Plot
"Samson And Delilah" picks up right where Season One left off. After the car bomb detonates, Cameron is badly damaged and reverts to her old programming, stalking John. Sarah and John barely escape Cameron by jumping out a window. They also crash their getaway car. Charley connects with Derek at the scene of the explosion and they race off to find Sarah and John, following a radio report about their car accident. Sarah and John hide in a church, with Cameron stalking them. They try to disable her but it doesn't work.
Ellison is left trying to sort out what happened and come up with a story for the FBI. They don't believe him.
We're introduced to CEO Catherine Weaver, who bought the Turk from a middle-man and is building a new team.
Tropes
- Beauty Is Never Tarnished: Despite pulling an arm-sized chunk of shrapnel out the back of her head and stapling her cheek shut, Cameron looks pretty good after the explosion.
- Berserk Button: Don't threaten Sarah in front of John, ever.
- Bond One-Liner: Weaver delivers one to the employee that she kills, in which she explicitly claims to experience emotion. This makes it clear that she isn't a normal Terminator mentally but a much more sophisticated AI.
- Chekhov's Gunman: We meet a priest in this episode who appears much later.
- Contemplative Boss: The first of many scenes of this kind with Weaver, as she delivers her monologue about crossing the street.
- Corrupt Corporate Executive: Catherine Weaver. In this episode, before we discover her grand plan, she murders someone who calls her a bitch, and she buys The Turk for $300,000.
- Crocodile Tears: Cameron pleading with John not to destroy her.
- Drives Like Crazy: Both John and Sarah crash cars in this episode. Come on, she's walking. Pretty sure you can out-drive her doing just the speed limit.
- Hassle-Free Hotwire: With a bit of trying, the truck starts up.
- Important Haircut: John clips his hair short near the end of the episode, losing the bangs that hid his eyes through most of the first season. This serves as a nod to Character Development, as well as a movement away from the child John of Terminator 2: Judgment Day and a stronger character on the show.
- Innocence Lost: This episode is the first time we see John holding a gun. Not only because he Took a Level in Badass, but his innocence (which was shaky anyway, due to his destiny) is also now gone.
- Kill Me Now, or Forever Stay Your Hand: John reinstalls Cameron's chip, and gives her a pistol to show his trust that she won't kill him.
- Mythology Gag: A few to the Terminator series.
- Derek lurking around the scene of a fire is reminiscent of the T-1000 doing the same at Dyson's house and Cyberdyne in Judgment Day.
- Cameron finding blood on the sidewalk is reminiscent of the T-X locating John in Rise of the Machines. Weaver impersonating a urinal to kill Tuck may be a reference to the controversial scene in Rise of the Machines where the T-800 beats the T-X with a toilet bowl.
- Cameron's dragging limp is a Call-Back to the damaged T-800 in the first film. Cameron tortures Sarah to get her to call John.
- Not Worth Killing: Cameron spares Sarah's life once she realizes that John isn't going to try to rescue her.
- Paper-Thin Disguise: Derek dons firefighters' gear and sneaks into Charley's ambulance.
- Red Herring: The superior FBI agent who questions Ellison is creepily unemotional and monotonic, making the audience suspect that he might be a Terminator. He isn't the big new Terminator character of the episode.
- Trash the Set: The Connors' first season house is destroyed by a gas explosion.
- Villain Ball: Things would have gone so much better for Sarkissian if he'd just shot Sarah and John on sight instead of deciding to have some fun torturing them for vengeance.
- Wham Episode: A hell of a lot happens in this episode.
- Wham Shot:
- "TERMINATION: OVERRIDE"
- The urinal transforming into Weaver.
- What Measure Is a Mook?: Addressed in passing during the FBI's investigation of Cromartie's massacre. When asked why he wasn't killed, Ellison has no answer for them. They wouldn't believe him if he did.
- Would Hit a Girl: Sarkissian bashes Sarah around for a bit.
