One of the great things about science fiction is that a story can lead to the creation of at entire world. That is, the audience is inspired to imagine what else is in the world out the story. Yes, I know, lots of stories inspire the imagination of the audience, as any browse through fan fiction architects archives will prove. But science fiction is particularly well suited to this sort of speculation since it requires creation of a believable world for the characters to inhabit. When well done, the audience will want to know more about that works, even the parts that don't involve the story's characters.
This is one of the few areas where big-budget pop-sci-fi movies can outdo their literary cousins. Those expensive effects can (when done well) give the audience a sense of detail that gives a great sense of realism, where a sparse description may not.
But it doesn't have to be that way. A lot of good science fiction doesn't have a complex world behind it. Usually that's because the science is used more to set up a confrontation than to create a setting. I would point to the Alien series as an example. It's my some mind-bending sci-fi concept, so much as an excuse to create a great villain.
That's not a criticism. Action movies work by giving you a hero who's just slightly stronger/smarter/braver than the villain. Many lackluster movies accomplish this setup by giving you a semi competent villain and an average hero. But the best action movies give a very powerful hero who barely defeats a seemingly invincible villain. And that's where science fiction can contribute well: by providing us with a seemingly unstoppable bad guy.
But if a movie is primarily about that struggle between a perfect setup of hep and villain, we don't really need to know more about them. Take Die Hard, for instance (yes, despite what I wrote earlier, I did eventually see it.) Hans Gruber was a great bad guy because he seemed so well-prepared as to be invincible, but I didn't really have any interest in learning his back story. A movie about the life and times of Mr Gruber probably wouldn't be very successful. We didn’t need to know about him, we just needed to know what he’s like.
Similarly, I didn't really have much interest in learning where the xenomorphs in Alien came from. Having said that, there was a movie on that very topic, Prometheus, and I actually did enjoy it. But I approached it as a stand-alone story only tangentially related to the Alien series. I find that Alien fans who saw Prometheus looking for some great revelation about the Alien story were quite disappointed. Personally, I think that was because there wasn’t any way to create a backstory that would add to the franchise’s mythology.
Which brings me to the latest Terminator movie, out this week. Like a lot of people, I liked the first two Terminator movies. I would argue that's because they squarely fit into the pattern I'm talking about, with competent heroes vs invincible villain. And like Alien, it uses a fairly simple sci-fi premise to concoct that situation.
But I - and again, probably a lot of people - lost interest after that. The simple premise produced a nice action movie set up, and did it in an easy-to-follow way that didn't limit the movie's appeal to hard-core geeks. But it also meant that I didn't really feel the need to learn more of the story. I can’t really imagine walking out of Terminator 2 back in 1991 thinking, this story really needs three more movies and a TV series. And yet, they keep going to the well again and again. Yes, I know, it’s because they make money, it’s a recognizable brand, haven’t you been paying attention to the entertainment industry for the past twenty years, etc. But they don’t keep making Terminator properties by rehashing the successful formula. Instead they set movies in different time periods, or focus on different characters. It’s like they think this sci-fi universe demands fleshing-out, Star Wars style. I wish they would understand that some stories don’t need, or even benefit from, extensive exploration.
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