Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles

About the show

I’m going to stick to Network television in answering this query as pay television is a whole ‘nother ball of wax, IMO.

Hands down, the show I’m most looking forward to this fall is Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles which is also known to viewers as T:TSCC, T:SCC, and Terminator: TSCC.

Here’s a thumbnail of what is in store in the first episode of Season 2–which in my mind should be called “Season 1.5″ as the first season was only nine episodes in length.

From TV Guide:

Episode Detail: S201 “Samson and Delilah” - Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles

In the second-season opener, the wake of the Jeep explosion brings danger for Sarah and John, while Agent Ellis handles the aftermath of Cromartie’s massacre. Elsewhere, high-tech CEO Catherine Weaver (Shirley Manson) has big plans for her corporation.

Cast: Lena Headey, Thomas Dekker, Summer Glau, Brian Austin Green, Richard T. Jones, Garret Dillahunt, and Shirley Manson

Why I love Terminator: TSCC~

• Everything Terminator:TSCC on this blog
• Bear McCreary
  When I watched the very first episode of T: TSCC I had this sensation of familiarity. I knew Summer Glau from her previous work on Joss Whedon’s Firefly (TV) and Serenity (film) and was thrilled for her to have a leading role. I knew almost none of the other characters though! What was it!? I wracked my brain but came up with nothing. It was simply a feeling…until Episode 2…then the light bulb came on. The soundtrack was excellent! I’d heard a similar style before! But could it be?. It was and is Bear McCreary–Battlestar Galactica’s composer!
  I cannot tell you how much Bears’ scoring of Terminator:TSCC brings to the overall feel of the show just as he creates an atmosphere through his uncanny ability to strike the right chords in Galactica, he does the same in Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles.
• Making Garret Dillahunt a series regular
• Watching this show will help me get through the long, cold fall and early winter when there are no new Battlestar Galactica episodes, not to mention when BSG ends completely next year.

Need more convincing? Here are a few reviews of the show when it was just getting up and running. It only got better as the season (9 episodes) progressed.

USA Today gave the premiere episode 3 and a half stars out of four, calling the series, “smart, tough and entertaining.” The New York Times referred to it as “one of the more humanizing adventures in science fiction to arrive in quite a while”, while the Los Angeles Times declared the show “has heart and feeling” and “an almost Shakespearean exploration of fate vs. character” that features “plenty of really great fight scenes, and explosions, as well as neato devices developed in the future and jury-rigged in the present.”

Tags: Battlestar Galactica, Bear McCreary, Spoilers, Summer Glau, Television, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, video

There has been much discussion About the Science of stem cell research. Years ago, when news of the possibilities of cure for genetically-based diseases first broke in mainstream news it sounded too good to be true. Sadly though the science was solid the opposition politically was every bit as solid. Instead of moving forward with promising research an iron grip was wrapped around anything remotely to do with placental stem cells. Many scientists and researchers though discouraged by the potential of the use of stem cells to cure disease being stymied, forged forward in an attempt to find “acceptable” sources of stem cells that could be as effective as cord stem cells.
C’elle menstrual stem cells have within them “multipotent” markers which indicate that they may be able to differentiate into many other cell types in the body much like bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells. The significance of this cannot be understated because the bone marrow stem cells show similar properties to cord blood cells which have solidly established successes in clinical applications.

I think that this C’elle Client Testimonial very effectively presents how a woman made the decision to use C’elle anticipation of what could happen in the future and how she decided with their permission to assist her immediate family members for future potential health issues.

Tags: c'elle, stem cell

Once again, this week there weren’t any Post Secrets that really grabbed me.

I think part of the secret of the success of Post Secret is the universality of the themes –fears, hopes, dreams, wishes–and then there are the funny ones. The one I chose here falls into that category. For something to be funny, it needs to touch some type of chord, too.  This Post Secret is amusing to me because I can imagine at one time or another my spouse doing this very thing–or perhaps even me in a more childish/churlish moment.

Tags: Favourite Post Secret This Week

There have been a number of Terminator: The Sarah Conner Chronicles promos released recently. I hadn’t seen the next four (below). They do have a number of new scenes as well as a few that have debuted already.
In one, the CEO of Cyberdyne (Shirley Manson) states that she “is pleased to announce the formation of a new division–Babylon.”

Promo Nine is among my favourites as it depicts the immediate aftermath of the explosion of Sarah’s Jeep after Cameron has gotten in and turned the key. Cameron is shown rebooting and semi-staggering away from the wreckage, then the shot cuts to Cameron in a warehouse using an industrial stapler to mend her facial wounds(!)

Yet another of the promo videos below shows Garrett Dillahunt as Cromartie. I’d noted in previous blogs that Garrett is being upgraded to a series regular. That makes me <smile>.
Can’t wait for the fun to begin–again! Much more on this website on Terminator: TSCC

Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles Season 2, FOX Promo 9

Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles Season 2, FOX Promo 10

Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles Season 2, FOX Promo 11
No new information here but–some different takes on what has been presented in prior previews.

Tags: FOX, promos, Spoilers, T:TSCC, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, video

The late Heath Ledger with daughter Matilda~
Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell have all donated their earnings from the film The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus to Matilda, Heath Ledger’s daughter.

The actors - who replaced Ledger following his death from an accidental prescription drugs overdose in January - wanted to give their money to Heath’s two-year-old child with actress Michelle Williams to ensure she has a secure future.

The movie’s director Terry Gilliam said:

“The three actors were totally heroic coming in. This doesn’t happen very often - where there’s a tragedy like this, and very famous, very successful actors suddenly say, ‘OK, we’ll do whatever it takes to help.’ “They came, they did the work, they allowed the movie to be finished, they didn’t take money - the money goes to Heath’s daughter. That’s extraordinary! “I am so glad these guys are so humble. That’s why they make a great addition to the film. It will be bittersweet seeing this movie knowing he was filming it only days before he died. This picture still hurts to see because as we all know he did die a couple of days after this picture was taken. My thoughts will always be with Heath.”

Depp, Farrell, and Law will each play Ledgers’ character, “Tony” as he is transported into three separate dimensions, which he accesses via a paranormal mirror belonging to a travelling theatre troupe.

Tags: Colin Farrell, donate earnings, film, Heath Ledger, Heath Ledger's daughter, Johnny Depp, Jude Law, Matilda, Terry Gilliam, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus

My Favourite Post Secret This Week…

…does actually come from another week but it’s a new one here.

This one I can relate to more as a parent, though I certainly put in my time as a babysitter, both paid and unpaid.

When I was a teenage babysitter, I was much closer in age to the kids I watched than the parents and I never really thought deeply about “how fast they grow up,” as I was still in the process. Now that I’ve been a parent twice over with one a full quarter decade old and the other 10 years his junior, I can relate to this Post Secret on a much deeper level than when I was my teenage self.

Tags: Favourite Post Secret This Week

Last pics of Maple Lake for a while, I promise.

My bedroom is an addition at the back of the cottage so not primo viewing but not poor, either.

View from my bedroom window, Maple Lake, Ontario, 2008.

It’s extra good because my bedroom view at the condo is shite–parking lot, a patch of grass, paved street, and expensive townhomes across the street.
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It’s been raining all frelling day today and I am bummed. I’m not looking forward at all to the 700-mile drive home to IL–alone on Sunday–nor to packing tomorrow. And the three oatmeal chocolate-chip cookies I just ate did not help. At all.
Tonite’s sunset:

Tags: drive home, maple lake ontario, photography

Minus Angelina, Mad, Pax, Shiloh, and new twins Vivienne and Knox, Brad and Zahara Jolie-Pitt 3, were accompanied by his parents on an outing to La Fondation Marguerite et Aimé Maeght, a museum in Saint-Paul, France before heading to chi-chi restaurant La Colombe d’Or. Looks like all is well in the land of the Jolie-Pitts. Brad sure looks like a new dad though, don’t you think?

Jane Pitt, Zahara Jolie-Pitt, Brad Pitt (l to r)

Tags: Brad Pitt, zahara jolie-pitt

By my parents not at all really because I was an extremely well-behaved child–a parentified child actually.

My mother, when I was younger hit me upside the head–which I did not like at all. She yelled a lot. In my teens though–nothing except one time when I really disappointed my folks and my dad was disgusted with me. That got to me. But it wasn’t a traditional punishment.

If anything I was “punished” by being ignored.

Now, I did have an evil aunt whom I was left in the care of for months in the summers–and she inflicted lots of psychic damage but that’s a different story and I can’t risk going into it on the Internet.