Where’s the science?, take 2

16 Jul

A few weeks ago I was inspired by conversations with friends and the constant rumblings in my head to write a post asking where the science in my science fiction was. The response was great! And essentially it came down to the audience, money, and storytelling. Which is to say that most audiences don’t care if there’s sound in space (people actually complained when Whedon’s Serenity was silent in space!), money issues say that production needs to move faster and thus not focus on reality but instead- tell the story. And on that note, the story may use some realism but to be completely realistic may slow the story or add too much depth/bulk when it’s better for the story to use quick basics.

It makes me sad, but I understand. I just think that sometimes a bit more realistic science would be nice.

So I was wandering around the ‘net the other day and stumbled on this- Which is a graphic from an io9 article reviewing the science in films. Brilliant. What’s really interesting is that the two films listed that aren’t 100% fiction, but are based on real events or softly fictionalized, are the only films that were accurate. Basically saying that if there’s fiction, the fact is tossed out the window.

I just think it’s interesting.

And don’t get me wrong- I love scifi and the fact that there’s more fiction than science in my scifi is not going to get me to stop watching/reading/enjoying. But it does mean that I turn off my brain more often than I keep it running. Which is fine… a summer blockbuster is for entertainment, not education. In fact the only time I’ve gone to a big summer scifi and expected to learn anything was Apollo 13. I think it says something about our society though… I’m just not sure what.

Maybe we’ll just touch on this topic again… I think it’s fascinating.

Oh and for the record, another inspiration for my original post was a marathon of Crossing Jordan. I moved on to a marathon of Sliders when I was done and lordy… bless their hearts they tried to have science fact but as the series progressed fiction won out. It’s like the old series, SeaQuest DSV– the first season tried to be factually based. The second had more scifi and by the time we got to the third, science had been blown out a torpedo tube. Still loved that show.