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Finished viewing the first episode of Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles some moments ago. All in all, I was quite positively surprised - especially as I had been sort of afraid they would ruin the franchise completely and turn it into something ridiculous. (Caution: contains a spoiler!)

Lionshare of the kudos should probably go to David Nutter, who is one of the three executive producers and directed the pilot episode. He’s a seasoned veteran of episodic genre television, whose name first became familiar to me during his stint on The X-Files. Go and take a peek at his resume, and you’ll see what I mean.

Josh Friedman is second of the three executive producers. His credits include the screenplay for Steven Spielberg’s War of the Worlds and Brian De Palma’s The Black Dahlia. He also wrote this pilot episode, which succeeeds in laying down a groundwork for intriguing future episodes. The script contains a number of nods to the original Terminator movies: one character is named “Cameron” (for James Cameron, duh!) and at one point she utters the famous words, “Come with me if you want to live.” In the comments section for my previous post, OlliS commented that the plot “tastes yummy”. I have to agree; it’s positively delish!

(In case you’re wondering about the third executive producer… James Middleton’s previous credits are pretty much limited to associate producing a turd called Basic Instinct 2. I think he’s in this show only because he’s previously worked with Mario Kassar and Andrew G. Vajna.)

On to particulars, then, while trying to avoid spoilers. I thought there was plenty of action for a 50-minute pilot episode. Sure, some of it looked low-budget and there were a couple of amateurish jump cuts (like they hadn’t shot enough coverage), but overall it was a pretty good effort. Performances by Lena Headey (as Sarah Connor) and Thomas Dekker (as John Connor) left some room for improvement, but I didn’t see anything to make me cringe.

(Spoiler ahead!) Then there’s Summer Glau, who played River Tam in Firefly and Serenity. If you saw either of those, you know exactly what to expect from her in this show. Her character, Cameron, is not the familiar vacant-eyed fighter at first, but something happens and… hell, I’ll just say it since you probably guessed or know it already: she’s a Terminator, sent from the future to protect John Connor. And she’s totally River Tam.

As it happens, Cameron is physically the same age as John Connor, and pretty darn cute to boot. Yeah, you’re probably thinking what I’m thinking. Will we be forced to watch while a female robot explores her sensuality with the future leader of the human resistance? Gods, I hope not. That’s exactly the kind of thing that would ruin the show. Well, I’m fairly certain they won’t subject us to that during the first season; that sort of crap tends to crop up in season two or three after the show has jumped the shark.

All in all, I’d rate the pilot 8 out of 10. This show could really endure, as the story is perfect for this format. The main characters are always moving from one place to another, while evil is constantly a single step behind them. There’s a possibility of time travel, past affecting the future, maybe even clues travelling back in time… it’s the motherlode for genre TV. I’m certainly looking forward to more episodes.