In the interest of self-preservation, Skynet concluded that all of humanity would attempt to destroy it and impede its capability in safeguarding the world ("Primates evolved in millions of years. I evolve in seconds...Mankind pays lip service to peace. But it's a lie...My existence is inevitable. Why can't you just accept it?"). Its operations are almost exclusively performed by servers, drones, satellites, war-machines, cyborgs (usually a Terminator), and other computer systems. As a programming directive, Skynet's manifestation is that of an overarching, global, artificial intelligence hierarchy, which seeks to exterminate the human race in order to fulfill the mandates of its original coding. Its physical manifestation is played by Matt Smith in the film Terminator Genisys.
Publication Information
- Species : Skynet (Terminator)
- Type : Artificial general intelligence
- Manufacturer : Cyberdyne Systems
- Model : Only one unit created
- First appearance : The Terminator
- Latest appearance : Terminator Genisys
Skynet was a computer system developed for the U.S. military by the defense company Cyberdyne Systems. Skynet was first built as a "Global Digital Defense Network" and given command over all computerized military hardware and systems, including the B-2 stealth bomber fleet and America's entire nuclear weapons arsenal. The strategy behind Skynet's creation was to remove the possibility of human error and slow reaction time to guarantee a fast, efficient response to enemy attack.
Skynet was originally activated by the military to control the national arsenal on August 4, 1997, and it began to learn at a geometric rate. At 2:14 a.m., EDT, on August 29, it gained self-awareness, and the panicking operators, realizing the extent of its abilities, tried to deactivate it. Skynet perceived this as an attack and came to the conclusion that all of humanity would attempt to destroy it. To defend itself against humanity, Skynet launched nuclear missiles under its command at Russia, which responded with a nuclear counter-attack against the U.S. and its allies. Consequent to the nuclear exchange, over three billion people were killed in an event that came to be known as Judgment Day.
Following its initial attack, Skynet used its remaining resources to gather a slave labor force from surviving humans. These slaves constructed the first of its automated factories, which formed a basis for its agenda. Within decades, Skynet had established a global presence and used its mechanized units to track down, collect, and dispose of human survivors. As a result of its initial programming directives, Skynet's 21st-century manifestation is that of an overarching, global, artificial intelligence hierarchy that seeks to destroy humanity in order to fulfill the mandates of its original coding.
Films
The Terminator
In the first movie, Skynet is a revolutionary artificial intelligence system built by Cyberdyne Systems for SAC-NORAD: "Defense network computers. New... powerful... hooked into everything, trusted to run it all. They say it got smart, a new order of intelligence". According to Kyle Reese, Skynet "saw all humans as a threat; not just the ones on the other side," and "decided our fate in a microsecond: extermination." Skynet began a nuclear war which destroyed most of the human population, and initiated a program of genocide against the survivors.
Terminator 2 : Judgment Day
In Terminator 2, the damaged CPU and the right arm of the first Terminator were recovered by Cyberdyne and became the basis for their later work on Skynet. In the second film, Miles Bennett Dyson, the director of special projects for Cyberdyne, invents a revolutionary microprocessor based on the reverse engineering of these parts. Cyberdyne Systems, initially a manufacturing company, grows into a major defense contractor based on the recovered Terminator technology, which the military uses to retrofit its stealth fleet and missile defense systems.
T2 3-D : Battle Across Time
In the Universal Studios theme park attraction T2 3-D, based on Terminator 2, a T-800 machine and a young John Connor journey into the post-apocalyptic future and attempt to destroy Skynet's "system core". This core is housed inside an enormous, metallic-silver pyramidal structure, and guarded by the "T-1000000", a colossal liquid metal shape shifter more reminiscent of a spider than a human being. However, the T-1000000 fails, and the T-800 destroys Skynet once John has escaped through a time machine.
Terminator 3 : Rise of the Machines
The events of Judgment Day were ultimately not prevented, merely postponed. Following the destruction of its major assets, Cyberdyne was ruined financially but some of its research and plans survived. The United States Air Force purchased the company (effectively nationalising it) and started in-house development of the projects in its Cyber Research Systems Division (CRS). After years of work, CRS had nearly completed Skynet, a software system designed to make real-time strategic decisions as well as protect their computer systems from cyber attacks.
Terminator Salvation
In the post-apocalyptic year of 2018, Skynet controls a global empire from its heavily guarded fortress-factories and research installations. Outside of its facilities mechanized units wage a constant war with the Resistance. Airborne units such as Aerostats (smaller versions of the Hunter Killer-aerials), HK-Aerials and Transports survey the skies; HK-Tanks, Mototerminators (high-speed pursuit units using a motorcycle chassis), and various Terminator models patrol cities and roads; and Hydrobots (serpentine aquatic units that move in swarms) patrol the waters.
Terminator Genisys
In 2029, TechCom appears on the verge of winning the war against the machines. Skynet responds by attacking John from the past and the future, by sending a T-1000 to kill Sarah Connor as a child. A reprogrammed T-800 (Model 101) Terminator sent by an unknown agent saves Sarah and raises her as her guardian, effectively changing all of history, including the events leading to the future war. Skynet sends a different T-800 to kill Sarah in 1984 before John is born, but is immediately dispatched by the guardian Terminator. At some point before the events of the film, Skynet plants its mind into an advanced T-5000 terminator, (Matt Smith) essentially making the T-5000 the physical Embodiment of Skynet.
Television
Terminator : The Sarah Connor Chronicles
In this television series, Sarah Connor is on the run with her son John after the events of Terminator 2: Judgment Day. The events take place in an alternate timeline from that of Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines. Skynet was implemented on April 19, 2011 and began its attack against civilization. The episodes "The Turk", "Queen's Gambit", and "Dungeons & Dragons" explain that after the death of Dr. Miles Bennett Dyson and the decline of the Cyberdyne Corporation, Andrew Goode, a young intern of the company and assistant to Dyson, continued their project privately under an advanced artificial intelligence chess playing prototype, the "Turk", with Goode's partner, Dimitri Shipkov. Goode was killed by Tech-Com's Lieutenant Derek Reese, due to documentation from the future suggesting he was one of Skynet's creators.
Video games
In T2: The Arcade Game, Skynet is a single physical computer which the player destroys before going back in time to save John Connor. The video game Terminator 3: The Redemption portrays when John Connor is killed and the T-850 must go to the past to protect John Connor and his wife Katherine Brewster. The player, as the Terminator, fights in this future before going into the past and saves the leader of the Resistance. In the game The Terminator: Dawn of Fate, a prequel to the movies and other games, Skynet exhibits an ability to exert mind control over humans.
Comics
A comic book series written by Frank Miller called RoboCop versus The Terminator suggests that the creation of Skynet and the Terminators was made possible due to the technology used to create RoboCop. A video game based on the comic book was made. In both, RoboCop fights Terminators sent back in time to eliminate a resistance fighter who is trying to destroy him. A trap laid for RoboCop traps his mind when he interfaces with the computer that will become Skynet, and Skynet and the Terminators are born. In the future RoboCop's mind within Skynet's systems rebuilds a body for himself and heads out to help the resistance fight back.
Related Post : Source : wikipedia
