Properly speaking, science fiction is a subgenre of fantasy, one that became widely popular in the mid-twentieth century.
All science fiction is fantasy.
Not all fantasy is science fiction.
Strange New Worlds disappointment
- Thread starter just2wicked
- Start date
All science fiction is fantasy.
Not all fantasy is science fiction.
There's not really much separating Star Trek's "science" from, say, Forgotten Realms' magic. Both allow basically anything to happen, and both are treated as coherent facts in-universe. Spock being able to mind-control the guard in "A Taste of Armageddon" because of "Vulcan telepathy" isn't functionally much different from a mage casting Dominate Person (or a Jedi performing mind tricks); both arise from the stories taking place in worlds with different scientific laws of reality to our own world.
The only real difference is that Star Trek theoretically takes place in our own universe in the future... but then so does Forgotten Realms (albeit in the present, as far as I remember, unless WotC have messed with it again).
I will agree that the concept of objective good and evil existing in the latest SNW episode was completely batshit, as were Batel's super-godlike-ultra-powers. I'm just not sure the issue is that it was fantasy-tinged, but rather that it was just awful writing start to finish.
If you want hard sci-fi then Trek was NEVER the place to look. The first Kirk episode filmed literally had Gary Mitchell become a god because he left the galactic perimeter. That does not come close to any remotely realistic or extrapolated science, either in the 1960s or today.
Foundation by Isaac Asimov also borders on the fantastical, I mean psychohistory is inherently a fantastical science and even within the Foundation universe mind-controlling telepathic robots and mutants are needed to keep psychohistory's predictions accurate (there's literally a whole cabal of telepathic mutants called the Second Foundation).
I just finished watching Tencent's 30 episode adaptation of the Three-Body Problem, and Liu Cixin is probably one of the more "harder" sci-fi writers and even THIS story goes into (minor Three Body Problem spoilers)
Magical protons/sophons that can destroy Earth physics and implant visions onto masses, handheld nuclear bombs that can irradiate the person who shoots at it from a yard or so away but no one else outside that radius, invisible nanoblades that can slice through moving ships that are more reminiscent of Wolverine's adamantium claws than current tech has available, etc.
One of the guidebooks (might have been 'Grand History of the Realms') equated 1987 with Realms DR 1357 I believe. However since the Realms timejump to circa 1490s DR maybe the current Realms canon is now in Earth's future (let's not even get into the D&D cartoon protagonists, who are said to be from Earth, who are mentioned in the Baldur's Gate games taking place in the 1360s DR and show up in the Honor Among Thieves movie in the 1490s DR over 100 years later having only aged from childhood to young adulthood)
Last edited:
So to give more depth . not all fantasy are the same, I already said trek had low fantasy but it was only often it appeared. now for
high fantasy (star wars, game of thrones, lord of the rings)
low fantasy (star trek)
urban fantasy (buffy)
contemporary fantasy (harry potter)
All are different and tend to apply different concept to explain the supernatural stuff. star wars is high fantasy since it takes place in an entire made up universe. trek is not, trek takes place in our world and because of this, many things do vary, even Buffy had some episode that they had to apply physics.
I recall Harry Potter having time travel and while they did get the time travel theory right, which is the presentination paradox they used a time turner (fantasy). In trek you create worm holes or black holes for time travel, (science fiction) this is the differnce.
I cannot buy that star trek is as high fantasy as star wars as a defence here.
It doesn't need "a defense." It's science fiction to the same extent and degree as TOS. It is stylistically different and has different concerns because 50+ years separate the two.
They are. You just have scientists instead of wizards. Psi powers instead of magic. aliens instead of elves, dwarves and trolls.
What gobbledygook is this? Trek spends very time on scientific hypothesis for the future or other wise. Trek is not a science course. Phasers work because they need rayguns. Warp drive works because we need to get our characters to planet X. Fans have spent more time trying to figure out how the tech works than the writers ever did. Sometimes retrofitting actual science to explain it (Often with a hammer)
Still stuck on the rip off thing? Where was this outrage when Trek ripped off The Enemy Below, The Seven Samurai and Enemy Mine? Or a Frederic Brown 1944 story called "Arena?"
God mode? Have you met Q, the Metrons or the Sisko?
Last edited:
If Trek is so grounded in hard science in reality, how come dialogue in episodes like 'That Which Survives' establish that the 1701 can do 1,000 light years in 12 hours, and TAS and ST5 show that the center of the galaxy is reachable, yet suddenly in TNG to Voyager 70,000 light years takes 70 years and the center of the galaxy is unreachable?
No explanation on why Trek ships suddenly got slower 100 fold in the 24th century has ever been given.
You bash Star Wars for being high fantasy, but at least it keeps its travel times broadly consistent (I mean, the sudden unexplained slowdown of warp from TOS/TAS is literally the only reason Voyager has a workable premise).
Star Wars in not High Fantasy.
A great many fantasy stories take place in our universe, though - Forgotten Realms, again, being an obvious one (if you've never read/played it, it takes place on a fantasy world with dragons and orcs and magic and whatnot, but they also have space travel, and some characters have travelled to or from modern-day Earth).
There's not really anything separating this from Star Trek, which similarly takes place on different planets (often featuring fantastical, alien laws of physics or reality), but ostensibly occurs in our own future.
I'm not a big Star Wars fan and thus far from an expert, but doesn't it also take place in our universe, just in a different galaxy and in the past?
I said trek is more grounded in reality than the other series. I never bashed star wars, and speaking of star wars, do you remember not to long ago, when star trek 2009 came out, a lot of trek fans said it was a star wars movie and it was fantasy and it was not real star trek.
Wonder how they can now defend SNW that is even more fantasy than star wars while in reality star trek 2009 was actually a science fiction film more sci-fi based than SNW or star wars. I am baffled by the inconsistency.
SNW has been the least sci-fi driven series in nu trek, star trek discovery has done better, I am worried about all the excuses.
I think part of the confusion is that nobody's 100% sure what definition you're using for "sci-fi".
There's nothing in the Star Trek universe that prevents, say, Kirk landing on a planet with magic, and helping a sorceress fight a dragon. All those things already exist in the setting - people with powerful abilities, large sapient reptilian creatures, planets with different physical laws, etc. In TAS, Kirk actually does cast magic. At the Salem witch trials. For some reason.
There's similarly nothing in many fantasy settings preventing the Enterprise from appearing in orbit - one of the oldest D&D adventures literally had your team enter a crashed alien ship and fight security robots. Forgotten Realms and Magic: the Gathering would both very easily accomodate a plot where Kirk suddenly beams down - they already feature spaceships and alien life.
If you use sci-fi to just mean "doesn't have fantasy tropes", then Star Trek never qualified as sci-fi. If you use sci-fi to mean "based on real-world science", Star Trek never qualified there either.
There's nothing in the Star Trek universe that prevents, say, Kirk landing on a planet with magic, and helping a sorceress fight a dragon. All those things already exist in the setting - people with powerful abilities, large sapient reptilian creatures, planets with different physical laws, etc. In TAS, Kirk actually does cast magic. At the Salem witch trials. For some reason.
There's similarly nothing in many fantasy settings preventing the Enterprise from appearing in orbit - one of the oldest D&D adventures literally had your team enter a crashed alien ship and fight security robots. Forgotten Realms and Magic: the Gathering would both very easily accomodate a plot where Kirk suddenly beams down - they already feature spaceships and alien life.
If you use sci-fi to just mean "doesn't have fantasy tropes", then Star Trek never qualified as sci-fi. If you use sci-fi to mean "based on real-world science", Star Trek never qualified there either.
Thanks for this, one of my hobbies is spelunking the internet for malinformed ragebaity clickbaity stupid fucking nonsense with zero grounding in reality. This "article" has filled my quota for the week, and it's only Monday!
Why assume those who bashed ST09 are the same people who like SNW? Probably all kinds of combos.
Based on what criteria? Which episodes haven't passed your scifi litmus test?
DISCO??? With it's mushroom drive and time traveling Iron Man suit? Really?? (And I that as a fan of the show.)
And since we're there. Have you even watched SNW? Seems most of what you say is punctuated by "fans on IMBD said..."
Why what difference does it make? They like the show and you don't
Actually it was
Trek 2009 had the major basis for science fiction that drove the story
Time travel
Alternate reality
Black holes
Red matter
Space battles
It is a pure science fiction film with little fantasy in it.
This were the plot points of the story
Star fleet academy also got a good background in terms of world building that trek is a sci fi series.
Oh and it had romance that did not take up screen time or was toxic or was a batel demi God fantasy
Now when you have yahoo, ign ,polygon, cbr, den of geek all calling out how bad the snw element is on their reviews and some just bluff it off. I fear it is down the drain since there is nothing of substance left to argue. I have personally even stop replying to some since it they just say no or yes without any substance to why a no or yes
I am afraid my approach is different
Are you from the future?
No it was a review from a yahoo critcal writer.
So wait review do not matter anymore or do they only matter when they are good
No I am not from the future
I was talking about star trek 2009 film or kelvin trek
The movie was just over 2 hours but did a good world building of Star fleet academy and how the students are meant to function
Kirk cheats on the kobiyashi mark test
Uhura does extra hours helping out other cadets
Spock is the instructor of the test
Maybe if snw focused more on some star trek lore on a daily primary basis than their soap opera. It will be a better show.
You do not need to do a generic documentary as a one off so you can shove more soap down our throats
also another episode cricallly panned across the board and even on trek wbesite
I remember uhura and bet budding romance more than anything deep about star fleet
DSC did almost nothing better than SNW.
Wait, there's someone who wants more lore in SNW?????? Truly a unicorn has been spotted!!!!
One might say....more of a....legacy.
Similar threads
- Poll
- Poll
- Poll
