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.
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.
Unpopular opinion: Star Wars is in space and has spaceships and aliens. Good enough, it’s sci-fi.
People attribute these silly, gatekeepy characteristics to sci-fi, but sci-fi doesn’t need to be about anything. Sci-fi is allowed to be shitty or irrelevant.
Sci-fi is allowed to be shitty or irrelevant, but that is absolutely unrelated to Star Wars not being sci-fi. Star Wars isn’t shitty, and it is relevant.
The reason it isn’t sci-fi is because it a) makes no attempt whatsoever to explore the implications of the differences between its world and ours, and b) it makes no attempt to scientifically explain those differences.
There has been exactly one time when SW has attempted to explain its universe, and midichlorians have been a meme for decades because it was trying to introduce scientific explanations into the wrong genre.
To be clear: this is fine. Saying Star Wars isn’t sci-fi is not an insult. It’s just a genre, and genres aren’t better or worse than each other. If Star Wars did try to be sci-fi, it wouldn’t be able to tell the grand good and evil story it’s trying to tell - that’s the advantage of fantasy.
Agreed. With Star Wars the longer you think about the sci-fi elements, the less sense they make. The force was great as just space magic, it didn’t need midichlorians. Droids are another, are they sentient? Are they slaves? Why do they feel pain? Spaceships, hyperspace, distance… how did the Death Star get to Aldoran and Yavin? GAAAAAAH!
Space Opera is a good genre name. Let’s stick with that.
Isn’t it not sci-fi? It’s usually more classed as sci-fantasy, if memory serves.
True sci-fi is rare most of it is sci-fantasy. Great recent sci-fi is Expanse - author was pissed about these warp nonsense so he grounded it in physics and only added few technologies which could be made in future.
Yeah, usually sci-fi has a point to make about the human condition or some underlying philosophy that guides all of it, or at least a philosophical idea that guides each episode. I find if you ask yourself to finish the phrase “What would society/humanity look like if we had to access to _______?” if the answer to the blank is clear then it’s sci-fi. Some sci-fi goes the opposite route though “What if we did NOT have access to ______?”
so brave
Sci-fi and fantasy are genres that naturally bleed into one another, and everyone will draw the lines differently. I’d personally agree that Star Wars is more fantasy than sci-fi, but I wouldn’t want to gatekeep anyone who called it their favorite sci-fi franchise.
Star Wars was a reboot of a semi-forgotten genre called sword and planet, which is basically fantasy with technological trappings. It is its own thing, but sci-fi has become so diluted nowadays that it can pass itself as legitimite part of it.
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.
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.
I agree with this so much, I have just been afraid to say it online ahah
Plus it isn’t futuristic. It happened a long time ago.
I think it is sci-fi, but “old sci-fi” and “for the masses”. Because if that, it is just not so good as sci fi.
I agree so no upvote for you.
Wow, never thought of it from that angle!
Is that unpopular? It’s usually considered sci-fantasy.
I honestly consider it more of a space western, but I also find them boring so have not delved too deeply into them.