The Letters to the Editor department is intended to be a forum for our readers to express their own opinions and ideas. While we appreciate the many complimentary letters we receive each day, you won't find them on this page. Instead, you will find letters that go beyond or even contradict what we have written, letters that offer a different perspective and provide a different view of science fiction.
— Scott Edelman, Editor-in-Chief
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'm writing in regards to the new Spider-Man movie. I just got back from
the first screening here at our theater and I must say that although I've enjoyed such comic-book themed movies as Blade, Batman, X-Men and Spawn, I must now say that Spider-Man is the best ever made. While they have deviated from the comic book, they did so tastefully and made it so much more realistic in many ways. Well, after three directors, 10 years and several scripts, they did it right! More thought and effort should be put into other comic-book themed movies. Don't get me going on about Batman Returns, Batman Forever or Batman & Robin, but I only hoping we can keep Sam Raimi, Tobey Maguire and Kirsten Dunst for all the sequels ... or not do them at all.
Tony Wallace
scribals_75@yahoo.com
have to admit that I have been sorely disappointed by the way that the last season of The X-Files is wrapping up. [Warning: Spoilers ahead.] Can it possibly get more depressing? The funniest part was the title of last week's episode, "Jumping the Shark". That, of course, referred to the killing-off of characters. I can't believe they killed the Gunmen ... I was holding out hope
that the SCI FI Channel, or at least FX, would bring their show back. They were some of my favorite characters. As if that weren't bad enough, Scully has now given up her baby. What tragedy are they going to throw at us next? I just hope that they leave us enough people for another couple of X-Files movies.
Dawn Suiter
dawnsuiter@yahoo.com
erhaps because of new highs of death and destruction in the real world, I find the rising death toll in May sweeps—which has barely started—a real downer. [Warning: Spoilers ahead.] This is not to say that characters in TV series should never die. But just in the past week, I've endured the deaths of the Lone Gunmen (X-Files), Krais (Farscape) and Kai (Lexx). The news briefs say someone is yet to die on Buffy, so there's at least one more.
In particular, I thought the death of the Lone Gunmen was poorly juxtaposed: They were always in the "comic relief" episodes of X-Files; their own spin-off show had a light-hearted underpinning. This final episode with them was too serious, no homage to what they stood for in the series, and the Gunmen didn't even seem to be themselves. Yes, I caught the "save the world" justification for their deaths, but the whole we're-over-the-hill/washed-up attitude beneath it was out of character (and a slap to Baby Boomers everywhere). The future X-Files movies will be less dimensional without the possibility of a little Lone Gunmen comic relief.
I know producers don't coordinate with each other, but I really hope May Sweeps doesn't become an annual procession of funerals. Can't anyone (not everyone) ride gracefully into the sunset? We could use more messages.
Barbara Goldstein
Barb2051@aol.com
have recently finished reading R.A. Salvatore's novelization of the Star Wars: Episode II—Attack of the Clones movie and I have to say this: If you are a true Star Wars fan, read this book now! Forget about worrying that it will spoil the movie for you, because I felt the same way. And I am here to tell you all that reading that book just made me want to see the movie about 100 times more! The novel is truly one of the best I have ever read, and you are going
to be blown away with all of the detail that it gives you. I want everyone to know that if you were disappointed with Star Wars: Episode I—The Phantom Menace, well, you should be overjoyed that this book (and movie) is going to rock your world. I look forward to hearing others' comments on the novel, as well as the movie.
Brad Poynor
bradpoynor@tycom.net
alling Repo Man "cyberpunk" has got to be the funniest thing I've heard since Pam Andersen said she could direct. I don't know what your reviewer's smoking, but I want some. C'mon, cyberpunk describes more than just attitude. It's setting. It's subject. Repo Man is certainly punk, which is obviously an influence on a genre that uses its name, but some unseen aliens in a trunk and a government conspiracy do not sci-fi make. The glowing trunk hearkens back to Robert Aldrich's Kiss Me Deadly, and forward to Pulp Fiction, but it's just a MacGuffin. By those lights, Repo Man anticipates X-Files more than cyberpunk.
While I agree that Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? is of another era, it's the movie, not the book, that is most noted as inspiration. Blade Runner's gloomy attitude, ubiquitous tech, low-rent setting, civilization on the decline and implication that flesh is just another commodity did more to define cyberpunk than virtually any work before or since. To cheapen its impact and influence to add depth to an unrelated work is a travesty. The entire review reads suspiciously like someone's high-school term paper.
Repo Man: A great movie, yes. Punk, yes. The "fullest expression to that date of the cyberpunk worldview," no. If one wants to see Emilio Estevez do cyberpunk, they can watch Freejack.
But I wouldn't suggest it.
P.S. "Zeitgeist" is the most overused, overrated word in kneejerk criticism today. (Possibly excepting the word "seminal.") Minus five points for using it.
John Bykowski
johnbykowski@attbi.com
Reviewer Paul Di Filippo responds:
The search for literary ancestors is a tricky one, fraught with pitfalls of pride, envy and greediness. Perhaps I pushed the cyberpunk envelope by trying to include Repo Man, despite its lack of certain quintessential CP hallmarks. But I still bet that a survey of the core cyberpunk writers would find this film cited often as a touchstone to their subsequent mature work.
Best,
Paul
must say that I am very proud to live in a country that allows all of us to have the opportunity for free speech, because it gives every one of us a chance to listen to fools as well as act like them.
However, I must also mention that I was deeply saddened by Mr. Ahearn's letter regarding Science Fiction as needing to be current and "with the times" ("Hollywood SF Needs to Move Forward"). I thought his points were both informative and silly. Science Fiction's very nature is to present a fantasy for the readers, viewers, listeners, etc. I know the word "fantasy" is taboo for some of your readers, but it is the best description for the purpose of sci-fi. We do not need books and films in this genre to reflect the possibilities of our future all of the time.
[Ray] Bradbury's works are hauntingly brilliant. The mere fact that he didn't use proper technological descriptions or concepts (the Martians in Martian Chronicles used bees for ammunition in their guns) just made the stories within these pages even more beautiful in his way with prose. The stories were more about emotion and change. They were never about the future and all its amazing accomplishments (For a great short story by him about possible futures, read "The Toynbee Convector")! He also presents mankind as it really is ... ignorant. He doesn't play games with his fables about the grand species of humankind, but presents the issues that are a part of everyone of us. From racism to pride, and even the issue of superstitious fear are major parts of the Bradbury mythos.
Mr. Ahearn's comment "Science fiction is about new ideas and insights on humanity's place in the universe," brings forth another problem. Where did he get the official definition of science fiction from? The same long-time sci-fi editor that equated Rendezvous [with Rama] with being "little more than a high-tech schoolboy's exploration of a very fancy tree-house"? Does he realize what he's done here? These are opinions, my friend ... opinions ... nothing more, nothing less. They cannot even be called educated theories!
A "classic" is based on each individual experience. For me, The Empire Strikes Back is a classic. I saw it when it first came out (I was eight), and to this day it remains to be my favorite film. It isn't plated in gold, and I don't think you'll see it written in the stars by the wondrous hand of God. However, it made an immense impression on this fertile eight-year-old's mind, and that has made it a classic.
What I am saddened by is the fact that I don't believe Mr. Ahearn will be able to enjoy truly enjoyable films and books with his current state of mind. If you cannot see the remarkable splendor of many films and books in this genre, then I'm afraid that you'll be spending the rest of your life looking for the "invisible charm." Ironically, many of Bradbury's short stories dealt with such dilemmas; the loss of childhood imagination.
Star Trek, Babylon 5, Time Machine, etc. are all great contributions to the genre. However, they are only a minor part of the great universe of sci-fi ideas. Science fiction, to me, is about the love of the unknown, not the need to explain it away in trite scientific jargon. Great writers write these stories to explore the "out there" on our imaginations, not to dominate it with humanist understanding.
Mr. Ahearn, I really do hope that you and those like you will have the chance to experience the wonder of great storytelling one day ... I know I have ...
D.C. Jeanes
dcjeanes@moheck.com
oe Beaudoin's letter last week ("Fahrenheit 451 Is Not Irrelevant") disputing my contention ("Hollywood SF Needs to Move Forward") that Ray Bradbury's novel Fahrenheit 451 is irrelevant in the Information Age was well-intentioned, but misplaced.
451 was about the total eradication of the written word, even including STOP signs. It's a novel to be read. That's the whole point. Making yet another film about the joy and privilege and ambition and worth of the written word and the reading experience skewers the very core of Fahrenheit 451.
The idea that I was attacking Bradbury or any other master SF writer is equally absurd. Bradbury is more than just a great writer, but a spokesman for what science fiction should be. More than 30 years ago, he wrote an open letter blasting the planned remake of King Kong. In 1998, at the film's
65th anniversary event, he also took a well-aimed potshot at the "re-imagined" Godzilla.
Verne, Wells, Clarke, Shelley, Rand, Asimov, Huxley ... These men and women didn't just write great stories. They set the bar for future writers of science fiction. And they set it high, very high. That's what the genre is: an open challenge to all those seeking to make their own marks—clear the
bar. Don't go under it. Go forward, not back. Make, don't remake.
Imagination, that courageous adventure into the unexplored, that bold, new and novel insight on humanity's ever-evolving place in the universe, is the very lifeblood of science fiction. "Re-imagining" is a gutless, insulting cop-out that will be its deathknell.
Disagree with me if you will, but blame my stand on Ray Bradbury. He said it a lot better than I ever will.
Kevin Ahearn
KEVTOMA@aol.com
hile I do admire Joe Beaudoin's optimism ("Fahrenheit 451 Is Not Irrelevant"), exhibited by his defense of
Fahrenheit 451 and his comments on the sci-fi genre in general, I cut my now-ancient teeth on sci-fi books, TV, motion pictures, et. al. I was a Trekkie when Kirk was still at the helm and had a school girl crush on [Ray] Bradbury, among others. But I have come to realize that sci-fi in all its myriad forms is not just fiction, it's a fairy tale. The stories and events live only in the mind of the author, unlike most other fiction where the human equation endows
other types of fiction with a modicum of possibility. Sci-fi unfortunately has none of that. More's the pity.
Shirley Kacmarik
mensa63@yahoo.com
his is an addition to the previous letter about Fahrenheit 451 and book burning. It wasn't that long ago that people were burning Harry Potter books in New Mexico. Lots of books have been set to the torch, including The Bible.
Fahrenheit 451 isn't just a story about burning books, it's a book about control. When you control information, you control the world. It's a relevant problem in today's society if you consider that when the book was first written in the '50s, there were lots of independent newspapers and magazines. Today there still are lots of books and magazines, but they are owned by a handful of corporations. Television and radio are in the same boat. There used to be lots of independent television station owners and it used to be illegal for any company to own more than a few stations. Today there are only a handful of companies that own and control the bulk of TV and radio stations in this country.
Let me give you a for instance. General Electric owns NBC. General Electric is also responsible for polluting the Hudson River. Why hasn't there been major news stories about the millions of dollars in damage, and why won't GE clean it up? The answer, control. GE owns NBC. They aren't going to rat
themselves out, nor will CBS (Viacom) or ABC (Disney) or CNN (AOL-Time-Warner). They're in league with one another.
Fahrenheit 451 is more than a sci-fi adventure story. It's a book set in a futuristic setting with a clear message: knowledge and information are valuable. Whoever controls them, controls the world. You may also find that George Orwell wrote a book on similar lines, 1984.
Dave
dgrhm@hotmail.com
he comments by Keith Kitchen ("Adaptations Can Create A Catch-22") that George Lucas and J.K. Rowling were very lucky are correct, but I can't help but think he'll raise a few
hackles with the comparison.
In 1977, Star Wars was never seen as something that would be a big success. Lucas' vast success is, in many ways, founded on the same kind of good luck which happened to Bill Gates. People who should have known what they were doing were completely clueless as to where the future of their industry lay. Lucas was in the right place at the right time, with a basic idea—something the public wanted, and the movie moguls had no idea about. He cobbled together Star Wars. It wasn't, and never will be, a science fiction masterpiece. It's just easy-to-understand, black-and-white fun.
The world of Harry Potter is completely different. J.K. Rowling planned this for five years, without any guarantees of payment, and produced something fantastically intricate. Harry Potter is the first time in about 50 years that a massively popular product has, at its core, something which lives up to the publicity. If George Lucas lives to be 1000, he's never going to write anything which even comes close to that kind of depth or complexity. It took 20-plus years for Lucas to begin making the sequels to his original. Harry Potter is set for the filming of all seven books, before they've even written!
The big difference between Lucas and Rowling is that the latter has changed her industry in the same way that The Beatles changed theirs. Any publisher of SF and fantasy that wants to sell more books is now on the look out for good, quality fiction. Not just any old film tie-in, but something that people will actually love. Doors, if not kicked open, are now at least ajar. In the U.K., the fifth Harry Potter book has no price and no release date, but is already in the top 10 best sellers! If this trend continues, J.K. Rowling is set to become the world's first billionaire author. What she may do with that kind of power is every bit as intriguing and magical as Harry Potter himself. Meanwhile, Lucas "treats" us to the likes of Jar-Jar Binks.
Nathan Brazil
nathanbrazil@freeuk.com
n a recent SciFi Wire news article ("Romulans Coming To Enterprise?"), you stated the following regarding an attempt to have Romulans on the Enterprise TV series:
"Bringing Romulans into the universe of Enterprise would be tricky, as current continuity holds that
Romulans didn't make first contact with humans until the time period of the original Star Trek series."
That's not really true. In StarTrek.com's official synopsis of the original series episode, "Balance of Terror," they say that while this is the first time humans see Romulans, it's not their first encounter with them, in fact:
"The U.S.S. Enterprise is able to pick up a visual from the Romulan bridge, which shows the previously unseen Romulans to look very much like Vulcans. This sparks an old prejudice in Lieutenant Andrew Stiles, whose family fought in the Romulan wars."
I'd have to check other sources, but I seem to remember the Romulan War was about 100 years
before the episode—or about 50 years after Archer took out Enterprise. Therefore, there is nothing to preclude some type of encounter between Archer's crew and Romulans as long as, in my opinion for continuity's sake, three things are kept in check:
1. Archer's crew never sees a Romulan face to face, even on a view screen. They went a bit far with the Ferengi episode a few weeks ago. They will have to be very careful about handling a storyline to make sure it's Kirk and crew that see a Romulan first.
2. The encounter doesn't spark the Romulan War yet. I'm pretty sure it didn't take place much more than 100 years before Kirk, but either way, I think Enterprise has a lot more growing up to do before they engage in such a huge an ongoing story arc.
3. T'Pol: I gathered from "Balance of Terror" that even Spock didn't know up until the Romulan commander's face came on the screen that the Romulans were an offshoot of Vulcans. The writers would have to make sure that T'Pol says nothing to contradict that. Either a) she doesn't know who they are, or, at worst b) she keeps any knowledge of such a connection to herself.
In any event, I think it would be great to show the first encounter between humans and Romulans—just as long as they finally respect the continuity established by Roddenberry, et al.
Martin L. Cahn
m2cahn@mindspring.com
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