More ado about Terminator 4

Now that it has been confirmed that Christian Bale will play John Connor in the next three Terminator films, producers Derek Anderson and Victor Kubicek have decided to tease the fans with a few enigmatic quasi-revelations at Entertainment Weekly.

In contrast to producer James Middleton’s remark three months ago that there would be a new central character and John Connor would simply be the guy who “influences” him, much as Jesus influenced the lead character in the Ben-Hur movies, Anderson and Kubicek now say that John Connor is a “very central character throughout the next trilogy” who will “lead our franchise forward.”

And then things begin to get a little more mysterious:

So he’s the star?
KUBICEK: Yes.
ANDERSON: There’s gonna be another major costar with kind of equal presence in this installment.

And that costar would play the Terminator character?
ANDERSON: Yes…. Well, it’s hard to say. It is a new character introduced in the mythology that’s not replacing Arnold [Schwarzenegger]. It’s not like he’s stepping into Arnold’s shoes. It’s a completely new character.

Okay, but is it a Terminator — a killing machine?
ANDERSON: No, not really. That’s one of the big twists that if we told you —

You’d have to kill me?
KUBICEK: [Laughs] Yes.
ANDERSON: It would ruin the story for you. But there’s an element of humanity to it. It’s a bit different.

Not to beat a dead horse, but is the new figure Connor’s enemy?
KUBICEK: The other lead character is a new figure. [Anderson laughs] And it’s questionable if he’s an enemy or not. That’s not necessarily resolved.
ANDERSON: It’s a really interesting time in the franchise because it’s where all the fans have always wanted the franchise to go, and it hasn’t to date, which is the post-apocalyptic world. It’s after judgment day. So because we’re in a different time in the mythology, it introduces a whole new set of circumstances and characters.

And of course, none of this will have anything to do with the upcoming TV series The Sarah Connor Chronicles, which takes place in a completely different timeline altogether, where the events of Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003) never took place and thus the trilogy which follows that film never took place either. (Though I suppose we can never rule out the possibility that the two timelines might be bridged somehow. This is science fiction, after all.) So, anyway, make of all that what you will.