With the women of Battlestar Galactica on hiatus, fanboys everywhere went searching for a new lust object. And they hitched their ride to Summer Glau—with good reason. In 2002, Joss Whedon (the Buffy guy) handpicked this 27-year-old Texan to appear in his much hyped space Western, Firefly. Though that show was short-lived (despite a tear-stained-letter-writing campaign from loyal nerds), Summer is back, playing an ass-kicking cyborg in Fox’s Terminator retread, The Sarah Connor Chronicles. She’s the girl on all the posters, the one affectionately called the “good” Terminator. “I thought I would be going up against six-foot blonds for the role,” Summer says. Fox knew better. And to think this girl once nearly quit the business. Summer, a lapsed ballerina, recalls one of her first Hollywood auditions: “I was almost the pink Power Ranger! I was second choice!”