Demon Hand

Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles Season 1 Episode 7 - Plot: Sarah attempts to track down the missing hand of the T-888 that was recently destroyed. Meanwhile, Agent Eliison's investigation in to Sarah leads him to Dr. Silberman.

Ellison & Sarah

First of all, we find that Ellison has hidden the T-888's hand in his freezer box. As I think a lot of people expected, he's starting to buy in to Sarah's prophecy and he eventually finds himself at the door of Dr. Silberman. Silberman is here played by Bruce Davison, having been portrayed by Earl Boen in the film trilogy.

Ellison and Silberman sit down to tea. Ellison is drugged by Silberman, who reveals that he needed to be certain that he wasn't a machine. Silberman clearly believes Sarah and realises the danger that someone asking questions about her might pose. Most interestingly, he tells of his encounter with Schwarzenegger's Terminator and the T-1000 as a religious experience. Saying how The Terminator reached out the hand of God to John Connor, 'Come with me if you want to live, like the Sistine Chapel.

Silberman douses Ellison in petrol and sets the cabin on fire around him. As he escapes, he runs in to Sarah, apologising for not believing her. Sarah knocks him out, takes the hand and rescues Ellison.

John

During the course of her investigation in to the whereabouts of the hand, Sarah finds herself at Ellison's apartment, where he has tapes of Sarah from her time in the mental hospital. She takes one away with her, which John watches. It shows her signing a form to relinquish parental responsibility over John. John is understandably upset at this, but Sarah explains how it was on the day that they found each other and that she needed it to give herself the strength and the necessity to break out and get to him.

Cameron

Cameron sets to work in finding The Turk. She ends up at the dance studio of the sister of Andy Goode's partner, Dmitri. She eventually finds Dmitiri and learns that he messed with The Turk's end game protocol to make it lose the chess match in order to sell it to someone. She gets an address in exchange for money, though Dmitri and his sister are soon killed by Russian mobsters, to whom the money was owed. Scarily, Cameron did nothing to help them, as it was out of her mission protocol.

Very interestingly, Cameron shows a very keen interest in ballet while conducting her investigation. She's seen at the very end practising some moves. A voice over from Sarah explains that the machines cannot appreciate beauty, they cannot create art. If they ever learn these things, they won't have to destroy us. They'll be us.

The Review

Certainly interesting to see the characters going off in different directions. The links back to T2, especially relating to Dr. Silberman provided some very intriguing scenes, especially in the cabin as he explained his encounter with the 2 Terminators.

I think The Turk has played a much bigger part in this season than I originally anticipated. The initial set up of the show made it seem as if Sarah, John and Connor would be off systematically taking out key components of Skynet. Instead, it's been a lot more complicated. There are more players in the game and even removing one component has proven to be a challenge. It's a show of great plot depth and a show that patience will be key to stopping Judgement Day and enjoying the show.

Cameron again proves to be a very interesting character, not just relating to her dancing, but also to an exchange between her and Derek Reese, where they both reveal that they know who each other is. I'm guessing there's more to Cameron than we know so far and I wouldn't be surprised if we find out what that is in next week's 2-part season finale. I've also got a slight suspicion that she might not make it out of that finale alive. I've really enjoyed Cameron as character, but I'm not sure that she necessarily needs to part of the show long-term. There were just a few very subtle hints in this episode that suggest to me that something might happen to her.

I guess we'll all find out next Monday. :)

8 out of 10