Funko and Super 7 Go Retro with New ReAction Action Figures

The power of nostalgia strikes again! Back in 2012, toy companies Funko and Super 7 teamed up to finish what Kenner started back in the '70s by producing a line of 3 and 3/4-inch action figures based on the movie Alien. This partnership marked the beginning of the ReAction line of action figures, one that later expanded to include similar-sized action figures based on the Six Million Dollar Man TV series.

I'm guessing that these ReAction figures must have been a success, because that would explain the recent announcement by Funko and Super 7 to produce even more ReAction figures based on characters from Back to the Future, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Escape From New York, Firefly, Goonies, Nightmare Before Christmas, Predator, Pulp Fiction, The Terminator and other popular films and TV shows from the '80s and '90s. These figures are currently available for pre-order over at Entertainment Earth.

I find it amusing that even after the arrival of highly detailed yet reasonably priced action figures from companies such as McFarlane Toys and NECA, fans and collectors are still willing to spend money on even less detailed action figures that have a design aesthetic similar to Kenner's during the late '70s and early '80s. On the other hand, I have no room to judge--after all, the expanding ReAction line will also include figures based on classic Universal Studios monsters, figures that I'm assuming will appear similar to the 3 and 3/4-inch Universal Studio monster figures that Remco released during the early '80s.

Remco's Universal Monster action figures.

Even though I never collected any of Remco's Universal Monster figures, I eyed them with great curiosity and fascination back in the day when I was just discovering classic monster movies. Remco's line had Dracula, Frankenstein's Monster, the Wolfman, the Mummy, the Phantom of the Opera and the Creature from the Black Lagoon; the ReAction line will have the same set of characters along with the Invisible Man. Thus, while I prefer to collect figures that have greater detail, such as Diamond Select's line of classic monster figures, there's a part of me that wants to spend a chunk of change on ReAction figures so that I can have classic Universal Monsters rub elbows with more contemporary horror icons such as the Alien, Predator, a T-800 endoskeleton, and slashers such as Micheal Meyers and Freddy Krueger.

Check out the ReAction Figures and More blog for updates about additions to the ReAction line of figures.

Dark Horse Returns to a Familiar Future War in Terminator Salvation: The Final Battle

Given the number of comic book, movie, novel and TV series that I've followed over the decades, I'm used to having key questions, plot developments and character fates remaining unresolved. I don't like this--I much prefer to explore interesting ideas in further detail instead of forgetting them--but I suppose it comes with being a horror and sci-fi fan.

That said, Dark Horse has brushed the dust off of its Terminator license and is currently publishing Terminator Salvation: The Final Battle, a 12-issue miniseries that's written by J. Michael Straczynski and drawn by Pete Woods. The first issue arrived last month and the second issue is currently available at comic shops, newsstands, and other places that carry Dark Horse titles. The miniseries sets itself up to answer certain questions posed in the first four Terminator movies, questions that will probably not be addressed when the franchise is rebooted in 2015. So far, Final Battle looks to be the most ambitious Terminator comic book miniseries since Malibu Comics' two-part Cybernetic Dawn and Nuclear Twilight miniseries. Read on for my complete review, and why Final Battle is worth a look for any Terminator completist.

Terminator Salvation: The Final Battle takes place in two different time periods: in 2029 during the days before John Connor's final attack on Skynet, and in 2003 during the months before Skynet's nuclear assault on humanity (a.k.a. "Judgment Day"). Most of the action in 2029 centers on John Connor and his wife Kate, while the action in 2003 involves Dr. Serena Kogan, the enigmatic character that was introduced in Terminator Salvation. (Other characters that were introduced in Salvation--Marcus Wright, Blair Williams, Barnes, Star, and John and Kate's unborn child--haven't appeared in Final Battle yet and I don't know if they will at all.) Another character, Simon, appears in both 2029 and 2003; he's sent back to 2003 by John to prevent something related to Dr. Kogan's research that could secure Skynet's victory against the human resistance.

The Terminator franchise has a very haphazard history when it comes to who-owns-what within the franchise, so it's nice to see Dark Horse trying to put the pieces together before the 2015 reboot. I wasn't a fan of Straczynski's signature TV series, Babylon 5, and I'm not familiar with his extensive work in the area of comic books; regardless, his experience with complex, multilayered narratives shines through in the first two issues, and the ground work that he's laid so far is shaping up to be an engrossing conclusion to the first four Terminator movies--or at least a conclusion to the story threads from the Terminator 3 and Terminator Salvation timeline. (Terminator fans who are looking for a conclusion to the Sarah Connor Chronicles will have to look elsewhere, unfortunately.) Adding to the story's quality is Pete Woods' artwork, which expertly captures the look and feel of the Terminator universe. In one panel, he even included a Skynet machine that bears a similar design to the T-1 tank in T3.

Terminator novels, comic books and video games and flirted with the idea of human sympathizers for Skynet, but Dr. Kogan is shaping up to be a sympathizer who is essential to Skynet's overarching plans. Just as Cyberdyne and Miles Dyson were crucial to the birth of Skynet, Dr. Kogan is proving to be essential to the development of T-800 units, Terminator hybrids, and other Skynet technology that uses organic components.

What I also find fascinating about Dr. Kogan is that she only appears in the T3 - Salvation timeline; her involvement with that timeline's Skynet would also explain why T-800s appear almost a decade earlier than they do in the timeline that the Kyle Reese from the first movie came from. The unexpected early appearance of the T-800 in 2018 is a muted but crucial plot point in Salvation, the plot point that leads John Connor say this: "I knew it. I knew it was coming. But this is not the future my mother warned me about. And in this future, I don't know if we can win this war." This summarizes his realization that all he and his mother Sarah knew about Skynet--its strengths, weaknesses, and stages of development--came from a different timeline and may wind up leading humanity to its doom. What exactly Straczynski has in mind to do with Dr. Kogan isn't completely clear yet, but I'm sure it will be an interesting addition to the Terminator saga.

Early conceptual art of Dr. Serena Kogan for Terminator Salvation.

Click here and here to read my reviews of other tie-in comics and novels for Terminator 3 and Terminator Salvation.

Get Your RC Geek on with Wow! Stuff's Six-Legged Attacknid

I've ranted before about how the Terminator franchise really needs a much better selection of scale-accurate replicas of Skynet's vast army of kill 'bots, and I think that's especially true in the area of remote control (RC) toys. So far, there has only been one officially licensed RC toy replica of a Terminator vehicle, the aerial HK unit from Terminator Salvation; otherwise, the only other RC Terminator replicas that I know of are ones made by extremely tech-savvy fans.

However, even though we'll never see an official Lego Mindstorms version of a T-600 or a T-1 tank, there are other RC toys that toy collecting Terminator fans can use as substitutes to terrorize their action figure collections. A WooWee Robosapien toy could be used as a substitute for a Harvester, a quadcopter could be used as a substitute for an aerial HK, and a Kid Galaxy Cybercycle could be used as a substitute for a Moto-Terminator. Even the rarely seen HK Centurion and T-7T Tetrapod now have their own substitute with the Attacknid, which is part of the Wow! Stuff’s Combat Creatures line of RC toys. The Attacknid differs from the Centurion and Tetrapod in that it has six legs instead of four, but that doesn't it mean it is any less cool.

In addition to crawling like a mechanical insect, the 10 inch tall Attacknid features a rotating turret that launches discs up to 30 feet. It also has removable, customizable armor panels on each leg, and it shuts down if its "Battle Brain" is hit directly three times. The disc launcher and Battle Brain features are provided so that RC geeks can have fights between their Attacknid units; nevertheless, the Attacknid's disc launcher and 360 degree range of all-terrain mobility should provide hours of fun for shooting at action figures during an imaginary post-apocalyptic future war with a Skynet that outsources with Wow! Stuff.

Check out the video below to see the Attacknid in action, and you can learn more about this battling ‘bot toys on the official Combat Creatures site.

A Look at Storm Toys' 1/6th Scale Replica of the T-1 Tank from Terminator 3

Due to personal and professional circumstances beyond my control, I haven't been able to blog as much as I would like to as of late. Nevertheless, someone just told me a bit of Terminator news that I absolutely had to share: Storm Toys is releasing a highly-detailed, limited edition 1/6th scale replica of the T-1 tank from Terminator 3. Read on for more details and additional pictures of this stunning collectible from the Terminator universe. (Photos courtesy of Storm Toys.)

According to the details that I found on the Storm Toys Facebook page, the T-1 tank replica is a "props grade model" made of high-quality model plastic that features jointed arms, spinning action mini-guns and light-up eyes. Each tank will come with a metal name plate and a limited edition serial number. The retail price of the T-1 replica is $890.

Even though its price is way, way out of my own disposable funds budget, this T-1 tank would make a great addition to the collection of any well-funded, die-hard Terminator fan. As you can see in the pictures below, Storm Toys clearly went to great lengths to ensure that its replica matches the original T-1 tank that was designed by the Stan Winston Studio for the third Terminator movie.

The Future Remade: A Terminator Reboot is Scheduled for 2015

I consider myself to be a huge fan of the Terminator franchise; thus, I have been closely monitoring what is going on with the franchise and what it might do next. Way back when this blog first started in February 2010, I did a post about how the rights to the franchise were up for grabs to the highest bidder. Now, over three years later, Paramount has announced that the Terminator saga will be rebooted into a new, stand-alone trilogy of movies, with the first film scheduled for June 2015.

As with most reboots, the new Terminator trilogy could be just what the franchise needs to stir interest in a new generation of fans, or it could be the final nail in its coffin. Read on for some thoughts about the reboot--what could go wrong and why, as well as what needs to be done to get the Terminator series back on its cyborg feet.

The current owners of the Terminator franchise are Megan Ellison, who runs Annapurna Pictures, and her brother David Ellison, who runs Skydance Productions. (Paramount will be handling the distribution of the Ellisons’ Terminator movies, but I don’t know how much creative input Paramount will have--if any--into the films’ scripts.) From what I’ve read since the Ellisons purchased the rights to the franchise, they planned to make more Terminator movies before the rights revert back to the franchise’s creator, James Cameron, in 2019. To me, this situation with the Ellisons is a bad news/good news type of situation:

The Bad News: The obvious reason why the Ellisons purchased the rights to the Terminator franchise is to make more Terminator content, which will in turn make money and contribute to the reputation of Annapurna Pictures and Skydance Productions. However, the problem with such a plan is that both C2 Pictures and the Halcyon Company both had similar plans and now both companies are defunct due to their poorly executed attempts at continuing the franchise. In particular, Halcyon produced Terminator Salvation with the intent of making a new trilogy of movies--just like what the Ellisons plan to do with their reboot.

It’s possible that the Ellisons could avoid the mistakes made by C2 and Halcyon. On the other hand, news surrounding the next Terminator movie under the Ellisons has so far included the return of Arnold Schwarzenegger, the possible involvement of director Justin Lin (Fast and Furious), the possible return of Terminator alumni Linda Hamilton and Michael Biehn, and a script set during the 1950s with a Terminator hunting down Sarah Connor's parents (!). With so many conflicting and inconclusive news stories surrounding the next Terminator film, I’m wondering if the Ellisons’ really have any plan at all for the franchise other than making money from it.

The Good News: Computer technology has come a long, long way since The Terminator appeared in 1984, so a reboot would allow the franchise to explore a completely new set of techno-fears. With recent news about military drone strikes and computer-based surveillance of civilian populations, the rebooted version of Skynet (Skynet 2.0?) could assert its dominance over humanity through deception, surveillance, sabotage, and surgical military strikes instead of through a global nuclear assault. New Skynet methods of attack could include nanotech-based weapons and Hunter-Killer units designed to imitate insect flight, heirarchy and locomotion. Given the heavy involvement of computers in genetic research, the rebooted Skynet could create Terminator units with a wider selection of biological capabilities (e.g., faster skin regeneration, the ability to host and transmit pathogens that are fatal to humans, etc.). The possibilities for a new Skynet are endless, and I hope that the Ellisons understand that and take full advantage of it.

Of course, the rebooted Terminator series would allow the Ellisons to avoid the franchise’s most egregious errors. I’m hoping that they’ll keep a focus on the human side of the story, and that we won’t get a different actor playing John Connor in each of the new films. I also hope that whoever plays the time-traveling Terminator in the first movie of the reboot trilogy doesn’t become the center of attention in the remaining two films. I've already argued why making Schwarzenegger such a prominent part of the franchise ultimately led to its downfall, so it would be painful to see the Ellisons make the same mistake again. When a franchise’s villain becomes more important than the franchise’s hero, you've got a serious problem on your hands.

If the Terminator reboot doesn’t work out, we’ll still have the original movies, novels, comic books and TV show. Furthermore, there’s also Continuum--another saga about a war for the future waged by technology-enhanced time travelers--and that TV series was just renewed for a third season.

Flying RC Model Hobbyists Take to the Skies with Terminator and S.H.I.E.L.D.

When it comes to being jealous of people who are more talented than me in the area of making horror and sci-fi replicas, I prefer to prioritize. I'm jealous of people who can assemble model kits so they appear nearly flawless; very jealous of people who can make professional-looking customized model kits and/or toys; and extremely jealous of people who can make customized model kits and/or toys that can move in some way, either along the ground, on/under the water, or through the air. In the last category, I recently found two talented hobbyists who were able to make vehicle replicas from the Terminator saga and last year's Avengers movie that could actually fly. Click below to read more about these amazing RC replicas and see video clips of each model in action.

The first hobbyist is from Russia, and he goes by the name of Native 118. He built two customized RC replicas that caught my eye: one based on the aerial HK design from Terminator and Terminator 2, and one based on the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier design from the Avengers movie. What's particularly impressive about the Helicarrier replica is that it floats on water and can launch itself into the air while in the water. Check out the videos below to see the models demonstrating what they can do.

Here’s a short video provided by Native 118 that provides an overview about how he assembled his HK model:

The other hobbyist is from Colorado and goes by the name kahloq. Inspired by Native 118's flying HK, he built a flying remote controlled aerial HK drone unit based on the design from Terminator 3. The main difference between the two flying Terminator models is that the Native 118 model has two fans on the outside with a third hidden in the nose, while kahloq's model has three fans on the outside according to the original T3 design. The video below provides some footage of this HK model in flight, as well as an overview of how kahloq built and tested his model.

Nerd Rant: Arnold Schwarzenegger Will be Back for Terminator 5, But is That Really a Good Thing?

According to the box office totals from last weekend, The Last Stand, Arnold Schwarzenegger's first starring role since his stint as the Governor of California, has performed below expectations. I won't go as far as to call it an outright flop--after all, films like this can be quite lucrative overseas and in the home video market--but it was handily beaten at the box office by a ghost movie, a gangster movie, a film noir movie, a Quentin Tarantino movie, a musical, and a godawful Marlon Wayans comedy. For a one-time king of action movies, this could hardly be called a "comeback". With such a dubious return to acting, Schwarzenegger has recently announced his involvement in the upcoming Terminator 5, a move that he apparently feels will better help to restore his acting career.

I understand the logic here: A familiar name like Schwarzenegger wasn't enough to promote The Last Stand, so combining a familiar name with a familiar franchise should logically do better. It’s Hollywood logic, and I think it’s a horrible idea. I've written before about how it's a mistake to regard Terminator as Schwarzenegger's franchise (click here to read that particular rant), so I think that linking the next movie's production to a washed-up action star's campaign to become a box office champ once again is going to be a disaster. Remember, Schwarzenegger thought that The Governator, a cartoon about Schwarzenegger playing himself becoming a superhero, was a guaranteed comeback vehicle too. He was also willing to write and promote a tell-all book about his extra-marital exploits--less than two years after he split from his wife--as a way of staying in the public eye.

But another thing to consider here is that Schwarzenegger's acting career, for the most part, was built on a shtick--a goofy Austrian bodybuilder shtick. People didn't watch films like Commando, Red Heat or Twins for their plots--they went to see these films because a goofy Austrian bodybuilder they liked was in them. I would even argue that Terminator 2, the most profitable film in that series, achieved its popularity because Schwarzenegger's shtick still appealed to large audiences at that time. Yet in the years since Schwarzenegger's acting career faltered and first ended, ask yourself this: When was the last time an action movie star was able to keep a career going based only on shtick?

The problems here are twofold: Not only is the Terminator franchise all too capable of telling great stories without anything remotely resembling Schwarzenegger at its center (case in point: The Sarah Connor Chronicles TV series), but the action-adventure genre has moved on from the era when big muscles, big gimmicks, big stunts and big budgets were all you needed to make a name for yourself. Maybe this was because of the import of Hong Kong action movies during the last two decades, or that more talented writers, directors and actors have entered the genre with increasing frequency. It could also be that the influence of filmmakers such as Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez has encouraged the genre to embrace its pulpy, grindhouse roots, which in turn have produced action movies that are grittier, smarter and wilder than their over-muscled Reagan era counterparts. With that in mind, it is quite fitting that 2010's Predators, the most recent sequel to Schwarzenegger's 1987 movie Predator, was produced by Rodriguez.

I can't begrudge the action genre's influence on the sci-fi genre, because I have a feeling that many sci-fi films wouldn't have been made at all if there weren't components of action and adventure in their scripts. Yet if Terminator is going to continue as an action sci-fi franchise, it needs to remove Schwarzenegger from its production line. It won't matter what new kinds of killer robots the next sequel will create or what kind of ground-breaking special effects it will use to bring them to life; Schwarzenegger has become the obsolete model of action filmmaking, and he doesn't have the talent or creativity within himself to change that.

"Alas, poor Arnold! I knew him, Horatio; a fellow of 

infinite ego, of most excellent biceps ...."

I'll Be Block: The Terminator Buildable Construction Playset

With Lego raking in the cash through licenses such as Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Star Wars and superheroes from both DC and Marvel Comics, it's inevitable that Lego's competitors will follow suit. For example, Best-Lock Construction Toys has picked up the Terminator license and has released The Terminator Buildable Construction Playset.

According to the product's description, "Recreate your favorite scenes from the blockbuster The Terminator movies with this superb value building block set, The Terminator Buildable Construction Playset, from Best-Lock Construction Toys. Containing over 1,000 pieces, The Terminator comes to life in block form and features all the essential elements to role play your very own Judgement Day, including; three Aerial Hunter-Killer models and two Tank Hunter-Killer models plus an army of T-800 cyborg figures as well as the iconic Terminator figure and a number of other models and accessories. This block set provides hours of fun for children aged five years up and can build everything illustrated at the same time, following the full-color, step-by-step building instructions which are included." I don't know if this set will allow builders to make larger Skynet war machines, such as the Harvester or the HK Centurion, although I'd be surprised if you could not with over 1,000 pieces at your disposal.

Best-Lock Construction Toys has also picked up the Stargate license, and it has released a few kits based on the Stargate SG-1 and Stargate Atlantis series. (Both of these TV shows were cancelled years ago, but I suppose that this is better late than never.) For additional brick-based sci-fi fun, Best-Lock has a "War of the Outer Planets" line, which includes space ships that look suspiciously similar to ship designs from Battlestar Galactica.

Nerd Rant: Darth Vader Goes to Disneyland, while Terminator Remains Lost in Time

Everyone knows by now that George Lucas has sold Lucasfilm and all of its creative properties, such as the Star Wars and Indiana Jones franchises, to Disney for over $4 billion. This is big news for both Star Wars fans and sci-fi and fantasy fans in general, so I thought that I would contribute a few of my own thoughts as to what this means for the future of Star Wars and sci-fi/fantasy film franchises in general, as well as how it compares to the current status of the floundering Terminator franchise. Read on ...

I'm kind of torn about Lucas selling Star Wars to Disney. It's not much of a surprise that he would do this, since he's worked closely with Disney before on other Star Wars projects. In fact, the last time I visited Disney back in 2007, it was during one of the "Star Wars Celebration" weekends at the park (events that were held to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the first Star Wars) and people were getting their photos taken with actors dressed as various characters from the Star Wars universe. This was before the recent renovation of the Star Tours ride at the Disney parks, a renovation that completed in 2011.

The rationale I've heard Lucas provide in interviews is that Disney will provide a safe environment for the future of his creative properties. I can't argue with that logic, because I think that Star Wars will do better under the ownership of Disney than, say, Star Trek has done under the ownership of Paramount. The same could be said about the relationship between Marvel and Disney in comparison to the relationship between DC Comics and Time Warner; in other words, given its creative roots in fantasy storytelling, Disney will be a safer, more supportive environment for fantasy franchises such as Marvel and Star Wars than a less niche-focused media company such as Paramount or Time Warner.

For example: Two of the four Star Trek spin-offs, Voyager and Enterprise, were put into production for the sake of attracting the Trek fan base to provide a steady supply of ratings for Paramount's fledgling--and later cancelled--United Paramount Network (UPN). This was a revival of Paramount's original plan to launch its own TV network back in the 70s and use a new Trek TV series, Star Trek: Phase II, as the new network's flagship show. That plan fell through and the Phase II pilot script later became the script for Star Trek: The Motion Picture, but that didn't stop Paramount from using the Trek franchise (twice, no less) to help establish and sustain the non-Trek project that was UPN. Given Disney's long-established system of media production and distribution, I doubt that Disney will put the Star Wars franchise into the same kind of awkward and ill-conceived situations.

All that has been determined so far for the immediate future of Star Wars under Disney is that a new trilogy is in the works, the long-rumored Episodes 7, 8 and 9 of the saga. Episode 7 is currently in pre-production and is scheduled for release in 2015, with the sequels following every two or three subsequent years. The Star Wars: 1313 video game is still scheduled for completion and release. As far as I can tell, everything else about the franchise has yet to be determined. I still don't know how many more episodes of The Clone Wars series will be produced and how long it will remain on Cartoon Network, a network that's owned by Time Warner. I suspect that Cartoon Network's recent rescheduling of The Clone Wars from its successful Friday night slot to a Saturday morning slot was probably based on the pending sale of Lucasfilm to Disney--in other words, Cartoon Network's relocation of The Clone Wars to a less successful time slot could be a signal of its near cancellation--but this is only speculation on my part.

Where I feel uncertain about Disney's acquisition of Lucasfilm is in light of how much else Disney owns right now--it's currently the largest media conglomerate in the US--and how much more it will go on to own after the profits from Star Wars are added to its collective revenue. In addition to Lucasfilm, Disney also owns Pixar, Marvel, and The Muppets Studio; the combination of these companies' creative licenses amounts to an enormous piece of pop culture real estate, along with all of the creative licenses that Disney already has by itself. This doesn't even include the other assets that Disney owns, such as ESPN, ABC, Touchstone Pictures and Hyperion Books. Sure, the creative side of the Disney media empire may do wonderful things for the Star Wars franchise, but I'm not very comfortable with the corporate side of the Disney media empire using Star Wars revenue to gobble up even more chunks of domestic and international media--something that is inevitably going to happen, unfortunately. How future sci-fi and fantasy film franchises can achieve success in a media landscape that's dominated by Disney remains to be seen.

Bringing things back to a more geek-centric level, I'm also hoping that Disney's ownership of the Star Wars franchise will not prompt it to abandon its own Tron franchise. The Tron Uprising series is a fantastic show and the franchise as a whole has a lot of potential, so I would hate to see Disney completely ditch their cult fan favorite in exchange for the more well-known and much more lucrative property.

Concerns aside, the transition of Star Wars from Lucas to Disney is a good example of a well-maintained franchise that will see more success under new and proven ownership. Say what you will about what Lucas has done with his franchise since its inception, at least he made sure that there was always someone at the helm to manage the Star Wars universe. The same cannot be said for the Terminator franchise, which is currently struggling to break free of its current state of limbo. For as much as I love the Terminator franchise, I'm still shocked that it has made it as far as it has without a consistent leadership figure such as James Cameron--or anyone else.

As of now, the Terminator franchise is currently owned by Megan Ellison and her production company Annapurna Films, but the rights to the franchise will revert back to Cameron if a new movie is not made by 2018. Some rumors suggest another sequel, while others hint at a complete reboot. Personally, I think that the franchise made its worst mistake when it associated its success with the bankability of Arnold Schwarzenegger, a mistake from which the franchise may never recover.

Terminator 2 was a big hit in 1991 and the most profitable film in the franchise, but I think that most of its success was due to Schwarzenegger's peaking popularity during the late 80s and early 90s. (Then again, T2 is the most positive and optimistic movie in the series, which might also have something to do with its appeal to a larger, blockbuster-sized audience. As film critic Sean French observed, the violence and anti-social nature of The Terminator were sanitized by Cameron himself in T2, essentially transforming the franchise that started as a gritty, violent, grindhouse-style low-budget sci-fi movie into a sleek, high-tech summer blockbuster movie with a then-popular leading actor.) Utilizing Schwarzenegger to produce a successful sequel was a shrewd decision on Cameron's part, since T2 salvaged his own career after The Abyss tanked at the box office in 1989 (without T2, there never would have been True Lies, Dark Angel, Titanic or Avatar), even though this decision would ultimately cripple the Terminator franchise.

T2 led many to regard the Terminator franchise as strictly a Schwarzenegger vehicle, even though his creative input to the movies is negligible and his character was the most disposable one in terms of the franchise's overarching narrative logic. The Schwarzenegger connection was further reinforced by the T2 3-D: Battle Across Time ride in the Universal Studio theme parks--in a story which depicts Schwarzenegger's T-800 character as the triumphant vanquisher of Skynet and recasts humanity's post-nuclear savior, John Connor, in a secondary and superfluous role--and by Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines in 2003. Schwarzenegger appeared in T3 under the direction of Jonathan Mostow, after years of saying that he'd only do another Terminator movie if Cameron directed it. Schwarzenegger hoped that T3 would do for his career what T2 did for Cameron's; it didn't, and I don't think a Terminator 5 would either.

As any devoted Terminator fan knows, there are plenty of Schwarzenegger-free, universe-expanding Terminator stories to be told through the narrative rules established in the movies. For example, the Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles TV series explored the Terminator universe in entertaining and character-driven ways that the movies never had time to do, all without involving a cyborg that looked and sounded like an Austrian bodybuilder.

I enjoy Terminator 3 and Terminator Salvation for what they are (as well as the Terminator novels connected to those sequels), but I think that Josh Friedman's involvement in the franchise through his creation of the Sarah Connor Chronicles series was the last real chance to get the franchise back on stable creative ground. This chance was lost between the writer's strike during the show's first season and the Fox network's dwindling support of the series during the second. Alas, the association with a faded campy action star, the lack of behind-the-scenes leadership, shifting ownership of creative rights, and an unstable production schedule and distribution venue for its TV series have all combined to terminate the Terminator's chances of significant continuation into the future.

The Schwarzenegger-Terminator link is inescapable by now, and how his future, post-political film career fares will determine what the Terminator franchise will do next. If the poor sales of his recent tell-all book and his god-awful Governator cartoon series proposal are any indication, Schwarzenegger's blockbuster days are long over and the Terminator franchise will move on without him--that is, if it ever moves again at all.

A Review of Scrap Sculptures' 12" Terminator T-800 Endoskeleton

A few weeks ago, I did a post about Scrap Sculptures' 7-foot-tall Terminator T-800 endoskeleton. Even though that sculpture is way out of my price range, I nevertheless wanted to add the smaller 12-inch sculpture from the same company to my own Terminator collection. I'm glad I did--weighing over three pounds and made completely from recycled metal parts, this T-800 sculpture is one of the most fascinating and durable items that any Terminator and sci-fi fan can purchase. Read on for my complete review and picture gallery.

I'm absolutely amazed at how Scrap Sculptures interpreted the Terminator, arranging metal items such as nuts, bolts, screws, spark plugs, nails, bicycle chains and wires to accurately correspond to features in the T-800 endoskeleton design. Just looking at it, I can imagine this thing emerging from the burning wreckage of a fuel truck to resume its relentless pursuit of Sarah Connor and Kyle Reese. Such devotion to detail makes me wonder what Scrap Sculptures would do with other machines from the Terminator universe, such as the T-600, the T-X endoskeleton, and the HK Centurion.

The sculpture only has two moving joints, one in the neck and one in the waist. Since these joints were made using screws and nuts, you can unscrew the sculpture into three separate parts: head, torso, and hips and legs. The sculpture also comes with a removable gun that fits snugly into the T-800's hand.

I highly recommend this sculpture to other Terminator and sci-fi collectors. While it's more expensive than NECA's plastic T-800 replicas, it's cheaper than the Terminator replicas sold by Sideshow Collectibles and Hot Toys. Furthermore, because the sculpture is not made from plastic, you don't have to worry about weak joints that have a tendency to wilt after long periods of display. Click here to order your Terminator sculpture from Scrap Sculptures.

Scrap Sculptures' 12" Terminator sculpture, next to NECA's 18" T-800 endoskeleton.

Scrap Sculptures Builds a Full Metal Terminator

I’ve seen plenty of Terminator replicas over the years, including many interpretations of the T-800 endoskeleton. However, I’ve never seen a T-800 that’s completely made from real metal and real mechanical parts … until now.

Meet Scrap Sculptures, a Los Angeles-based art company that specializes in making sculptures by using recycled metal. Scrap Sculptures has previously produced sculptures of characters from various sci-fi franchises, including Star Wars, Alien, Predator and Transformers, but its T-800 sculpture leaves me--a die-hard Terminator fan--completely floored. This menacing machine is 7.5 feet tall and it features a removable gun and a movable head, jaw and arms. It’s not an exact replica of a T-800 endoskeleton--Scrap Sculptures’ work is considered fan art and each sculpture is an interpretation of an iconic character, not a copy--yet it’s usage of real metal and real mechanical parts is very complementary of the original design’s usage of pistons, cables and hinges. Furthermore, because the sculpture is made from real mechanical parts such as bicycle chains, shocks, gears, nuts and bolts, this T-800 has a Steampunk feel to it, sort of a “Steampunk Terminator”.

Read on to see more pictures of this amazing sculpture, and to learn more about the process the Scrap Sculptures uses to bring classic movie characters to life in the form of recycled metal.

I recently contacted Scrap Sculptures about how its artists go about taking scrap metal pieces and reshaping them to fit the dimensions of Stormtroopers, Predators and Terminators. The way Scrap Sculptures see it, its artists engage in the “creative recycling” of scrap metal. Even though the artists produce sculptures of animals and other subject matter, they are also willing to sculpt movie characters that are most requested by their fan community.

The scrap metal sculpting process begins when artists gather ideas and draw concept art. After having a concept, the artists begin to collect spare scrap metal parts. The sculptures range from a few inches tall to life-sized. For bigger sculptures, bigger parts are needed and some are even cut into shape from sheet metal. If you take a close look at Scrap Sculptures’ larger pieces, you will find many things such as car parts, motorcycle parts, spark plugs, nuts and bolts, shocks, transmission parts, sheet metal, and much, much more. It should also be noted that Scrap Sculptures’ artists make each sculpture by hand and nothing is mass produced, which means that each sculpture--regardless of size--is a unique piece of art.

Here's a photo of the life-size Terminator sculpture in its early stages.

Note the life-size sculptures of the Alien Warrior and the Alien Newborn 

from Alien Resurrection in the background.

According to Scrap Sculptures, it has not received any direct feedback from anyone who has worked on the Terminator franchise, but the Terminator fan base has been very enthusiastic about the new T-800 sculpture. For fans who can’t afford the full-sized scrap metal Terminator, don’t worry--there is also a 14 inch Terminator sculpture, which includes a removable gun and a movable head and torso.

Of course, Scrap Sculptures offers much more than just Terminator sculptures. It has an impressive selection of Predator sculptures, and its life-size Alien sculpture and two glass top Alien tables--one with the Alien Warrior and one with the Alien Queen--are exquisite interpretations of H.G. Giger’s biomechanical artwork. The Spider-Man sculpture features a scale-accurate musculature that would amaze any fan of Marvel’s legendary web-slinger. Scrap Sculptures tries to work together with its fan community and it is always happy to receive suggestions for future projects. From what I’ve been told, recently fan requests have included King Kong and Godzilla; I think that these would be very cool to see, along with scrap metal sculptures of Mecha-Godzilla and Mecha-Kong.

Go to the Scrap Sculptures site for more information about their wide selection of art, as well as ordering and shipping details. See the YouTube video below for a closer look at the life-size Terminator sculpture.