Fact and Science Fiction

Hello All!!!

I'm really not sure where to start as I have a few points that I would like to make in (hopefully) very little space (in other words I'm not planning on this being a very long entry, but you never know with me). Maybe I'll start with something flashy and snappy then move to the more cerebral portion of this entry (I half apologize for the self-annotations that I've been incorporating I just figure that if I express my own train of thought that sometimes it helps my audience follow). :)

So as some of you may know one of my (if not my very) favourite television shows is Doctor Who (the new series that started in 2003...no, I've never seen any of the old series). I'll get into why I like the show a little later right now I am just concerned about the opening/theme song. For the number of years this show has run the creative forces behind the show have never changed the opening theme (they have modernized and jazzed it up, but the tune remains the same). Every time I get to sit down and watch an episode and the music starts I can't help but feel like I'm getting sucked into something that is quite exciting. Just below I have posted the latest (and my favourite) rendition of the theme song.



Now as you also may know one of my favourite bands is Muse. A couple of months back I read that they were planning on releasing a new album this fall. Last week on my Internet wanderings I found out that the new album, entitled The Resistance, will be released September 14th (15th in North America), AND that their new single "Uprising" had already been released. When I heard this song I couldn't help but hear Doctor Who-esque-ness in the intro, much to my excitement. For those unfamiliar with Muse's work it can have a very driving/apocalyptic/spacey ruch to it at times (with their own share of slower ballads as well). At any rate I am quite excited for this new album, and on the basis of the two songs I've heard it sounds like a very natural follow-up to their previous studio album Black Holes and Revelations. Give it a listen.



A few weeks ago I decided it was time that I started spending less time watching TV, which was something I wasn't doing too bad with until I made that resolution. Instead I have found myself watching more TV in the last few weeks (an issue I may discuss in a later blog). But something that I noticed about myself, a few months back, was that I am definitely turning into a bigger "sci-fi nerd." While I have always been somewhat of a fan of sci-fi my recent TV/movie watching has definitely moved away from more typical dramas (think The Curious Case of Benjamin Button or Gray's Anatomy (I should mention I dislike almost all TV drama, especially doctor shows and cop shows...that's a rant for another blog)) and embraced more sci-fi oriented material. Here's what I mean:

• In January I purchased the complete series of Firefly and loved every minute of it
  
• This past season (2008-2009) on TV my favourite show, hands-down, was Dollhouse (no I'm not a Joss Whedon junkie)
  
• I started watching Battlestar Galactica (2004 TV series) and have been pleasantly surprised thus far (just into season 2)
  
• For a while daily recorded/watched The Outer Limits
  
• Am eagerly anticipating District 9 (I know it's out, just haven't seen it) and 9 (check it out here)
  
• The other day watched The Last Man on Earth (1964) with Vencent Price (much better than it's terrible remake, I Am Legend)
  
• Thought the pilot episodes for TV's 2 new space opera-esque shows were both great; Virtuality (which didn't get picked up as a regular show, see it if you can) and Defying Gravity (which is basically drama in space, and is getting a longer run)
  
• I've made a list of sci-fi movies that I plan on eventually seeing (both classics and those that fly under the radar)
  

My science fiction interests do not solely sit in TV/movies (contrary to what this list may imply), but with the genre as a whole.

Why?

Glad you asked. While many works of science fiction often adopt elements of any other kind of drama I feel that it often deals with issues that "mainstream" drama cannot, or does not, deal with. In a world where our techology is advancing at such a rapid rate (in everything from medicine to entertainment) science fiction is not afraid to speculate on questions that have not been, but may at one time in the near future need to be be, asked; with varying "answers" or speculative results. I was just reading in the August 24th, 2009 edition of Maclean's that there are scientists trying to bring back dinosaurs. This may be an extreme example, but how people deal with issues regarding everything from stem-cell research, the human genome, or cloning to cell phones, the mass sharing of information, and technology making people stupider and lazier (yes, I'm preparing another blog on this or see previous entries) are issues that are ripe for science fiction.

Science fiction, however, not only deals with the facts or fiction of science in our current (or future) time, but also with the facts of everyday life as well. Notice that while sci-fi often asks, assumes, or speculates about the most abstract ideas the "answers" still point to that which is most human: not a single thing, but the human experience as a whole.

For the various sources of science fiction that I enjoy there are varying issues that are dealt with: Doctor Who's constant dealings with the issues of human nature, Battlestar Galactica's queries on religion, prophecy, government and sociology, Dollhouse's questioning of what it is to be a person, or C.S. Lewis's endless dealings with sin, salvation, redemption and nature in his cosmic trilogy (which were meant to deal his view science fiction).

Sure, even though the veneer of "science" and adventure scares some away I appreciate how the genre is not afraid to ask larger questions, and perhaps get people thinking about issues that they may not otherwise think about. I appreciate the storytelling, adventure and special effects that goes into many of these bodies of work. This isn't meant to tell you to embrace the sci-fi genre whole-heartedly, but just to put a bug in your ear.