Terminator TV series is season hit for Fox

by Staff, Brand Republic 15-Jan-08, 10:55

LONDON - Virgin 1 can look forward to a major hit as it prepares to debut 'Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles', which extinguished all competition when it aired for the first time in the US at the weekend.

The Terminator TV series, which stars '300' British actress Lena Headley as Sarah Connor, the role taken in two films by Linda Hamilton, began its run on Sunday in the US on Fox TV and pulled in 18.3m viewers.

The show trounced NBC's very slimmed down '65th Annual Golden Globes', which only pulled in 5.8m viewers. Such a hit was the Terminator show that it gave Fox its best TV scripted premiere in eight years and was easily the strongest new show of the Autumn and Winter season.

It opened to strong reviews and pulled in 4m more viewers than the now panned reboot of the 'Bionic Woman' starring former 'Eastender' Michelle Ryan, which is set to be screened on ITV1.

This is disappointing for ITV as it is one of the first primetime US dramas that the channel has aired on its main channel. These usually appear on ITV2, where long-running and more acclaimed shows such as 'Supernatural' and 'Entourage' have found a home.

The 'Sarah Connors' series, which also stars Summer Glau from 'Firefly' as the female Terminator, is set two years after the second hit film 'Terminator 2: Judgment Day' where Sarah blew up Cyberdyne Systems.

Controversially, the show opens with the bad Terminator, Cromartie, posing as a substitute teacher who then pulls a gun out of his leg and starts shooting at the young John Connor.

The episode was a candidate for being pulled as it was aired around the time of the Virginia Tech massacre, but the producers left in the section.

The show will begin broadcasting on Virgin 1 on February 21.