It's been a long time since I've seen the first Terminator, and my memory of how it plays out is almost non-existent. As such, I can't read your intent here – are you agreeing or disagreeing that it was really similar? At first I thought it was the former, now I'm leaning towards the latter, but still not entirely sure what your argument is.
Disagreeing. The way "The Terminator" starts, there's a couple shots of the future-war with robo-tanks crushing skulls and such, and then the credits, then the Terminator popping out of a time-bubble in the parking lot of a school late at night. Arnie beats some punk kids to death and steals their clothes, and then the movie goes to an inner city alley, where Reese pops out of his time-bubble, and steals some clothes from a hobo, and is chased by the cops for a couple minutes, but manages to escape (I'd forgotten that last bit last night).
So, the similarities are future-guy, alley, hobo, and cops. I can see the resemblance, but there's a strong case to be made that you can develop both concepts independently from each story's own plot and character needs. "Soldier" begins in an alley because it was shot on a backlot and the soldier needs to be easily captured (the soldier causes a huge commotion, so if it had been practical to shoot, it seems just as likely he would've popped up in the middle of the street and been captured with a bit more effort). The hobo is there because the soldier needs a disposable character to kill to demonstrate that he's a mad-dog murdering machine without making him irredeemable in the eyes of the audience. The cops show up to get the soldier into custody so he can meet the present-day protagonist and get the plot rolling.
"The Terminator" begins in an alley because the plot requires Reece to escape fairly quietly, so he can't pop up in front of a lot of witnesses (also, it had to be an enclosed space for the cut part where Reese had a future-buddy with him who was telefragged when he materialized in a fire escape). The hobo is there because Reece needs pants, and he needs someone fairly powerless to steal them from, to demonstrate how he's at a disadvantage to the Terminator (who just walks up to people and demands pants, and then starts yanking out hearts until he gets some). The cops show up to put Reese on the run, continuing to demonstrate his powerlessness, as well as showing his distrust of contemporary authority (explaining why he doesn't just call the cops and say that someone is going to try to kill a woman named Sarah Connor), and also his resourcefulness in escaping while also stealing a shirt and a shotgun.
Context matters. Police, alleys, and hobos are generalities (like I said, Ellison used all of those same elements himself in "City on the Edge of Forever"). The specific uses of both scenes are wildly different, and could be plausibly be arrived at independently.
On the contrary, it would seem that he's taken very seriously if we're hearing about this suit. The vast majority never get even a moment of time in the press.
I meant, if he were taken seriously enough that people generally knew to avoid concepts he's used. Avoiding Ellison material doesn't seem to be a rule of thumb on the scale of "Don't read unsolicited story ideas, and if you do, don't do anything like them." As evidenced by the fact that he is still finding people to sue, and his bibliography has yet to circumscribe a no-man's-land in science fiction.
I cannot believe that people are still debating that The Terminator isn't so close to Ellison's Outer Limits segments when Cameron flat out said he based the film on them in that Starlog article.
It would probably help if there was any objective public accounting. It seems the unedited Starlog article is unavailable, much less the original notes from the interview, so it'd be difficult to determine the exact context where Cameron said, "Oh, I took a couple of Outer Limits segments," or even if that's the exact wording, since the only source is Ellison's own second-hand recounting. Same for the bit about Cameron telling Tracey Torme, “Oh, I ripped off a couple of Harlan Ellison stories.” It's so odd that
the bad guy in Harlan Ellison anecdotes are such overt mustache-twirling villains. Maybe I just encounter a more sophisticated brand of asshole in my daily life.
Anyway, the "smoking gun" is pretty biased since it all comes from Ellison's after the fact recollections, so he'd naturally be telling things from his perspective, and knowing his sense of humor, he'd probably also exaggerate parts of it. Since it never went to court, we can't look at a lot of the evidence to decide for ourselves (ironic, considering Ellison's famous line about informed opinions). It's all hearsay, and Cameron's said that he disagreed with the decision to settle, but was forced to when the studio said that he, personally, would be on the hook for damages if they went to court and lost, and he couldn't afford that gamble.
Let's not go overboard. He's a hell of a filmmaker.
