The Terminator & Godzilla Are Now the Same Thanks to the New Netflix Anime’s Japanese Setting

Terminator Zero, Netflix’s new anime series created by Mattson Tomlin, tells a refreshingly new story in James Cameron’s beloved sci-fi universe. Set in Japan in 1997, the new eight-episode animated series follows Malcom Lee (André Holland), a scientist with visions of the impending Judgment Day. When Skynet sends a T-800 (Timothy Olyphant) back in time to kill Malcolm (from the year 2022), the resistance fighters send back their own warrior, a hardened fighter named Eiko (Sonoya Mizuno), who must protect Malcolm and save the new timeline from nuclear Armageddon. Terminator Zero doesn’t just tell a new story. By setting the series in Japan, it allows Tomlin and director Masashi Kudō to implement the unique Japanese perspectives on nuclear war.

MovieWeb spoke to Masashi Kudō about his work on Terminator Zero. During our conversation, Kudō discussed the importance of imbuing the series with Japanese perspectives on Judgment Day and the country’s long history and experience with nuclear weapons. The nuclear apocalypse has been a dominant theme in Japanese storytelling since the 1940s, with nuclear fears giving birth to one of the most iconic cinematic creatures of all-time, Godzilla. Kudō explained how important it was for him to accurately depict not only the destructiveness of nuclear weapons, but their long-lasting aftermath. He said:

“So in terms of nuclear [war], the [horror] and the danger of nuclear weapons if you live in Japan, it’s something that we all are aware of, especially going through what happened in the Second World War, and especially in August. It’s a huge topic here in Japan. And personally, if you go to the Hiroshima museum, the Atomic Bomb Museum, you really feel that. And I went there when I was still very young, and I could still remember it. And so, I wanted to make sure I was able to depict how dangerous and horrific a nuclear weapon can be to humans, and I wanted to make sure I captured that in the visuals.”

Setting The Terminator in Japan Forced Surprising Changes

Opening with a bold, 10-minute long action sequence was a strong way for Terminator Zero to establish that it was pulling no punches with its embrace of the anime medium. For Tomlin and Kudō, the Japanese influence on the show went far beyond its thematic narrative. When MovieWeb sat down with Mattson Tomlin, the showrunner and writer explained a unique problem that the show’s Japanese setting presented.

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When writing action scenes, Tomlin wrote from an American perspective. That country’s loose gun laws means that firearms are regularly available, a boon when writing a fictional shootout. However, Japan has much stricter gun laws, and Tomlin found out the hard way when he shared his action scene with his Japanese producers. He explained:

“I had written a scene where Eiko is in a parking lot, and she’s getting ready to face off against the Terminator for the first time, and she puts her elbow through the car window, gets in the glove box and takes out a revolver.
And I get a note back from Production IG at Nobu, it’s like, ‘That would never happen.’
And I’m just like, ‘What do you mean?’ They’re like, ‘We don’t have guns.’ They basically broke down for me [that] the people who have guns in Japan are the police and the military, and other than that, it’s really not a thing.

When he first received the note, Tomlin said he panicked, believing that the project was immediately dead in the water. However, looking back at The Terminator, the writer and showrunner realized it provided a new opportunity for the series. He explained:

At first I freaked out, like, ‘
Oh, we can’t do Terminator in Japan, I’ve done this all wrong
.’ And then it just kind of dawned on me that this is a narrative hurdle that I have to overcome, but it’s a great hurdle for me as a writer, and it’s a great hurdle for the characters as well. It’s not that different from what Kyle Reese goes through in the first movie, getting a police shotgun.

“But he also is saying throughout half the movie ‘These weapons aren’t gonna do anything, this is just kind of bullsh*t.’ So, in a way, we get the characters right back in that place, but it’s even worse because
I don’t even have the thing that isn’t going to do anything
.”

Fortunately, Terminator Zero found what it needed. Terminator Zero premieres on Netflix on August 29, 2024. Check out the latest trailer and watch it on Netflix through the link below:

Watch on Netflix