genitive case to the relative personal pronoun, IMO.

Either way, it's an excellent example of resolving temporal paradoxes.

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"That's the last time I have a headcheese hoagie before bedtime." - Leonard Nimoy

Posted by Omega (Member # 91) on :

Yeah, I'd bet the French screwing up our language created weird words like "whose," right, Frank?

As for why, I just do it for the fun of it. Impossible problems are a good thing to worry about in your spare time. Voyager's "Future's End" works out pretty well this way, too.

For my next trick, resolving the Grandfather Paradox.

Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :

Isn't "who's" the contraction for "who is", which would make it "who is name...".....

Anyway, I do like his theory.

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"One's ethics are determined by what we do when no one is looking"

Posted by Omega (Member # 91) on :

Well, "Bob's" is either "Bob is," or the possessive form of "Bob."

And thank you.

Posted by Hobbes (Member # 138) on :

Pre-Destination Paradox.

My theory is:

T-1: The Terminator and Kyle Reese are sent back in time. John Connor knows that Kyle is his father but doesn't tell him in order to protect the timeline.

Because Kyle is dead, John keeps his mother's last name (this also keeps Kyle from relizing he's John's father related).

Meanwhile the Terminator is destroyed, but all the technology is aquired by CyberDyne (most likely contracted by the Government to research this advanced tech). SkyNet is created and the AI war begins.

T-2: In order to prevent Judgement Day (JD) from occuring CyberDyne and the original Terminator technology is destroyed. However, if SkyNet was never created then a Terminator could not of been created, thus never go back in time and would stop John from being born. So really John should vanished at the end of T2 never existing.

The fact that he continues to exists suggests that JD will still happen and opens the door for T3. It also makes since because the AI should be able to look in it's history records and know that both Terminators sent to the past failed. But perhaps it knew they had to fail in order to set off certain events to start JD.

In conclusion: I don't think James Cameron had all the facts of Terminator plotted out which explains the holes and inconsistancies.

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Pronouces it "Twenty-O-One"
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Posted by Michael Dracon (Member # 4) on :

Lets see whats left of this theory when the new movie is out...

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"That's your plan? Wile E. Coyote would come up with a better plan than that!"
- Crighton, Farscape.

Posted by Omega (Member # 91) on :

But my theory eliminates the need for a pre-d paradox, Hobbes. The things really are unnesecary in sci-fi, and can usually be resolved. You could also create them in real life, with a little outside assistance, so I don't guess it's really a paradox at all.

As for John disappearing, the thing with that is the time travel model the creators are using in these movies. In these movies, when history is altered, it simply creates an entirely new timeline, instead of overwriting the existing one. Thus, timelines "A" and "B" still exist somewhere out there, inaccessable to us. The T-800 from T2 was modifying the future of timeline "C," but as he was from timeline "B," this did not affect him. In the same way, Reese was from timeline "A," so therefore any changes to timelines "B" and "C" would not have any effect on his existance, and being sent back by John Connor "A" to father John Connor "B."

As for how this will hold up in T3, that will depend on whether they deal with time travel at all. From what I know of the possible plot, it's not nesecary for it to be brought up. Either way, anything can take place in the future of "C," since no one's come back to tell us anything about what happens then. 'Course, if they did, we'd have a timeline "D" to deal with...

That would be an interesting way to keep the series going, though. We follow the war through, and regardless of the outcome, each side sends someone back in time to do something to the other side, or to prevent that. With some good plotting, you could follow the cycle over and over, creating an unending series of movies.

In one cycle, WE could loose the war, but commandeer the time portal and send our own soldier back to do some assasinatin'.

With good writers, that just might work...

Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :

Coming in June of 3000, Terminator 751: Invasion.

Skynet send it's entire force back to 1900 to fix all the previous mistakes that it made in the first 750 episodes.....

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"One's ethics are determined by what we do when no one is looking"

Posted by Soontir_Fel on :

Great. The Terminator series is an infinately recurring temporal loop.

Or it could be a way to generate more money.
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"I find your lack of faith disturbing."

-Lord Darth Vader (Star Wars: A New Hope)

[This message has been edited by Soontir_Fel (edited January 01, 2001).]

Posted by Nim (Member # 205) on :

As I said earlier, poor Braunschweiger will be a senior citizen before they're done exploiting.

There's prolly going to be a spin-off TV-series with NO blood and NO nudity and the Terminator will be played by a totally unknown body builder from Pasadena, or some other poor schmuck, which will erase any originality and charm that was established with the original movie.

For those of you that didn't read between the lines I was hinting on the fate of RoboCop.

And what's this "T-800"-crap you're talking about, Omega? The script and dialogue in the movies say "Model 101". Are you referring to some comic book?

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Here lies a toppled god,
His fall was not a small one.
We did but build his pedestal,
A narrow and a tall one.

-Tleilaxu Epigram

[This message has been edited by Nimrod (edited January 01, 2001).]

Posted by Omega (Member # 91) on :

As I recall, in "The Terminator," Reese was explaining the terminators to Sarah. He said that the old T-600s had rubber skin, and were thus easy to spot, but that these new T-800s were covered in real flesh, and thus could blend perfectly. Then there's the T-1000 prototype from T2...

Posted by Soontir_Fel on :

I'm nitpicking here.

The T-800 from T2 said that the T-1000 was an advanced prototype (I wonder what the original prototype was, the T-800?) and it was based upon a hevemetepoly (spl?) alloy aka liquid metal.

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"I find your lack of faith disturbing."

-Lord Darth Vader (Star Wars: A New Hope)

Posted by Omega (Member # 91) on :

You're right.

You are nitpicking.

Posted by Teelie (Member # 280) on :

It's model 101. Look into the sunglasses on the cover of Arnold on the first Terminator movie.

CSM 101 (Cyberdyne Systems Model 101) is what it says.

As seen here:

Anyhow, a 3rd timeline does work, maybe for the 3rd movie?

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Three important questions to ask an alien before having sex:
(1) Are you carrying any diseases which might be communicable to humans?
(2) Have you had sex with any high-risk partners in the past six months?
(3) Which one is your mouth?

Posted by Omega (Member # 91) on :

He may have been a model 101 in some way, but he was a T-800 series terminator.

Posted by PsyLiam (Member # 73) on :

Don't start the 101/800 series argument. I bet it's as famous on Terrminator forums as the Defiant thread is around here. Maybe it's the 800-deries Terminator, model 101. Or something convulted like that.

Good job there Omega. It does answer one HUGE nitpick I've always had with the films, which was Kyle saying in the first film that the time machine was destoyed after he was sent back, so that no-one else could use it. Even though they did.

Although I suppose that can be answered by there being another time machine, I suppose.

There's another difference between timelines B/C and A. In B and C, John KNOWS about the coming of Judgement day, and prepares for it. In A, he is simply thrust into the role.

And regarding the left over tecnology from T1. Even though they destroyed it, there was still plenty of bits of T2 Arnie left all over the shop in the sequel. His arm got cut off (again), for example.

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"And Mojo was hurt and I would have kissed his little boo boo but then I realized he was a BAD monkey so I KICKED HIM IN HIS FACE!"
-Bubbles

Posted by Soontir_Fel on :

This thought recently occurred to me.

The Terminator that Arnold plays is a T-800. The model number could be the living tissue human repica. Model 100 could look like James Cameron, Model 101 looks like Arnold Schwarzenegger, Model 102 could look like Robert Patrick, etc.

In conclusion the model number tells us who the T-800 looks like as a human.

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"I find your lack of faith disturbing."

-Lord Darth Vader (Star Wars: A New Hope)

Posted by Omega (Member # 91) on :

That's possible. Or perhaps the CPU was model 101? Heck, why would SkyNet put a textual ID inside a machine it constucted at all? That would seem to indicate that the CPU of the T-800 was designed completely by Cyberdyne. Perhaps SkyNet is incapable of improving on its own central design?

Posted by Nim (Member # 205) on :

I just want to say that I loved the old computer-game SkyNet. I miss it, it was ahead of Quake by far with total 3d-objects and surroundings. It was the first game I played were you had total control of the aim with the mouse.
It really gave me a feeling of what the post-apocalyptic era of 2027 was like.
It was very creepy with the old 80's synth-bass of the first movie wowing away in the background, suddenly to be drowned by the shriek of an intercepting hunter/killer craft.
You could drive a car as well, dispatching the hunter/killers with the mounted machinegun-turret.
I Wish I could play the whole game, not just the stupid demo. The T-800's were scary as well, they packed a punch.

If all goes well, maybe they'll make another game after the third movie is out. There are few plots better than that to base a game on.

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Here lies a toppled god,
His fall was not a small one.
We did but build his pedestal,
A narrow and a tall one.

-Tleilaxu Epigram

Posted by Teelie (Member # 280) on :

Hmmm true, although I bet SkyNet's fighting with Microsoft's Windows AI for dominance.

The model 101 could mean the literal skin of the Terminator 800 series, which would make sense, except why make mention of it? It's just flesh and blood over a normal 800 series model, right? If it had some weakness or stand-out ability that would make more sense.

"The model 105 acts like a drunk and has a bad leg and hobbles in circles muttering about hallucinations and smells like piss"

Posted by Nim (Member # 205) on :

Sounds like "Ey, buddy? Did you just see a real bright ligtht?".

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Here lies a toppled god,
His fall was not a small one.
We did but build his pedestal,
A narrow and a tall one.

-Tleilaxu Epigram

Posted by Omega (Member # 91) on :

You know, that's not a bad idea, though you may have it backwards. Perhaps the endoskeleton is the model 101. The T-600 would have had the same thing, with a different outer covering, and thus when the upgrade came along, it'd still be designated model 101. Perhaps other models have extra apendages, or are shaped like cows or something.

Posted by Teelie (Member # 280) on :

Yeah, oops. Heh

Anyhow, the different builds could mean people/animals even objects which would make sense.

Posted by Nim (Member # 205) on :

Ol' McGarney walks his cows back.

-Come on now, Rosie. Back into the barn.
-I need you car-keys, an I.D-card and a blanket over me back. NOW! Or I start a stampede.
-huh?
*Cow stands up on back legs, with glowing red eyes*
-It is pointless to resist.

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Here lies a toppled god,
His fall was not a small one.
We did but build his pedestal,
A narrow and a tall one.

-Tleilaxu Epigram

Posted by Teelie (Member # 280) on :

*lol*

I wish someone would make a cgi'd cow do that.

Posted by Free ThoughtCrime America (Member # 480) on :

I seem to remember an interview with James Cameron where he stated that there was a factory that was just spitting out countless terminators that looked exactly the same, thus explaining why the second T-800 could be played by Arnold again.

Personally, I didn't like that idea. After all, wouldn't the humans figure out that the Arnolds were Terminators after the second or third one? (Yep, he's got the bulging biceps and that cheesy accent...blow it away, Jim Bob!) I don't think Cameron thought that out very well.

As for what the time travel thing...While the parallel universe theory holds out (i.e. every failed attempt by the terminators created a new timeline) I always believed that the ending of T2 was trying to say that you could effectively erase the future; that no matter what, it wasn't set. It's an interesting idea, really, because that would mean instead of multiplexing timelines branching out from one another based upon countless differences (such as whether or not suzy bought those leather shoes that day), there was only one timeline. Going back and changing something was as effective as if it had really gone that way the first time...
a second reason I think this way is that IF the original terminator HAD killed Sarah, Skynet would've reaped the victory, because time WOULD have changed in it's favor...if an alternate timeline were created, the skynet that had actually sent the terminator back would STILL be destroyed, because in IT'S timeline John Connor existed to destroy it. I would hazard a guess that Skynet, being very, very intelligent, would have calculated that the future (its present) could be altered safely by killing sarah...no alternate timelines to worry about.

Hmmmm...that was an extremely convoluted paragraph, so If you got that (i'm not sure I did) tell me what you think about it.

On another note: The easiest way to explain a new terminator movie is to simply say that they didn't destroy ALL of the info Cyberdyne had...surely they didn't just have ONE office building. The engineer guy may have destroyed all of HIS work, but it was clear that several other people were working on the project, and they're still alive. And besides, the terminator said that the man most directly responsible for the creation of Skynet was him...but he may have already done enough work to allow the project to continue somewhere else.

Besides, I'd love to see another terminator movie. I saw that thing they did with it at the universal studios theme park, and it kicked ass...so i'm sure they could pull another one off.

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Between the idea and the reality, comes the Shadow

Posted by Vacuum robot lady from Spaceballs (Member # 239) on :

"After all, wouldn't the humans figure out that the Arnolds were Terminators after the second or third one?"

Well, it wouldn't matter. You see an Arnold, and realize it's a Terminator. Then it kills you. It could be as distinctive as Carrottop, and I don't think it would hinder anything but its ability to enter places covertly.

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"...[They've] been so completely dumbed down by the media, by tabloid scumbags, by the Christian "right", by politicians in general, the school, parents who are dumber than their parents were, who are dumber than their parents were, and all of whom think that they can bring up a child just because they got down in bed and had a little sex...well, frankly, here is an audience that knows more and more about less and less as the years go by...We are talking about a constituency...that knows nothing. This is pandemic; terrifyingly, paralyzingly pandemic. They know absolutely nothing."
- Harlan Ellison, on the Media Consumer of today.

Posted by Omega (Member # 91) on :

Something just occured to me. Do you think that the human resistance lives in an underground city called Zion?

Posted by Saltah'na (Member # 33) on :

Terminator IV: What is the Matrix?

It .... has .... possibilities ....

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"My Name is Elmer Fudd, Millionaire. I own a Mansion and a Yacht."
Psychiatrist: "Again."