Why Sci-Fi is so often pessimistic

Sechin Tower

@SechinTower

Name 10 sci-fi books or movies and I'll bet at least 7 of them are pessimistic. Post-apocalyptic worlds (e.g.: The Hunger Games), overwhelming threats to humanity (e.g.: War of the Worlds), dystopian societies (e.g.: Divergent), and inventions with unintended consequences (e.g.: Frankenstein) are the stock and trade of the science fiction writer. Why are the stories of our future so negative?

I blame evolution. We evolved to be intelligent creatures with the ability to learn from others and anticipate the future, and that influences how—and why—we tell stories of danger and darkness.

Imagine our caveman ancestors living in a world surrounded by deadly predators. If one of them wandered into a cave and got eaten by a saber-toothed cat, the other members of his hunting party had the ability to tell the story to warn others away. Those who paid attention lived, and those who didn’t ended up as smilodon kibble.

We are the descendants of people who survived in part because they told and listened to stories. Science fiction writers often make their stories frightening because they know we are instinctively inclined to listen to warnings about the bad things that could happen.

Science Fiction Dangers

Sure, most of the dangers portrayed in science fiction aren’t as immediate as saber-toothed cats were to our ancestors, and they’re even less realistic: deadly arena games, genocidal space aliens, and zombie hordes aren’t exactly the leading causes of death in America today. Yet hidden away in these scenarios are warnings and survival strategies for real-world problems.

Science fiction has the power to make us aware (even if in a metaphorical way) of the dangers of damaging our environment, the evils of dehumanizing an enemy, or the dangers of a totalitarian state. And the zombie apocalypse? Well, if you’re prepared for that, you’re ready for the less-awesome but much more likely event of an earthquake or hurricane. (Even the CDC (Center for Disease Control and Prevention) recognizes the power of zombie stories to encourage people to prepare for any disaster, undead-related or otherwise.)

Trouble is, all this adds up to a pretty pessimistic view of the future. If you read enough of these stories, the glass won’t seem half-full, it will seem cracked, drained, and ground into silicon used to make killer cyborgs. Pessimism makes for great stories, but is there a way to escape the negativity?

Is Optimism possible?

Yes. Probably the most famous example of optimistic science fiction is Star Trek, which presents a society that has solved the problems of racism, poverty, and nationalistic war. Maybe more authors could experiment with portraying a future so bright it’s worth fighting the Klingons to preserve.

Science fiction can be optimistic when it follows the ancient mythological pattern where the hero travels through unknown lands to bring back a boon to the rest of humanity. We can see this idea in a few science fiction books, such as Robert Heinlein’s YA classic “Have Space Suit, Will Travel,” in which Kip Russell battles tentacle-faced aliens and returns to Earth with scientific secrets that will unlock antigravity and faster-than-light travel. This idea of a “science boon” is where I hope to go with sequels to Mad Science Institute. I would love to see other authors pick up the torch here, too, and have a hero who returns with more than just the head of the hive queen.

Is Pessimism Bad?

None of this is to say that we should shun pessimistic science fiction. It’s fun, interesting, and sometimes deeply important to our society and our future. But if you’re a writer or a reader who feels like you’re not seeing any new ideas in the post-apocalyptic or space-war genres, well, maybe that’s because we’ve been walking down the same dark paths for too long.

I'm an optimist by nature, so maybe the pessimism inherent in most sci-fi stands out to me because it contradicts my expectations for the future. I also like to think I'm a realist because I know we don't have any guarantees to continue as a society or a species, and nature is unforgiving. Just ask the dinosaurs.

What do you think? What are your favorite science fiction stories/books/movies, and do you think they're pessimistic?

Sechin Tower is a teacher, a table-top game designer, and the author of Mad Science Institute. You can read more about him and his books on SechinTower.com and his games on SiegeTowerGames.com

What YA Book Movies Are You Looking Forward To?

Jordan Dane
@JordanDane

In no particular order, I am looking forward to THREE movies that originated as YA series books. From everything I have seen, the casting looks really good and I am keeping my fingers and toes crossed that the screen adaptation is as solid as the Hunger Games screenplay that Suzanne Collins had a hand in writing. Can you imagine what a thrill it was or will be for these authors to see their books on the big screen? For readers to see it? Woot!

Hunger Games #2 – Catching Fire (Suzanne Collins)
Casting Jennifer Lawrence really made this movie perfect for me. I saw her in Winter’s Bone and loved her acting chops. As an actress, she has made some really amazing choices in movie scripts. Silver Linings Playbook was a great film too.

In the continuation of the series, more key secondary characters will be added and I look forward to seeing how closely this next movie sticks to the books. Here is the IMDB link to the movie and the release date is November 22, 2013. In my opinion, I was a little disappointed that Catching Fire was so similar to the first book. It felt as if Collins wanted to get #1 right and took another stab at it, like another Rocky movie. she played up the love triangle more in book #2, to set up book #3 – Mockingjay. I find it interesting that Suzanne Collins did not write the script on book #2. My speculation is that this film will diverge from the books to set up the final conflict.

Sam Claflin looks like a good choice, physically for Finnick Odair, a key player in the series. He’s gorgeous. And hopefully we will see more of Liam Hemsworth and Josh Hutcherson as Gale and Peeta.

Sam Claflin (Finnick)

Mortal Instruments – City of Bones (Cassandra Clare)
Cassandra Clare is listed as a writer on the screenplay. I’m excited about that. The strength of her books is her characterizations and her amazing story arcs for all the characters, even secondary ones. Her world building is amazing too, but as a writer I loved how she kept every character growing over the series.

From what I’ve seen of the cast, there will be some extreme eye candy for everyone. Lily Collins is perfect as Clary and I love Jamie Campbell Bower as Jace, even though I know he wasn’t people’s first choice. I think moviegoers will fall in love with this guy once they see him in the part. Here is the IMDB link. The movie will be released August 21, 2013. I can smell the popcorn now. My niece and her mom, my spectacular sister, go together to see movies made from YA books. I gave this series to them as a Christmas present and we’ve had this movie on our radar for a long time. Can’t wait.

Lily Collins (Clary)  & Jamie Campbell Bower (Jace)

Divergent (Veronica Roth)
I saw an interview with the lead actress today, who will play Tris. Seeing Shailene Woodley on Jon Stewart The Daily Show inspired this post. She did a great interview and was very entertaining and well-spoken. I don't see her as the image of Tris in my mind, but actors can bring so much to the table that I would love to see her in this role.

So I looked into the movie. OMG, Theo James will play Four. He is PERFECT for this role! Here is the IMDB link. The movie will be released March 21, 2014. Veronica Roth is only listed with a credit for her novel, so she didn’t contribute to the screenplay as a writer with credits there. The strength of these books is Roth’s world building and the way she ramped up the stakes in these novels, especially with her endings that foreshadow things to come that make you want to grab the next book, but the plot structure within each book wasn’t as strong (screenplay-wise) as Suzanne Collins or Cassandra Clare’s books.

I’m sure Roth had input to the screenplay treatment (the preliminary adaptation summary of the plot structure that the script will attempt to follow) and with popular books like this, filmmakers will want to stay true to the world they are trying to build into a movie franchise. Hollywood had a lot to work with in Roth’s books, so fingers crossed on this one too. Can’t wait to see it.

Theo James (Four) & Shailene Woodley (Tris)

So let’s take a quick poll in comments. Which of these movies are you most anxious to see? If there are other movies coming up that were adapted from YA books, please share them in your comments. I’d love to hear about them.

On the side bar to our YA blog, I have a poll set up for these three movies. Vote for one. Polling ends Aug 4th at NOON. Let your voice be heard here!

Stories and Treks

By Dan Haring

My older brother and I shared a room growing up, and for many years we had this poster of the USS Enterprise hanging on our wall.

Neither of us were huge Trekkies, (or Trekkers) although I seem to remember my brother watching a fair share of TNG as he got older. But before that, we were little boys and it was a cool spaceship with a ton of really neat detail. That's all that really mattered. After watching a few of the Star Trek films and finding out who Kirk and Spock and the rest of the crew were, I found even more enjoyment staring at the poster. Not only that, I was inspired by it.

And that's what great stories and characters can do. That's why there are millions of Trekkies and Star Wars and Batman fans. Millions of Dr. Who and Firefly and Sherlock fans. It's because these mythologies have characters that we love and hate, characters we're able to lose ourselves and our normal lives in, characters that change our lives. 

And that's why we see these characters popping up again and again. That's why there have been 500 James Bond films. It's why we're getting a new Superman movie next month. These characters resonate.

So think about it as you're crafting your story and characters. Are your characters worth caring about? Would anyone cry if they died? Does it break your heart when something horrible happens to them? Are you elated and inspired when they overcome their hardships and obstacles?

If you answered "no" to any of the above questions, chances are your characters aren't quite where they need to be. I don't have a silver bullet answer for what to do or how to fix them if they're falling short. But the best characters not only have pieces of us in them, they allow us to project our hopes and dreams and fears onto them. It's not easy to create a Katniss Everdeen or James Tiberius Kirk or Luke Skywalker, but it's possible. 

This past weekend I saw Star Trek Into Darkness, (which was fantastic) and got this cool Star Trek poster by Mark Englert. (it even glows in the dark)

As soon as I saw it, I knew what I was going to do with it. My two boys share a bedroom, and I hung it where they both can see if from their beds, next to the Batman and Star Wars pictures. They're a little young for Star Trek, but they're not too young to be inspired. And as they read Harry Potter and watch The Avengers I want them to have favorite characters and go through the love and hurt and joy and pain those characters go through.

If you ask me, that's why we read and watch stories.

And why we tell them too.

Bella vs. Katniss

by Diane Weipert (aka T.J. McGuinn)

Today we're so excited to welcome Diane Weipert, aka T.J. McGuinn, whose awesome YA debut THE WAKING MOON is tearing it up on Wattpad right now (you can read it there FREE!) I was lucky enough to get my hands on a copy months ago, and it was one of my favorite books of last year. So definitely check it out!

And now, without further ado: Diane Weipert dicusses being a tomboy and damsels in distress...

When I was little, I was a daddy’s girl. I loved doing errand runs with my dad, even when he went to boring places like the hardware store. Even though I wasn’t into sports, I’d wear a Raiders jersey and watch football games with him, dancing around and high-fiving whenever our team got a touchdown. And even though I hated to ride roller coasters, I would always suck it up and go with my dad, so that he wouldn’t have to ride them alone. But more than anything else, I’d go with him to see action movies--loud, explosion-filled stories that I never would’ve watched on my own.

For me they were “guy movies.” The heroes were strong. They never showed fear. They always kept their cool. And there wasn’t a bind too tight for them to escape. And these heroes were always men.
 

The women in the films were always beautiful. But that was it. Beyond the perfect curves and gorgeous hair, they didn’t have much going for them. They couldn’t find their own way out of a shoebox. They ran away from bad guys in impractical footwear. They wore very little and screamed very loud. And I hated that I was supposed to identify with them.
 

Then Terminator II came along. According to its backstory, the Linda Hamilton character, who’d spent the first Terminator movie running around in a pink waitress dress, had spent several years in a mental institution getting really buff and really tough. Now she was strong. She never showed fear. She always kept her cool. And there wasn’t a bind too tight for her to escape. Throughout the movie, I put myself in her place. I imagined I could be that strong, that cool, that tough. It was then that I understood why guys like those movies so much. And why I never did.

Everyday life is difficult. It is rife with moments that make us feel stupid or ugly or alone or misunderstood. We’re at the mercy of the world and all its cruel whims. We feel helpless. That’s why we’re drawn to books and movies. They allow us to escape the limitations of our lives (and ourselves) and experience the extraordinary. And there’s nothing extraordinary about a hand-wringing damsel in distress. It’s just an exaggeration of how we secretly feel every day.

Just like boys, (who, I’m sure, also spend their waking hours feeling inadequate and insecure) we’d like to get lost inside some fantasy realm where girls have more to offer than bulging sweaters. We’d like to know that there’s power in us. That we can save ourselves, and others, too. That we aren’t just breasts, butt, and legs, but brain, muscle, sinew, knuckle, and a thunderous beating heart.

The main character in my novel The Waking Moon is a regular 16-year-old girl facing bizarre and horrifying circumstances on her own. But she doesn’t sit around waiting to be saved. She takes control. It’s what we all want to do. 

If you ask me, we’ve spent enough time longing to be ravished by a gorgeous vampire. It’s time for girls to grab bows and arrows and get in the game. We have a revolution to lead!

Diane Weipert has written mostly for film. Her feature Solo Dios Sabe premiered at Sundance in 2006 and starred Diego Luna and Alice Braga. Since then she has developed scripts with actress Michelle Rodriguez and written a psychological horror script for Eddie Izzard's production company. Diane's young adult novel The Waking Moon, written under the pen name T.J. McGuinn, is edging in on 1,000,000 reads in only two months on Wattpad.com. Follow her on Twitter: @dianeweipert