One of the biggest revelations in Terminator: Dark Fate's first trailer was that Mackenzie Davis' new character Grace appears to be a Terminator herself. After all, her synthetic skin gets revealed during a highway battle with Gabriel Luna's relentless killer robot.
According to Dark Fate director Tim Miller, Grace's cybernetic body comes at a tragic price. She is a cyborg and underwent a painful process for her suicide mission back to the past.
"It’s a painful life, and they’re scarred and take a lot of drugs to combat the pain of what’s been done to them. They don’t live a long time," Miller explained to Variety. "It’s a very sacrificial role; they risk death to save others. And from the very first suggestion it was always a woman. We had to look for someone who has the physicality, but I’m very sensitive to actors. I didn’t just want a woman who could physically fit the role but emotionally as well. Mackenzie really wanted to do it; she came after the role. She worked harder than anybody.”
The first trailer has Grace insist she is still human, even after her true nature becomes revealed to Sarah Connor and Dani, a young woman targeted by Luna's Rev-9 Terminator. The trailer also revealed the Rev-9 to be a combination of liquid metal and a hard metal endoskeleton, effectively capable of being in two forms at once and making it the most formidable Terminator yet.
Directed by Tim Miller and produced by James Cameron, Terminator: Dark Fate stars Arnold Schwarzenegger, Linda Hamilton, Mackenzie Davis, Gabriel Luna, Natalia Reyes and Diego Boneta. The film opens Nov. 1.