Terminator to Terminator 2 twist

I was thinking about Terminator 2 recently. In the movie the T-1000 (Robert Patrick) doesn't explicitly do anything to reveal that he's a terminator until the scene in the mall hallway.

From a hypothetical perspective of someone who has seen only the first movie, one could have assumed that Robert Patrick's character was another resistance member sent to protect John Connor, with Arnold Schwarzenegger reprising his role of another terminator.

Looking up the original theatrical trailer they forego the idea and totally just tell you "Oh hey he's a terminator sent to protect John Connor."

I think it would be a pretty cool twist for someone to experience, watching the first Terminator then seeing T2. Although with all the Terminator movies since and the cultural knowledge of the franchise I would think it'd be pretty hard to find someone who didn't know.

I can confirm that's exactly what I thought when I saw it for the first time, I was too young to know about trailers and such. When Arnie said get down to John when they first opened fire on each other I was very shocked.

T2 is one of my all time favourite films, more T2 threads!

I was too young to watch the first so it was actually surprising to me that arnold was the bad guy when I watched it later lol.

Are you sure you caught the real original first trailer? I always heard that it was indeed meant to be a big reveal that Arnold was actually a good guy, but it's been a long time since I first saw it in the theaters.

From a hypothetical perspective of someone who has seen only the first movie, one could have assumed that Robert Patrick's character was another resistance member sent to protect John Connor, with Arnold Schwarzenegger reprising his role of another terminator.

At the time this was a significant plot twist. It was intentional that you think the T800 is still the bad guy and the T1000 is the soldier coming back to save John. It was playing on expectations (because, even then, people often expected the same things from their sequels). But the whole time something is a little off- until the reveal. It's now a classic moment and a great scene in the movie. There may be a trailer that spoils it (because PR and marketing always sucks at not spoiling movies), but if you were someone like me who barely (if ever) watches trailers because you know better then it doesn't matter.

That's really weird. I had never considered the concept that anyone would even not know that this was how the film was intended to be perceived. huh, interesting

This was how I experienced the films first time I saw them as a kid. The 2 films back to back having no knowledge about the plot of either. The twist in 2 came a huge surprise to me.

Doesn't T-1000 kill a cop like 1 minute after he shows up?

I remember so much hype in the newspapers and MTV about the at the time brand new CGI "morphing" technology used in T-1000 that it never occurred to me that any of this was supposed to be a surprise.

I thought it was very well known ahead of time at the time that Arnold was the good guy, Patrick the bad guy but that was a very long time ago.

@cornfed40: Ya, but it's off screen and you don't know that's what he does. It's so vaguely implied you don't even consider that unless you watch the movie again.

At least that's how it was for me.

@rorie: Everyone I discuss this with says they can't remember either. If you go check the Youtubes, and wade through the many fan trailers, the only one you can find features Don Lafontaine (RIP). That is the one I'm referring to.

I was too young at the time to remember the zeitgeist of the premier, first time I saw it was on VHS years after.

@cornfed40: Yep, but watching it recently, it could be implied that he knocked him out and stole his clothes. As opposed to later in the film where he is shown explicitly stabbing people in the face.

I could be wrong but I think it was pretty much pitched as Arnold playing the hero in trailers and media. Arnold was basically the biggest action star on Earth at that point, which meant he wasn't really allowed to play a villain anymore. I'm guessing that Cameron finagling a plot where a T-800 could somehow be a hero figure instead of a stone cold killing machine was necessary for Arnold to sign on.

@notsosneakyguy: Yeah I just rewatched the scene. I thought I remembered him snapping the cop's neck, not just hitting him in the gut. Damn you Mandella Effect!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I also just rewatched this and thought the same thing.

I think s lot of people (including me) who saw the movie without having seen the trailer prior, got that assumption.

@august: One of the early ideas for T2 was to have two Arnold terminators, one good and one bad, fighting each other. It was ditched for a couple of reasons. This site has an exhaustive collection of deleted, omitted or changed scenes between the first script drafts and the final film including story boards for an extended future war battle.

It's very much like Predator: you go in expecting the macho-commando movie, and halfway through it turns into an alien horror movie.

I remember the first theatrical trailer explicitly said how this time there are two terminators and one is sent to help. But I think it always showed Robert Patrick in the cop uniform and then shows Arnold minigunning the cops so it's intentionally going for the swerve even if it's not really subtle about it.

That's a pretty cool way to experience the movie, going in fresh.

As an MTV kid I definitely had the "Arnold is the protective terminator" aspect spoiled by Guns 'n' Roses' "You Could be Mine" music video which had a ton of movie footage. Some TV commercials too.

As an MTV kid as well it's pretty incredible how much that video spoils the movie. I never noticed it as a kid but it's the modern trailer of music videos.