5 Reasons ‘I’ll Be Back’ From ‘Terminator’ Is the Worst Catchphrase Ever
The American Film Institute named “I’ll Be Back” from Terminator as number 37 on its list of the 100 greatest movie quotes. But frankly, you shouldn’t give a damn how anyone ranks individual movie lines. That’s a ranking of how strongly various lines became memes, which isn’t the same thing as properly appreciating what the movies really did with their dialogue.
In fact, when we really look at this line closely, we see how it did everything wrong.
It Ruined a Brilliant Joke
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In the original The Terminator, Arnold Schwarzenegger’s character says the line after a police station refuses to let him come in and visit Sarah Connor. “I’ll be back,” he says. Then he drives a car into the station and kills all the officers there.
Originally, the line was scripted as, “I’ll come back.” It stayed that way through several drafts. In the end, Arnold went with, “I’ll be back,” and some sources say this switch was his own idea, as he thought it sounded more badass. In reality, he didn’t like the “I’ll be back” wording (more on that in a moment), but it was on the page because Cameron approved it. Either way, the switch was a shame, because it ruined the setup for the scene that followed.
The words “I’ll come back” and “I’ll be back” might look like they say the same thing, with the only difference being how one adds a threatening connotation. But in practice, the phrase “I’ll come back” doesn’t really mean “I’ll be back.” It means, “I’m leaving.” We say, “I’ll come back” when we’ve been trying to get something done at a public establishment and we discover that it’s not working, so we’ll have to try again at a later point. “I’ll come back” is what we say right before we leave, as a form of goodbye. You aren’t promising to see this person again, as someone else will likely be in their place when you return.
As originally scripted, the Terminator tells the cop, “I’ll come back,” which seemingly means he has accepted that visiting Sarah is impossible. He’s leaving, just as the cop wants him to. But then, he comes back immediately. Rather than using the phrase in the way we conventionally do, he was literally announcing that he was about to come back. That’s really funny.
Orion Pictures
In the movie we got, he instead darkly declares that he’s going to return, and we instantly have a pretty good idea what this means, even if the cop doesn’t. It’s still fun how he returns immediately and so violently, but the play on words is gone.
According to Cameron, first-time audiences were not supposed to respond to the line, as the punchline only arrives when the car does. But audiences cheered at the line itself, guessing that it announced some imminent action scene. That was because by rewording the line, the movie gave the game away.
The Series Already Has Its Own Commentary on One-Liners
So, the line was the setup to a joke, but it transformed into a pre-asskicking one-liner. One problem here is that the sequel scripted a whole separate thing on the subject of pre-asskicking one-liners.
It’s the scene where young John Connor gives the T-800 a speech lesson. “You say, ‘No problemo,’” he tells him. “And if you want to shine them on, it’s, ‘Hasta la vista, baby.’ And if someone gets upset, you say, ‘Chill out.’”
Having newly learned the virtue of quips, the T-800 goes on to say, “Hasta la vista, baby” right before blasting apart the frozen rival Terminator. The unspoken joke here is that, clearly, it would have been more fitting for him to say, “Chill out."
Everyone loved “hasta la vista,” simply as a character saying something awesome before kicking ass. The line is number 76 on the AFI’s list of the 100 greatest movie quotes, and we all know that list is legit. But the line was also so good because this is a robot, for whom pre-asskicking one-liners are a brand-new concept. If we say the earlier Terminator’s “I’ll be back” was a one-liner like that as well, that undermines this.
Of course, John Connor doesn’t say he’s teaching his friend how to deliver cool movie quotes. This isn’t a parody like Last Action Hero. He says he’s teaching him to speak less robotically. Which brings up another point…
That’s Not Even Robotic
When doing the original scene, Arnold objected to the wording, saying he thought they should lose the contraction and have him say, in full, “I will be back.” This wouldn’t only be more menacing but would more suit the robot he was portraying. Cameron overruled him and made him stick with the “I’ll.”
This is the part where we’re tempted to label this as an example of the limits of rationality. Sometimes, doing the exact wrong thing results in movie magic. Except, given that Arnold was right, his version would have resulted in just as much movie magic, as far as we know, maybe even more. “I will” would have sounded more like a machine and would have tied the line even more to the character in our minds.
Sure, it feels impossible to imagine the line any differently now, but that’s because we’re so used to hearing it quoted, not because we think the version we know suits the scene best. And be honest: Unless you were an adult 40 years ago, you heard this line quoted a bunch of times before you ever saw The Terminator.
The Callbacks Call Back to Nothing
Yes, we’ve all heard the line quoted many times, including by later films in the series. And here’s where the line truly descends into nonsense.
A catchphrase may not be high art, but when it does work, it’s the character calling back to all the times they said the line in the past. In the Terminator series, this is impossible because a different character says it every time.
The second time the series trots out the line is in Terminator 2: Judgment Day. As before, Arnold’s character says it, but he’s playing a different robot this time, with no memories of the last one we saw. However, the whole scene is supposed to call back to how Arnold said the line in the previous movie (he again takes down a bunch of officers, and he again drives a vehicle into the station), so I’m not going to fault the movie for underlining the connection.
But then in Terminator 3, Arnold plays yet another robot with no memories of the last two, and when he says his version of the line — “She’ll be back,” this time — it has nothing to do with the previous scenes. The movie still wants us to cheer at the line we recognize. Why?
Then came Terminator: Salvation, in which they have John Connor say the line. No, the character isn’t recalling the time he heard the Terminator say it. He’s just saying it on his own, and we’re supposed to clap.
Many historians claim that there was a movie named Terminator Genysis in 2015, and this one gave the line back to Arnold, but it’s once again a new robot with no memory of the previous lines. This instance of the phrase deserves special recognition for making little sense in context. When the Terminator (named “Pops”) says it, he’s about to jump out of a helicopter, and Sarah Connor replies, “What?”
By the sixth movie, they have Sarah Connor herself say the line. This scene makes the least sense of all (she shouldn’t be in this location, for reasons you’d need to watch the movie to understand), to the point that the empty return of the line “I’ll be back” didn’t even make the AFI’s list of the 100 Stupidest Things About Terminator: Dark Fate.
It Was a Total Missed Opportunity for Advertising Sequels
This is a catchphrase in which a character talks about being back. So, you’d think every time a new sequel comes out, trailers could include a clip of him saying that, to announce that the series is back, right?
Nope. They can’t. Because the line says, “I’ll be back,” but by the time we’re trying to get audiences into seats, he’s already back in theaters.
Clearly, the superior catchphrase would have been, “I’m back, baby!” Along with: “Bite the living tissue over my shiny metal ass.”
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