- This page is about the original incarnation of T-1000 in Terminator 2, the second installment of the mainstream Terminator series. The Terminator Genisys version can be found here: T-1000 (Genisys).
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| “ | Call to John now! | „ |
| ~ T-1000 threatening Sarah Connor to call her son. |
The T-1000 is a liquid-metal android and the titular main antagonist of the 1991 film Terminator 2: Judgment Day. Its main goal is to kill John Connor in the past. Unlike the last Terminator, the T-1000 can survive almost any injury and changes back to its original form almost instantly.
He was portrayed by Robert Patrick, who also played Rome in The Marine, Colonel Merton Bell in NCIS, and The Skiptracer in the 2013 film Identity Thief.
Contents
Biography
Past
As the supercomputer Skynet became self-aware, it started mass-producing Terminators, in order to wipe out the humans from the face of earth. A human resistance was led by John Connor, who organized the survivors of Judgement Day to fight the machines. Skynet then sent a Terminator to the past to kill Sarah Connor before she gave birth to John.
As the first Terminator failed, Skynet took the next step and sent another Terminator, the prototype T-1000, to kill John when he was still a child. The future John Connor managed to capture a Terminator, reprogram it, and send it to the past as well to protect himself in the past.
Travel to the past
In a last-ditch effort to prevent its destruction, Skynet sent the T-1000 prototype Terminator back to the year 1995 to kill the human resistance's leader, John Connor, when he was 10 years old.
Upon arrival, the T-1000 murdered a police officer, mimicked his clothes, and took his gun and car in order to blend in like a normal human. He tracked down the foster home that Connor currently lived. His foster parents, Todd and Janelle Voight, were not surprised to see a police officer on their doorstep asking about John, due to his multiple run-ins with the law, but as John ran away earlier that morning, the T-1000 was unable to get to him. He was also told that someone else was looking for John, too. The T-1000 picked up right away that this person was someone sent back to protect John, but insisted to the Voights that he was of no concern. He managed to get information of where John is due to two girls who ratted out on him saying that he went to the galleria.
First meeting with John and the T-800
Both Terminators tracked down John at a mall, and this resulted in the two of them fighting each other while John escaped on his motorbike. The T-1000 started chasing after him, but on his motorbike, John proved to be too fast, so the T-1000 required a new mode of transportation. After chasing John on a busy street, he hijacked a tow truck and eventually caught up with him and almost ran him over. But, the T-800 saved John by shooting a tire on the truck, causing it to swerve out of control and crash. A leak from the gas tank made contact with a loose spark plug, triggering an explosion, allowing John and the T-800 to get away.
The T-1000's next idea was to return to Voights' house and wait for John to return. The T-800 warned John about this, so rather than return home, John decided to make a call from a public payphone to warn his foster parents. However, he sensed something was up, because Janelle Voight sounded "too nice," and his dog was barking very loudly. The T-800, impersonating John's voice, tricked the T-1000 into revealing himself by giving John's dog a false name (Wolfie) and convincing him that was the real name. It was confirmed that the T-1000 was at John's house, and his foster parents had been killed. The T-800 tells John that his foster parents are dead. The T-800 then reveals to John that the T-1000 is a shape-shifter and can flawlessly impersonate any person it touches or makes contact with in any way.
In a deleted scene, the T-1000 walks outside to the barking dog and kills him. He then rips off the dog's collar and sees his real name (Max) and walks away in frustration having realized he'd been tricked.
In another deleted scene, he also looks in John's bedroom to look for clues as to where his next location might be. He finds a shoebox filled with letters from John's real mother, Sarah Connor, written from the Pescadero State Mental Hospital, and decides to go there next.
Second meeting with John
The T-1000 then drove to the mental hospital and decided to copy Sarah Connor and possibly kill her, as that is what he normally does to the people he transforms into, and wait for John to arrive. The T-800 warns John of this, but John insists they rescue her anyway.
Despite being disguised as a cop, the T-1000 still raises the suspicious eyebrows of an office worker at the hospital, so he decides to copy and kill a nightwatchman to get easier access. He reaches Sarah's holding cell, but finds it empty, as Sarah escaped earlier. He later finds her with John and the T-800 and chases them into an elevator, leaving a slice wound on Sarah's shoulder in the process, and climbs onto the police car that the Connors and T-800 have stolen, almost succeeding in his mission to kill John, but shot off the car by the T-800. The car ultimately is too fast for him, so he gives up for now.
He returns to the hospital later where several other policemen have arrived, and meets up with one motorcycle cop. As he is disguised as that cop later on, and driving his motorcycle and wielding his gun as well, it is assumed that the T-1000 killed him (this is confirmed in the novelization of the film).
Attack at Cyberdyne
Cyberdyne Systems was currently working on the microchip that would eventually become Skynet, so Sarah decided to kill the man responsible, Miles Dyson. However, as she was never a killer, she found herself unable to do it. After talking with John, she decided to tell Dyson everything, and this convinced him to stop working on the microchip, but found out all his work on it had to be destroyed to prevent Skynet and Judgment Day. So they went down to the Cyberdyne headquarters to destroy everything.
The T-1000 was aware of this, so he decided to go to the Dyson home, only to find nobody was home. However, he received a call from the Police Department that the Connors were attacking the Cyberdyne building. When he arrived, the Connors and the T-800 had already taken off in a SWAT van, but then he hijacked a police helicopter and chased them in that.
Highway Chase
He then proceeded to chase the Connors down the highway, and mortally wounds Sarah. The T-800 then slams on the brakes, causing the helicopter to crash into the van and blow up. However, the van crashes as well, so the Connors and the T-800 are forced to drive in a farmer's truck while the T-1000 steals a truck transporting liquid nitrogen. He chases them into a steel plant, where, thanks to the T-800, the truck is destroyed, and liquid nitrogen spills all over the T-1000, causing him to completely freeze on the spot. The T-800 then shoots the T-1000 with a pistol, causing him to shatter into pieces.
However, the intense heat from the molten steel caused the nitrogen pieces to completely melt, allowing the T-1000 to fully reform.
Fight in the Steel Plant
The T-1000 had some glitches now. For example, in a deleted scene, when touching a black-and-yellow colored pole, this caused his hand to uncontrollably stick to it and change into that color. That didn't matter too much, as he was able to jam the T-800's hand in a giant gear, allowing him to look for the Connors.
He finds that Sarah put John on a conveyor belt and he was now out of sight. Sarah attempted to draw a shotgun at him, but wasn't fast enough, as the T-1000 sliced a blade into her shoulder and demanded that she call John to help her, threatening to stick another blade into her head if she refused. She refuses, but before he could kill her, the T-800, now with just one arm, attacked the T-1000 from behind, forcing him to free Sarah.
He was, by now, extremely furious with the T-800 constantly ruining his plans so much that he repeatedly rammed a large steel beam into the T-800's head and jamming a long pole in his body, causing him to shut down before he could reach for his grenade launcher. Now with him out of the way, the T-1000 attempted to find John himself.
Destruction
As he had touched Sarah Connor earlier, he was now able to imitate her. He called John to come help him, which John did. He almost succeeded, as he fooled John into thinking that he was his mother, but then the real Sarah Connor showed up and shot a hole in his body, revealing him as an imposter (John also saw he glitched again). Sarah then shot him several times in the chest, almost causing him to fall off the ledge, but before she could, she ran out of bullets, allowing the T-1000 to reform and wag his finger at her with a "tsk-tsk" gesture. As John rushed to his mother's safety, the T-1000 started to move forward towards them, hell-bent on killing them once and for all.
Suddenly, the T-800, working again because of an alternative power source he had, showed up and shot his last grenade into the T-1000's chest, causing him to blow apart. Before he could fully reform, though, he lost his balance and fell into the pit of molten steel below. The extreme heat rapidly-decimated its molecular structure, and it changed from shape to form, trying desperately to adapt to the deadly 1600°C environment, but it turned out to be capable of destroying it permanently. It proved futile, as the steel corrupted its design and melted its body. It shrieked in agony and loudly shape-shifted uncontrollably into all the people it had imitated previously (except Sarah for unknown reasons), as well as its default form, before completely dissolving into the steel and giving one last metallic scream of mindless terror as it literally turned itself inside out, vomiting forth its own face from within before dissolving into the steel and making their second mission a failure, also avenging the deaths of the humans he had killed.
Legacy
There are plenty of other terminators similar in design to the T-1000.
- Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines features a T-X terminator, the first ever female terminator. This terminator has a metal endoskeleton mixed in with liquid metal and has built-in weapons. It was destroyed when a T-850 terminator blew it up using a hydrogen bomb/fuel cell.
- Terminator Genisys featured another T-1000 with the same shape-changing abilities, but however it was destroyed when a T-800 named Pops melted it using hydrochloric acid. Pops was later turned into a T-1000 (on the good side) after he got thrown out of a magnetic force field and landed in a vat/tub of liquid metal.
- Terminator: Dark Fate features a more advanced Rev-9, similar in design to both T-1000 and T-X. This terminator as the same abilities as well as a human form like most of it's predecessors. Unlike it's predecessors, it separate liquid metal form from its metal form, creating two autonomous units. It was disintegrated by an electromagnetic pulse.
Other Media
The T-1000 has appeared in a few films that are not part of the Terminator film series. Both times he was played by Robert Patrick like in Terminator 2: Judgment Day. In an interview with Robert Patrick in 2014, he claims that he is not willing to return to the action role as the T-1000 as he wanted his performance to stand-alone and he now has a bad hip.
- Wayne's World - The T-1000 asked Wayne if he's seen the boy in the photo (John) but Wayne just drove away screaming without answering.
- Last Action Hero - Danny, the main character of the film, spotted the T-1000 walking out of the police station and he tried to tell the character played by Schwarzenegger, Jack Slater, but Slater simply refused to listen.
Personality
Although the T-1000 is a heartless machine, he shows some traces of cynicism and sarcasm and can act like a normal human being when in public. The T-1000 can also feign kindness, such as smiling or using opinion words such as calling John "honey" or a good-looking boy, but other than that he is overly relentless, being fixated on murder and genocide of the whole human race.
It's worth noting that, unusually for Terminators, he displays hints of sadism when he stabs Sarah's shoulder and demands she call for John even though he could easily mimic her voice. He also gives a "tsk tsk" sigh towards Sarah and slowly goes to her, relishing in her fear as opposed to immediately killing her.
Reception
The T-1000 is considered one of the greatest fictional villains ever created in American cinema and is praised by Terminator fans as having helped define Terminator 2: Judgment Day as an improvement over the original film. He is considered the best fictional character created by director/writer James Cameron. It was ranked #29 on Wizard Magazine 's "Top 100 Greatest Villains" list.
Quotes
| “ | Energy source detection. Location: Arctic Circle. Energy analysis matches fugitive designation: T-800. Finally. | „ |
| ~ T-1000's first words in the sequel. |
| “ | T-1000: Are you the legal guardian of John Connor? Todd Voight: That's right, Officer. What's he done now? T-1000: Could I speak with him please? Janelle Voight: You could if he were here. He just took off on his bike. So, he could be anywhere. T-1000: Do you have a photograph of John? Janelle Voight:Yeah, sure, hold on. Todd Voight: Could you tell me what this is about? T-1000:Just need to ask him a few questions. He's a good looking boy. Do you mind if I keep this picture? Janelle Voight: No, go on. There was a guy here this morning looking for him, too. Todd Voight: Yeah, a big guy on a bike. Does that got something to do with this? T-1000: No! I wouldn't worry about him. Thanks for your cooperation. |
„ |
| ~ Janelle giving the photo of John Connor to T-1000. |
| “ | Say... That's a nice bike... | „ |
| ~ T-1000 before taking a motorcycle from a police officer. |
| “ | Get out. | „ |
| ~ T-1000 to a terrified police helicopter pilot. |
| “ | Call to John. I know this hurts. | „ |
| ~ T-1000 after pinning Sarah Connor through her shoulder to a wall. |
Trivia
- According to James Cameron and the novels, Skynet stopped producing the T-1000 almost immediately after creating it, as it was aware of the T-1000's highly advanced intelligence and learning capabilities compared to other Terminator models and feared they might go rogue.
Gallery
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 Villains
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Skynet/Legion Humans | ||
