Shameless Monday Filler: Special Credit Where Credit Is Due Edition

Okay, I'll admit it...I'm looking forward to the next installement in the Terminator saga -- the forthcoming Terminator Salvation, opening at a Hell Octaplex near you starting on May 21 -- as much as the next guy. And not just because of that whole Christian Bale Going Ballistic on Some Poor Grip's Ass thing, amusing as that may have been -- no, I just think all that post-apocalypse landscape with indestructible killer robots and flying machines stuff is cool.

That notwithstanding, I would be remiss if I didn't finally state here, and for the record, what everybody knows but seemingly nobody has had the stones to say over the years.

To wit: The entire look and feel of the series, beginning with the 1984 James Cameron original (art direction by George Costello) was shamelessly ripped off from inspired by Jack Kirby's Fourth World saga, a brilliant and ahead of its time run of comic books originally published between 1970-73.

Which is to say that this guy/iconic image of ultimate evil...

...was rather obviously modeled after Kirby's Darkseid, still the greatest villain in the history of the comics medium....

...and that this blighted landscape of destruction, nuclear waste and charred bodies...

...is so obviously derived from Kirby's nightmarish planet of The Old Gods...

...that it might as well have a sign on it reading "Welcome to Apokolips."

Incidentally, Cameron eventually copped to lifting major elements of his original Terminator script from two Outer Limits episodes written by the irascible Harlan Ellison and settled some cash on him. The great Jack Kirby, who died in 1994, never got a dime for his obvious contribution to the films' mega-success, and it might be nice if somebody connected with Terminator Salvation redressed this obvious wrong.

Just saying.