From: py1djf@sunlab1.bath.ac.uk (D J Ford)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.movies
Subject: Re: Terminator
Date: 29 Dec 92 15:17:19 GMT
Organization: School of Physics, University of Bath, UK

In the referenced article, 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


	Several years ago, in a SF collection I read a great
	short story called 'Third Variety' possible by Philip K. Dick
	though thats probably wrong, basically it went thus...

	In a devastation US/Soviet war, with the US losing and
	having to retreat to there last outpost on the Moon,
	the US army introduced a system of killer robots ( only
	small, but lethal ) that kill _anything_ that moves, and 
	are only stopped from killing the US soldiers by radio-active
	tags worn by them.

	In the US front lines, a small group of soldiers receives
	a surrender message from the Soviets, and one soldier goes
	out of discuss terms. On the way to the Soviet front lines he
	meets a quite, emancipated young boy, clutching a teddy bear, who
	starts to follow him.

	When the soldier arrives at the Soviet lines, a lone soldier
	fires at the boy, killing him, and revealing that the boy is
	, in fact, a robot. The few surviving soldiers in this soviet
	group, two men and a women ( I think ) , reveal to the American
	that groups of these killer robots disguised as humans
	have been infiltrating the soviet bunkers. So far they have
	discerned two types, The young boy and his teddy bear ( First 
	variety ), and a wounded soldier ( Second Variety ) and now
	there waiting to find out what the Third Variety is.

	But soon, the US soldier realises that the Robots have turned
	on there masters, and have destroyed what was left of the 
	American forces. So, he and the soviets leave on a trek, 
	to find a hidden escape rocket so they can get to the base on
	the moon.

	I will not go on, mainly because this story is fading 
	in my memory. But, needless to say that paranoia breaks out
	amongst this group, and the ending of the story is quite
	superb.	It certainly reminded me of Terminator when I first 
	read it, and is the closest of any story I have ever read
	to the ideas in Terminator. Indeed I think that somewhere
	along the line, this story must have influenced whoever 
	came up with the concept behind the film.

	But, like I said, I memory is hazy, and I cannot be
	sure I even have the title right, let alone the author.
	So, has anyone else out there read it?


-- 
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	|  // /||\/| | / ` /| ||       Dave Ford.	  |
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