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Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles: “Gnothi Seauton”

The title of this episode is Greek for “know thyself” and is derived from an old quote by the Greek philosopher Socrates. Sarah Connor mentions it at the beginning of the episode and then goes on to note how difficult it is to know one’s self when one is continually changing one’s identity to survive.

Shortly afterward, the cyborg Cameron Phillips gives Sarah a lead as to where to acquire new fake I.D.s for herself and her son and for a change, it does not involve the Hispanic community. Instead it involves a group of kindred spirits sent back by the future to help out the anti-Skynet resistance. Unfortunately, someone meets up with them before Sarah does and that someone succeeds in doing away with all but one member, who is not to be found.

So instead Sarah ends up going to an old connection in the local Hispanic community after all, only to find out that her contact is officially retired. The contact, however, does suggest that Sarah contact his nephew who has taken over the family I.D. business. This nephew proves to be more mercenary than his uncle and Sarah is forced to break into a safe left behind by the dead time travelers in order to find funds with which to pay him off.

Along the way, Cameron learns to imitate the posture of the nephew’s Latina look-out, proving -- among other things -- that it is just not white Anglo-American humans that the young cyborg learns from. In addition, Sarah learns from the nephew about the infamous 9/11 incident of September 2001 -- and her reaction to that proves to be most interesting. Moreover, both Cameron and Sarah prove to be multilingual, giving both of them an unexpected break when their knowledge of Spanish allows them to eavesdrop on the nephew’s bodyguards. As a result, Sarah soon realizes that her old connection is not quite the reformed felon he claims to be but rather an informant who may or may not be giving info to the feds. Sarah confronts him with this information and he comes up with a convincing alibi, but Cameron kills the guy before Sarah has a chance to verify it.

Not that it matters in the long run. Before the episode is over, it becomes quite evident that the contact really was not quite the guy he claimed to be and even in death, his existence proves to be quite inconvenient to the Connors. Which proves -- among other things -- that knowing herself wasn’t Sarah’s biggest problem this time out after all.