She Blinded Me With Science Fiction!

I always wanted to write a really super-terrific science fiction story. Something with cool weapons, freakishly grotesque aliens, and a protagonist who saves the universe from some tragic demise at the last second. Oh yeah, and he gets to bang some gorgeous extraterrestrial Vargas Girl on the hood of her Astro-Glider. Ahem.

The biggest obstacle with writing a science fiction story, besides the fact I have zero scientific knowledge of anything in the known universe, is that I can't stand science fiction. Everything seems to hinge on the word "somehow" - as in:

"Somehow the space-time continuum morphed into a cosmic boomerang. We are exactly one second in the past. Everything is deja vu."

"Somehow, when we passed through that anti-matter membrane, I became a Republican"

"Somehow, the Glorks are able to curve natural light but they panic when they see themselves in the phosphorous lights in the bathroom mirror."

Those are some pretty major plot lines pivoting on the whimsy of a conditional "somehow." Need a way to see through the hyper-structure of a fortress made from Orionum? No sweat, invent an alien that specializes in seeing through cosmic polymers. Want to bathe your dashing hero in his boldest aura? Have him battle a thousand Wonks with nothing but a Gravity Staff and good old American know-how. He has to be American. Even if he is from some far-flung galaxy, he will exhibit all the fine noble qualities of the idealized American hero that probably has never existed. All this of course happens while having a brunette borne of a thousand Frank Frazetta wet dreams clutching helplessly to his leg or hiding behind a boulder ready to whack a baddie on the head with her space sandal and then complaining that she broke a nail. Women not named Sigourney Weaver generally are in science fiction for the purpose of comic relief and showing their jugs when they slide into the hydro-therapy tank clutching a glass of creamy mint-green gloop.

My Dad is a big time science fiction addict, as is my older brother. Having to sit through Star Trek every evening in the early to mid-1970s listening to Captain Kirk's Morse code delivery and having to look at a Vulcan who looked like the love child of Moe Howard and Count Dracula was enough to convince me that the world of science fiction could do without me, thankyouverymuch. Still, science fiction does pretty much provide a writer with a canvas much broader than he deserves.

I sure hope the future isn't as cold, metallic, and antiseptic as science fiction depicts. Whatever happened to blue jeans? Ain't nothing more comfy than a pair of 501s. If cotton no longer existed, you would think that some egghead would have invented some sort of synthetic replacement. Makes sense that if a crew consisting of a stoic captain, renegade pilot, bureaucratic hanger-on, ice queen science officer, wise-cracking mechanics and some sort of alien mascot are setting the controls for the heart of the sun that they could at least have some buttonflys in the cargo hold. That's what the future needs, trucker wallets, tube tops and Chuck Taylors instead of the shimmering metallic jump suits, gravity boots and facial jewelry.

Now, you may paint me as a hypocrite for saying I enjoyed Star Wars. When it was released, it was like nothing ever seen on the big screen and yet it was so very familiar. For those who do not remember when Star Wars came out, you just do not understand the angle here. Star Wars worked because the story was straight out of the loins of Akira Kurosawa and John Ford. It was an old fashioned cowboy movie in a galaxy far, far away. It didn't rely on overly-contrived ideas that the actors themselves were probably secretly loathing:

"Dear diary. We shot the space delegation meeting scene today. Must fire agent. All sense of self-respect vanishing. Hope they have muffins at the food service table tomorrow..."

Still, I'd like to try my hand at writing a good science fiction story. I know I have it in me. I just have to make it happen.

Somehow.