As part of Geeked Week, Netflix has shared the first teaser trailer for Terminator: The Anime Series. It's been a few years since Netflix first announced the series, making it a bit disappointing that the teaser doesn't contain any actual footage from the series. It does announce that the series will be coming "soon" to the streaming service, which suggests it won't be long now before we get to actually see what the anime series has to offer.
That's not to say the teaser doesn't drum up any excitement. Although the Terminator franchise, as a whole, has disappointed of late, there's hope that this series could help restore faith in the once-beloved action franchise.
"There is no fate," the trailer teases. "On August 30th, 1997... two days from now... everything changes."
For those who aren't quite familiar with the Terminator timeline, August 30th, 1997 is known as Judgment Day, the date that the artificial intelligence network known as Skynet becomes self-aware and, in gaining sentience, incites a nuclear holocaust. It marks the beginning of an all-out war between humanity and machines.
Terminator: The Anime Series will serve as a prequel story, set days before Judgment Day. Speaking to IGN, Netflix's Terri Schwartz offered the following synopsis for the series:
"In August 1997, a computer scientist named Malcom Lee is working furiously from his lab in Tokyo to launch an AI program he believes will save the world. As the course of the future changes from the past, an unrelenting assassin is sent back in time to murder Malcom and his three children in order to ensure its future dominance over humanity. The assassin is followed through time by a lone soldier who will do anything to keep Malcom and his family alive in order to prove, once and for all, there is no fate."
In other words, a (likely) Terminator assassin is sent back to eliminate someone who will potentiall be a future threat to Skynet. This is a tried-and-true formula we've seen play out in the Terminator franchise time and time again, but never in anime form.
Terminator: The Anime Series is executive-produced by Skydance, Japan Animation Studio Production I.G., and Mattson Tomlin. Tomlin (The Batman co-writer) also serves as the showrunner and writer for the series.
Unfortunately, today's update didn't offer us a release date, although Netflix did say that the series will be "coming soon" to the service.