Sunday, September 28, 2008

NYT Parallel Universe in Sarah Chronicles

TV in the NYT is part of the stern nanny mentality and feminist universe guiding the NYT this era. Take for instance the 9/21 article in the Arts & Leisure section on "Terminator: The Sarah Conner Chronicles" and its comparison of the TV heroine "who is to a hockey mom what a hyena is to a potted fern" to another Sarah. Read the link for the so-called evangelical tone of the series to be elucidated, but the clueless aspect comes at the end of the article.

Ms.Bellafante notes that "the name of the Skynet brain [Skynet is trying to exterminate the human race & convert the planet to cyborg rule, ed. note] is not geopolitically neutral: it's called the Turk. So the machine endangering mankind is symbolically Ottoman."

Perhaps, but perhaps also the screenwriters might have a more playful trope in mind. The name of the guy who knocks on the door of an aspiring NFL candidate-player in the middle of the night in training camp to inform him to pack up and get out because he's been cut from the team: "The Turk."

It's been 100 years since the demise of the Ottoman Empire, counting from the "Young Turk" movement. The NFL cuts happen weekly. It's a better metaphor for what Skynet's brain is trying to accomplish.

Some NYT editor in that girlie-paper might know this, but I doubt it.

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