No More!!

September, 2007

©2007 John Pickard

We have just passed the 29th Anniversary of the premiere of Battlestar Galactica (Happy Birthday to the one and only BSG!).  This anniversary has me thinking again about science fiction and the lot of the sci-fi fan.

I've gotten myself involved again in a few conversations over at Skiffy lately.  I know, I know - I promised myself I was done with that board, but when they hand you a product that is so ripe for ridicule - this incredibly bad thing they call "Flash Gordon" - I couldn't resist.

An aside, for those of you who have successfully avoided it: I envy you.  This supposed incarnation of the venerable Flash Gordon is a prime example of how not to do television (or anything else beyond a third-grade school play).  It is another example of Skiffy's disdain for their alleged audience - horrible writing (and I truly mean horrible), wooden acting, 3rd-tier special effects, a complete disregard for the source material (a Skiffy hallmark), and is generally an insult to the intelligence and to the 60-plus year history of the franchise.  I could go on but you get the idea.  Everybody but the Skiffy shills are slamming this production.

I've said it before and I'll keep on saying it: this is what we're getting because we won't ask for better.  As a group, we simply mutter under our breath while they feed us the cheapest possible product they can.  And that product is often written by a dozen untrained monkeys, acted with all the skill and talent of a 2x4, and staged in the same sets and the same Vancouver, BC locations as every other cheap attempt at sci-fi.

Enough.  I'm through muttering.  I'm done with the same few square blocks of Canada filling in for alien landscapes in every single science fiction show produced on these shores.  I'm finished with the American entertainment industry's disrespect for me as a fan and the properties they're tearing apart.

We have the talent and the skill to produce quality science fiction.  We have the same capacity for creative ingenuity that we did 30 years ago when sci-fi bloomed on our television and movie screens.  We can produce something the quality of a Dr. Who - the best sci-fi on US television now is British.

But "Hollywood" won't give it to us.  They refuse to learn the lesson the British learned 40 years ago and learned well.  They won't do it because we don't demand it of them.

Well, I'm through muttering.  I'm demanding Hollywood give us quality science fiction, and I'm speaking up and speaking loudly.  Not propaganda with spaceships, not poorly written and produced series of bad cliche's - I demand GOOD stories with GOOD writing and GOOD acting and GOOD direction with GOOD sets and believable locations and good SFX.  Smart science fiction.  And if you're dipping into an established universe, show some respect for the source material and don't just steal the marquee to slap over any old garbage.

Frankly, I won't be patronizing the purveyors or sponsors of the kind of dreck we've been getting the last several years.  And I won't until they start providing me GOOD science fiction.

I want GOOD sci-fi.  Join me in asking for it.