The new Fox drama based on the Terminator movies will be re-shooting certain scenes that include campus violence out of sensitivity to the tragic April shootings at Virginia Tech. In "The Sarah Connor Chronicles," Connor tries to protect her 15-year-old son (played by Thomas Dekker who played the "totally not-gay" gay friend to Claire on "Heroes") who "may be destined to save mankind from technology gone amok."

The scenes were written and shot before the mass shooting in April, Fox entertainment chairman Peter Liguori told reporters at the TCA press tour. At that time, Liguori said, executive producer Josh Friedman had explained to Fox executives that the scene would depict the one place — a school setting — where even the woman charged with saving the world would have no control over what happened to her own child. As Friedman told reporters:

I certainly didn't write it for some sort of shock effect or anything like that. ... And for all of us parents, I think it's a very scary world. And for her particularly, it's a very scary world, maybe more so than for the rest of us, but not in a quantum leap, necessarily.

But after the shooting, there was a recognition from all sides that the scenes would have to be changed, Liguori said. Friedman and director David Nutter said the re-shot scenes will be sensitive to people's concerns, but they declined to describe the new sequence in detail.

The show's not scheduled to premiere until mid-season, and it's interesting that scenes not airing for another five months would be considered too soon for American audiences — especially given the sometimes controversial "24" plots Fox airs.

Photo courtesy of Fox