The iconic character of Sarah Connor, originally played by Linda
Hamilton, was first introduced through James Cameron’s 1984 film The Terminator and its 1991 sequel Terminator 2: Judgement Day.
The story of The Terminator centered on Sarah being relentlessly
pursued by a human-looking machine known as the T-800 (the titular
“Terminator", played by Arnold Schwarzenegger) that has been sent back in
time to kill her. Seven years later, a sequel, Terminator 2: Judgement Day was released, also directed by
Cameron, which took the story into several new directions.
In the sequel, audiences were taken by surprise when the Terminator
that had been such an effective antagonist in the first film was re-introduced
as one of the heroes. Instead, a new, far more dangerous terminator, the T-1000
(Robert Patrick) appears as the villain, this time sent to kill Sarah’s son
John Connor (Edward Furlong). In order to survive and protect the future, Sarah
must undergo a huge transformation in character. She begins the first movie as
a young college student making a living as a waitress and evolves into a
self-reliant musclebound hardbodied heroine by the end of the sequel.
At first Sarah Connor is a friendly individual who lives with her
college roommate Ginger. She has no immediate aspirations in her life and is
struggling to find some form of meaning. Her helplessness is made clear when
she encounters what she believes to be a stalker (actually Kyle Reese, played
by Michael Biehn, who has been sent from the future to protect her from the
Terminator) and immediately calls the police. When she first encounters the
T-800 at the nightclub Technoir, she can only stare helplessly as it aims its
laser-sighted pistol towards her forehead.
Sarah only survives this encounter due to Kyle’s interference.
Much of the rest of the movie centers on the two of them running away from the
T-800, and Sarah is constantly looking for protection. During this time, Sarah
is forced to become more self-reliant as everybody she depends on is killed.
Even after she stops, faces, and destroys the Terminator, she is still shown to
be in a panicked state of mind. While Sarah may be unsettled by her experiences
with the Terminator, this final confrontation begins a major shift in her
personality which is developed much further in Terminator 2: Judgement Day.
In the second film, Sarah becomes something more closely
resembling a middle-ground between the wise-guy action heroes of the 90’s, such
John McClane in Die Hard,
and the hardbodied action heroes of the 80's such as Sylvester Stallone in Rambo: First Blood Part II.
This becomes evident during the climax in which Sarah is shot in the leg and
later impaled through the shoulder. Much like the wise-guy heroes of the 90’s
she does manage to show pain. She cries out as the T-1000 slowly runs a massive
rod through her shoulder and she is visibly limping afterwards (she had also
been shot shortly before that).
What puts her on a level with the hardbodied heroes is that the
despite the obvious agony of her wounds, she keeps getting up and fighting.
Even during that scene where she is impaled, Sarah never gives into the
T-1000's simple demand: "Call John". Linda Hamilton’s co-star Arnold
Schwarzenegger, known for playing hardbodied heroes and in this case a literal example, actually endures far more
physical harm than Sarah. She gets hurt, but The T-800 gets an arm ripped off,
loses an eye, and is temporarily shut down before finally being lowered into a
vat of molten steel. This makes Sarah Connor more of a hardbodied hero than the literal hardbodied hero.
In Terminator 2 Sarah’s body is used as a far greater
spectacle than that of the T-800. One notable aspect of the hardbodied action
heroes of the 1980’s was their muscular display. Stallone made this image famous
with the Rambo films and Schwarzenegger
himself has done this numerous times in his earlier action films like Commando.
It's a trademark of the genre for the lead male actor to have few clothes
on by the end in order to allow them to display their impressive muscular body,
but that is not quite what happens in Terminator
2.
Instead, Schwarzenegger spends most of the film with shirts and
jackets and much of the bodily spectacle focuses on the abuse he takes rather
than on his muscles. By contrast, the majority of Sarah’s wardrobe throughout
the film wholly exposes her muscles and puts them on display for the viewer.
This also deviates from her wardrobe in The
Terminator, where the more conservatively dressed Sarah Connor was less
exposed. Muscular display has traditionally been associated with men, which
makes Sarah’s character appear more visually striking.
In a similar vain to the hardbodied action films of the 80’s and
even the urban vigilante films of the 70’s such as Dirty Harry, weapons are heavily
romanticized in both Terminator films.
In The Terminator,
numerous characters are equipped with large guns, particularly the T-800 and
Kyle Reese, whose weapons become an extension of their character. At the same
time, Sarah never holds onto a gun until the final scene in The Terminator, where her
handling a revolver is used as a visual indication of her growth as a
character. By the start of Terminator
2: Judgement Day, Sarah is far more comfortable around firearms, to the
point where she has an entire cache containing a huge array of weapons. This
leads to a development where Sarah herself starts to become more like the
Terminator she had previously fled.
The parallels between Sarah and the T-800 as seen in the first
film become especially clear in one scene of Terminator
2: Judgement Day. This scene happens right after Sarah has learned of the
work of Miles Dyson (Joe Morton), whose programs later ultimately led to the
creation of Skynet and, though indirectly, both the T-800 and T-1000. She
decides to kill him in an effort to prevent the apocalyptic future from being
realized. The scene begins with Miles in his home working on a program when a
red dot appears on his back, quickly calling to mind the T-800 aiming its
laser-sighted pistol at Sarah Connor’s forehead in The Terminator.
Unlike Sarah, Dyson is not aware of her presence nor is there
anyone to save him. A close-up reveals Sarah outside the house, coldly looking
through the scope of an assault rifle, and her finger wrapping around the
trigger. In another close-up, Miles bends down after his son accidentally
drives a remote-controlled monster truck into his foot, just as Sarah fires.
The next close-up shows Miles sitting up in shock and staring out his window.
Miles’ reaction is followed by another close-up of Sarah, but this time with
the camera almost facing her directly—literally staring down the barrel of her
gun. When she begins firing she only stops once, in order to reload, before she
runs out of ammunition.
When she is finally forced to discard her weapon, Sarah proceeds
to draw a pistol and walk just as coldly towards the house. Miles stands, and
she immediately begins to fire on him. She shoots three rounds before finally
hitting him in the shoulder. What distinguishes her from the T-800 is that she
still shows her humanity when she breaks down after confronting him directly,
creating a parallel to the way in which the previously emotionless T-800 is now
being humanized. This scene shows her full capability, but also emphasizes that
she is not completely transformed by her experiences.
Having men attempt to protect Sarah is crucial to emphasizing the
transition in her growth as a character. All three of the men who attempt to
protect Sarah Connor (Kyle and two police officers) die over the course of the
first movie. The establishment of law enforcement’s futility against the T-800
eliminates its status as a source of protection leaving Sarah Connor with no
one to turn to except Kyle. The transition continues as Kyle is wounded while
escaping from the Terminator. This forces Sarah to take on a more active role.
Finally, Kyle’s death puts Sarah into a position where she has to rely
exclusively on herself to survive by seizing an opportunity to crush the
Terminator with a hydraulic press.
A similar situation also occurs in Terminator 2: Judgement Day.
During the climax, the T-800 is temporarily disabled by the T-1000, putting
Sarah into a position where she is unable to rely on its assistance. When the
T-1000 threatens her son, Sarah is able to save John’s life. Similar to how
Kyle saved her in The Terminator, Sarah manages to stall the T-1000 by shooting
it multiple times with a shotgun. This fails to kill the T-1000, but does save
her son’s life and puts the T-1000 into a vulnerable position. While it is not
Sarah herself who ultimately destroys the T-1000, this particular action
manages to buy time for the T-800 to reactivate and take the other terminator
by surprise.
Sarah Connor goes through a very clear shift in personality over
the course of both The
Terminator and Terminator 2: Judgement Day,
going from a passive woman with everyday problems to an action heroine
determined to avert the potential end of humanity. This is emphasized by a wide
range of elements including her treatment of guns, her general appearance, her
attitudes, and the role of the male characters. Across both films, Sarah
develops into a more “masculine” figure reminiscent of the types of heroes
traditionally played by men. While The
Terminator and Terminator 2: Judgement Day were not the only action films of
the period to introduce a strong-willed heroine in a leading role (The The
Terminator was released
between Alien and Aliens, the latter also by
Cameron) they helped to popularize it and create a path for later action
heroines.
She is a classic action hero (heroine) and one who grows from an innocent to a protector. One of the few women in film to do this and not be just a sex symbol in tight outfits (Hally Berry)
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