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In 1984, The Terminator was a relatively low budget ($6.5 million) action-adventure film starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, hot off Conan and Linda Hamilton pre-Beauty and the Beast. Written by James Cameron and Gale Anne Hurd, it was a fun little science fiction film of a potential future that needed to be avoided. Things blew up and Arnold stoically told a cop and the audience, “I’ll be back.” No one knew at the time that the film would trigger such an enthusiastic response, giving us sequels, comics, novels, and a television series. Suddenly, SkyNet, John Conner, Sarah Conner and the Terminator T-800 model would become a part of the social fabric of pop culture.

It also got Cameron sued by Harlan Ellison, who successfully argued that the story lifted a lot from the classic “Soldier” story penned for The Outer Limits.

Little wonder then, that when Blu-ray discs started showing up, it would be among the first from Sony in June 2006. Since then, it periodically gets dusted off, cleaned up, and rereleased, most recently in 2011.  Now, 20^th Century Home Entertainment assures us the latest edition, out now, is “the ultimate high-definition experience”.

Looking back, the film feels small, just as it did then, hinting at the apocalyptic future and tossing around concepts and elements that would be explored later. This was all about Kyle Reese (Michael Biehn) traveling back in time from 2029 to find and protect Sarah Connor (Hamilton) from the android killing machine. We’re told the machines have taken control of the world and humanity is fighting for relevance and survival. Connor, a single waitress will give birth to mankind’s salvation. Also in the mix are police detectives Lt. Traxler and Det. Vukovich (Paul Winfield and Lance Henriksen, respectively), trying to stem the mayhem.

The film is definitely a product of the early 1980s as seen in the wardrobe and hair styles, but that makes it all the more charming in some ways, when 2029 seemed so awfully far away.

The Terminator‘s transfer compared with the 2006 release shows that a fine improvement with better contrast and black levels so the film’s visual clarity is superior. The film, surprisingly, was shot with a mono track so only so much can be done to improve what was there so Cameron went back and remixed it later. And it is that soundtrack in DTS-HD MA 5.1 that we find yet again.

Included on the disc are special features matching the 2006 release: Deleted Scenes, the short piece on Creating The Terminator: Visual Effects & Music, and Terminator: A Retrospective. The fun pieces that were included in the 2001 DVD version, such as the Other Voices documentary, remain AWOL, meaning this is not quite “ultimate’ at all. Still, if you don’t have it in your library or have not seen this in a while, the new edition is well worth your time.

I’m gonna take a slight detour off my normal path this week, kiddos. Mike Gold and I like to e-mail one another every now and again. It just so happened that today Mike name dropped the <a href=”

sketch from SNL from last week. I told him I’d not seen it, as I was waiting to see Django first. Turns out having a toddler makes for a pretty house-bound social calendar. In his retort, Mike lamented “Django is great, unless you don’t like Tarantino. Then it’s ‘Tarantino.’” Oh ho! Sweet Mikey G. Me and QT go way back.

Long before we were Unshaven Comics, Matt Wright, Kyle Gnepper and I were just bros. And prior to making amazing comics, we just read ‘em. Amidst the angst, part time jobs at local retail establishments and foodatoriums, we wasted our ample free time with movies, anime, video games, and comics all to help us find our way through the world. Nothing spoke to me in these tumultuous times more than the films of one Quentin Tarantino.

Somehow, his pop-culture drenched films permeated my mind in a wash of “too cool for school” attitude, and “fuck the system” structure. I wholly thank Kyle for introducing me first to Reservoir Dogs, QT’s take on a heist film. Here, I was left dumbstruck over the simplicity to it all. Over 99 minutes, we stay largely in a single location. There’s no massive chases, or hyperbolic action sequences. And best of all? No chicks getting in the way. OK, so it’s not a perfect flick. However, to a 16 year-old it’s practically soft-core porn. Everyone swears. Everyone has a gun. No one backs down. And Harvey Keitel suggests tacos. And it does it all with a wit and charm that required nothing more than snappy dialogue and expressive eyes.

I did not get to see Pulp Fiction in the theater. Knowing what I did about Dogs was enough; I promptly traded in some shekels for a VHS copy the second I could. In some weird way, I’d like to think this was exactly how Quentin would have wanted me to partake of his (then) magnum opus. I freely admit that I literally wore the tape out from watching and re-watching it. More-so than Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction was visceral style etched on to magnetic tape. Strictly speaking of the story alone, a teenage me got ruthless mobsters, ass watches, defeated boxers, sexy women, Mr. Pink as Buddy Holly, and most important, a dose of story by way of character, not plot device.

To a point, yes, much of the film is a meandering tale of cause and effect. But better than the action-and-gangster driven drivel my young mind was accustomed to, Pulp Fiction (Jackie Brown and Dogs as well) was a universe unto itself. As Roger Ebert noted in his reviews “A lot of movies these days use flat, functional speech: The characters say only enough to advance the plot. But the people in Pulp Fiction are in love with words for their own sake.” In short? The characters of the film were me and my kind. And better than my other deity-of-the-day, Kevin Smith, each person in QT’s films were individuals with individual drives. And don’t worry, I’ll talk about my love affair with ole’ Kev soon enough. As Alton Brown might say, “That’s for another show.”

If there is a point here in my one man circle jerk session, it’d come right down to Ebert’s aforementioned point. Beyond anything I’d seen or read up unto that time (comics included), characters in my fiction were always essentially empty vessels I could place myself into. In comparison to those heroes of my childhood, He-Man, G.I. Joe, and even the animated Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were merely placeholders and plot movers. Tarantino’s films showed me a world where there was no room for me on screen. Vincent Vega was a cool, mysterious mob hit man who had come back from a vacation into a world of troubles. Mr. White was a hardened, loyal criminal with a past so chock full of vitriol, a lesser director would still be presenting us with prequels. And if you could find an inch of room to move inside the mind of Beatrix Kiddo? Well then you’re a better man than I.

In the post-modern world, I freely admit to the rafters that my own modern fiction was inspired first by Quentin Tarantino. And while masters like Waid, Morrison, Busiek, and Moore would soon lay claim to the rest of my influence CV, it was QT who started the big ball a rollin’ down the hill. His ability to fill worlds, to allow those worlds to breathe, and to realize that A lead to B, but not because the hand of God requires it… remains a breath of fresh air amidst rotting garbage. While I no longer need to proclaim him a lord of creation anymore, I can admit true admiration for a new-era genius of modern fiction. Tarantino mastered the art of homage, and proved that the stories that molded us can give birth to new creations unto themselves. Surely anyone looking at my own Samurnauts will see nothing more than a bearded QT-phile playing in the sandbox built by years broiling away under the heat of after-school cartoons.

Now I’m hungry. Let’s go get a taco.

SUNDAY: John Ostrander

MONDAY: Mindy Newell