Terminator Genisys will have Arnold Schwarzenegger’s T-800 character as Emilia Clarke’s Sarah Connor’s “Pops”
Paramount Pictures' Terminator: Genisys, the fifth installment in the Terminator film franchise, is scheduled for release on July 1. Directed by Alan Taylor from a screenplay written by Laeta Kalogridis and Patrick Lussier, the upcoming science fiction action movie has been described by Collider as a "reset," which serves to act as a sequel, a prequel, and a reboot to the series. It will involve moving back and forth in time which will have Arnold Schwarzenegger's T-800 model character revisiting events in the earlier Terminator 1 to 4 movies.
Aside from Schwarzenegger, others confirmed in the Terminator Genisys cast include Emilia Clarke as "Sarah Connor," Jason Clake as "John Connor," Jai Courtney as "Kyle Reese," Dayo Okeniyi as "Danny Dyson," Courtney B. Vance as "Miles Dyson," Aaron Williamson as a "T-800," Byung-hung Lee as a "T-1000", J.K. Simmons, Matt Smith, Douglas Smith, and Sandrine Holt.
According to the film's synopsis, in the year 2029, John Connor, leader of the Resistance in the War against the Machines, learns of a new Skynet plot to attack him from both the past and the future to change the way the warfare will go forever. He thus sends his trusted lieutenant Kyle Reese back through time to save his mother Sarah's life and ensure his very existence, while he continues with his struggle to lead the fight against Skynet within his own timeline. However, what Kyle finds on the other side of time is like nothing he ever expected. After being orphaned at age 9 by a Terminator, Sarah has since been brought up by another T-800 Terminator, a Model 101, that is one fitted with living tissue skin, programmed to protect her.
As revealed by Entertainment Weekly: "[the new] Sarah Connor isn't the innocent she was when Linda Hamilton first sported feathered hair and acid-washed jeans in the role. Nor is she Hamilton's steely zero body-fat warrior in 1991's T2. Rather, the mother of humanity's messiah was orphaned by a Terminator at age 9. Since then, she's been raised by (brace yourself) Schwarzenegger's Terminator-an older T-800 she calls "Pops"-who is programmed to guard rather than to kill. As a result, Sarah is a highly trained antisocial recluse who's great with a sniper rifle but not so skilled at the nuances of human emotion."
On his being a "Pops" Terminator, Schwarzenegger told MTV: "The way that the character is written, it's a machine underneath. It's this metal skeleton. But above that is human flesh. And the Terminator's flesh ages, just like any other human being's flesh. Maybe not as fast. But it definitely ages...Terminator deals a lot with time travel, so there will be a younger T-800..."