Sarah Connor

Terminator (1984), Terminator 2: Judgement Day (1991)

There’s nothing more awesome than an angry, strong, independent woman with a machine gun. Sarah Connor, played by Linda Hamilton, was just voted as one of MTV Movies’ Top 10 Greatest Badasses, which should come as a surprise to no one. She’s a great role model for females. Now, now, before you get the wrong idea that I’m ENCOURAGING you to go out and get a machine gun, I don’t necessarily mean her actions. I’m talking about her personality and how Sarah Connor goes against the standard female archetype so commonly seen in action films.

She’s angry, maniacal, and psychotic, yet she’s also passionate, nurturing, and self-aware. Since action movies are almost always catered to the male audience with an exlusively all-male cast, there are very few strong female leads in action films. Usually for action films, female characters are relegated to the role of the neglected wife, the slain hooker, or the hot girlfriend. Sarah Connor is NONE of that. Sure, in the 1984 film, Terminator, she was portrayed as a frightened, confused female who’s on the run for her life from a scary cyborg sent from the future to kill her. But over the years as her character is sent to prison, she has turned into an hardened, angry, bitter woman who is hell-bent on destroying Skynet and saving the world from a cyborg takeover. She’s also determined to protect her son. In T2, we see such an interesting yet strange interaction between Sarah and her son, John Connor.

We’re so used to seeing sweet, soft-natured mothers in leading roles onscreen, that we’re not really used to the idea of a female leading character with a non-conformist mothering attitude. Sarah Connor is rude and nasty toward her son, acting rough with him, yet she does so out of love and protection. She doesn’t need or want help from anyone, male or female, but especially male. When her son tries to help her, at first she balks at his attempts, gradually slowly learning to accept his help.

It’s not just her personality that sets her apart from most standard female characters onscreen. It’s also her appearance and her attitude. She’s not your average-looking pretty female. Her facial features aren’t soft. She doesn’t wear girly clothes. She doesn’t have long silky hair. With narrowed eyes and an angry sneer on her face, she intimidates people. She doesn’t care how she looks, and neither do we, the audience. We’re so absorbed with her, that we don’t actually care if she’s hot or not. Often, male audience viewers would make comments about how a certain “chick” is hot in an action film, ignoring what role she has played for the story. Sad to say, but that’s just how the audience rolls.

When Sarah Connor fights alongside her son and the Terminator, there is a great sense of thrill in seeing a woman holding a machine gun and holding on her own against an army of police officers and against the T-1000. She doesn’t need protection from anyone. She’s not a damsel in distress. She’s not trying to look sexy while fighting. She’s an equal in battle, fighting for her life, fighting for her son, fighting for the world, and fighting for the future. For me and many other fangirls out there, there is nothing more empowering and liberating than that.

In the ending, when Sarah Connor, her son and the Terminator have successfully defeated the T1000, it was time for the Terminator to self-terminate and say goodbye to the Connors. John gets emotional, even becoming teary-eyed and begging him not to leave, while Sarah remains calm, although visibly upset. This is yet another rare moment we don’t see too often with female characters onscreen. In such emotional scenes in many films, female characters would get overly emotional or cry, but Sarah Connor doesn’t let her emotions get out of control as she bids farewell to the Terminator. To be fair, there was one scene earlier in the film where she broke down into an angry fit of sobs as she tries to kill Dyson, the man behind Skynet. But she cried out of anger, spite and conflict. Here was this man who would be responsible for a worldwide slaughter of humans in the future, yet he had a wife and son, both who were cowering for their lives behind him.

The movie came out in 1991, at a time when a new second wave of feminism was coming our way. Women had almost achieved total equality in the workplace, academics, sports and at home, yet there was still a large gender disparity in the film industry, onscreen and behind the camera. At the time, we had very few iconic strong feminist characters that were popular and memorable. There was Ellen Ripley (played by Sigourney Weaver) in the Alien movie franchise and there was Princess Leia (played by Carrie Fisher) in the Star Wars movie franchise. When Sarah Connor arrived with a sneering glare and holding a machine gun, at last, we had another kickass feminist character to look up to.

-Sabina England