History Film / TheTerminator

** Creator/ArnoldSchwarzenegger underwent weeks of weapons training before starting the film and wound up garnering a compliment from ''Soldier of Fortune'' magazine for his realistic handling of the weapons on camera (also something of a minor SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome, because ''Soldier of Fortune'' usually ''ridicules'' movies for their unrealistic weapon handling). Also, Schwarzenegger served in the Austrian Army (he actually went AWOL at one point to win his first bodybuilding competition), so he already had some knowledge of firearms.

** "There's over 30 cops in this building. You're perfectly safe here."
** Earlier the same detective tells Sarah, who's hiding in a crowded disco, to stay out in a public area where she'll be safe until they get there. The Terminator then tries to murder her in front of several dozen witnesses.

** May 12, 1984 was a Saturday, not a Thursday. This may be due to the fact that the script was written in 1983, which did have May 12 fall on Thursday. 1984 was a leap year.

** Sarah looks up [[spoiler:Cyberdyne Systems' address in a phone book, which was actually filmed but not used in the film, though it can certainly be speculated that it happened after watching the sequel]]. Together, she and Kyle [[spoiler:concoct a plan to blow up Cyberdyne and stop the rise of [=SkyNet=] ]]. The Terminator follows them. [[spoiler:The Terminator's remains, including the chip, are found at Cyberdyne, where they are taken to be studied, which leads to the development of Skynet]].

* OminousClouds: At the end of the film, as Sarah Connor is preparing to head into Mexico to prepare for the coming war and raise her son, John, she's informed that AStormIsComing. She agrees, and then drives off into the mountains, where a thunderstorm is gathering.

** "Fuck you, asshole."
** "[[PreMortemOneLiner You're terminated, fucker!]]"

* SerendipitousSurvival: Dr. Silberman leaves the police station just before the Terminator arrives and massacres the place, and the only reason he didn't glimpse the killer robot is because he looked down to turn off his pager.

** [[spoiler: Kyle Reese makes love with Sarah before the climactic fight. He even says that John's father, i.e. him died before Judgement Day. This is foreshadowing.]]

* TimeTravelRomance: [[spoiler: Kyle volunteers for the mission to protect Sarah because he in fell in love with her from a picture that her son showed him. She then falls in love with him RescueRomance style and they conceive said son.]]

* ArtisticLicenseBiology: The writers have [[WordOfGod admitted]] the whole "only things surrounded by living tissue can go back in time" rule has no scientific basis and was conceived purely as a DramaPreservingHandicap. Without that rule Reese could just bring a {{BFG}} or two back with him to kill the Terminator and the movie would be over in five minutes.

* CherryTapping: The protracted way that the Terminator murders Matt (Ginger's boyfriend). By this point in the narrative, it has been established that the machine can [[AndShowItToYou kill a human with one punch]], not to mention that it also had a pistol (which it even used to kill Ginger after it dealt with Matt). So this trope is being played straight when the Terminator insists on spending several minutes throwing poor Matt around like a ragdoll until it finally kills him.

** Kyle himself will never stop either. [[spoiler: It took a pipe bomb explosion to put him down.]]

** Ginger's boyfriend tries to fight the Terminator when he bursts into their house. It is, of course, a CurbStompBattle, but he somehow manages to keep the Terminator occupied for a good half minute or so, even managing to shove the Terminator backwards a few steps at one point. In later ''Terminator'' media, any human going up against a Terminator in hand-to-hand would get killed pretty much instantly.

*** Another possibility is that, unlike the later Terminators, this one took a lot of damage over a span of time; the others didn't take RoboticReveal damage until shortly before their destruction. Sarah in T2 actually cleans the wounds of "Uncle Bob". However, the Original didn't "care" about the damage it was taking, and by neglecting the state of his living tissue he allowed an infection to set in and rot the skin.
*** Or, as John pushes the date to judgement day to much further in the future each time, the medical tech to create more durable, regenerating skin becomes more accessible.

** {{Averted|Trope}}, as Sarah and Kyle have probably the most plot-critical sex scene of all time.
** Also played straight, though, in the form of [[MrFanservice male fanservice]]. Watch the opening scenes of that movie (both Kyle and the T-800 are naked, courtesy of their time transport. They are both very, very well-built, and Kyle particularly stays at the least shirtless for a good long while). Arnie also goes above and beyond. In his scene with the punks, he really is fully nude. No conveniently placed fabric over his junk, even if it's visible on screen [[FreezeFrameBonus for only a second]].

* HeadphonesEqualIsolation: Sarah's roommate Ginger is so busy rocking out on her headphones that she doesn't hear her lover being beaten to death by the Terminator in the next room. What does that tell you about the quality of their sex?
** The novelization makes a point to mention that Ginger's performance during sex is...enhanced by whatever she's listening to, which is why Matt, in the movie, can be seen turning the volume up on her Walkman.
** Also earlier when the detectives are trying to call Connor's apartment; Matt turns up the volume on Ginger's Walkman in response [[KindaBusyHere as they're having sex]].

* IncrediblyObviousTail: Reese is very clumsy when tailing Sarah. Makes sense, as he's probably never done anything like this before, not to mention having grown up in a war zone, and is unfamiliar with typical pre-war behavior.
* IndyPloy: Just about everything Kyle does. He's up against an unstoppable robot killer with nothing but a shotgun (and later, some pipe bombs), so he doesn't have any grand battle plan.

* KnowWhenToFoldEm: Despite its reputation as a, well, ''Determinator''...The Terminator knows when it can't win a fight. An injured Terminator escapes from the police when it, Sarah and Kyle crash their cars and goes back to its hideout to perform repairs and get more powerful weapons.
* LaserSight: "The .45 longslide, with laser sighting." At the time, laser sights were nowhere near as common as they are now, and Arnold had to hide the battery up his sleeve. Of course, this invites the question as to why an advanced cyborg with night vision who can probably calculate the ballistics of a round would need to use a laser sight. But it does give a cool ImpendingDoomPOV when Sarah Connor's vision goes red as the Terminator puts the laser dot right between her eyes.
* LastDayOfNormalcy: Even as we're shown the titular Terminator systematically eliminating everyone who shares the name of our heroine, the audience is shown the life of Sarah Connor, waitress, as she goes about her daily life, interacting with customers and co-workers, chatting with her roommate, and playing a mild prank of said roommate's boyfriend when he tries to do a bit of foreplay over the phone. Then she has a close call with the T-800, and her life is ''never'' the same again.

** Downplayed. The police are shown to be highly intelligent, figuring out the pattern of the killings almost immediately (though that ''was'' pretty much a gimme), take advantage of the power of the press to warn Sarah Connor, and can readily explain the mysterious gunman's seeming invulnerability. They're just WrongGenreSavvy. Furthermore, their armament in the precinct station (up to [=M16=] rifles) demonstrates they're definitely ready for most disturbances. Unfortunately, the Terminator is just [[ImmuneToBullets too tough]] for them. After the police station massacre, a radio newscaster reports that a state-wide manhunt for the Terminator was underway.

** The owner of the gun shop hands the Terminator an unloaded SPAS-12... but also leaves a box of loose shotgun shells on the counter where the Terminator can just take them and pull a BallisticDiscount. He's also not at all suspicious of a guy dressed like a street punk (in a time when dressing that way stereotyped you as a violent thug to begin with...) buying a large number of high-powered firearms all at once.

** Downplayed. The police are shown to be highly intelligent, figuring out the pattern of the killings almost immediately, take advantage of the power of the press to warn Sarah Connor, and can readily explain the mysterious gunman's seeming invulnerability. They're just WrongGenreSavvy. Furthermore, their armament in the precinct station (up to [=M16=] rifles) demonstrates they're definitely ready for most disturbances. Unfortunately, the Terminator is just [[ImmuneToBullets too tough]] for them. After the police station massacre, a radio newscaster reports that a state-wide manhunt for the Terminator was underway.

* LowSpeedChase: The T-800 loses the ability to run after its flesh cover gets scorched and pursues Sarah and Kyle on foot at a reduced speed while Sarah and Kyle are injured. Then the T-800 [[HalfTheManHeUsedToBe gets reduced to a torso]] and crawls after Sarah, who's now too injured to stand up and crawls as well to escape the robot.

* MonsterThreatExpiration: JustifiedTrope; it made sense that the Terminator was getting weaker by the end, due to all the damage it has slowly been accumulating throughout the movie. The suspense lay in the fact that the heroes had been getting hurt and killed too. The Terminator also loses the ability to run after its flesh component was scorched, and pursues Sarah and Kyle on foot at a reduced speed.

* WhamShot: [[spoiler:At the end of the movie, while Sarah's at a gas station in Mexico, a boy takes a picture of her with an instant camera. After she gives him four bucks for it, she takes a look at it; [[StableTimeLoop it's the same picture John Connor will eventually give Kyle]].]]

* CostumeInertia: The terminator does not seem to care much about the clothes to wear. He just took what was at hand and that's all. Sure, why care even if it is a biker/street punk outfit that one would definitely not want to wear if the goal was about keeping a low profile and looking like an average Joe. It is clear that it is for the RuleOfCool but nevertheless... Really, changing the clothes would be just a sound and logical action.

One night in 1984, two men emerge naked from two separate electrical storms in UsefulNotes/LosAngeles. One, played by Creator/MichaelBiehn, stays low and out of sight to avoid the authorities. The other, played by Creator/ArnoldSchwarzenegger, picks up a phone book so he can find women named Sarah Connor-- and kill them. When a young diner waitress also named Sarah Connor (Creator/LindaHamilton) hears that two people with her name have been killed within a day, she begins to worry about the killer coming for her next. As the killer murders two people in Sarah's home in an effort to find her, Sarah hides in a nightclub; the killer catches up with her there, but she is rescued by the other man, Kyle Reese.

Kyle explains [[{{Backstory}} his story]] to Sarah after they escape the killer: [[TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture in the near future]], the United States will transfer control over its strategic defense to [=SkyNet=], an artificial intelligence system [[AIIsACrapshoot that will promptly]] [[TurnedAgainstTheirMasters turn against its masters]] and attempt to KillAllHumans in a cataclysmic event that will become known as [[FauxSymbolism Judgment Day]]. Mankind will eventually defeat [=SkyNet=], but before its final defeat, [=SkyNet=] will send a T-800 model Terminator -- an [[KillerRobot android]] wrapped in human flesh to give it the appearance of a human -- [[TimeTravel back in time]] to kill Sarah and prevent the birth of her son, John, who will become the leader of the [[LaResistance human resistance]]. John will respond by [[WaybackTrip sending Reese into the past]] to protect John's mother--and the timeline.

A sequel with a [[SequelEscalation much bigger budget]] and a marked [[GenreShift shift]] towards [[ActionizedSequel more action]], ''Film/Terminator2JudgmentDay'', came out in 1991.

''The Terminator'' is a 1984 {{action|Genre}}[=/=]{{science fiction}} {{thriller}}, the first film in the ''Franchise/{{Terminator}}'' franchise and the second feature film directed by Creator/JamesCameron. The film differs from its successors in its ActionHorror angle, compared to the more strictly action-focused direction of later installments.

* ShotgunsAreJustBetter: Kyle Reese's primary weapon in the first half of the film is a shotgun with a sawn-off stock tied to his shoulder, allowing him to conceal it under a trenchcoat. It is able to temporarily disable the Terminator, while other firearms have little effect. The Terminator itself also makes use of a SPAS-12 stolen from a gun store.

* DoorHandleScare: Subverted. When the T-800 assaults the police station, Sarah hides in a room under a desk. Then we see a shadow approaching the door, the camera closes up on the door handle getting turned. Then the window gets smashes in. It's not the T-800 but Reese.

---> "Wash day tomorrow, nothing clean!"

* EvilSmellsBad: The T-800's flesh takes a lot of damage both due to combat and its own surgery to repair damage. Late in the movie, one scene shows that the flesh is has begun to rot and grayed out, attracting flies. A janitor asks if [[SmellsOfDeath there's a "dead cat in there"]], but the robot responds rudely and resumes its chase against Sarah.
* EyeScream: The T-800's "[[SelfStitching self-repair]]" scene, where he cuts away the damaged organic covering over his left eye with an X-Acto knife.

%%* StealthPun: [[CyberPunk Tech Noir]].

* VoicemailConfusion: Sarah Connor's voicemail greeting. Subverted in that no one is fooled by it, and played for irony in that the message's joke is that "you're talking to a machine" when the Terminator is calling.

* UnbuiltTrope: This film set the gold standard for depictions of a chillingly bleak RobotWar post-nuclear BadFuture, with its mountains of human skulls, flattened cities patrolled by mechanical horrors, and human survivors living in painfully squalid holes in the ground. In spite of this, it also tempers this seemingly impossible vision of HopelessWar with an unusually optimistic message. The whole point of the movie is that, despite how far they've fallen and how little they have to fight back with, humanity still '''[[{{Determinator}} wins]]''' and has Skynet on the ropes so bad that the seemingly invincible machine intelligence gets desperate and has to resort to time travel to save itself.

* CheckpointBluff: How the Terminator attempts to get past the front desk of the police station where Sarah is. When the cop won't let it through, it resorts to its [[CarFu usual]] [[KillEmAll methods]].

*** Just before that, he opens the door to a cop car to steal a shotgun, revealing the police slogan "to care and to protect".

* BoringButPractical: The T-800 arms up just in case confrontation is unavoidable but at the police station, The Terminator simply asks to see Sarah Conor and by implication, get a clear chance for a melee attack or shot. The officer at the desk tells the robot that she is unavailable but doesn't find the inquiry suspicious, so the T-800 determines that force is inevitable and resorts to ram-raiding the station to seek out Sarah with while armed.

** The owner of the gun shop leaves a box of shotgun shells on the counter where the Terminator can just take them, apparently not at all suspicious of a guy dressed like a street punk (in a time when dressing that way stereotyped you as a violent thug to begin with...) buying that many high-powered firearms all at once.

* BoringButPractical: The T-800 arms up just in case confrontation is unavoidable but at the police station, The Terminator simply asks to see Sarah Conor and by implication, get a clear chance for a melee attack or shot. The officer at the desk tells the robot that she is unavailable but doesn't find the inquiry suspicious, so the T-800 determines that force is inevitable and so resorts to ram-raiding the station to seek out Sarah with while armed.

* WhatCouldPossiblyGoWrong: "There's over 30 cops in this building. You're perfectly safe here."