The lack of decent sci-fi

I was reading this new article while waking up this morning on zee android:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_9489000/9489104.stm

Brief synopsis said we weren't living like they through we would way back when but that a lot of things had happened. I watched a video on the beeb yesterday of a kid controlling a bionic hand with the powers of his mind. It was pretty futuristic:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-13287537

But in that first article they mention landing on the moon and the ship was powered by anti gravity paint. Very portal 2 I thought. But in terms of an actual sci-fi story a bit laughable now days. And it got me to thinking I'm constantly disappointed with sci-fi, all the aliens looks like us, nothing particular imaginative and stick to a set formula of space ships and such, and I thought perhaps its because in times gone by the average joe was not so well informed of what was and wasn't possible. Basically we know now that light speed will never be a reality and teleportation too. But star trek and star wars are based on such things.

Are modern day writers stuck in a rut of not making things to crazy so that they won't be laughed out of the cinema because our horizons have been clipped by the progress of science?

i agree partially, whereas there is a good sci-fi movie every year or two, television is an absolute wasteland of decent programming. think of all the 80s 90s & 2000s shows that are now tits up, and badly missed

Star Trek

X-Files

Lost

Firefly

Farscape

Babylon 5

Galactica

Caprica

Quantum Leap

Blake's 7

Carnivale

the technology of our everyday lives gets more and more amazing and people get pissed that the fiction is suffering?

I was just watching Total Recall with the girlfriend and was surprised how many things in it have become reality - gps, cell phones, TVs in metro trains, body scanners...sadly no "Johnny Cab" yet, lol

The reality is are technology is not overtly amazing. Its just everyday. A lot of it is existing technology shrunk, smartphones for example can't do anything computers haven't done for years but they bring that power to a handset.

I just want to see a decent alien movie/tv series. Something that's fresh and new. That one that was on Sky for a while V for Vistors. I tuned into that, the motherfuckin aliens looked exactly like humans. Why bother!

hm, guess i just can't sympathize with the premise of this thread. real, actualized science > cool looking new aliens on tv... carry on.

The best, most alien, representation of an alien life-form I've seen was in Solaris (Clooney-version for prettier visuals).

use some spoiler tags asshat

( )

and yeah I agree, Solaris in the book and Tarkovsky versions is a fantastic representation of alienness. Clooney solaris sucked complete ass. Why Lem never liked the Tarkovsky version is beyond me - Tarkovsky improved on his ending a thousand-fold (though Lem had more "hard science" details and the lack of heavy russian religious symbolism, so there's that)

  On 5/20/2011 at 5:16 PM, El_Chemso said:

The reality is are technology is not overtly amazing. Its just everyday. A lot of it is existing technology shrunk, smartphones for example can't do anything computers haven't done for years but they bring that power to a handset.

 

You cant really trust a persons judgement on whether technology is "amazing" if they have been along for the ride from 1981 to 2011 because technology nearly always progresses in little incremental steps. The previous step prepared you for the current step and the current step prepares you for the next incremental advance. In other words, the impact of a new technology is greatly reduced because you are subtly being prepared for each new advance all the time. It's like watching someone lose 100lbs over a couple of years when you spend every single waking moment with them; doesn't have the same impact.

  On 5/20/2011 at 5:49 PM, lumpenprol said:

use some spoiler tags asshat

 

 

 

 

 

( )

 

 

and yeah I agree, Solaris in the book and Tarkovsky versions is a fantastic representation of alienness. Clooney solaris sucked complete ass. Why Lem never liked the Tarkovsky version is beyond me - Tarkovsky improved on his ending a thousand-fold (though Lem had more "hard science" details and the lack of heavy russian religious symbolism, so there's that)

Not sure why you think it needed a spoiler. There's no big twist. The characters explain what they think might be going on as it progresses, but the alien isn't the main focus of Solaris (Clooney's Solaris, at least).

I loved the book, but yeah, it's very technical and heavy going.

I agree with what Rambo said. I suppose it's a lot easier to let your mind run wild when you just have a seed of a concept to expand upon. When space was still completely black and Neil had just jumped on the moon in blurry footage there are lots of gaps to fill. Now there is so much imagery that we grow up on that you actually have to try to think of things in a new way. It's like telling people to imagine a new kind of tree; you know a lot about trees so you can't really thing very far outside of those constraints. Now if you try and think about an alien space ship the first thing in your head will be about 20 alien space ships you've already seen, my mind is already full of Red Dwarf, Nostromo, Sulaco, crashed Alien ship, Tie fighter, Imperial destroyer, Millenium falcon, that shit from The Abyss, 2001, Futurama, Starship Enterprise, etc and all the sounds they make and how they move, it’s hard not to be derivative now.

If you think of sci fi as just space and aliens and such I suppose it is limitless but it is a well-trodden path all the same. Films like Moon and The Core and Sunshine are basically the same old ideas. There must be other directions to look in, I mean Inception didn’t really focus on it but it does crucially involve a piece of imaginary technology not unlike Philip K Dick’s Ubik does. Imaginative people must be able to think of science fiction that isn't just about a cool space ship or alien or whatever.

I loved the book for all the scientific research and theories trying to grasp what's going on. I want more sci-fi where no boring assumptions are made about the nature of an alien race/entity or that can at least bring something new to the table. It doesn't matter to me that it becomes more abstract or stays largely unexplained. Anyone know of more sci-fi literature like this?

Last interesting sci-fi movie I saw was Na srebrnym globie, incredibly dark and bleak. It's unfinished though, so lacking a lot of scenes.

  On 5/20/2011 at 6:17 PM, Coalbucket PI said:

I agree with what Rambo said. I suppose it's a lot easier to let your mind run wild when you just have a seed of a concept to expand upon. When space was still completely black and Neil had just jumped on the moon in blurry footage there are lots of gaps to fill. Now there is so much imagery that we grow up on that you actually have to try to think of things in a new way. It's like telling people to imagine a new kind of tree; you know a lot about trees so you can't really thing very far outside of those constraints. Now if you try and think about an alien space ship the first thing in your head will be about 20 alien space ships you've already seen, my mind is already full of Red Dwarf, Nostromo, Sulaco, crashed Alien ship, Tie fighter, Imperial destroyer, Millenium falcon, that shit from The Abyss, 2001, Futurama, Starship Enterprise, etc and all the sounds they make and how they move, it’s hard not to be derivative now.

 

If you think of sci fi as just space and aliens and such I suppose it is limitless but it is a well-trodden path all the same. Films like Moon and The Core and Sunshine are basically the same old ideas. There must be other directions to look in, I mean Inception didn’t really focus on it but it does crucially involve a piece of imaginary technology not unlike Philip K Dick’s Ubik does. Imaginative people must be able to think of science fiction that isn't just about a cool space ship or alien or whatever.

Completely agree. I think we're about at the "end of history" in a lot of ways (though I never read the Fukuyama book, I've always liked my probably inaccurate interpretation of the central idea). The "isms" are dead - we all know capitalism plus representative govt. is about as good a form of governing as is humanly possible. Philosophy is looking increasingly silly (ok, maybe only to me). We're reaching the limit of how far we can see into the stars/physics, and most of the dark places on the globe have been revealed and explored. I think there'll be three more big leaps in the foreseeable future - AI, and the ability to extend our lifespans indefinitely, and modify our biology at will. But after that? It's hard for me to conceive of anything, unless it's a truly "aha" moment that overturns some cornerstone of relativity or quantum theory. I think there's a lot of boredom these days, which is why people seem to crave the second coming/ET/2012 etc...

I just hope we can get our shit together enough to start colonizing space. Fixing our own damaged globe is necessary but hardly cool. We need to get out there - even though there's not a whole lot out there...

good sci-fi is in books, it almost never translates well to motion pictures.

  On 5/20/2011 at 7:00 PM, lumpenprol said:

we all know capitalism plus representative govt. is about as good a form of governing as is humanly possible.

Ooooooook. Maybe science fiction hasn't run out of scenarios just yet.

Also, there's a huge unknown on the horizon that has yet to be brought up, and that's the likely development of a technological singularity. The ramifications for something like that are so far out there that even futurists like Ray Kuzweil aren't even gonna bother taking a stab at the way that will develop once it occurs.

  On 5/20/2011 at 5:54 PM, Rambo said:

  On 5/20/2011 at 5:16 PM, El_Chemso said:

The reality is are technology is not overtly amazing. Its just everyday. A lot of it is existing technology shrunk, smartphones for example can't do anything computers haven't done for years but they bring that power to a handset.

 

 

You cant really trust a persons judgement on whether technology is "amazing" if they have been along for the ride from 1981 to 2011 because technology nearly always progresses in little incremental steps. The previous step prepared you for the current step and the current step prepares you for the next incremental advance. In other words, the impact of a new technology is greatly reduced because you are subtly being prepared for each new advance all the time. It's like watching someone lose 100lbs over a couple of years when you spend every single waking moment with them; doesn't have the same impact.

This is most wise and really very true when you think about it, something I never had.

  On 5/20/2011 at 7:00 PM, lumpenprol said:

foreseeable future - AI, and the ability to extend our lifespans in definitely, and modify our biology at will. But after that?

I've been doing AI at uni this past year, just sat the exam today in fact. And the one thing its highlighted to me that is well known throughout the computer science world. Is that there will never be true AI like you see in movies. Its to hard to explain as it sort of emerges as a full picture of a few topics. But if you mean AI in the sense that people talk about AI now days in that its clever responsive programming to its surroundings then I think your right. The leaps and bounds that can yet integrate into our lives have hardly been explored at all.

My biggest disappointment with AI is the robot vacs. I bought my mum the scooba one that hovers, wets, scrubs and dries the floor in one pass. I had great images of it learning the layout of the room overtime and stuff. But it doesn't it just bumps off the walls over and over again and you keep filling it with water until you think its hit everywhere. Its only since doing this course I realize how complex it is just for a robot to learn a floor plan.

Whats like the top 5 sci-fi books then?

Something worth considering is that the spirit of SF is very closely entwined with that of colonialism (and, by extension, capitalism). Once earth was perceived to have been satisfactorily explored and mapped, the only frontier remaining was the stars. Later, during SF's next "evolution" western culture also became fascinated by existentialism and psychedelicism, opening up fresh and unanticipated avenues for SF. The development of the internet led to "cyberpunk," perhaps the last true step in SF's evolution as a field.

I think the decline in the colonial fervor that sparked SF, combined with waning interest in serious discussion of the nature of reality and the perception that both psychedelicism and cyberculture have been completely tapped may have led to a falling off in the production of truly inventive or groundbreaking SF. This is not to say that SF has no future, merely that it is desperately wanting of some new discovery, philosophy, or cultural phenomenon to set it into motion once more.

/stoned blather

Every time someone thinks outside the box, the box gets bigger, making it harder to think outside of it.

This may be old news but...

  Quote

After years in development, (Splice director) Vincenzo Natali’s Neuromancer is finally moving forward. According to a press release, the film has secured sales from distributors at Cannes and visual effects work has already begun. Filming will begin in 2012 with locations in Canada, Istanbul, Tokyo, and London.

 

Neuromancer is an adaptation of William Gibson’s award-winning book of the same name. The book is widely regarded as visionary, foretelling certain aspects of the internet and coining the term “cyberspace.” Read more of what we know about the project after the jump.

http://www.slashfilm.com/neuromancer-preproduction/

It would have been great if Chris Cunningham was still attached to this.

if you go back and read jules verne, it's dumbfounding how far ahead that guy was. i think el chemso is just becrying the lack of that sort of vision, these days.

to which i answer: go read "the diamond age" or "snow crash" by neal stephenson.

  On 5/20/2011 at 4:49 PM, El_Chemso said:

I was reading this new article while waking up this morning on zee android:

 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_9489000/9489104.stm

 

 

Brief synopsis said we weren't living like they through we would way back when but that a lot of things had happened. I watched a video on the beeb yesterday of a kid controlling a bionic hand with the powers of his mind. It was pretty futuristic:

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-13287537

 

But in that first article they mention landing on the moon and the ship was powered by anti gravity paint. Very portal 2 I thought. But in terms of an actual sci-fi story a bit laughable now days. And it got me to thinking I'm constantly disappointed with sci-fi, all the aliens looks like us, nothing particular imaginative and stick to a set formula of space ships and such, and I thought perhaps its because in times gone by the average joe was not so well informed of what was and wasn't possible. Basically we know now that light speed will never be a reality and teleportation too. But star trek and star wars are based on such things.

 

Are modern day writers stuck in a rut of not making things to crazy so that they won't be laughed out of the cinema because our horizons have been clipped by the progress of science?

All sci-fi has to be informed by the culture of the time it was written in. This means that there is a point, which you can't venture beyond, for ultimately it's being read and written by the creatures that exist today on this planet.

Personally i get a lot of my sci-fi jollies from the writer prepositioning how society is effected. The good writers have a creative sense of future directions in things, not just technology. So we have a story with action and drama set against the encapsulating sci-fi backdrop.

As to being confronted by what on reflection seem ludicrous technologies. Personally i don't mind a little magic and mystery, some spice from the beyond. Sure the writers past have gotten their extrapolations on technology wrong in so many clumsy ways. But if it's a beautiful story, it's ok.

  On 5/20/2011 at 5:16 PM, lumpenprol said:

I was just watching Total Recall with the girlfriend and was surprised how many things in it have become reality - gps, cell phones, TVs in metro trains, body scanners...sadly no "Johnny Cab" yet, lol

And to think think that's being remade...Total Recall - now with Colin Farrel, CGI, and (likely) product placement!

the stories are lacking creativity

i blame the internets for a big part. series like the x-files were based on undergroud alex jones type radio stations. But with the internet pretty much everyone knows about that wacko stuff before it is put into a series like the new V, so it looks rather dull and predictable.

same goes with technology, i've seen crazier sci-fi stuff in TED talks then in movies recently.

and with the way tv works now you cant really make anything "deep" because the audience wants instant action/pleasure (blame youtube lol) and if the grades are low it doesnt matter how genious your series is.

and the "zomg quantum shit" is pretty much sucked dry now and they can't seem to find other interesting subjects. so back to aliens and BNW/1984 society type stuff!

  On 5/20/2011 at 10:54 PM, doorjamb said:

Every time someone thinks outside the box, the box gets bigger, making it harder to think outside of it.

I like that

  On 5/21/2011 at 12:23 AM, joshuatxuk said:

And to think think that's being remade...Total Recall - now with Colin Farrel, CGI, and (likely) product placement!

It'll probably be awful, but the first one was not without product placement. I counted Jack-in-the-box, Penafiel (lol?), Sharper Image (lol), and one other I'm forgetting - guess it didn't take :)

  On 5/21/2011 at 12:00 PM, lumpenprol said:

  On 5/20/2011 at 10:54 PM, doorjamb said:

Every time someone thinks outside the box, the box gets bigger, making it harder to think outside of it.

I like that

I don't know. Haven't people always thought this? It's not because you and I can't imagine groundbreaking new things, the other 6 billion brains on our planet can't. Thinking like that always reminds me of this quote: "Everything that can be invented has been invented." - Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, U.S. patent office, 1899. I'm very sceptic towards the idea that we are at "an end of history" or that the box is starting to become too big. It's probably just our perspective.

I still see a lot of people that are able to think outside the box. Wether it's Jonathan Blow doing amazing things with game design, installing electro-magnets in roads or the constant innovations in computer technology. I think the movie industry is not suffering because of lack of new ideas but because every high-budget movie has a script that seems written by a marketeer.