The only complete TV season I’ve watched for many a year is season one of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. Due to the writers’ strike, there were only nine shows. I watched them online, on Hulu to be specific. There is of course a lot of online activity around the show: fan sites, petition for there to be a season two, and so on.
There’s also a wiki, which includes a polls page. Here are some of my votes, with some stats that were current around the time I voted.
- Favorite character: Cameron (who’s the clear leader, with 69% of the votes cast).
- Favorite cast member: Summer Glau (74%)
- Favorite episode: Demon Hand (9%). At the time of this writing, it’s still available on Hulu.
“Demon Hand” is the 7th of the 9 that made up the first season. It probably won’t be a surprise that the reason I like “Demon Hand” so much centers on Cameron, and on Summer’s Glau’s performance. Cameron takes dancing lessons, since the gang need to track down the teacher’s brother.
Cameron attempts a pas de chat, which TV Sans Pity tells us means totally graceful spins and ballet shit. Teacher tells Cameron’s that her lower body is fine, but that her upper body is rather mechanical. Sorry, but I just can’t get enough of this sly Terminator humor.
At the end of the show, Cameron is practicing ballet. That is at once another Cameron wants to be human moment, a reason for Derek, who sees her dancing, to wonder if he’s being too suspicious of her, and a good use of Summer’s background as a dancer.
Moving back to a different episode, the best quote of the season came in episode 4: “Heavy Metal.” “If you’re gonna be a hero, you gotta learn how to drive stick,” concerned mother Sarah told John.
Hey, here’s that pas de chat: