How to Sequel Like James Cameron: TERMINATOR 2
ALIENS is brilliant, but let's break down the superior cinematic achievement that is JUDGMENT DAY
One of the most common refrains you will hear when pitching on a Hollywood sequel or reboot or even just a good old-fashioned adaptation of a good old-fashioned (but tired) piece of intellectual property is: “We’re looking for more of the same…but different.” In other words, “We want to give audiences exactly what they expect from this film but in a completely different way that will surprise them, thrill them, or, really, just make them feel less like we had completely run out of ideas…which we have…so what have you got?” And there is no greater master at delivering this to studios and audiences than James Cameron - which is why we’re going to be taking a look at THE TERMINATOR and TERMINATOR 2: JUDGMENT DAY to demonstrate how the filmmaker sequels better than anyone else in the game.
In 1986 and then, again, in 1991, Cameron helmed two of the greatest sequels ever made: ALIENS and TERMINATOR 2: JUDGMENT DAY respectively. Both successfully delivered audiences “more of the same, but different” in spades, establishing themselves as wholly distinct from their originals while also building on the originals’ stories in exciting, unexpected, and dramatically moving ways.
But in the case of TERMINATOR 2 — which I would argue is the superior sequel of the two — Cameron goes one step beyond simply reproducing and building upon a sense of what worked the first time around in 1984’s THE TERMINATOR. Instead, he almost perfectly recreates the original’s structure, right down to echoing numerous lines of dialogue and images - and I don’t just mean “I’ll be back.”
In doing so, the filmmaker accomplishes the mission he undertook (more of the same, but different), uses the film’s structure to actually dramatize its thematic debate about free will versus fate, and, perhaps most spectacularly, shows how the act of making a sequel can be just as much of an artistic statement as the content of the film itself.
Next, I’m going to break down the first two TERMINATOR films — both directed and co-written by Cameron — to compare, contrast, and show how he accomplished this triple feat.
THE TERMINATOR
THE TERMINATOR was co-written by James Cameron and producer Gale Anne Hurd. It stars Arnold Schwarzenegger as a T-800, a cyborg “terminator” from the year 2029 sent back to 1984 to kill one Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton). Sarah’s future son John Connor is humankind’s last hope against the artificial intelligence known as Skynet that has wiped out most of the human population. Kyle Reese (Michael Biehn) is sent back in time by John to protect Sarah, thereby ensuring John will one day be born and help retake Earth from “the machines”.
From this description, you would assume THE TERMINATOR is an action film, but it’s a science-fiction horror film to the core. Specifically, it’s a slasher flick. Think of the Terminator as a cybernetic Michael Meyer, silent, unstoppable, capable of mass murder without emotions. Cameron even shoots the film far more like a smaller, lower-budget, say, John Carpenter film than the increasingly slicker and bigger films of his that would follow including TERMINATOR 2: JUDGMENT DAY.
What this means in practice is: there are plenty of jump scares, horny twentysomethings who get mutilated, and gleeful gross-outs and body horror. To tie it all together, there’s an unsettling synthesizer score by Brad Fiedel that also feels like it belongs to the slasher genre.
Now, let’s look at the film’s structure because, as I’ll show when I get to TERMINATOR 2: JUDGMENT DAY, the sequel uses a nearly identical one on purpose. The same breathless three-night/two-day story is, you might say, repeating itself beat by beat (with a few exceptions)…but different.
A title card and brief futuristic sequence introduce us to a post-apocalyptic world of machines where human beings appear to be fighting for their survival. The year is 2029.
From the future, we cut from killer machines to hydraulic arms lowering like mechanical fists. These belong to a garbage truck. It’s 1984 now, a title card tells us, 1:52 a.m. This is one of many tricks Cameron plays in this film, constantly playing with the audience to confuse its expectations and cleverly inject moments of levity into the proceedings. It tells the audience it’s in the hands of someone it can trust; just sit back and enjoy the ride wherever he takes you.
Then, a giant naked muscle head appears in a sphere of crackling blue electricity. If you’re watching this for the first time, you have no idea Arnold Schwarzenegger is playing a cyborg or a murderous monster here. A moment later, he encounters three young punks (one of which is a young Bill Paxton) and demands their clothes. One of them stabs him in the gut, but he doesn’t even flinch. He then drives his fist through one of the punk’s chests. This is how the naked muscle head gets his cool leather jacket and edgy killer look.
Next, we meet Kyle Reese (note that the “good guy” shows up second here, in pursuit you might say). He appears in another sphere of electricity, except he’s half the size of Schwarzenegger – who we’ll just call the Terminator at this point, because we know what he is even if 1984 audiences didn’t yet – and his body is covered in countless scars. These scars tell us two things. One, Reese has seen a lot of action. Two, he can be harmed, unlike the Terminator. Reese goes on to steal clothes from a homeless person and run from the cops rather than kill him, letting us know he’s an unsexy hero and, oh yeah, he’s the actual hero (or else he would’ve just killed those cops with the same lack of concern the Terminator demonstrated when he squeezed Bill Paxton’s heart like a stress ball).
Reese then turns to the Yellow Pages for a name…Sarah Connor. We still don’t know what he’s here for, remember, but we now know it involves this person - which makes this our inciting incident, the event that sets our characters in motion and lets our audience know what’s at stake (even if they don’t understand the stakes fully yet).
Now it’s time to meet Sarah, our heroine. She’s a diner waitress, all soft-faced and stylish, with big hair and an enthusiasm for life. Ah, to be young and alive in the eighties. The poor thing has no idea what’s coming her way.
The Terminator hunts down two other Sarah Connors until he finds the right one hanging out alone at a club – which is when Reese pops up. Sarah sees his shotgun first, assuming he’s there to kill her. But no, the twist (at least for her) is he’s her savior. “Come with me if you want to live,” he tells her. This is our Act 1 turn - our heroes, Sarah and Reese, are now united.
Note: THE TERMINATOR is unusually constructed in some ways and one is that it’s first act is very long (like it’s sequel); it ends roughly 35 minutes into the film. Not that you care about any of that as you watch it; it’s a lean, mean story that only periodically lets up long enough for you to catch your breath.
Next comes the rules, a period in THE TERMINATOR and its sequel in which our heroes bond while discussing the rules they — and the audience — need to understand for the rest of the film to make sense. In the first of two such rules scenes, Reese tells Sarah she’s been targeted for “termination.” This confuses Sarah, who insists she didn’t do anything. “You will,” he says flatly. He tells her he comes from “one possible future, from [her] point of view. I don’t know tech stuff.”
Note how fantastic this one line is – “I don’t know tech stuff.” He’s presented rules, but Cameron leaves enough narrative flexibility for future reinterpretation. Plus, the filmmaker avoids boring audience’s with too many words in what has so far virtually been a silent film (no, really; this “rules” section involves more dialogue than the whole of the film up until this point).
At the midpoint, Sarah and Reese are apprehended by the police. Reese is arrested and Sarah is questioned by cops who don’t believe her fantastical story and even make her wonder if she’s insane. Then, the Terminator arrives. The desk officer tells him he can’t see Sarah, and the Terminator replies – iconically now – “I’ll be back.” When he returns, he kills almost everyone in the station except Sarah and Reese, who narrowly escape.
Note: This massacre is arguably THE TERMINATOR’s low point, but it comes very early in the film to typically referred to as such. For structure sticklers, the Act 2 turn would usually follow this low point within a few scenes, but in THE TERMINATOR a whole series of them follow - including a flashback…er…forward?
While hiding out in a hotel room, Reese describes what life is like in the future. This involves revealing that he carried a photo of Sarah with him that her son John gave him, kept in his coat sleeve like soldiers kept photos of their sweethearts with them in Vietnam – a war Cameron lived through. “I came across time for you, Sarah. I love you. I always have.” Obviously, Sarah has to sleep with Reese after that amazing line…which she does, even though he admitted to never having been with a woman before only moments earlier. I’d criticize the guy’s game, but, like I said, it works.
Note: This is a reversal of a slasher flick rule in which “sluts die” for giving it up. By taking Reese’s virginity, Sarah actually ensures that he’ll die by the end of the film…which, of course, he does.
The Terminator shows up at the Act 2 turn. Sarah and Reese flee in a thrilling highway chase that culminates with a crash and explosion outside an industrial complex. The Terminator’s flesh is burned away, and it — no longer a he — rises from the flames to stalk after its prey.
Reese, Sarah’s protector, dies - blowing up the Terminator as he goes, fulfilling the promise that “sluts die” in slasher flicks.
Note: I call Reese Sarah’s protector here because that was the role assigned to him, but there’s another role that Reese plays here I don’t think gets enough attention (it will be echoed in the sequel, as I’ll explain). Yes, Reese saves Sarah’s life many times, which you could say makes him the damsel in distress. But dying is what the female love interest typically does in action films to transform the male hero. It’s a tired, arguably misogynistic trope. Here, the male love interest dies to transform the female hero. This is because Cameron — who has written some of the most iconic female action heroes of all time — likes his heroines forged in violence (heroines are forged in violence in slasher flicks, too, remember - which, as I explained, THE TERMINATOR is).
Sarah, injured, fights a maimed Terminator alone. But hey, good news, she’s triumphant. The Terminator crawls across a grated floor, after her, unwittingly into a metal press where she crushes him - leaving behind only a skeletal forearm and hand.
In the final scene, we find Sarah completely transformed. She looks harder, somehow even sharper, and wears a Rambo-like headband that says she’s either ready to disco or kick ass. A kid takes her picture with a Polaroid camera, and the photo it produces turns out to be the one Reese carried with him in the future. More importantly, she’s pregnant – meaning Reese fathered John Connor, future savior of humankind. Another way to look at this, of course, is that John Connor sent his father back in time not so much to stop the Terminator as to knock up his mother and then die. Was this always fated to happen, or were these all decisions human beings made for themselves? Sarah seems to think so. The film ends with her determined to prepare her son for what’s coming his way.
TERMINATOR 2: JUDGMENT DAY
Still here? Because if you thought that summary was epic, I’m only getting started.