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Does humanity have a future? That's the question at the heart of Terminator: Zero, Netflix's anime addition to the Terminator franchise. But ahead of the show's debut on August 29, there's a different question on fans’ minds: does Terminator: Zero have a future? To get an answer, we spoke to showrunner, Terminator junkie, and writer of the upcoming The Batman Part II and BRZRKR films, Matson Tomlin. 

Tomlin was at a roundtable discussion along with director (and Bleach veteran) Masashi Kudō ahead of Netflix's screening of the first two episodes at Anime NYC. Asked about whether there were plans in place for season 2 (which Netflix has not greenlit as of this writing), Tomlin had this to say:

“When you get hired to make a TV show, the people putting lots of money into it are always going to go, ‘Do you know where you're going?’ What I'll say is that, right now, it's just this [season]. People have to show up, they've got to watch the first season and hopefully those numbers will grant me an opportunity to keep on going.”

Related: Every Terminator film and TV show, ranked best to worst!

“I would love to go five or six seasons,” he continued, “ I have a story because, you know, one of the questions that you have to ask yourself when you're doing something that was live action as an animated project is ‘Why does this have to be animated?’ And for me part of that answer was telling a generational story.”

“There is this family and these children at the center of the story,” here Tomlin is referring to central character Malcolm Lee - played by André Holland in the English version - and his three kids, “And being able to see them grow up, get older endure the war, go through the war and then see how all of that wraps up; That's that's very appealing to me.”

“It's something that hasn't quite been done,” Tomlin concludes, “not just in this franchise, but the way that I want to do it it hasn't been done period. The only other thing that I can say is that, whether it's a two-season situation or a six-season situation, I know what the last episode is.”

Terminator: Zero  debuts on Netflix August 29.

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