Next week’s Terminator journey takes us someplace we never expected… the 1920s??

Self Made Man
Monday - 8PM/7PMc
Live on FOX

Strange Things, indeed. Last night witnessed the return of our favorite endoskeleton, a twisty Riley reveal that those from the future probably wouldn’t have predicted, three-dots, and one badass Sarah Connor. But what was happening at the One-Two Point behind the camera?

Let’s get to it right off the bat — Riley’s working with Jesse?? We won’t get into the specifics (obviously, there is more to be learned), but it’s a twist we’ve been protecting for a while. A long while. We here at T:SCC have been hiding the truth about Riley’s character since day one, as has Leven, who Josh informed of her character’s true past and motives before she shot a single frame. But what does this mean for John Connor?

Though we had to cut a chunk of the opening sequence for time, you may notice that Sarah and Derek drop their car off at a valet before breaking into the Dakara Systems offices at the beginning of the episode. Originally as conceived, Dakara Systems was housed in a high-rise building with an upscale restaurant on the ground floor. Sarah and Derek were to sneak through the restaurant before entering the offices…

As Ash informed us yesterday, the GO proverb Xander teaches Cameron — Strange Things Happen at the One-Two Point — obviously doubles as the title to the episode. But what exactly does it mean? Web GO expert Sensei tells us that “the two-one point is a critical point in many life and death problems. The difference between living or dying locally is at least twenty points. It is something that cannot be taken easily. That’s the difference between winning and losing, or losing and losing badly.”

Most of our scenes involving the Dakara Systems storyline in this episode were shot in downtown Los Angeles. The restaurant is actually Cicada Restaurant and the park Sarah and Alex stroll through is Pershing Square.

Easter egg alert: Did you catch the sneaky references to a conversation from an earlier episode? In front of Sarah, Cameron exclaims that hair “is the hardest thing to get right,” a statement she was quite proud of when torturing Allison in Allison from Palmdale.

In the episode, The Turk communicates with Ellison using images and binary code. Whenever we feature any sort of computer screen (including projected screens) on the show, we have to setup the programming and video graphics playback long before production ever reaches the set. Lucky for us, we’ve got one of the best (and busiest!) in the biz. With script in hand, Mark Marcum designed the images and overall look for The Turk’s visualization. Though this is the first episode we really get to see it in depth, Marcum actually began creating the design for The Turk a few episodes ago when it told the joke in The Tower is Tall… episode. With Josh’s feedback, Marcum completed a few variations before finally landing on what you saw on screen!

As Weaver explains to Ellison that before his death, the dearly departed Doctor Sherman dubbed her Babylon project (aka The Turk), John Henry. Through them we learned that John Henry was the subject of an American folk story about man versus machine. But did you know that John Henry is also considered a representation of the American melting pot working class in the nineteenth century?

Strange Things Happen at the One-Two Point was written by our Co-Producer team of Ashley Miller and Zack Stentz (Goodbye to All That, Dungeons and Dragons) and was directed by the creator of The 4400, Scott Peters. Zack and Ash originally dubbed the episode Jesse’s Girl as shorthand on the episode’s outline, but stuck with the new title once they wrote their first draft.

Strange Things Happen at the One-Two Point…

That’s an episode title, and it’s a Go proverb. No, really. The game of “Go” has proverbs, and that’s one of them. If you’re interested, you can find a couple of really good, in-depth descriptions of what this actually means with respect to playing Go. But the important thing for us (and the episode) is its meaning in a larger sense: in certain situations, the rules of battle change. The pace of battle gets faster, more intense. Everything can become life-and-death (which, as it turns out, is another term that comes from Go).

Why this obsession with an old strategy game from China played with white and black stones? Well, when a writer goes in search of a metaphor… just as when Sarah Connor goes in search of three dots… sometimes, we land on a thing we’re so sure is right that it becomes everything. In this case, Go and its proverbs. At the risk of getting meta, Go became the tale and the tale became Go. Starts simple, gets complicated. Nothing is what it seems until you get to end-game and suddenly realize “of course”. It was always this way. It was always going to end this way. It had to end this way.

There’s a great Go proverb that didn’t make it into the episode but applies nicely: “learn the nuclear tesuji”. That’s a fancy way of saying sometimes the only way to prevent a loss is to get ticked off, destroy the board and beat your enemy senseless. It’s meant in jest, but it’s strangely effective. At the very least, it might make you feel better.

Just ask Sarah Connor. And Skynet…

So Hadley, my Prime Minister of Most Current Media, has informed me that I’m to write a few words about the “scheduling thing.” My immediate response was: “Scheduling thing? What scheduling thing?” But now I understand that there seems to be a little bit of consternation out there in the Most Current Media regarding the announcement that we’ve removed the episode Alpine Fields from the current schedule.

As the great Douglas Adams once said: “Don’t Panic.”

We were informed last week that Fox wanted to run a two-hour Prison Break finale in the slot that would have been our mid-season finale, the episode Earthlings Welcome Here. In order to keep that episode our finale (as it was designed to be), we are shifting the mostly stand-alone Alpine Fields into the second half of our schedule. It is worth noting that we (TPTB@TSCC) had already shifted Alpine Fields one other time due to our own whims and inclinations, so if nothing else, the episode does pack light and knows better than to make friends or put down roots.

So never fear. Everything’s the same. Just a little different. Kinda like the future.

Peace
jf

12/1 UPDATE: How profound that JF is. Word came in late last week that FOX has decidedly gone back to the original plan/schedule and will now be airing Self Made Man tonight (12/1), Alpine Fields Monday 12/8, and Earthlings Welcome Here 12/15. Fear not, continuity-addicts!

Strange Things… are happening tonight (at the One-Two Point).

8PM/7PMc - Live on FOX
You’ll be watching, won’t you?

Things to look forward to tonight — our girls (okay, one’s a cyborg) dressed to the nines, the return of Dorian Harewood’s Doctor Sherman, three-dots, and one helluva Sarah Connor fight scene…

Oh yeah, and some big plot twists that should surprise you too.

One more thing before we go away for the night. Another look at this coming Monday’s Strange Things Happen at the One-Two Point.

Monday. 8PM/7PMc. Live on FOX.

Quick update from the front lines.

First off, you’re not going to miss Monday’s all-new Strange Things Happen at the One-Two Point, are you? Let’s just say you can expect a few big story progressions…

It’s Friday-land on the Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles set as we’re on our second day of production on episode sixteen (yes, really!) — of course, we won’t tell you anything about it quite yet.

While our amazing cast and crew will be shooting late into the night tonight, our writers are hard at work piecing together the rest of the season.

Perhaps you deserve a little Friday surprise? How about the titles of our three remaining episodes you can look forward to before the new year. Stay tuned for…

Strange Things Happen at the One-Two Point on November 24
Self Made Man shows his face on December 1
Earthlings Welcome Here lands December 8

Oh, we did mention that there’s big twists in this week’s episode right? Trust us. Catch it live.

So you’re anxiously awaiting this coming week’s big new episode, but you’re wondering: what exactly does the title, Strange Things Happen at the One-Two Point, mean?

Hey, don’t rely on us! Do a little research! Start by googling Go.

You’ll quickly learn that “Go is a strategic board game for two players. Go originated in China, where it has been played for more than 2500 years and is noted for being rich in strategic complexity despite its simple rules. It is played by two players who alternately place black and white stones on the vacant intersections of a grid of 19×19 lines. The object of the game is to control a larger part of the board than the opponent. To achieve this, players strive to place their stones in such a way that they cannot be captured, while mapping out territories the opponent cannot invade without being captured.”

The rest is up to you, friends…

Thursday afternoon seems like the perfect time for a first-look at this coming week’s Strange Things Happen at the One-Two Point, don’t you think?

Well, if you’re in the minority that doesn’t think so, I wouldn’t click that play button below…

Strange Things Happen at the One-Two Point
Monday, November 24 @ 8PM/7PMc
Watch it live on FOX.

FOX went behind the scenes with our Special FX Makeup guru, Rob Hall. Check out his very cool Almost Human shop…