Netflix’s Terminator show with record Rotten Tomatoes score confirmed a hard truth about the sci-fi franchise

Warning: Spoilers ahead for Terminator Zero.

Terminator Zero has the best Rotten Tomatoes score for the franchise since Terminator 2: Judgment Daywhich, in addition to The Sarah Connor Chroniclesconfirms that Terminator It’s better on TV. Terminator is unfortunately one of the franchises with the most disappointing films than the good ones. As innovative as The Terminator and Judgment Day were, it’s impossible to deny that every other film that came after missed the mark on some level. Starting with Terminator 3: Rise of the Machinesthe Terminator the films never managed to recapture what made the first two films so great.

On the one hand, it can be argued that Terminator Shouldn’t have become a franchise and it didn’t need multiple sequels and prequels. On the other hand, Terminator 2 proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that it was possible to take the concepts from the first film and expand them into something even cooler. There is room for more Terminator stories, but the approaches chosen by films like Terminator: Salvation and Terminator: Genesis They weren’t what the saga needed. While James Cameron apparently worked Terminator 7 It’s exciting, the future of the franchise should be on TV.

Terminator Zero confirms that Terminator could be better on TV

The Terminator anime was much better than the previous films

Terminator Zero has an 86% critic score on Rotten Tomatoes, the highest ever for a Terminator project from T2. Terminator Zerothe reception is much better than that of films released later T2most of which have a “rotten” score on the famous review aggregator. The most well received Terminator film since T2 was Terminator: Dark Fatewhich has 70% critics and 82% audience. The fact that Terminator Zero received much better reviews than its predecessorsparticularly Salvation and Genesisconfirm that taking Terminator Returning to television was the right decision.

THE Terminator franchise made the jump to television for the first time in 2006 with The Sarah Connor Chronicles. Set later T2 but disregarding the events of Rise of the Machines, The Sarah Connor Chronicles worked as expected Terminator 2 sequel that never happened on the big screen. While Terminator Zero and The Sarah Connor Chronicles are very different shows – one is anime and the other is a live-action procedural, after all – both highlight how well the Terminator universe fits on TV. Despite the scale of the Terminator universe, it welcomes “smaller” stories surprisingly well.

Terminator ZeroThe anime format meant he didn’t have to worry about what he could or couldn’t produce visually. Still, the action sequences and cool visuals were only part of the reason why Terminator Zero it was so good. The Netflix anime didn’t completely ignore nostalgia, but still brought something new to the franchise by combining classics Terminator tropes with new ideas. Terminator ZeroThe cast was made up of original characters, rather than bringing back the likes of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s T-800 or another version of John Connor.

Not coincidentally the best Terminator projects since T2 were TV shows

The Sarah Connor Chronicles and Terminator Zero got a lot right

Big-budget films associated with a famous IP have certain expectations to meet that can make it difficult for them to be a truly new and exciting story. Given the popularity of Terminator it’s the movies, it’s no surprise that each sequel ends up bringing back at least a few characters or concepts from previous entries. For example, the T-800 and its many variations have so far appeared in all Terminator film. In the same way, John Connor was in all Terminator film since T2while Sarah Connor got it wrong Terminator 3 and Salvation but was included in Genesis and Dark Fate.

TV shows don’t have to deal with these same expectations, which often gives them more creative freedom compared to a blockbuster movie. The Sarah Connor Chronicles had a significant budget for a TV showbut it was a smaller project compared to the films. This means that although the first Terminator the show didn’t necessarily have the resources to have a scene like the T-1000 melting down and putting itself back together every episode, it had enough time to tell a fun story Terminator history.

Terminator Zero had even fewer restrictions than The Sarah Connor Chronicles considering it was lively. Additionally, Terminator ZeroThe timeline has moved just far enough away from that of the films, establishing that each change to the past essentially creates a new version of history. While Terminator Zero never mentioned John Connor, this implies that Skynet and humanity are in a loop involving time travel. This allowed the series to tell its own story without worrying about how it fit into the larger context. Terminator canon.

Terminator Zero deserves a better fate than the Sarah Connor Chronicles

The Sarah Connor Chronicles was canceled too soon

Terminator ZeroThe ending is quite self-contained, but leaves the door open for the story to continue. In the same way as the first Terminator film, the Netflix anime ends with the message that the future has not yet been written and can always be changed. Kokoro saved Japan from Judgment Daybut the destiny of humanity remains open. Malcolm Lee is dead, but his children – and their mother from the future – will now have to survive in the middle of a war involving Skynet, Kokoro and humanity. There are more than enough ingredients to Terminator Zero 2nd season to work on.

Sadly, The Sarah Connor Chronicles was canceled after just two seasons. The show never got a proper ending and it could have led to a lot of great stories that unfortunately never came to pass. Hopefully, Terminator Zero will have better luck than the first TV show in the franchise. While the anime series worked great as a standalone story, it would be a shame not to revisit this version of the anime. Terminator universe with a second season. Terminator has a complicated history with sequelsbut I’m confident that Terminator Zero season two would be great.

There should be more Terminator TV shows after the Netflix anime

Terminator works on the small screen

Terminator Zero should be just one of many Terminator TV projects. Even though the theatrical films remain the most important part of the franchise, with new episodes arriving every few years, the Terminator universe is big enough to receive stories like Terminator Zero on television. The Sarah Connor Chronicles emerged in a very different TV landscape than we have todayand it may have been too ambitious for an early 2000s show. However, virtually every major film franchise has now partially branched out to TV, from Marvel and DC to Star Wars.

A big-budget live action Terminator Showcasing echoing projects like The Mandalorian or Andor would be incredibly exciting. The first Terminator the film was practically a horror and not a science fiction epic, which means that Terminator it doesn’t need multiple sets and innovative VFX shots in every scene to work. Hopefully, Terminator ZeroThe strong reception will lead to not only a second season, but also more Terminator television projects.