Terminator Salvation‘s human Terminator hybrid, Marcus Wright (Sam Worthington) began his journey as a convicted man, but what was he convicted of, and did he really deserve ‘salvation’?
Even though 2009’s Terminator Salvation was rated PG-13, it presented us with, quite possibly, the darkest human character to ever grace the Terminator franchise. Marcus Wright is a character who donated his body to Cyberdyne Systems Genetics Division and was then transformed into a half man, half machine, hybrid Terminator.
The character was played by Sam Worthington; an actor who was suggested to Terminator Salvation’s director McG by series creator James Cameron. It was an opportunity to give Mr. Worthington some much needed exposure before the release of Avatar, but nevertheless it was an interesting recommendation, and one which McG listened to.
As stated, Terminator Salvation was PG-13 – the reasoning as to why Marcus Wright was sentenced to death was briefly skimmed over in the movie in a conversation with Dr. Serena Kogan (Helena Bonham Carter) where Marcus says…
“You know what I did. My brother and two cops are dead because of me.”
Marcus Wright
The incident which led to the deaths of these three people was murder, the culprit being Marcus Wright, with the bulk of the information being left to discover via SkyNet’s data files when Marcus logs into SkyNet’s database and security defence system. The information flashes by so quickly that you literally have to pause the movie to read it.
The Reason Marcus Wright Was On Death Row
A news article reveals…
“Convicted murderer, Marcus Wright, was sentenced to death last Monday after he was found guilty for the murder of his brother, Sam Wright. Sam was found fatally stabbed repeatedly throughout his body, intense trauma to all major organs resulted in a quick death. The reason for what prompted Marcus to initiate such a vicious attack is still not known, as Marcus did not reveal to police or reporters the reason behind the senseless violence. Marcus Wright seemed un-remorseful the entire duration of his time in prison, and even up until the last minutes before the needle was inserted into his vein he showed little to no compassion for the brutal crime he had committed. However, underneath the cold exterior of a soulless murderer there was a sense of redemption as Marcus accepted an offer from Dr. Serena Kogan, Founder, to donate his body to scientific experimentation after his death. His body was transferred to Cyberdyne/Skynet Corporations last Tuesday.”
News Article From Terminator Salvation
Dr. Serena Kogan led the Genetics Division for Cybernetic research at Cyberdyne Systems. When Cyberdyne Systems was purchased by the U.S.A.F. Dr. Kogan’s research facility folded into the armed forces branch known for SkyNet. ‘Project Angel’ was the name given to the top secret program that would create human hybrids. Once SkyNet was fully self-aware it saw Project Angel (an experimental program previously run by humans) as a good way to potentially create the perfect infiltrator. Marcus Wright was the perfect infiltrator human / hybrid who led John Connor and the Resistance to SkyNet in the year 2018, the same year that the T-800 would later be created and put into mass production.
The fourth Terminator movie was Marcus Wright’s ‘Salvation’ but do you, as the viewer, think that he deserved to be saved after killing his brother in such a brutal way (and the two cops that likely attended an emergency call)?
Let us know what you think in the comments below.
7 Comments
Marcus was a great character. Even though he had done terrible things, his dedication and protection of children ( Star and a young Kyle), as well as his own sacrifice later to John shows he is still a good person and a human being.
He wasn’t a good person before he was executed. After he was reborn in the future as a human/machine hybrid, he was a completely different person who had no memory of his prior life. They were two completely different people.
Marcus has a certain depth. We do not know what lead to the events but Marcus knows that he can never undo the terrible things he did. He has to live with them.
I think he had a great moral compass. But he had a problem with self-control, which is basically a chemical short circuit. Skynet took advantage of that.
In my opinion, Salvation was great when I miss MCG’s efforts to flash and create a magatransformer, or why explain to the viewer that lung failure and blood filling lead to heart failure.
Sony eventually killed it with a decision by pg13 …
tout à, fait d’accord avec toi il aurait mérité une note R ! j’espère que les idées de ce terminator sera repris de base pour un terminator 7 thriller slasher qu’avec la patte de Cameron !
Je pense que son sacrifice à la fin en donnant son coeur pour sauver la vie de john résumé bien la culpabilité de ses 3 meurtres après avoir été vendu par skynet sans pouvoir trouver de raison en tant que mi homme mi machine car il était perdu et ne savait plus de quel camps il faisait parti dans cette guerre ! Ce Terminator aurait mérité une suite qu’avec la patte de cameron en note R horreur gorre stressant.
How do we know Marcus killed his brother in cold blood? What if his brother went crazy towards Marcus? Or his brother was torturing someone else? Marcus had too much of a moral compass to just kill his own brother for no good reason.
And what about the training Marcus had? How to hotwire things? Improvise with weapons? Disarm, but with no intent to harm Kyle.
That seems more than what someone might learn on the streets, but, possibly not. How do we know there wasn’t military training there? Did he have PTSD & his brother did something to trigger an attack? Or were those skills given to him by Skynet?
I think it’s interesting that everyone instantly paints Marcus as a bad guy for killing his brother when there is ZERO information as to WHY. Not that I’m saying that killing anyone is a good thing, but, there’s not enough to know.