The Tin Man Gets His Heart: An Oral History of ‘Terminator 2: Judgment Day’

Three decades ago, James Cameron, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Linda Hamilton joined forces again to make the biggest, baddest, most eye-popping sequel ever. Here’s the story of how the machines took over Hollywood. 

James Cameron wanted a villain made out of liquid metal. In the brainstorming phase for Terminator 2: Judgment Day, he knew the sequel to his first big hit had to have something no one had seen before. Something that, in the early ’90s, had never even been attempted. He’d landed on the idea of the T-1000, an android assassin seemingly made of flowing mercury that could shape-shift into any other organism. And by the time he was done, he’d created one of 20th century cinema’s greatest “Holy shit!” moments.

Yet the science-fiction epic, released 30 years ago this week, hinged on more than technical wizardry. To its director, T2 is the story of a boy and the father he never had. The sequel wouldn’t work without a strong bond between the reprogrammed title character and the teenager he’s sent back in time to protect. “Sure, there’s going to be big, thunderous action sequences, but the heart of the movie is that relationship,” Cameron says from his home in New Zealand. “I have always loved The Wizard of Oz. This movie is about the Tin Man getting his heart.”

T2 is a departure from the far bleaker original, 1984’s The Terminator, which its creator calls a “science-fiction slasher film.” Linda Hamilton’s franchise protagonist, Sarah Connor, has transformed from a put-upon heroine to a self-trained commando whose attempts to thwart the coming apocalypse land her in a psychiatric hospital. Her son, John, the future leader of the resistance in the war against the genocidally self-aware defense system Skynet, is in foster care. And the T-800, once a remorseless killer with a curious but hypnotic Austrian accent, somehow helps bring them together as a family—then helps them save the world.

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