From: donnell@tuna.micro.umn.edu (BogusMan)
Subject: Re: Terminator
Organization: none
Distribution: na
Date: Sun, 27 Dec 1992 20:50:26 GMT

In article <1992Dec26.182738.1@stsci.edu> jwalters@stsci.edu (Jim Walters) writes:
>In article <9212232324.AA18444@rutgers.edu>, DCHANG@uhccmvs.BITNET (Doreen Chang) writes:
>> Does anyone know where the idea for the "Terminator" movies originated?
>> Several video guides cite James Cameron as the author of the screenplay but
>> Leonard Maltin's guide claims that the original was based on a Harlan
>> Ellison short story.  Does anyone know of such a short story?  If so, what
>> was the title and in what anthology might I be most likely to locate it?
>> Better yet, any chance of loading it into ASCII or is that a copyright
>> violation?  If so, forget I asked that last part...  Thanks to whoever
>> can assist.
>>                                          dchang@uhccmvs.bitnet
>
>I'm not aware of any Harlan Ellison story which can directly translated
>into "Terminator", but he has written two stories with themes related to
>"Terminator".  One, called "I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream" is about a
>defense computer called AM which became intelligent and started a nuclear
>war.  AM then spends it time tormenting the handfull of survivors.  It can
>be found in _Alone Against Tomorrow_.  The other is an _Outer Limits_
>episode called "Soldier".  I haven't seen it since the 70's, but it
>involved soldiers from the future time traveling to the 1960's. 
>
>I imagine that James Cameron was simply covering his rear by giving Harlan
>Ellison an acknowledgement in the credits for "Terminator".  After all,
>H.E. had recently won a copyright infringement suit against ABC (?) because
>he convinced a jury that the series _Future Cop_ was too close to his short
>story "Brillo". 

The "Brillo" case was much older than anything to do with the "Terminator".
It was settled a year or so before the Terminator case though. And it was
plagarism of a script that he had shown to ABC, not the short story.

"Soldier" concerns a soldier of the future, who is accidentally sent back
to the early 60's. Also, an enemy soldier has also been sent back, leading
to the inevitable conflict and some interesting speculations on the nature
of man, as was "The Oyuter Limits" typical style. H.E. produced four pages
of his original script and when they were compared to the Terminator
script, were judged to be very near outright plagarism in dialogue, and
camera direction. H.E. won the case, and settled for credit, which was all
he wanted in the first place. Cameron didn't cover his ass, he was ordered
to do it.

I am still amazed that nobody noticed an even greater similarity to the
old late night TV favorite "Cyborg 2087", with Michael Rennie. Rennie 
comes back from a totalitarian future to persuade a scientist to stop
his research, which will result in cyborgs taking over the planet.
Two cyborgs are sent back to stop Rennie.

Scenes of the cyborgs tracking Rennie and the scientist bear a remarkable
resemblance at times to "Terminator". Cameron got away with this one,
apparently. If anybody has a copy of this on tape or knows of copies for
sale, please E-Mail me with the details!

Have a New Year!
Pax
<what opinions are here, are mine and mine alone!>
					
					--Judex--