Question: Arnold said that when the T-1000 took the form of someone he would likely terminate the person being copied. Why didn't the T-1000 kill Sarah? He had been in physical contact and could mimic her voice. There was no reason to get her to call John at the end, he could have killed her immediately.
BaconIsMyBFF
16th Jan 2019
Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
Answer: It comes down to the difficulty in impersonating someone John actually knows. The T-1000 had failed impersonating someone close to John when he got the name of the dog incorrect. A deleted scene (re-incorporated into the film in the Director's Cut) shows him checking the dog's tag afterwards, so he is aware exactly how he was outsmarted. Keeping Sarah alive is a way to avoid this sort of mistake. She is more useful to him at this point alive. He is not expecting her to endure his torture and he certainly isn't expecting her to be able to fight him afterwards.
27th Aug 2003
Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
Corrected entry: Why didn't the machines send the T-1000 back in time to 1984 to help the first Terminator? Even if the rebels had sent the reprogrammed T-800 back to 1984 as well that would have confused the hell out of Reese and Sarah, which would surely only have helped.
Correction: For that matter, why the machines didn't send the T-1000 to kill Sarah Connor when she was a kid - and, thus, an easier target? Or why didn't they send the T-1000 to kill John Connor when he was 9, instead of 10 years old? That was an arbitrary choice of the script, and any year would give space to questioning. So, why bother? The real reason was: the movie was made in 1991 and so Cameron decide to set the story in 1991.
The story is set in 1994.
27th Aug 2001
Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
Corrected entry: In one scene, the police shows Sarah a picture of Arnie taken from a surveillance camera at a police station in 1984. But in that picture, Arnie has the same haircut as in the rest of the film. In the first Terminator film, Arnie has longer hair and a different haircut. (00:42:50)
Correction: In the first film during the police station sequence, Arnold did have shorter hair. He cut it himself after reparing his eye and arm.
It's true that he has a different hairstyle during the police station sequence, but it wasn't cut by the terminator himself. The T-800 is set on fire during the foot chase in the alley after the nightclub sequence. From that point forward, the terminator has the "spiky" hairstyle for the rest of the movie. James Cameron chose to have the T-800 in T2 have a look closer to the look the character sported in the final 2/3 of the original film (spiky hair, leather jacket, sunglasses, motorcycle) because that is how the character is most remembered by audiences.
17th Feb 2004
Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
Corrected entry: When the T-1000 and the T-800 first come face to face, the T-800 pushes John Connor through a door to get him away from the gunfire. The two cyborgs then proceed to empty their guns into each other, finally resulting in the T-1000 being knocked from its feet. Now, why did the T-1000 waste its time (and ammunition that could have been used to pick off Connor) firing a 9mm at the T-800 (when weapons of this sort do no serious damage to its endoskeleton), when it could have strode up and did much more damage with its hands/blades? Surely a Terminator would know the strengths and weaknesses of a fellow SkyNet soldier?
Correction: This falls under the heading of "why didn't this happen?" For one thing, it's far more likely that the T-1000 was actually trying to shoot John - John was only protected because Terminator used his own body as a shield.
The idea that terminators are not programmed to fight/kill one another is an important plot point in Terminator 3. The T-X was specifically designed to combat other terminators.
1st Sep 2003
Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
Corrected entry: When the T-800 first sees John Connor on his bike with his friend, he zooms in to check the identity, and the close-up shows us Johns face with his hair nicely done and hanging down - however, wouldn't his fair be thrown backwards, accounting for the speed they were going on the bike?
Correction: That was a photo that the Terminator had, so he could identify the target.
That's not correct, the image we see in the T-800's vision is supposed to be a zoomed in image of John Connor on his motorcycle, but is a still photograph.
27th Aug 2013
Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
Question: One of the taglines for this film is "It's nothing personal". I have no idea what that has to do with the film and was hoping someone could explain it.
Chosen answer: Two possibilities. 1: The Terminator is emotionless, so the killing isn't personal, but rather what it's programmed to do. 2: Sarah Connor's plan to kill Miles Dyson to stop Skynet's creation.
It's also a sly nod to another famous tagline, Jaws: The Revenge. "This time it's personal."
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Answer: In addition, another deleted scene shows that the T-1000 was damaged by being frozen and thawed and was having difficulty maintaining form. He wanted to be sure he wouldn't mess it up.
LorgSkyegon
What's especially odd about the scene is that both examples we gave to help answer this question were actually deleted from the original release. When I first saw this movie in the theater when it was released I had the exact same question, it wasn't until I saw the Special Edition with the deleted scenes reinserted that it made sense.
BaconIsMyBFF