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No Need For Trek Anymore
dcsmith writes "In an article at the LA Times, Orson Scott Card says 'So they've gone and killed Star Trek. And it's about time.' SciFi blasphemy? Not really. Card makes several good observations about the growth of SciFi over the past 30+ years. The article also comments on several other genre gems, including Joss Whedon's Firefly." From the article: "...the hungry fans called their friends and they watched it faithfully. They memorized the episodes. I swear I've heard of people who quit their jobs and moved just so they could live in a city that had Star Trek running every day."
Live long and prosper ...
Hulk SMASH Celiac Disease
Enraged Trekkie __________ attacked Orson Scott Card today and beat him senseless with a 1960s-vintage officially licensed Star Trek (tm) phaser. Other trekkies soon arrived in mass and quickly stoned the defenseless Card to death with their DVD box sets of TOS, TNG, DS9, Voyager and Enterprise.
Card had made the mistake of making comments in a Los Angles Times op-ed piece about the Star Trek franchise that did not deify all people ever involved in the series, including bit-part actors who barely had speaking parts. He even went so far as to suggest that perhaps Star Trek was not the best TV series of all time.
"He made some good points in the article," said a fellow sci-fi writer who feared for his life and did not want to be identified. "Too bad he had to make them about Star Trek. I'll miss him."
I wasn't sure if it was OK for me to not like Star Trek anymore. If it wasn't for Card telling me what to think I would probably never make up my mind.
In summary, he states that Trek has always sucked, Roddenberry was a hack, and the Klingon language is stupid. I've got some tar over here, anyone else got some feathers?
:-/
Honestly, it's great that he doesn't like Star Trek. I'm happy for him. Really. But not everyone is looking to have their heads messed with when they watch Science Fiction. They don't necessary need to find the "deeper connection", "reveal the hidden truths", or "find another plain of existence". Sometimes people are happy addressing issues that are relevant today rather than issues from some dysotopian future. Star Trek did that. It used allegories (e.g. Klingons == Russians) and analogous situations (e.g. A Private Little War) to help put current issues into perspective. In addition, Roddenberry made Star Trek nothing more than a canvas for far more experienced writers to make their points.
In short, people loved Star Trek because it was both thought provoking and accessable to people who aren't interested in "hardcore sci-fi" visions of the future.
Side Note: Has anyone ever noticed that when Star Trek addresses a topic that some find to be a repulsive trait of hardcore Sci-Fi (e.g. telepaths), the blow is somehow softened to where the concept is easy to accept? Perhaps there's even more missing than Mr. Card realizes.
"I wonder sometimes if the motivation for writers ought to be contempt, not admiration." -Orson Scott Card
Well, that explains everything.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
I use to have a crush on Wesley Crusher.
Star Trek gave many people a vision of a future much more peaceful and prosperous than the present day, and awakened who knows how many minds to the potential and wonder of the universe and science. I'm in the sciences today because of it.
The hope that tomorrow can be better than today is what keeps all people going. Star Trek really connected with people on a level I've rarely seen.
occultae nullus est respectus musicae - originally a Greek proverb
Everythings become so staid or stupid in StarTrek. They need to get name authors to pen plotlines if they ever want to do Trek again. Perhaps if they set everything in the Mirror Universe, it would be good. Afterall, how many TV series set out to be evil all the time?
... people love discussing it's demise! Two "trek dead" stories in two days on /.
I still say they should do a trek reality series that follows Romulan assassins weeding their way into Romulan culture and the Federation. 24 in space type thing...
The dangers of knowledge trigger emotional distress in human beings.
Who would have thought Star Trek would outlive Star Wars?
Through-line series like Joss Whedon's "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and Alfred Gough's and Miles Millar's "Smallville" have raised our expectations of what episodic sci-fi and fantasy ought to be.
Fantasy, yes... science fiction, no.
To make laws that man cannot, and will not obey, serves to bring all law into contempt.
--E.C. Stanton
Card is an excellent writer - his Ender character is immortal, and the writing is some of the best in the genre of his contemporaries. But outside of his own novels, who cares what he thinks about anything else? For example, he's an insane Christian homophobe. That doesn't affect his SF writing, but it does impugn his judgment about "society", even the place of the writing of others in society.
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make install -not war
Orson Scott Card is a gifted writer. Nobody denies this. Well, maybe a few.
But let's be serious here. As far as "Sci Fi" goes, he's off the deep end. He's the sci-fi world's equivalent of some british royalty gimboid sipping tea from a saucer with their little finger sticking out, mumbling on about how the "unwashed commoners" don't truly appreciate horse racing, or polo, and how ghastly sports like soccer are.
So he champions the hardcore sci-fi shows. That's fine. I've watched them. Some of them, I've actually enjoyed.
I doubt if Orson Scott Card has seriously watched a Trek series, ever.
I doubly doubt if he's paid attention to some of the absolutely amazing episodes Enterprise has had this year.
And I really don't understand why anyone gives a shit what this ivory-tower sci-fi snob has to say on the subject.
The problem though comes from a friend who doesn't have the money for cable or Satelite. Unless NBC starts carrying BattleStar Galactica, Enterprise is the ONLY current BROADCAST space-opera style sci-fi. When you consider that there will always be a younger generation of kids discovering science fiction for the first time, space opera still has a place. Maybe not Star Trek- which is particularily bad space opera- but space opera all the same.
With Firefly and Enterprise canceled- and fewer stations than ever before carrying the syndicated version of Stargate and Andromeda (the second of which I'm sure Mr. Card would say suffers from the Roddenberry curse) what can step up to take the hole?
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
The worst stuff just drags on and on, rehashing the same tired prejudices and routines with regularity until it's mercifully cancelled. You're not normally supposed to hate the protagonists and root for the end of humanity by raging alien hordes, but each Star Trek has gotten better at inspiring this kind of "hope".
I never vote for anyone. I always vote against.
-- W.C. Fields
From the article:
I don't want to admit it, but Card is right. Star Trek was wonderful in large part because it was the first of its kind on TV. Now SF is not a gamble TV and is all over the place. That's a good thing since we can now concentrate on good story, characters and so on.
This is perhaps a natural step in the development of a genre. Even Homer was great mostly because he was the first (have you every actually read the Illiad (even in translation?) It's not that good!)
I still have a warm place in my heart for Star Trek that will never go away, but it must seem mysterious to those young whippersnappers who have never lived in a universe without Star Trek.
--- Attorneys Assisting Citizen-Soldiers & Families -
Yes, Sci-Fi has grown up over the last 30 years. I love Firefly and Stargate. But that doesn't mean old ideas are inherently worse; the new Battlestar Galactica series is fantastic. The problem is that since Star Trek: The Next Generation made it OK for shows like Quantum Leap to take to the air, Star Trek itself has had closed-in ideas and stagnant leadership. Deep Space Nine was alright, Voyager was decent, but Enterprise just got worse as it went along. They didn't realize it until it was too late. Manny Coto might have done a lot for Star Trek. He may yet have the opportunity. What's needed is a new vision. When legends like J. Michael Straczynski are lining up to reboot Star Trek, something is up. Maybe something great. If only Paramount would shake off the stranglehold Rick Berman has on the franchise, they could really make progress.
(It's never too late to join the Renaissance)
It's almost like he learned nothing from Rodenberry's secular humanist vision of the future. No wonder he's glad to see Trek go. And no wonder he's got all kinds of other reasons to say he's glad. He probably doesn't even realize he's lying - that's one of the most effective characteristics of his cohort in America.
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make install -not war
Yes, God forbid anybody should be a Christian. Everybody knows that Christians are all evil and bad. Except we can't say they're evil and bad, because nothing is really good or evil, you know? That's Christian thinking, and we reject that. Because Christians are bad.
Also, anybody who disapproves of sodomy is really just scared of it. Don't dignify their positions by saying that they disagree or that they don't approve. Instead, accuse 'em of having a phobia. That way was can totally ignore their point of view without having to feel bad about doing it.
Part of what makes this country great is the (unfortunately declining) encouragement to tolerate people that are wrong. The alternative is worse.
I never vote for anyone. I always vote against.
-- W.C. Fields
It's puzzling, to me, that Card (a writer whom I respect greatly, BTW) spends his entire column arguing that the "Star Trek" series(es) should be cancelled because ST:TOS was a bad show.
Why should that even matter? ST:TNG was (by the third season, anyway) a far better series, and DS9 was better still, despite stealing ideas left and right from "Babylon 5". It's the last twenty years of Trek that's being cancelled, not the first three.
Postscript: Now we finally have first-rate science fiction film and television that are every bit as good as anything going on in print. If only....
The problem is the same as actors blabbing about stuff you think is stupid: it makes it harder for you to concentrate on their major work. Once I knew that Tom Cruise was a $ceintologist, it made it damn hard to sit through a his movies without thinking "gee, he thinks the souls of dead aliens makes us do bad things"... the same for Card. It's now hard to read a book, knowing he's so kookie, and not be distracted by it.
And, there's the whole I don't want to support his bullshit views (by helping to make him rich).
I'll admit, this might not be a problem for everyone, but it is for me.
Yes, God forbid anybody should be a Racist. Everybody knows that Racists are all evil and bad. Except we can't say they're evil and bad, because nothing is really good or evil, you know? That's Racist thinking, and we reject that. Because Racists are bad.
Also, anybody who disapproves of Blacks is really just scared of them. Don't dignify their positions by saying that they disagree or that they don't approve. Instead, accuse 'em of having a phobia. That way was can totally ignore their point of view without having to feel bad about doing it.
The only people who consider mormons Christians are mormons. As my favorite History of Christianity prof used to say - (my paraphrase) - 'Take a look at all the Christians through the history of Christianity. Find what they have in common, discard what they don't. Then you will have what defines Christianity.' Using such an approach one finds that mormonism does not fit the definition.
Interestingly enough it bothers many mormons when someone challenges their attempt to redefine the term Christian-- it also bothers them if you call the polygamist mormons, mormons. Go figure.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
In short, people loved Star Trek because it WAS both thought provoking and accessable to people who aren't interested in "hardcore sci-fi" visions of the future.
Emphasis on the WAS.
The problem here is too many people view Trek as one big, indivisible thing. It's not. You can't have a rational conversation about "Trek is Good" or "Trek is Bad". Some Trek was good. The current state of Trek is bad.
The worst thing that can happen to a piece of Sci Fi is for it to become commercially successful. The more commercially successful something is, the greater the temptation to extend the franchise just for the sake of profit. The more money a franchise is worth, the lower you can set your creative standards and still justify releasing a product.
Why do half of the Star Trek movies suck? Because PAramount wanted to make a Star Trek movie, regardless of whether the script was any good. Sometimes they got good scripts, sometimes they didn't. But the people who get to decide whether a Star Trek movie should get made don't make that decision on whether the script is going to produce a good movie. They make that decision based on whether money in will be greater than money out.
The Original Series was a ground-breaking series that only happened because Roddenbery believed in it and made it happen. Next Generation only happened because Roddenbery believed in it and made it happen. Star Trek XXXVJWII, Voyager, and Enterprise was made because if Paramount didn't churn out new Trek they'd be wasting this huge, profitable sci fi franchise they'd built.
That can't go on forever though - eventually you produce so much crap just for the sake of making a buck that your franchise becomes worthless.
Unprofitable or New Sci Fi will only happen if it's good. Profitable Sci Fi will happen REGARDLESS of whether it's good.
If Star Trek hadn't been successful, it would have died after DS9 or earlier, and we'd all still think Trek is Good. But it didn't. But new trek being bad doesn't make old trek any less good.
paintball
That's the exact opposite of what the article was claiming. He says that Star Trek sucked from the beginning, but it was the only sci-fi most people knew for generations (because they didn't read). Now that decent sci-fi is starting to come into its own (ex: Firefly), Star Trek can actually die.
OMFG!! I can't believe you played the Orson Scott Card!!!
Can I bum a sig? I left mine at the office.
Last Trek: May 13
Last Star Wars: May 19
I'm no trekkie, but that's one thing that I noticed Card didn't mention a word about: original Trek was very progressive for television of the time. In fact, during the original pilot, the first mate of the ship was a female spock-like character called "number one" (they never gave her a name), who had better knowlege of the ship than the captain, in a uniform similar to that of the men. NBC ordered her cut because audiences wouldn't be able to identify with a powerful woman. Even Uhura, who made it into the show, was a pretty impressive step - a high ranking, non-submissive, black female officer was something you didn't see much of at the time. As for racism, a quick look at the bridge of original trek speaks wonders for its progressive view at the time.
It's a Cyrillic alphabet. It's like all those keys you never push on a calculator.
As geeks, we LOVED Card because he wrote about Ender Wiggin; a very bright young boy who could not get along with his peers because of his intellectual capacity. C'mon, this is Slashdot. If you read Slashdot, and you've read Ender's Game, you identified with Ender to some extent.
We all like to believe that we are special. Geeks like to believe they are smarter than the average person. Is it so crazy to believe that maybe it wasn't Card's extraordinary writing and plot that made Ender's Game so popular -- perhaps it was because Ender's Game was the ultimate braniac dream? To be smart enough to save the world, and get the accolades that go along with it.
His blatant religious proselytizing in his other books, most notably the Alvin Maker series, choked me with its sickly-sweet taint. I enjoyed the series at first because it was well written and fun, but it soon turned into a carousel of reptition. Alvin did and said the same things over and over, Card using him as a hand-puppet to express his Love Thy Neighbor and Turn the Other Cheek platitudes until I was racing through to the end of the novel not out of enjoyment and eagerness to see what happened, but just to be able to put the book down and go wash the veneer of his homophobic Christianity from my hands.
Card is not a saint. He wrote something that we all very much wanted to read; that we were alienated from our peers as children for a reason. There's a destiny waiting for us so we can use these big brains. We were humiliated on the playgrounds in grade school, but we'll show them! Someday!
Card gave us this pipe dream. But it's time to let go of the security blanket, Linus. You're smart, but you don't need a writer to give you a raison d'etre in a science fiction fairy tale.
From TFA you linked to: The fanatical Left will insist that anyone who upholds the fundamental meaning that marriage has always had, everywhere, until this generation, is a "homophobe" and therefore mentally ill.
What's funny is, you've just proven him absolutely correct. About the above quote, not the rest of his article.
Arr! The laws of physics be a harsh mistress!
I was wondering the same thing as I read his piece on trek, when one the most oft cited things you see on things like "trekkies" is the socially progressive and accepting nature of the Trek Universe presenting for many fans a optimistic view of the future.
But then after reading his marriage essay, you quickly realize, progressive and social change are things that OSC is not comfortable with, so then it makes more sense that he was not a fan.
I've written that media SF has often been a good few decades behind written SF, especially movies. They quote Richard Morgan in the NYTimes article ("That's the past of science fiction you're talking about, . .
The literature is filled with writing by Greg Benford, the 'how to empathize with ordinary deathless people' writer Greg Egan, Ken Macleod, Richard Morgan, Ian Banks, Cory Doctorow , or Charlie Stross. Movies haven't made it past the 70's (Bladerunner, the Matrix) other than perhaps 'Eternal Sunshine' (similar to a few 80's stories), and T.V. shows have only tentatively reached the 80's or early 90's (some Outer Limits and Twighlight Zone episodes). With Star Wars and Star Trek out of the way perhaps there'll be more room for the average media SF to catch up to at least the 80's.
"I swear I've heard of people who quit their jobs and moved just so they could live in a city that wasn't full of Homophobic Mor(m)ons like Orson Scott Card running the place."
Take a look and feel free: http://www.PieMenu.com
As much as I like his books (at least ones that are not trying to turn me into a drooling mormon) he is a dispicable human and an outrageous bigot:d /index.html l
See
http://dir.salon.com/books/feature/2000/02/03/car
and his actual views
http://www.nauvoo.com/library/card-hypocrites.htm
Those articles will turn you off on that guy.. or at least stop purchasing his books.
anime+manga together at last.. in real time.
I posted another reply already that lists what is commonly held to be the primary doctrines of Christianity. The trinity is the first. I don't think the concept of the trinity could be considered nitpicking. It is the thing that most differentiates Christianity from the other Abrahamic religions. In fact were it not for that-- Christianity would be more an offshoot of Judaism than anything else.
The ramifications of the trinity are huge. They show up in the places where the mormonism and Christianity don't meet. God being spirit. The incarnation. Humankinds destiny in regards to after this life. The list is long.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
Good point. Let's check the Oxford English Dictionary.
The official name for the Mormon church is The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The subtitle of the Book of Mormon is Another Testament of Jesus Christ (the first being the Bible). Articles of Faith 1, 3, and 4 (which they basically brainwash their children with via ritualized repetition) all claim belief in Jesus Christ as a member of the Godhead and their personal savior.
Ergo, Mormons fit the definition of "Christian".
As you said "There is no need for this to be an issue of opinion. Words have definitions."
(For the record. I'm an ex-Mormon. I was raised one, but left once I actually started thinking about what I was told rather than just accepting things.)
As much as I like his books (at least ones that are not trying to turn me into a drooling mormon) he is a dispicable human and an outrageous bigot:d /index.html l
See
http://dir.salon.com/books/feature/2000/02/03/car
and his actual views
http://www.nauvoo.com/library/card-hypocrites.htm
Those articles will turn you off on that guy.. or at least stop purchasing his books.
(this was originally buried in another thread, but reposting here as OSC is really not a nice guy, so does not surprise me that he would turn on a large segment of his fans.)
anime+manga together at last.. in real time.
Once I knew that Tom Cruise was a $ceintologist, it made it damn hard to sit through a his movies without thinking "gee, he thinks the souls of dead aliens makes us do bad things"
So that's who's to blame for Vanilla Sky!
Well, having read TFA, I can say I have no interest in reading anything by Mr. Card, ever. It's rare that I see such pure arrogance. The last time I saw it was in my high school short story lit book, which talked about "mature readers" wanting deep, moving stories and only "immature readers" cared about actually enjoying the story.
Mr. Card, perhaps you were not aware that Trek, when it's good (meaning not when Berman is running things), offers some of the best and most insightful social commentary and discussion you'll see on film. There is a group where I live that gets together monthly at a Unitarian Church to watch an episode or two and then discuss the social, ethical, and moral implications thereof. It's been meeting for about 6 years, I think. Are there any groups that do that with Firefly? Or Smallville? I didn't think so.
Just because more people like Star Trek than like your books is no reason to declare them all immature grade schoolers. That's very grade school of you.
--GrouchoMarx
Card-carrying member of the EFF, FSF, and ACLU. Are you?
If that's true, why is it that the Right is firmly in control of the United States, the only remaining Western superpower? I call Troll. (Or Flamebait, take your pick.)
Yeah, we can see how badly beaten the political Right is. Please, spare me.
People slag Star Trek for having every alien be humanoid, but that is deliberate. Roddenberry wanted people to see the humanity in every character.
Personally, I don't watch much Sci Fi because most of it shows a future which sucks. Star Trek shows a future that I want to believe in.
The Slashdot article suggests Card makes some good points about the development of SciFi over the last 30+ years. I'm not entirely sure, because based on what Card holds up as paragons of good SciFi, it's pretty clear to me that his definition of SciFi doesn't match mine. (Another poster echoed this sentiment, stating that many "examples" were more Fantasy than SciFi.)
To be clear: Science Fiction is fiction in which, when you remove the science element, it no longer makes sense. Science is integral somehow. Mary Shelly's Frankenstein is SciFi; without the premise of reanimation with electricity, it just wouldn't be the same story. (I can just hear the Fantasy apologists chiming in with the "Fantasy is indistinguishable from SciFi" argument, by claiming that magic is indistinguishable from technology. I don't want to get mired in this debate, however. Good fantasy requires some kind of self-consistency on some level, just like good SciFi, but fantasy doesn't have to square with conventional reality in any way. Even "far out" SciFi concepts are usually extrapolations of current ideas or trends or technologies.)
By this definition, most space opera is not SciFi. Star Wars, minus the SciFi trappings of spaceships and futuristic weaponry and droids, would be a Western with some metaphysical overtones. Now, it's true that Star Trek was sold to NBC as a "wagon train to the stars." This was because Westerns were the popular milieu of the day; most of the successful TV shows at the time were Westerns. But there were still stories being told against that backdrop that had real science fiction in them.
Orson Scott Card's LA Times article does a lot of name dropping. He mentions Larry Niven and Robert Silverberg and Harlan Ellison. And yet, many of these writers wrote episodes for Star Trek. (Ellison's script won an award, even though Roddenberry rewrote it for the screen. The episode was "City on the Edge of Forever," and won a Hugo. Ellison's original script won a Writers Guild of America award. Niven wrote for the animated series.) Some young SciFi authors got their start because of Star Trek -- remember David Gerrold? He wrote "The Trouble with Tribbles," and is now a respected SF author in his own right.
What is Card's problem with 1930's SciFi? Not all of it was episodic pulp crap or low-budget moviehouse serials. Some of the best SciFi I've read has come from the 1930's and 1940's.
He's right that later incarnations of Star Trek were better acted, and wrong that the content stagnated. At least with ST:TNG, many thought provoking stories were told, and would actually qualify as "real" SciFi by my test above, providing you're willing to forgive Star Trek physics and some of its consistent inconsistencies with real physics. Even the mundane backdrop trappings of the Star Trek universe were the subject of fascinating books.
I will grant that Card's right about one thing: Star Trek popularized Science Fiction. Some would say Trek diluted the pool of good stuff by filling the airwaves with mediocre material. This is an opinion I do not share.
I would also argue that Card's wrong about the quality of modern SciFi on television and film; I disagree that it's every bit as good as what's in print, if only because there are many things that can only be approximated with special effects, things that the human imagination is much more adept at rendering. (But then, I have long believed that Card simply doesn't "get it," and wouldn't recognize truly good SciFi if it bit him on the ass.)
While the recent incarnations of Trek have been painful to watch (with season 4 of Enterprise being what the show should have been all along, but too little, too late), I don't think the "need" for Trek has diminished. Trek was more than just a vehicle for telling stories in a SciFi milieu. Trek was more
Star Trek has been soul food for people with open minds. It's always been a story of moral questions, even if it was under the guise of scientific mumbo-jumbo. Unlike Star Wars, where the adolescent view of evil dark side and the good light side fight, Star Trek always probed the grey areas where good/evil don't really make sense. It was always about how to be human when faced with radically new circumstances. Holographic doctors treated with dignity, just like the rest of the crew, fighting the Borg collective that thinks it's perfect, and it only gets anywhere by assimilating, never creating something from scratch. You name it .. if that's not food for thought, than I don't know what is. The new scifi series, like Andromeda or Stargate fall back to the adolescent posturing, and zero challenge to your moral views. I guess the establishment had enough of free thinkers, now it's time to make everybody dumb and controllable by peer pressure - welcome Apprentice, Survivor, Americal Idol, Fear Factor.
I'm not trying to troll. I would think that this is apparent in the fact that I have done my best to carry on the discussion that I started. (I had no idea it would be like this though)
Mormonism does not add a layer to Christianity-- adding but not subtracting. I would posit that it alters the very core of Christianity and this is why I object to the lack of a distinction between the two. Here is why I think so.
I think this goes beyond just adding. But I truly am not trolling. I am taken aback by the number of vehement responses I've generated. I am searching for the why in this. Why my saying mormonism and what has been called Christianity for the last couple thousand years are different is such a big deal.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
The main point of his entire rant seemed to be that episodic programming with larger character development arcs provides more compelling fiction than programs that start and end at the same place. When Xander is scared for his life and reaches for Willow's hand, it's a lot more compelling if they've gotten near to a relationship, he burned her badly by going with someone else, then they spent the last 3 episodes working their way to the point where they are speaking again. When Bones takes a jab at Spock, it's meaningless because their relationship never changes.
Being John Malkovich was a popular, excellent movie, and while I'd put it more in the category of fantasy than Sci Fi, if you read Card's books the distinction is academic. Plus the characters to go through an immense arc throughout the film, falling in love, falling out of love, changing... evolving as characters in exactly the way that Homer Simpson doesn't. Again, the focus, as in all good Sci Fi, is on the character evolutions.
Smallville isn't the best series ever by a long shot. But like Buffy it is a popular show that opened people's eyes to what can happen when characters evolve across episodes.
Trek did and does follow an antiquated model, and he's right in thinking that it would only continue to do so. Probably the best bit of Trek, the last few seasons of DS9, took place when Paramount's main people were focused on Voyager and allowed a smaller group of people to create a broader story focused more on large story arcs and developments. The best season of Enterprise has been this last one, when multi episode story arcs were plentiful.
Orson's books reflect this thinking, of course. His most popular work, the Ender's series, follows one character along his evolution from a weak abused nobody kid to a reclusive man hiding from unwanted fame from his past, to an old man accepting of his place in the world. And the latest Ender's book takes place in the same time frame as the original, exploring another character who isn't the hero, but who evolves from a lone troubled genius striking out at anyone or anything that might subjugate him, to being a mature, willing second, giving himself over to a man he believes deserves it.
Oddly enough, I've always felt Asimov was at his best in short stories, but even then his characters were undergoing tremendous evolution within the span of several pages.
The ______ Agenda
Lost is sci-fi in that it has an element of the supernatural, etc. I mean, it really depends on your definition of sci-fi too. Some people would look at X-Files and say "Not Sci-Fi", and under a classical definition it is not. But then in many ways it is. It is all on your point of view.
As far as being good. That is your own taste. I think it is VERY well written. The fact that each character was pretty much defined by a different person has made the show pretty interesting. The way their paths crossed before the island is interesting. And just overall what is going on is fascinating. I think it is one of the best shows on TV (regardless if you think it is Sci-Fi or not).
RonB
PS - We are up to episode 20, and we still don't know what the thing in the jungle is.
It is human nature to take shortcuts in thinking.
For my own viewpoint, one of the best SciFi movies ever made was "Contact" starring Jodi Foster. It was also an incredible improvement over the book, which IMHO is a pile of political activism and dribble that I expected better from a professional scientist like Carl Sagan. The book was fair on science but poor on the English and character development.
Occasionally you see some good SF come around and an attempt to make it into a movie, but it is a difficult task. Most good SF authors have some section of their book where a narrator of some sort (sometimes written into the dialog of the characters, but often simply described by a narrator or an entry in "Encyclopedia Galactica") where the hard science is explained. To a reader this is good background material, but in a movie this is either very boring or slows down the flow of the movie to the point that it has to be cut out and removed.
The only person I've seen to successfully put in a "galactic guide" entry into film was Douglas Adams... in part because HHGG is humorous and these entries had a life of their own as another character on screen. Even then, it only worked because the guide was the focus of the entire production. (I'm speaking about the TV series BTW... as I have yet to see the movie. I hope they've captured at least some of the guide in the movie in a somewhat similar fashion).
The other problem with producing SF into film is that the people who make movies in Hollywood (or Baliwood) simply are not SF fans to start with. You get some people like George Lucas or Robert Rodriguez that are familar with SciFi movies done in the past, but aren't exactly fans of classic SF books like Heinlein, Asimov, Clarke, or Bradbury. The movie "I, Robot" starring Will Smith is a good example of SciFi taking over done by SciFi fans and not the hard SF fans... particularly where the shortcuts were made to make the movie flow.