Survival Research Laboratories

Carlo Ramos

Survival Research Lab

Created by Mark Pauline in 1978, Survival Research Laboratories combine machines, special effects and robotics to create the fantasy of live-action mechanical interaction. The interactions could be through fighting with loud, destructive and very scary mayhem that live audience can enjoy right in from of them! It is basically the fantasy of futuristic robots--controlled and automatic--battling it to the end. It is a sort of pre-judgement day via Terminator type of action. It also allows for the fantasy of those who wish to be deaf since SRL does not hold back on that part.

Compared to other forms of media that wish to accomplish the same fantasy, the key difference would be the scale of ambitiousness as close to reality as possible that SRL brings to the table. As I mentioned before, Terminator wants to bring the fantasy of a machine war as well which brings their commonalities. The difference between SRL and Terminator is the sophistication of the robots as Terminator is not quite realistically sophisticated compared to SRL's more primitive robots (so far). Destruction derbies also try to create the same fantasy of battling machines but they cannot go as far as completely decimating the cars because there are people in them which would be a whole other problem. SRL has remote-controlled robots that can be destroyed to the fullest since there are no people in them.

From a distance, it certainly does look like SRL can be called "yanks with tanks". But it is not quite like that because the technology that goes into one SRL machine is not too primitive like the statement implies. I think SRL is promoting and critiquing mechanized violence. Since I can be destructive and love seeing mayhem, I think they are going more for promoting even if the performances can be satirical of the military weapons testing.

The SRL audience is catering to those who love destruction and mayhem. Yes, we love that in America but SRL's insurance policy would take them to the cleaners. Amsterdam is very liberal with their prostitution and drug laws so a few exploding, fire-breathing killing machines do not pose as a problem. For American-created SRL to be in Afghanistan would seem like an American attack towards them so….. probably not a good idea to have SRL there…..