Two Kinds of Science-Fiction Innovations

Most common are the fictions that begin with Jules Verne, and concern the single artifact—a submarine, flying machine, or death ray—and its consquence for all of humanity. These extraordinary voyages—to use Verne's term—play along the fault line between what we think we are and what we can do. Nemo is no accident, or a tragic figure, but the natural consequence of the intersection between present-day humanity and extraordinary technology. Even 2001: A Space Odyssey plays on the same t...

 A Small Defense of the Star Wars Prequels

***Sigh*** There are lots of problems with TPM, but its failure to be mythic isn’t one of them because that’s, in fact, the point of the entire prequel trilogy — demythologizing what we thought we knew about the Old Republic, the Jedi, and the rise of the Empire. The Old Republic wasn’t a “more civilized age,” it was a corrupt and flawed entity riven with divisions. The Jedi weren’t “guardians of peace and justice,” they were guardians of the status quo to the extent that ...