New adventures in "The Sarah Connor Chronicles" air on Monday nights on FOX.

They're baaack! Those terrible machines from the future return in "Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles," airing Monday nights at 9 p.m. on FOX, in their attempt to kill Sarah Connor (LENA HEADEY) and her son John (THOMAS DEKKER). The two take a time machine into the future -- our present -- in an attempt to hide. This time around, John's protector who came back from the future is a female terminator (SUMMER GLAU).

ET caught up with Lena Headey to get her take on the TV series version of the hit movie franchise.

How familiar were you with the franchise before you started filming this show?

LENA HEADEY: I have to be honest. I saw the first 'Terminator' movie when I was a teenager, and at that time of my life, I wasn't deeply interested in things like that. I was more worried about chasing boys, so I was slightly distracted. I revisited it, and also 'T2,' which I absolutely love, and I think it's the most relevant to the show, and I find it actually very inspirational, and that's a very good thing.

Are you still receiving flak from fans saying, 'Oh, my God, this petite person can't possibly be macho'd up like LINDA HAMILTON in the film?

LENA: I guess that ghost is always going to be there. For the pilot, I did quite a lot of physical training, because I was back in London before we went out to Albuquerque, so I had time to do a lot of stuff there, and then came out and worked with the stunt coordinator for a while.

During the making of the show, it's been very hard because the schedule is really tough, and long days, and I think the amount of physical work we do keeps you to a certain level of fitness, and it is called acting, thank God.

Do you have any examples of any close calls on the set, or did you get injured or hurt, or anything happen like that?

LENA: Yes, there seems to be a sort of curse, that every punch-able surface that is supposed to break never does, so you get encouraged to really hit it, and every single time, it never breaks, and I never learn.

Have you ever thought about reaching out to Linda Hamilton, and talking to her at all?

LENA: No, but not because of any weirdness. I just thought it was really important to make this Sarah my own, because it's going to be on my shoulders, and my responsibility. I think it was just down to my instincts, really.

How do you strike that balance between keeping the character true to what people know somewhat, and also making it individual, and your own?

LENA: I think it's really hard for people. Obviously, the biggest difference is our physical appearances. What I think I've taken from her performance is there's such a sense of, she's incredibly strong as a human being, and, I think, her belief in humanity, and right and wrong is incredibly ingrained, and she's trying to put the same thing into John, so I took that from her performance.

The fact that it's an unusual circumstance, it's a single mother who happens to be literally carrying the weight of the world in her heart, and the one person she has to fight every day to keep alive is her son, who she loves more than anything. I think it's such a strong character from the franchise anyway; you can't help but be inspired and take from the original film what was already in her character.