A future hero gets a sexy new protector in 'Terminator'

A teen hero-to-be gets a sexy new protector in Fox's 'Sarah Connor Chronicles'

Summer Glau, Thomas Dekker and Lena Headey are out to stop Skynet again in "Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles."

Do I have to remind anyone that "The Terminator" never stops, never quits, never tires, but just keeps coming?

James Cameron's enduring, adaptable futuristic myth returns in a new form as a TV series in "Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles," debuting at 7 p.m. Sunday on Fox WFLD Channel 32.

And when I say, "a new form," that's not the half of it.

Arnold Schwarzenegger's original "Terminator" was an indefatigable killing machine sent from the future. In "T2" he returned as a good guy, a father figure to John Connor, future hero of humankind in its battle with machines, as well as his defender against an upgraded Terminator.

"Of all the would-be fathers that came over the years, this thing, this machine, was the only thing that measured up," Linda Hamilton's Sarah Connor mused for disaffected, disappointed mothers everywhere. "In an insane world, it was the sanest choice."

Much the same went for "T3," but with the twist that the new, even-more-high-tech Terminator was a Terminatrix -- in female form.

Yet, in all his experience, both in the future and the past, nothing has prepared 15-year-old John Connor for the latest Terminator -- a nubile, butt-kicking nymphet played by Summer Glau.

It was one thing to have a Terminator father figure, but now a Terminator fantasy object? Thomas Dekker's John Connor is going to have some serious issues to work through when he finally grows up and leads the war against machines.

And who's going to be the one to inform him that, when the sexy Terminator traces her finger along the nape of his neck, that's just her way of taking his temperature?

That sad task would figure to fall on Lena Headey, who slips out of her "300" tunics and into Hamilton's sleeveless T-shirts to play Sarah Connor, one fearsomely protective mother.

"Chronicles" opens in 1999, in the limbo between "T2" and "T3" in the "Terminator" timeline. Having thwarted Skynet, the independent-minded computer program that was to wreak such havoc in the future, Sarah and John are laying low -- "No one is ever safe" is Mom's mantra -- first in Nebraska, then in New Mexico, where John is befriended by a cute if somewhat dour female classmate named Cameron. (Dig the knowing wink at James Cameron, Aware One.) Good thing, too, because when a substitute teacher tears open his leg, pulls out a gun and starts blasting away at the class, she comes to John's aid, revealing herself to be, yes, a Terminator sent by his future self to save him -- and no doubt bedevil his dreams on nocturnal missions.

Jeez, what was the future John Connor thinking when he sent this vixen back to baby-sit his teen self?

Not that it isn't a kick to see this little girl whoop bigger, badder, nastier meanies on a regular basis. As ever, "Terminator" glories in destruction (which resonates off Arnold's comment on mankind in "T2": "It's in your nature to destroy yourselves"). And Headey's Sarah Connor is no slouch in that regard either. "Chronicles" is above all a post-feminist allegory about strong women protecting a weak nascent male, and it even throws in a little Oedipal element in the form of a lover Sarah had to abandon, who had treated John like a son.

In any case, it proves too true that no one is ever safe in 1999, so Cameron leads them on a leap in time -- past "T3" and, not coincidentally, past Sept. 11 and Sarah's own death from cancer -- into the present day, or anyway the near-present of 2007. (Hey, not even the future John Connor knew that last year's "Chronicles" pilot would be held by Fox for a midseason debut.)

That's where things get even more lively and interesting, with the shift to its regular timeslot at 8 p.m. Monday. There, Sarah takes to calling Cameron "Tin Man" and urging her to "do what you do, Girlie," while Cameron begins to develop some of that semi-aware wit Arnold displayed in "T2," for instance wondering aloud, "Why are diamonds a girl's best friend?"

Ah, yes, and a headless Terminator -- but which one? -- is unearthed at a construction site and goes off looking for its metallic skull.

Sunday's pilot is just a nonstop thrill fest of blasts, belts and explosions, but Monday's follow-up finds the series developing some of the ironic commentary that worked so well in "T2." In short, this looks as if it could be a fine show worthy of the "Terminator" franchise. Any number of Terminators and resistance fighters could come leaping back from the future to enrich the story, and in the meantime the clock is back ticking, with Skynet once again being developed and now on target for a 2011 apocalyptic missile launch. That allows for three or four seasons. Shoot, by that time John and Cameron could be married, as in "Joanie Loves Chachi," and with little Terminators running around.

Yes, the only thing that might stop "The Terminator" is jumping the shark. That's the risk of series television.

In the air

Diane Lane is "Unfaithful."

Remotely interesting: "Nick News With Linda Ellerbee" jumps into the election season with "The Kids' Primary" at 8 p.m. Sunday on Nickelodeon. … PBS begins "The Complete Jane Austen" by airing its versions of all her novels starting with a new "Masterpiece Theatre" take on "Persuasion" at 8 p.m. Sunday on WTTW Channel 11. "American Experience" returns with a new episode on the John F. Kennedy assassination in "Oswald's Ghost" at 9 p.m. Monday on Channel 11. … Martin Scorsese plays host to a reconsideration of the work of horror producer Val Lewton in "The Man in the Shadows" at 7 p.m. Monday on Turner Classic Movies. … Consider yourself warned on "Comanche Moon," Larry McMurtry's dreary "Lonesome Dove" prequel airing as a CBS miniseries at 8 p.m. Sunday, Tuesday and Wednesday on WBBM Channel 2.

Thanks and a tip of the hat to "The Wire" fans Carol Hoshall and Greg Cameron, who caught that Tristan Wilds plays Michael on the HBO series.

End of the dial: WVAZ 102.7-FM is picking up Doug Banks' new syndicated ABC Radio afternoon show from 2 to 6 starting Monday.

Steve Cochran broadcasts live from Mama Rini's Restaurant in Crystal Lake at 4 p.m. today as part of WGN 720-AM's "Home Town Voices Tour."

Waste Watcher's choice

"Unfaithful" is a fairly trashy modern-day bodice-ripper about a wife who cheats on her husband, but Diane Lane is one hot momma as a woman rediscovering her sexual self. You hate to see her go back to Richard Gere, especially once it turns into a conventional murder thriller. It's at 9 p.m. Saturday on TNT.