impressive action sequences, taut economic direction, and relentlessly fast pace, it's clear why The Terminator continues to be an influence on sci-fi and action flicks." Metacritic (which uses a weighted average) assigned The Terminator a score of 84 out of 100 based on 21 critics, indicating "universal acclaim". The Terminator won three Saturn Awards for Best Science Fiction Film, Best Make-up and Best Writing. The film has also received recognition from the American Film Institute, ranked 42nd on AFI's 100 Years... 100 Thrills, a list of America's most heart-pounding films. The character of the Terminator was selected as the 22nd-greatest movie villain on AFI's 100 Years... 100 Heroes and Villains. Schwarzenegger's line "I'll be back" became a catchphrase and was voted the 37th-greatest movie quote by the AFI. In 2005, Total Film named it the 72nd-best film ever made. Schwarzenegger's biographer Laurence Leamer wrote that The Terminator was "an influential film affecting a whole generation of darkly hued science fiction, and it was one of Arnold's best performances." In 2008, Empire magazine selected The Terminator as one of The 500 Greatest Movies of All Time. Empire also placed the T-800 14th on their list of The 100 Greatest Movie Characters. In 2008, The Terminator was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry. In 2010, the Independent Film & Television Alliance selected the film as one of the 30 Most Significant Independent Films of the last 30 years. In 2015, The Terminator was among the films included in the book 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die. In 2019, Huw Fullerton of Radio Times ranked it the second best film of the six in the franchise, stating "The Terminator was a brilliantly original, visceral and genuinely scary movie when it was released in 1984, and no matter how badly the visual effects age it hasn't lost its impact." In 2021, Dalin Rowell of /Film ranked it the fourth best film of Cameron's career, stating "While its pacing and story structure isn't as tight as its sequel's, The Terminator remains one of the most iconic pieces of pop culture ever created." Phil Pirrello of Syfy ranked it at number seven in the "25 scariest sci-fi movies ever made", stating "Cameron forever changed both the genre and Schwarzenegger's career with The Terminator, an iconic, tension-filled flick that