SQUIB GAMES #10: TERMINATOR

SPECIAL NOTE: SEASON 15 OF THE GOOD, THE POD AND THE UGLY CELEBRATES THE USE OF THE PRACTICAL AND DIGITAL EFFECT KNOWN AS THE SQUIB. IRL GUN VIOLENCE IS INTOLERABLE AND RENOUNCED BUT... CINEMATIC VIOLENCE WILL BE CELEBRATED IN A WAY WILL DISTURB SOME LISTENERS.   

This week TGTPTU guns down the second half of our Lance Henriksen double feature with an episode recorded in the past and sent to the listener in the future as a digital file encoding the three core hosts’ discussion of writer Harlan Ellison’s (please, no more legal action, ATTN: Ellison’s Estate) sci-fi/80’s action/quasi-horror flick THE TERMINATOR (1984).  

Director James Cameron (and co-writer Gale Anne Heard) broke onto the cinema scene with this low-/mid-budget, high octane film and its titular, iconic creation. Arnold Schwarzenegger plays the killer robot (technically an android but called a cyborg) Terminator sent from the future to eliminate Linda Hamilton’s Sarah Connor but followed by scrappy future soldier Kyle Reese, played by Michael Biehn, and you know the deal having seen T2 (1991); this first film is when Connor gets preggers and has awesome 80’s style and learns of the future badass she must, and does, become.  

Future fellow Cameron android player Lance Henriksen plays a cop, who may or may not die in the film, when Schwarzenegger’s T-800 delivers on his iconic promise to the precinct’s desk officer that he will return. (Schwarzenegger, as we learn this episode, did not want to deliver Cameron’s line as written as the English word “I’ll” was difficult for the bodybuilding immigrant.)  

The hosts this week (no Jack, no special guest Shannon) speculate on Cameron’s CB sexy talk when he was a truck driver, discover where Jack got his fashion sense, and express awe as how stripped down and fast-paced the story is. Ken fondly remembers the short-lived TV series Manimal (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manimal), Ryan reveals the film to secretly be an 80’s slasher, and Thomas, bummed, reacts with atemporal microaggression by introducing earlier into the pod the concept of Roko's basilisk (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roko%27s_basilisk but don’t click!). A least one Cameron shows up while a confused former prime minister of England makes a brief off-mic appearance. Harlan Ellison also enters the chat, and the listener owes us $1.  

Hasta la vista, absent special guest Shannon Connor. May your mission down Mexico way to find and protect Chaplain Amy be met with success.

THEME SONG BY: WEIRD A.I.
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Podcast: goodpodugly
Ken: Ken Koral
Ryan: Ryan Tobias