Science Fiction Cliches

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A useful link for us all:

http://www.geocities.com/evilsnack/cliche.htm

The truth is, most science fiction has no basis whatsoever in scientific fact. Those that do usually distort these pretensions so badly they insult the audience into asking us to believe it, and that their misunderstanding of the issue is somehow pertient to our time (like The 6th Day). I also dislike the sci-fi films with pretentious philosophical metaphors and no human dimmension whatsoever (like Blade Runner). It's even worse when they are essentially action or fantasy movies disguised as thoughtful science fiction (like the Matrix movies).

Something you RARELY get in any GOOD scifi



Agen, not allways true



Um... Luke Skywalkers hand?



Probably exclusive to Matrix and Battlestar Galactica



Eh ok Ill give u that



Not allways. Sometimes the good guys actaully beleeve everything they talk about, and sometimes (eg Han Solo) they dont claim to have any ideals



Ill give u that...



Ill give you that, but in an interstellar society, individual colonies wood probably be about as specialised as individual cities in our own society anyway.



Benn done ONCE to my knowledge.

Um... running lights?


They dont HAVE to be, you can just fit more guns on a bigger ship

As for how there built, capital ships in any series/film are usually built in orbital/deep space shipyards



NOT allways. In Star Wars, it dosent even exist



Logical, red tends to symbolise danger

Nah. Sometimes the hero accidentally kills her while trying to avenge her supposed death



Granted.



Granted.



lol



That is the most likely single form of aliens thogh, cos its what was said to have been found at Roswell. If the Roswell stories are true, then theres aliens who look like that. Wereas in the case of anything else aliens could look like, theres no point of reference whatsoever in reality, its completely made up, so the odds against it being accurate are far grater




The Asgard in Stargate fit into both of these stereotipes



Or sometimes (in the case of the Belgaxas in Sons of Earth) scavenged/stolen/captured. (Allthogh, they did capture a shipyard and force the workers there to keep manufacturing weapons, for them instead of the USF)

Mabey they didnt


lol yeh


LOL!

ET didnt kidnap elliot...

TV/movie SF gets lots of things wrong, true (You forgot the sound of ships whooshing by, even though space is a vacuum) but most of the SF novels I've read are intelligent extrapolations of technological, sociological, psychological and political trends.

In Harlan Ellison's original script for "City On The Edge of Forever" (ST:OS), the death of Edith Keeler has a deep psychological impact on Captain Kirk. The climactic scene occurs in Kirk's cabin between Kirk and Spock. In Ellison's version, the final line is Spock saying to Kirk that "No woman was ever offered the universe for love." In the TV version, after all the eviscerations of Ellison's script, all Kirk says is "Let's get the H*** out of here."

Aliens with mouths that look like certain unmentionable body parts....

The energy needs of the life support system or even the lighting will be so great that it is worth while to divert power from life support to propulsion or to go around in a darkened ship.(more often,shedding excesses heat would be a problem,if your using
any nuclear or other long burn/low acceleration engine intead of primitive chemical fuels).

The line of acceleration will always be parallel to the plain of the deck, instead of perpendicular to it, which would work better
with a one g-acceleration or less (don't have to invent "gravity plates' or some such control to keep the crew from being slammed against the aft bulkhead-and if gravity behaves as a field shouldn't those gravity plates in the deck only interfere
withforces perpendicular to them anyway?)

instead of suiting up and dumping the ship's atmosphere as soon as we recognize an intruder or biohazard, we will wait till everything else has failed and most of the crew is dead9or at least the tribbles have eaten the grain).

Anyone can figure out an alien species control panel in a few hours,Lanuages are like codes and can be deciphered.

We will not send unmanned probes down to the planet's surface first, that would be cheating.

Penal Colony planets!
The Moon is a Harsh Mistress(Heinlien)
Fatal Impact
Star Trek The wrath of Kahn
Aliens 3
episodes of both Star Trek ong and Enterprise

They got the idea from the British Empire, which actually did that more than once.

J.D. Robb's "Eve Dallas" future police procedurals have a world in which the prisons are "offworld" - i.e. in orbit. A very good idea from a security standpoint! Although expensive.

Characters defy the laws of physics by venturing out in space without adaquate protection

Attractive females (alien or human) are required to wear skin-tight, revealing clothing

Only the main character suspects that a rebellion is imminent, even when it should be plainly obvious to everyone

Planet-destroying doomsday weapons must have obvious weakpoints for rebels to exploit

Glurks are nobel and wise, Widgets are honourable and courageous, but humans - despite being primitive, arrogant and clumsy, are "special" and destined for greater things

Nobody ever thinks to wear rubber-insulated gloves to prevent electric injury from the dangerous, overloaded circuitry

Viruses and bacteria are only common to earth

Its suprising how realistic this is. Most of the people I know cant see that Britain is turning into a fascist police state (well, that or dont care, but I prefer to assume they cant see it...)

There is always only ONE CITY per PLANET

Radiation can explain everything from ascending to godhood to aquireing an acne disorder.

The "Evil Clone" scenario

I personally fail to see whats so attractive about green women. And where are the green men?

"Again with the Clingons"

Captain, I belive we can fix (insert situation here) by (insert ridiculously simple answer with a cool name here).

Coruscant in Star Wars - 1 city IS the planet

That said, its actually quite realistic that extraterrestrial colonies WOULD have 1 city per planet, the settlers wouldnt bother to build too far from the original landing zone unless there was a reason to do so.


xD again, quite possible. Or do you have a list of all the different possible mutations that can occur from radiation? Exactly how long IS that list?


Prince Xizor. Also, the classical "little green men" scenario


I believe ull find Klingons are a Star Trek cliche, not a scifi cliche

I was referring to the uncolinized planets. Example in the Star Trek episode "A Piece of the action" There are only 12 or so bosses. Could that many people's territoies really encompass a whole planet? Especially with a mafia government. To do that they would need an incredible amount of "boys", yet when Kirk claims "There are over 400 guys" abord the enterprise, they find the idea unbelivable. Oxmix and Cracko must have many more than that to manage large portions of a planet. Of course all this assumes that the show is logical, wich, as Spock points out many times, it is not.

Futuristic armour is always crap. See: Storm Troopers, Imperial Guard.

The villain's super galactic space soldiers will always possess the shooting talent of Stevie Wonder, UNLESS expressly written in as part of the story. Again, see: 'Storm Trooper Syndrome'.

Futuristic space craft must always be powered by a super powered engine capable of destroying entire star systems if it ever breaks down, which it does, frequently. See: Warp Core Breach.