Science Fiction

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This magazine is aimed at fans and creators of sci-fi and related media of all kinds. It includes all content related to the sci-fi genre and only content related to the sci-fi genre. The goal is to build a community for everyone who enjoys science fiction and related topics. This includes the obvious books, movies, and TV shows, but also original writing, the discussion of writing SF, futuristic art and designs, and the science and technologies that inspire the sci-fi genre. **Team Top 20**

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What's your Sci-Fi unpopular opinion? (kbin.social)

submitted 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) by Anomandaris@kbin.social to c/scifi@kbin.social

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It's a slightly click-baity title, but as we're still generating more content for our magazines, this one included, why not?

My Sci-fi unpopular opinion is that 2001: A Space Odyssey is nothing but pretentious, LSD fueled nonsense. I've tried watching it multiple times and each time I have absolutely no patience for the pointless little scenes which contain little to no depth or meaningful plot, all coalescing towards that 15 minute "journey" through space and series of hallucinations or whatever that are supposed to be deep, shake you to your foundations, and make you re-think the whole human condition.

But it doesn't. Because it's just pretentious, LSD fueled nonsense. Planet of the Apes was released in the same year and is, on every level, a better Sci-fi movie. It offers mystery, a consistent and engaging plot, relatable characters you actually care about, and asks a lot more questions about the world and our place in it.

It insists upon itself, Lois.

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[–] ShaunaTheDead@kbin.social 47 points 2 years ago (17 children)

My sci-fi unpopular opinion is probably that I don't consider Star Wars to be sci-fi. It shares more with fantasy in that it's more character and story driven and less about philosophy and the way technology changes the human experience which imo is what defines sci-fi.

[–] StaggersAndJags@kbin.social 3 points 2 years ago (1 children)

A thought I've been having that might be more controversial: Star Trek isn't sci-fi.

It's basically a series of morality fables with magical premises. There's always a paper-thin sci-fi explanation, but for all that these matter to the story, they might as well just say "fairies did it."

(And many of Gene Roddenberry's "godlike being" characters, like Q, are almost literally fairies).

There's also its treatment of space. Just as Star Wars' combat was an excuse to do WWII fighter combat in space, Star Trek is an excuse to do WWII submarine combat in space. They're equally unrealistic in that regard.

[–] joonazan@discuss.tchncs.de 1 points 2 years ago

I agree on the fable argument but not on having to have a scientific explanation. Scifi is about sense of wonder, societal impact etc. Realism is optional as long as things don't work in arbitrary ways.

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