Sat in the theatre watching Rogue One: A Star Wars Story for the first (and still only) time, I felt my stomach lurch as Grand Moff Tarkin appeared on-screen. Viewed only from behind his artificiality was immediately apparent to me - the waxy skin, stringy strands of hair and wholly unconvincing lighting had me worried. Still, seen from behind only at a distance I could argue that I was merely over-reacting, that it wasn't as noticeable as I perceived it to be, and, so long as he never turned around, I could avoid letting it interfere with my ability to appreciate the movie. But I was afraid he was going to turn around, trained as I was on cinema and the inability of filmmakers everywhere to show the slightest modicum of restraint in such things. Hence my stomach lurched. And then, Tarkin turned around.
Star Wars and Adjusted Expectations
Herein I use Star Wars to refer to the entirety of the franchise (the films and ancillary media) rather than the original film from 1977.
When I first learned that Disney had acquired Star Wars from George Lucas I was incredibly excited. Finally the films could break new and unexpected ground free from the shackles of Lucas' very flawed vision. I imagined Star Wars brought to life through the lens of my own preferences, the ideas suggested to me by the early conceptual artworks from the original trilogy. I imagined a dark contemplative fantasy, perhaps exploring the question of why the dark side of the force was seemingly so much more powerful than the light side, hinting at an ultimately evil order at the seat of power. I imagined a minimalist musical score, perhaps haunting electronica, juxtaposed against technology so advanced and ancient that its purpose has been long forgotten. I let my mind run wild, and then I realized the ridiculousness of my thinking and reigned in my imagination. As I reflected on the Star Wars films, I recognized that I did not appreciate them so much on their own as I appreciated what they brought to life visually and what those visuals suggested to my own imagination. I didn't care for the narrative or even the characters, I wanted something closer to Dune perhaps, with some of the aesthetic and production values of Star Wars (or rather, the production values that a Star Wars film could afford). It occurred to me that if those at Disney felt as I did they would not have purchased Star Wars at all. If all one is interested in is the promise of Star Wars then one can go ahead and make their own take on the thing, keep it original and avoid all criticism of straying too far from the proven formula. To purchase Star Wars is to signal a keen interest in what Star Wars is and what it promises. What it is may be many things to many people, but to most certain things are common: a throwback pulp-serial adventure, a pastiche of genres, a classic good vs. evil story, wrapped in the latest filmmaking spectacle and technology. Realistically I had little interest in Star Wars as understood by most of the audience and therefore little reason to be excited by it. So I adjusted my expectations and came to expect little other than repetitions of what had been done with the property before.
When I first learned that Disney had acquired Star Wars from George Lucas I was incredibly excited. Finally the films could break new and unexpected ground free from the shackles of Lucas' very flawed vision. I imagined Star Wars brought to life through the lens of my own preferences, the ideas suggested to me by the early conceptual artworks from the original trilogy. I imagined a dark contemplative fantasy, perhaps exploring the question of why the dark side of the force was seemingly so much more powerful than the light side, hinting at an ultimately evil order at the seat of power. I imagined a minimalist musical score, perhaps haunting electronica, juxtaposed against technology so advanced and ancient that its purpose has been long forgotten. I let my mind run wild, and then I realized the ridiculousness of my thinking and reigned in my imagination. As I reflected on the Star Wars films, I recognized that I did not appreciate them so much on their own as I appreciated what they brought to life visually and what those visuals suggested to my own imagination. I didn't care for the narrative or even the characters, I wanted something closer to Dune perhaps, with some of the aesthetic and production values of Star Wars (or rather, the production values that a Star Wars film could afford). It occurred to me that if those at Disney felt as I did they would not have purchased Star Wars at all. If all one is interested in is the promise of Star Wars then one can go ahead and make their own take on the thing, keep it original and avoid all criticism of straying too far from the proven formula. To purchase Star Wars is to signal a keen interest in what Star Wars is and what it promises. What it is may be many things to many people, but to most certain things are common: a throwback pulp-serial adventure, a pastiche of genres, a classic good vs. evil story, wrapped in the latest filmmaking spectacle and technology. Realistically I had little interest in Star Wars as understood by most of the audience and therefore little reason to be excited by it. So I adjusted my expectations and came to expect little other than repetitions of what had been done with the property before.
Against the Universal Story
Admittedly this is perhaps argument for argument's sake, since I am not really familiar with the term "Universal Story" and all that it is meant to connote. It is a phrase that I heard or invented, and stuck in my mind, bothering me as I invented my own meaning for it. What follows is my response to that "invented meaning".
I reject the idea of a universal story. It is reductive, uninformative and diminishes the power of the narrative in our imagination. It requires a myopic view of both our past and future to imagine that the basic human story is unchanging in time. We tell our stories in time, and therefore they evolve with us. Even as we retell supposedly timeless stories, we shift the emphasis around and allow our current ideas to infiltrate them as viewed through our modern lenses.
I reject the idea of a universal story. It is reductive, uninformative and diminishes the power of the narrative in our imagination. It requires a myopic view of both our past and future to imagine that the basic human story is unchanging in time. We tell our stories in time, and therefore they evolve with us. Even as we retell supposedly timeless stories, we shift the emphasis around and allow our current ideas to infiltrate them as viewed through our modern lenses.
Thoughts On: Ringworld
The general story of Ringworld is one of exploration and discovery. A group of explorers venture out of known space to visit a vast artificial megastructure in space made by an advanced civilization. They crash land on the structure - the Ringworld - and seek out civilization as a means to get them off it and back to their own civilization. The Ringworld is a location that seems ripe for discovery - the foundation material is super strong and blocks 40% of neutrinos, for civilization itself to exist on it cheap transmutation must be available - the ability to generate one type of element from another - and yet these questions are never really explored. Aside from the Ringworld, the science fictional world itself is rife with things for the reader to discover - stepping discs, slide walks, booster spice, aliens called Puppeteers, aliens called Kzin, hyperdrive travel, the hull material of a General Products ship, Slaver stasis fields - the list goes on. Yet as with the Ringworld none of these exist for the sake of discovery or exploration, rather they serve simply for the sake of variety or to advance the plot. Ringworld is far from hard science fiction, and even frames itself as a fantasy at one point in a sort of knowing gesture.
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