50 Fun Facts About Terminator

James Cameron got the idea for The Terminator from a fever dream while promoting which film?

Piranha II: The Spawning was the film that had Cameron in Rome when, sick with a fever, he dreamed of a metal skeleton dragging itself from an explosion, the image that became the Terminator.

Which studio distributed The Terminator in 1984?

Orion Pictures released The Terminator in October 1984 with modest expectations and little marketing push, yet it opened at number one and topped the US box office for two weeks.

Roughly how much did The Terminator cost to make?

Made for about $6.4 million, The Terminator grossed roughly $78.3 million worldwide, more than twelve times its budget, and launched Cameron's career.

Which football star did Orion suggest for the Terminator, only for Cameron to find him unbelievable as a killer?

O. J. Simpson was Orion's suggestion for the Terminator, but Cameron thought the genial running back would never be believable as a killer; Schwarzenegger had been approached to play Reese instead.

Which actor showed up to a pitch meeting dressed as the Terminator to help Cameron sell the film?

Lance Henriksen kicked open the door of the Hemdale office in character, foil on his teeth and cuts on his face; he ended up as detective Hal Vukovich and later Cameron's Bishop in Aliens.

At which motel do Sarah and Reese hide and build pipe bombs in The Terminator?

Tiki Motel is where Sarah and Reese hole up and build pipe bombs; the Terminator finds them after intercepting Sarah's phone call to her mother's house.

Who plays Kyle Reese, the soldier sent back to protect Sarah Connor, in The Terminator?

Michael Biehn plays Kyle Reese and became a Cameron regular, going on to play Corporal Hicks in Aliens and Lieutenant Coffey in The Abyss.

What is Sarah Connor's job when we first meet her in the 1984 film?

Diner waitress is Sarah's job when the film opens: she works a shift at Big Jeff's family restaurant, where a kid drops ice cream in her apron pocket, before learning other Sarah Connors are being killed.

What is the name of the nightclub where Reese first fires on the Terminator?

Tech Noir is the club where Reese first opens fire; the name was later borrowed by critics for the blend of film noir and science fiction that Blade Runner and The Terminator typify.

Harlan Ellison threatened to sue over The Terminator, claiming it borrowed from his episode of which anthology series?

The Outer Limits episodes 'Soldier' and 'Demon with a Glass Hand' were Ellison's claim; Orion settled out of court and added an acknowledgment credit to later prints, over Cameron's objections.

Who composed the synthesizer score for The Terminator, including its pounding main theme?

Brad Fiedel wrote the synth score, which he described as being about 'a mechanical man and his heartbeat', and he returned for Terminator 2 and True Lies.

The Terminator's main theme is written in which unusual time signature?

The theme runs in 13/16 because the composer's finger rushed while triggering a loop on his Prophet-10 synth; he liked the herky-jerky propulsion and kept it without ever writing notation.

In what year was The Terminator added to the US National Film Registry?

The Terminator was added to the National Film Registry in 2008 as 'culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant'; the Library of Congress added its sequel in 2023.

How was most of Schwarzenegger's Terminator 2 salary paid, to ease the studio's cash crunch?

With a Gulfstream III jet is how Carolco covered most of his fee: the cash-strapped studio financed the aircraft rather than pay the sum outright, at a time when it was already being blamed for inflating star salaries.

Who played the liquid-metal T-1000 in Terminator 2?

Robert Patrick was cast as a lean, fast contrast to the muscular T-800; he reprised the T-1000 for a gag cameo in Wayne's World, asking Wayne 'Have you seen this boy?'

Which rock star was considered for the T-1000 before a motorcycle accident ruled him out?

Billy Idol was Cameron's early pick for the T-1000, but a February 1990 motorcycle crash in Hollywood badly injured his leg, ruling him out of a role built on relentless running.

Where was Edward Furlong discovered before being cast as young John Connor in Terminator 2?

A Boys & Girls Club in Pasadena is where casting director Mali Finn spotted Furlong, who had never acted; he went on to win a Saturn Award and an MTV Movie Award for the role.

How many Academy Awards did Terminator 2: Judgment Day win?

Four Oscars went to Terminator 2: Makeup, Sound, Sound Effects Editing and Visual Effects; it was nominated for six, missing out on Cinematography and Film Editing.

Which band's song 'You Could Be Mine' was used as the theme song for Terminator 2?

Guns N' Roses supplied 'You Could Be Mine', which plays in the film and in a video cut with footage of the T-800; the song came from the album Use Your Illusion II.

Which effects house created the liquid-metal T-1000 for Terminator 2?

Industrial Light & Magic built the T-1000's liquid-metal morphing effects under Dennis Muren; the work ran over schedule and is credited with pushing Hollywood from practical effects toward computer imagery.

Who doubled for Linda Hamilton in the Terminator 2 scenes where two Sarah Connors appear at once?

Her identical twin sister, Leslie Hamilton Gearren, stood in so that two Sarahs could share a shot in the steel mill; twins Don and Dan Stanton pulled the same trick for the hospital guard.

Which detail of the T-800's death scene in Terminator 2 was added during filming?

The thumbs-up as the T-800 sinks into the molten steel was not in the script; Cameron added it on set, and it became the film's signature farewell image.

According to Terminator 2, at what exact time does Skynet become self-aware on August 29, 1997?

2:14 a.m. EDT on August 29 is the moment the T-800 gives: the system had gone online on August 4, began learning at a geometric rate, and fought back when humans tried to pull the plug.

Who plays Miles Dyson, the engineer whose work will lead to Skynet, in Terminator 2?

Joe Morton plays Miles Dyson, the Cyberdyne engineer who reverse-engineered his breakthrough from the CPU and arm of the 1984 Terminator; Morton later starred as Rowan Pope in Scandal.

The T2 3-D: Battle Across Time attraction, directed by Cameron, first opened at which park in 1996?

Universal Studios Florida opened the show in April 1996, three years before the Hollywood park got it; its 12-minute 3D film reunited the 1991 film's lead actors in their original roles.

Who directed Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, the first entry made without James Cameron?

Jonathan Mostow, who had made Breakdown and U-571, directed the 2003 film; Cameron passed on it, and its budget of about $187 million included roughly $30 million for Schwarzenegger.

Who plays the T-X, the 'Terminatrix', in Terminator 3?

Kristanna Loken plays the T-X, a shape-shifting Terminator with a liquid-metal skin over an endoskeleton; she went on to play Rayne in Uwe Boll's BloodRayne.

Which actor took over as John Connor in Terminator 3?

Nick Stahl took over as John Connor after Edward Furlong was not brought back; Claire Danes plays Kate Brewster, the future wife the reprogrammed T-850 is sent to protect.

What is the grim twist at the end of Terminator 3?

Judgment Day happens anyway, that very day: the T-850 reveals that the events of 1997 only postponed the attack, and John and Kate are sealed inside Crystal Peak as the missiles launch.

In what year is Terminator Salvation set?

Terminator Salvation takes place in 2018, the first film set entirely after Judgment Day; Schwarzenegger appears only as a digital likeness laid over a body double.

Who directed Terminator Salvation, the 2009 film set during the future war?

McG, born Joseph McGinty Nichol and known for the Charlie's Angels films, directed Salvation and cast Christian Bale as John Connor.

Which actor plays Marcus Wright, the death-row inmate who wakes up as a cyborg in Terminator Salvation?

Sam Worthington plays Marcus Wright, the executed convict who wakes during the future war unaware he is a cyborg; he had just been cast as Jake Sully in Cameron's Avatar.

Which Game of Thrones actress plays Sarah Connor in Terminator Genisys?

Emilia Clarke, Daenerys on Game of Thrones, plays Sarah; director Alan Taylor also came from the show, and Jason Clarke, no relation, plays her grown son John.

In Terminator Genisys, John Connor is transformed into what kind of Terminator?

The T-3000 is a human converted at the cellular level into a swarm of nanomachines; a second trailer notoriously revealed the John Connor twist months before release.

What does the young Sarah Connor call the reprogrammed T-800 that raised her in Terminator Genisys?

Pops is Sarah's name for the T-800 that an unknown party sent to 1973 to protect her after a T-1000 killed her parents when she was nine.

Who directed Terminator: Dark Fate after leaving Deadpool 2?

Tim Miller, who had directed the first Deadpool and left its sequel over creative differences, made Dark Fate with Cameron back as producer; the story ignores the third, fourth and fifth films.

In Terminator: Dark Fate, which AI replaces Skynet as humanity's destroyer?

Legion, an AI built for cyberwarfare, takes Skynet's place as the machine that turned on humanity; Dark Fate is a direct sequel to Terminator 2, set 25 years later.

What name has Schwarzenegger's Terminator adopted while living quietly with a human family in Dark Fate?

Carl is the name the T-800 uses while running a drapery business in Texas with a human family; with no Skynet to give it orders it developed a conscience and began tipping Sarah off to time-displacement events.

Who plays Grace, the augmented soldier sent to protect Dani Ramos in Dark Fate?

Mackenzie Davis plays Grace, a cybernetically enhanced soldier sent from the future to protect Dani Ramos, played by Natalia Reyes, from the shape-shifting Rev-9.

On which network did Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles air for its 31 episodes?

Fox aired the series for two seasons, ending in April 2009, and cancelled it despite a fan campaign; the 2007-08 writers' strike cut the first season to nine episodes.

Who plays Sarah Connor in The Sarah Connor Chronicles?

Lena Headey, who had just played Queen Gorgo in 300, took the role; she went on to play Cersei Lannister in Game of Thrones.

Summer Glau, the protective Terminator in The Sarah Connor Chronicles, was best known for which Firefly role?

River Tam, the psychic fugitive of Joss Whedon's Firefly and its film Serenity, was Glau's breakout role before she played Cameron the Terminator in the Chronicles.

Which rock singer made her acting debut as the T-1001 Catherine Weaver in The Sarah Connor Chronicles?

Shirley Manson of Garbage plays Catherine Weaver, the T-1001 posing as CEO of ZeiraCorp, which buys the chess computer called the Turk that may become Skynet.

The Netflix anime Terminator Zero is set in 1997 in which city?

Tokyo in 1997 is the setting: scientist Malcolm Lee is building an AI called Kokoro to rival Skynet, and the eight-episode series premiered on August 29, 2024, Judgment Day itself.

Skynet was originally built by Cyberdyne Systems for which military body, according to the first film?

SAC-NORAD is the body Reese names: Cyberdyne Systems built a defense network computer for it that became Skynet, gained intelligence and launched a nuclear war.

For how much did James Cameron sell his Terminator rights to Gale Anne Hurd before directing the first film?

$1 was the price, on the condition that Hurd would produce the film only with Cameron as director, which locked in the unproven filmmaker's job before any studio could replace him.

Which company published the first Terminator video game, a 1991 MS-DOS title?

Bethesda Softworks signed a licence with Hemdale in 1990 and released The Terminator for MS-DOS in 1991, long before the studio became known for The Elder Scrolls and Fallout.

Midway's 1991 arcade game Terminator 2: Judgment Day was what kind of game?

A light gun shooter with mounted machine-gun controllers, the Midway cabinet put players in a future-war firefight; its Super NES port supported the Super Scope and the SNES Mouse instead.

What does the real Japanese robotics company Cyberdyne sell?

A powered exoskeleton suit called HAL, for Hybrid Assistive Limb, is the flagship product of the Tsukuba company founded in 2004 by Professor Yoshiyuki Sankai.

Terminator producer Gale Anne Hurd, who began as Roger Corman's assistant, later became an executive producer of which long-running TV series?

The Walking Dead had Hurd as an executive producer from its 2010 debut; she also produced Aliens, The Abyss and Armageddon, and was married to Cameron from 1985 to 1989.