Terminator Movie Facts, Easter Eggs and hidden details

As he walks away from Arnold you can see the T-1000 "pulse" into liquid metal for seemingly no reason - In the deleted scenes, it is made clear the T-1000 is malfunctioning after reassembling itself and is struggling to control its form

When Kyle and Sarah are leaving the Tiki Motel, Kyle looks cleaner than at any other time in the movie. He may have experienced the only bath/shower of his entire life.

The opening scene was shot at a demolished steel plant. The twisted motorcycles, burnt cars and blackened cinders are debris from the Universal Studios fire of 1989, when a disgruntled security guard torched the back lot.

The iconic twirling of the shotgun was achieved using a heavily modified prop gun. Originally, Arnold Schwarzenegger attempted the trick without the modification by mistake, reportedly leading him to nearly break his fingers.

Lieutenant Traxler assures Sarah she is safe as there are "30 Police Officers" in the Police Station. During the Terminator's rampage, if you count all the cops he shoots on screen, in addition to the gunshots he fires offscreen, it adds up to exactly 30.

The protagonists make a stop at a "Cactus Jack's Market". Cactus Jack (1979) was one of the first movie roles of Arnold Schwarzenegger, alongside Kirk Douglas.

When the cleaner knocks on the Terminator's door, he knocks in the same beat that the score uses to tell the audience of the machine's presence.

-- The machine Dyson is building is reminiscent of the "Connection Machine", worked on by renowned physicist Richard Feynman, which also aimed to produce AI

James Cameron purposefully named the club where the shooting happens Technoir as he knew his movie was mixing typical elements from film noir (urban setting, femme fatal, private eye) with futurist features in the same way Blade Runner (1982) did two years ago.

Arnold Schwarzenegger received $15 million for delivering a total of 700 words of dialogue. That works out to $85,716 for saying, "Hasta la vista, baby."

Arnold's lever-action shotgun had to be specially modified for his iconic "flip-cock". He nearly broke his fingers when he tried flipping an unmodified version.

The Terminator is portrayed by Franco Columbu, Arnold Schwarzenegger's best friend and bodybuilding rival.

: The petrol station that Sarah, John and the T-800 hide out in is a Benthic Petroleum station, the company from The Abyss.

The toy truck Arnold runs over at the beginning of the film is nearly identical to the real truck he drives at the end.

The laser used on the 1911 Longslide was custom made for the movie by Laser Products Corp, (later Surefire) as laser sights were rare at the time. It required an external power supply run through the sleeve and a switch that was activated with opposite hand in jacket pocket.

This real life picture of Arnold Schwarzenegger is briefly seen on his character's fridge.

The T-800 Terminator had 256K of RAM and appears to run on Basic. Same as a Commodore 64 with a RAM extension card.

the scene where John Connor first sees the T-800, when getting the gun out of the box of roses, this is a reference towards Guns 'n' Roses who did "You Could Be Mine" for the movie (can be heard when John leaves his foster parents on his bike).

Arnold's Character the Terminator flips a shotgun out of a box of roses to reference Guns N Rose's song in the movie soundtrack.

The list of weapons the T-X chooses from includes references to Aliens and Halo.

Throughout the Terminator franchise, dogs are shown to detect and bark in the presence of terminators. But in Terminator Dark Fate (2019) the terminator "Carl" has a dog that doesn't bark at him, showing he has become more human than machine.

During the helicopter chase scene, the T-1000 creates a third hand to control the helicopter while he reloads with his other two.

Sarah Connor remarks the the Terminator "weighs 400 lbs" and yet he is sitting on a flimsy garden chair

There is a clear shot of Arnold Schwarzenegger's stunt double during the first chase between the T-1000 and T-800.

When the T850 is warped back in time the area around him that heats up is sand and turns to glass which he steps on and breaks

The Rev 9 sends sparks as it is dragged along the highway as it's disguise of pants and boots is a liquid metal exoskeleton.

The T-800 runs through the fire of a burning car, which immediately scorches off his hair and eye brows, giving him a creepy 'rubbery' look for the remainder of the film.

Sarah Connor wears Kyle Reese's trenchcoat.

James Cameron directed Schwarzenegger to move his eyes independently from his head while searching for his target, because it would conserve energy -- a reasonable priority for a machine.

Judgement Day, the T-1000 gives this silver mannequin a confused look as it's how he looks in his natural form, not yet seen in the movie.

The only time that the T-800 and T-1000 actually talk to each other, they are both impersonating other people.

The man taking the photos of the T-800 was the cop that the T-800 assaulted in Terminator 1. That's why he was (speechlessly) taking photos.

Before confronting the SWAT Team, the Terminator puts his grenade bandolier behind his back. Because if bullets hit the grenades they'd explode and destroy him.

The FX team studied hours of nuclear test footage, combining practical and CGI effects. Large-scale miniatures, filmed at high-speeds and destroyed with mortars, stood in for close-up shots of L.A. The atomic shockwave was achieved with early Apple software.

The T-800 attacks a police officer responding to the Tech Noir shootout. In Terminator 2 (1991), the same officer stumbles upon a familiar face at the Galleria.

After the shootout in TechNoir, the T-101 chases Kyle and Sarah. It climbs over a car engulfed in flame, burning its eyebrows off. This subtle change in the terminator's appearance makes it look more menacing and less human.

When the biker blows cigar smoke into the T-800's face, the T-800 identifies the smoke as a carcinogen vapor and analyzes its components

Astonished guy with camera (who took picture of Arnold thrown through glass window) is the same guy who was knocked out by Terminator after night club scene in "The Terminator" (1984). He was played by William Wisher, who co-wrote scripts for both movies.

The number for "Carl's Draperies" is 512-1984, which is the date the original Terminator movie takes place (May 12, 1984)

During the helicopter-chase, the T-1000 grows a third hand in order to shoot and fly at the same time

The T-800 sets its defense systems to MAX just before delivering the "I need your clothes, your boots, and your motorcycle" line.

Sarah Connor wears Kyle's Trench Coat when they go to destroy Cyberdyne Systems.

The T-800 rides the motorcycle at night without the headlights on. Terminators are built with advanced vision processing and don't require any light to see.

Dr Silberman admits he could build his career from Kyle Reese's story about a machine sent from the future. In Terminator 2 (1991), he has succeeded in that endeavor.

The T-1000 initially searches for John Connor at his foster parent's home. When visited by the T-1000, the family dog is barking madly. It's later revealed that dogs can detect terminators.

The four burning spring rocker rides in the nuked playground represent the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, from the Book of Revelation (Source: James Cameron, T2 director's audio commentary)

The police dispatcher announces a "211 in progress at Bob's Liquor, on the corner of Third and Cameron". The Terminator is the third film directed by James Cameron.

While searching Sarah Connor's apartment, the phone rings. The Terminator draws it's weapon on the source of the sound, whipping around and coming to a dead stop on the phone, demontrating the inhuman precision of the machine underneath.

: As Kate Brewster (Clare Danes) complains, "This stupid thing's not working!", she has the handheld barcode reader nowhere near the barcode repeatedly throughout the scene.

The Terminator's heads-up display graphics from the Terminator's POV have English word options instead of garbled code, suggesting the HUD was originally designed by humans and to be controlled by humans, until Skynet became self aware and took control