We’re only up to 1991 in our “Terminator” flashback series, and those TDE (time displacement equipment) platforms in the Future War are already getting mighty crowded. The same month “T2” came out (July 1991), Dark Horse sent more folks into the time bubble in “One Shot,” which is the actual title of this 51-page one-shot comic for reasons that will become clear.
Matt Wagner’s stylized, many-paneled art is a departure from the dynamic style seen in “Tempest,” but I can go with it for one issue. James Robinson weaves a decent noir yarn about a woman named Sarah (Lang) Connor, who schemes to kill her doting new husband, Michael Connor, for his riches. Due to the happenstance of now being named Sarah Connor, fate throws a monkey wrench into her plan.
CHARACTERS
John Connor: Not born yet during the time of this story – although in one panel, Michael Connor becomes John Connor due to a typo.
Sarah Connor: Busy with problems of her own (the events of the 1984 movie) during the time of this story.
Kyle Reese: Busy with problems of his own (the events of the 1984 movie) during the time of this story.
Sarah (Lang) Connor: The target of the “first” T-800. This Sarah is unfortunate but not sympathetic, as she had planned to murder her husband, Michael, before becoming a target herself.
Ellis Ruggles: This retired Los Angeles police officer is sent back from the Future War to 1955 by John Connor as a safety valve in case Skynet ever tried to kill previous generations in John’s lineage. He has “one shot” to take out the T-800 with a “fazer” he assembled from circuitry he smuggled through the time bubble (“… inserted within me. I won’t be specific, but it was damn uncomfortable.”).
Corporal Graves: John sends this man to 1965 as another safety valve. But he is killed immediately by onrushing traffic. A freeway had been built in the spot of the time-displacement bubble in the time since Ruggles’ emergence.
TERMINATORS
The “first” T-800: Red-haired and muscular, she was transported by Skynet just before it transported the Arnold T-800 in the first movie, presumably to slightly earlier time as the two Terminators didn’t emerge on top of each other.
CONTINUITY
“One Shot” is a side-story to the first movie, taking place simultaneously in 1984, but up the coast in San Francisco. As the Arnold T-800 blows away two Sarah Connors tracks the Sarah we know and love, the female T-800 pursues a fourth Sarah Connor who isn’t listed in the Los Angeles phone book because she had recently acquired the name through marriage. Retired cop Ruggles goes after this T-800.
In the prologue, Robinson revisits the TDE facility seen in “All My Future’s Past” and adds the element of the female T-800 being sent back by Skynet just before the resistance arrived and saw the Arnold model being transported.
Robinson calls the TDE facility Skynet’s “Master Control,” keeping with the terminology of “Tempest.” In the Now Comics, it is just generically known as a Skynet fortress where the time-displacement platforms were located. I like Dark Horse’s stronger terminology, although this L.A.-based Master Control shouldn’t be confused with Skynet’s worldwide headquarters in the Rocky Mountains.
TIME TRAVEL
In “One Shot,” we learn about three new instances of time travel, starting with the female T-800. We also learn that John sent back Ruggles to 1955 and Graves to 1965. Robinson does not tell when or from what TDE facility John transports Ruggles and Graves. The fact that the soldiers emerged in a spot that became a freeway after 1955 and before 1965 suggests it is in a different location than the TDEs chronicled in the movies and “Tempest.” All of those time bubbles materialized in parking lots, back alleys or side streets.
I’m getting uncomfortable with how casually “Terminator’s” storytellers are starting to treat time travel. While Skynet built the TDEs, it seems like the resistance can access and operate them just as easily.
Indeed, if you make a tally from the stories so far, the resistance has used TDEs more than Skynet has. At least the previous comics and movie novelizations chronicled the resistance’s costly military missions to access the TDEs (although “T2” conveniently piggybacked onto the first movie). “One Shot” doesn’t even bother to chronicle the TDE mission that sent back Ruggles and Graves.
If you’re keeping score at home, so far we’ve learned about:
- Three TDE facilities and four distinct TDE platforms
- Seven agents sent back by Skynet (all Terminators except for the hybrid from “Tempest” who was secretly a good guy) in four different time bubbles (three in 1984 and one in 1995)
- Nine agents sent back by the resistance (although one was a reprogrammed Terminator) in five different time bubbles (in 1955, 1965, 1984 [two] and 1995)