As much as the Terminator franchise would benefit from bringing back Arnold Schwarzenegger’s original T-800, it’s too late for the iconic character to make a villainous comeback. 1984’s The Terminator introduced audiences to the instantly iconic T-800, a murderous android assassin played with clinical precision by Arnold Schwarzenegger. The strongman turned actor gave The Terminator’s titular antagonist a chilling, uncanny demeanor that made the T-800 an unforgettable villain and turned director James Cameron’s low-budget sci-fi horror into a blockbuster classic.
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A few years later, Terminator: Judgment Day flipped the original movie’s dynamic, making the T-800 the sequel’s unlikely hero. This allowed Schwarzenegger to display more range, showcasing the actor’s considerable comedic chops and even earning some poignant moments of pathos by the time Terminator: Judgment Day’s credits rolled. However, over the ensuing sequels, the Terminator series sapped Schwarzenegger’s original T-800 of any remaining threat, meaning the franchise villain can’t make a comeback in a new reboot.

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It’s unfortunate, but after so many years of being portrayed as a harmless father figure, a comic relief, and a heroic figure, Schwarzenegger’s T-800 can’t return to the character’s original status as a ruthless villain. This is a big part of why the Terminator franchise can’t return to its slasher roots, since its legendary villain has been seen as a hero for decades at this stage. While many other major horror villains were also parodied relentlessly, their own franchises never changed them into well-meaning heroes. In turning the T-800 into a good guy, Terminator: Judgment Day ensured that Schwarzenegger’s T-800 would never be taken seriously as the villain of the series again — and the franchise’s subsequent reboots, revivals, and re-imaginings have all acted as further nails in the character’s coffin.

Arnold Schwarzenegger Never Left The Terminator Franchise

While he hasn’t played the villainous T-800 since the original Terminator, Schwarzenegger has still stayed a part of the Terminator franchise in almost all of its screen incarnations. He was the bizarrely cuddly “Pops” in Terminator: Genisys and the absurd suburban Terminator stepdad Carl in Dark Fate, meaning the actor reprising the role of the T-800 wouldn’t be a return per se, since the actor never fully left the role in the first place. What Schwarzenegger’s various Terminator reboot characters did do, however, is make the Terminator progressively less scary and more silly, something that a T-800 would have a hard time undoing in a new franchise outing.

Schwarzenegger’s Later Terminators De-Fanged The T-800

While Terminator: Judgment Day humanized the robotic assassin, everything that came after made the T-800 progressively more and more cutesy until his original start as a cold-blooded robotic killer was almost entirely retconned. For some viewers, it was the disco shades of Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines. For others, it was the sight of the misguided failure Terminator: Genisys depicting Sarah Connor affectionately hugging “Pops,” the father figure that the T-800 had become. However, the final death knell for the T-800’s once-threatening mystique was Terminator: Dark Fate’s Carl. The reboot started strong with the shocking sight of John Connor’s former friend, Schwarzenegger’s T-800, shooting the kid dead in broad daylight.

However, Terminator: Dark Fate went on to illustrate the rest of this T-800’s surreally humdrum existence, from his redemptive time as a stepfather and suburbanite to his eventual self-sacrifice which was intended to make up for his earlier mistakes in Sarah’s eyes. This depiction of the T-800’s internal anguish – which went against a character whose original villainous appeal was rooted in Schwarzenegger’s choice to play the Terminator as an emotionless, unfeeling monster – was the moment when the T-800 stopped being scary. It would be nigh on impossible for a Terminator sequel to undo this, particularly when the franchise isn’t the only cultural force working against the character.

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Schwarzenegger Spoofed The T-800 Himself

Even if it weren’t for the later Terminator sequels ruining Schwarzenegger’s threatening screen presence as the T-800, pop culture at large did this for him. The original Terminator was parodied so often and so effectively throughout the 80s, 90s, and 00s that it would be almost impossible to take him seriously again. Even his actor spoofed the role often in Arnold Schwarzenegger’s many family comedy movies, a career pivot that can’t be retconned in an instant. Schwarzenegger, and the franchise at large, can’t make the T-800 an effective horror movie villain like Michael Myers, Jason Voorhees, or Freddy Krueger again after spending years parodying the role in the likes of  Kindergarten Cop and Jingle All The Way.

Pop Culture Loved Schwarzenegger’s Original T-800 (Too Much)

However, even if Schwarzenegger had never spoofed the role, movies and television did the same thing for so long that parodies of the T-800 are almost as iconic as the actual character’s terrifying screen debut. The Simpsons, Stranger Things, and Wayne’s World all featured memorable Terminator spoofs, while the anarchic animated sitcom Rick & Morty devoted an episode to parodying the Terminator franchise’s knotty chronology. If Schwarzenegger’s T-800 were to make a return to the big screen in a sequel or reboot that played its lethal villainy entirely seriously, younger viewers would be as likely to recognize the character from a slew of spoofs, references, homages, and parodies as they would be to recall its scary original Terminator persona. It would be almost impossible, when Schwarzenegger, movies, television shows, and the Terminator franchise itself have all poked fun at the T-800 and made the villain appear harmless, for the series to suddenly pull off an about-face and turn him back into a serious antagonist.

While it is possible for an effective Terminator franchise reboot to reinvent the T-800 for a new generation, this wouldn’t come in the form of Schwarzenegger’s original version of the character. After so many memorable parodies mocking the character, his effectiveness has been blunted beyond recognition and the robot now acts as a punchline more than a legitimately threatening horror villain. As a result, it is too late for the Terminator franchise to bring back Schwarzenegger’s original T-800, despite how beloved the character is.

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