I used to have sci-fi and fantasy friends. I used to share giggles every time Data on Star Trek TNG self-consciously inhaled before speaking or Brock on The Venture Bros dead-panned “Gotta love yer Zep.” Alas, no more. My sci-fi /fantasy friends have all left town or drifted away, or – worse yet – had children. Now I giggle alone.
But no more! I have finally gathered my energies to overcome my general introversion and exhaustion and attend a sci-fi meetup group in our fair city of lost angels and I HAVE NOT TALKED SO MUCH SCI-FI/FANTASY IN YEARS!
It was a SCI-FI FANTASY ADVENTURE!
Would you pay for CBS All Access to see the Star Trek series releasing in 2017? Is JJ Abrams destroying the franchise? Why does he always have to do that alternate universe thing? He did that in Fringe, too. And Lost. And will he do it in Star Wars? Is having one man write the screenplay to both franchises putting too much power in too few hands? What about Game of Thrones? What’s up with George RR Martin? Will he die before he completes the series? How much of his intended plot lines did he share with the HBO producers? Are the TV producers doing a better job of storytelling than he did in the novels? How can a series go wrong with such awesome costumes and well-designed CGI dragons? (Answer: It can’t!)
Does Doctor Who have strong season arcs, or do the producers just drop in finale-episode teasers unrelated to the rest of the plot? Is it really a through-line if none of the previous episodes were impacting the outcome of the finale? When Doctor Who establishes rules of the show like “You can’t go back in time and meet the old you – it would destroy the fabric of the universe,” and later goes back in time and does exactly that, is this annoying or endearing? See, I think that’s a love question. Because when you love someone, all those little faults are endearing. And when you don’t, they are annoying. I love Doctor Who, but as a sci-fi/fantasy writer, YOU MUST ESTABLISH RULES FOR YOUR WORLD AND THEN STICK TO THEM. Otherwise, the audience gets confused and the endings feel unearned. I think this is also my beef with JJ Abrams and his alternate universe trick. It feels like the writers ran out of new episode ideas and then pulled open a drawer and decided to use some old episodes they wrote before they killed off the characters that are in them. So now they have to figure out a way to bring dead characters back. This can be done through either a.) time travel or b.) a gateway to an alternate universe. Abrams seems to prefer the latter. I prefer the former. Doctor Who does both.
Anyways, I hope all us sci-fi/fantasy lady fans will get out there and partake of juicy films coming our way like Ghostbusters, Suicide Squad, and next year’s Wonder Woman! I can’t wait to pick them apart over drinks with you later!
L.A. Kuemmel 