alistic computer-generated effects showcasing these
transformations garnered an Academy Award for
Best Visual Effects.
Although action-oriented, Terminator 2 had a
compelling and thought-provoking story line. After
quizzing the protector terminator about future his-
tory, Sarah decides to kill Miles Dyson (played by Joe
Morton), the inventor of Skynet, thus preventing
the nuclear holocaust. Ultimately, she finds herself
unable to kill Dyson in cold blood, and instead con-
vinces him to help destroy the technology upon
which Skynet is based: the microprocessor and part
of an arm left behind by the destroyed terminator
from the first film. Audiences were fascinated by this
time-travel paradox and, given the imminent advent
of the Internet and the World Wide Web in the early
1990’s, particularly interested in the concept of com-
puter network intelligence.
Impact Terminator 2introduced a new crop of view-
ers to the Terminator universe, which has since
spawned the filmTerminator 3: Rise of the Machines
(2003); the television seriesThe Sarah Connor Chroni-
cles, which began airing in 2007; and several video
games and tie-in books.Terminator 2raised the bar
for special effects, driving further advances in com-
puter-generated movie technology throughout the
1990’s. In addition,Terminator 2helped fuel a trend
toward more physical and action-oriented female
heroes, and its sophisticated plot left audiences
wanting even more science fiction in the movie the-
ater.
Further Reading
Cramer, Bobby. “Terminator 2: Judgment Day.”Films in
Review42 (September/October, 1991): 336-338.
Shay, Don, and Jody Duncan.The Making of T2, “Ter-
minator 2: Judgment Day.” New York: Bantam
Books, 1991.
Amy Sisson
See also Academy Awards; CGI; Computers; Film
in the United States; Internet; World Wide Web.
Terrorism
Definition Terrorist activity in Canada and the
United StatesThe 1990’s saw a shift from the “old” terrorism to “new” ter-
rorism, utilized not for political reasons but for a truly inter-
national system aimed at destruction of the Western world.Terrorism during the 1990’s was an interplay be-
tween domestic terrorists pushing a political agenda
on the one hand and the rise of stateless interna-
tional terrorism with the goal of committing acts of
terror for terror’s sake. The prevalence of radical re-
ligious groups, animal rights activists, racist organi-
zations, and ethnic groups that continued the strug-
gle from their country of origin defined terrorism in
the 1990’s on the North American continent.1990-1992 In its 1991 annual public report, the Ca-
nadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) stated
that Canadian citizens and Canada itself are not gen-
erally regarded as targets by terrorists. Therefore,
the broader concern in Canada was the financial
support for terrorists overseas by ethnic or religious
groups living in Canada. However, in October, 1991,
five members of the Pakistan-based Islamic group
Jamaat ul-Fuqra were arrested while attempting to
cross into Canada to bomb a Hindu temple and In-
dian movie theater in Toronto.
The United States experienced largely domestic
terrorist attacks between 1990 and 1992. In 1990, the
organization Up the IRS, Inc. detonated a car bomb
outside a building in Los Angeles, California, that
housed Internal Revenue Service (IRS) offices. The
same organization later bombed the National Trea-
sury Employee Union and detonated pipe bombs in
an IRS parking lot in Fresno, California. In 1992, the
Animal Liberation Front (ALF) set fire to a research
facility at Michigan State in protest of its supposed
mistreatment of animals.
Beyond domestic terror, most of the other attacks
that occurred between 1990 and 1992 were religious
elements carrying out the struggle from their native
country. In 1990, Rabbi Meir Kahane was assassi-
nated in New York City, supposedly by El Sayyid A.
Nosair (who was found guilty of coercion, assault,
and weapons charges but was found not guilty for
murder in 1991). In 1990 and 1991, Jamaat ul-Fuqra
attacked two separate Islamic cultural centers, the
first in Massachusetts and the second in California.846 Terrorism The Nineties in America