[NGTM-1R]

Dude, don't joke, Daleks are freaking real.

The first Dalek combat deployments in Afghanistan had not completed testing.

[Pred the Penguin]

I like the Mandalorians from the KotOR games much better...

Mandalorians, much like the almighty shoggoth, suffer from severe badass-decay upon viewing.  I prefer to hear about them, than to see and slaughter them by the dozens.

It's just that though... I think I heard a little too much about them in EU.

[iamzack]

Yes, the genre of bland characters, cheap plots, and titles ending with "...in SPACE!"

Hmm.

Mass Effect meaning anything to you?
Battlestar Galactica?

Star Wars and Battlestar Galactica are about as similar to each other as they are to Apollo 13.

[Flipside]

To be honest, I'm getting tired of these 'near now' type Sci-Fi's that seem to wallow more and more in depression and pain and suffering than in raising humanity up to what it might possibly be one day. Each to their own I guess.

It should also be noted that even the producers stated that in places BSG was the Iliad... IN SPACE! Though in balance, I wouldn't describe the Iliad as containing cheap plots or shallow characters, just really old and well-used ones by todays standards, something it probably has in common with Star Wars.

It'd be interesting to find out how many Forum members were even alive when Star Wars came out, come to think of it. I was 5 at the time.

[Ghostavo]

Individual science fiction stories may seem as trivial as ever to the blinder critics and philosophers of today - but the core of science fiction, its essence has become crucial to our salvation if we are to be saved at all.

[Flipside]

Individual science fiction stories may seem as trivial as ever to the blinder critics and philosophers of today - but the core of science fiction, its essence has become crucial to our salvation if we are to be saved at all.

Exactly, I loved the Foundation series and the Robot stories, because they weren't just stories about science, they were stories about the human interaction and approach to science. Foundation dealt with a concept that seems to be more and more a concern in modern science, the stagnation of growth because we have considered that there is little left to 'learn' (and that something isn't worth trying because it "just won't work"), and the Robot books dealt with our own reaction to technology as it becomes closer and closer to ourselves.

[Polpolion]

Individual science fiction stories may seem as trivial as ever to the blinder critics and philosophers of today - but the core of science fiction, its essence has become crucial to our salvation if we are to be saved at all.

Exactly, I loved the Foundation series and the Robot stories, because they weren't just stories about science, they were stories about the human interaction and approach to science. Foundation dealt with a concept that seems to be more and more a concern in modern science, the stagnation of growth because we have considered that there is little left to 'learn' (and that something isn't worth trying because it "just won't work"), and the Robot books dealt with our own reaction to technology as it becomes closer and closer to ourselves.

Part of the term paper I wrote for a literature class actually talked about those two different kinds of science fiction ( XX in SPAAACE, and scifi like Foundation), I'll have to see if I can find it and post the section...

[Ravenholme]

Individual science fiction stories may seem as trivial as ever to the blinder critics and philosophers of today - but the core of science fiction, its essence has become crucial to our salvation if we are to be saved at all.

Exactly, I loved the Foundation series and the Robot stories, because they weren't just stories about science, they were stories about the human interaction and approach to science. Foundation dealt with a concept that seems to be more and more a concern in modern science, the stagnation of growth because we have considered that there is little left to 'learn' (and that something isn't worth trying because it "just won't work"), and the Robot books dealt with our own reaction to technology as it becomes closer and closer to ourselves.

Yep, the Foundation series (and the Robot stories) are an absolute gem of science fiction, and some of the greatest books I've read, despite Asimov's sometimes odd prose style.

[headdie]

Individual science fiction stories may seem as trivial as ever to the blinder critics and philosophers of today - but the core of science fiction, its essence has become crucial to our salvation if we are to be saved at all.

Exactly, I loved the Foundation series and the Robot stories, because they weren't just stories about science, they were stories about the human interaction and approach to science. Foundation dealt with a concept that seems to be more and more a concern in modern science, the stagnation of growth because we have considered that there is little left to 'learn' (and that something isn't worth trying because it "just won't work"), and the Robot books dealt with our own reaction to technology as it becomes closer and closer to ourselves.

Yep, the Foundation series (and the Robot stories) are an absolute gem of science fiction, and some of the greatest books I've read, despite Asimov's sometimes odd prose style.

I lost countless hours of sleep as a teenager reading Foundation 1-4

[Flipside]

I will admit, I loved the first 4, but from Foundations' Edge onwards, when it focussed on Golan Trevise, I personally felt it went downhill a little bit, I liked the 'Spectator' position that Asimov took for the first books, and the moment he got involved with a single character, and a little over-obsessed with the Second Foundation's (and Gaias' and the Olivaws') ability for mental manipulation, it felt like some of the vast panorama that made the books so interesting was lost.

[swashmebuckle]

Star Wars and Battlestar Galactica are about as similar to each other as they are to Apollo 13.

Wha?  The entire BSG franchise was greenlit as an explicit cash-in on the popularity of the original SW movie.  Whatever you might think of the two properties, BSG would very likely not exist were it not for Star Wars' success.

[Pred the Penguin]

The new BSG is a lot different from the old franchise... but you do have a point about Star Wars inspiring a lot of other sci-fi.

[Grizzly]

The new BSG is a lot different from the old franchise... but you do have a point about Star Wars inspiring a lot of other sci-fi.

The core is not that different. The crucial differences are mainly the 20 à 30 years of technoligical progression that we made on earth and that the cylons were made by men.

[Flipside]

Hmmm.... One-eyed monster is the offspring of a God. Man blinds one-eyed monster, monster appeals to help from said God, man is punished by spending years of hardship, losing several of his best friends in order to finally sail home. Man's daggit dies when he returns home... ok... maybe that bit didn't work...

Thing is, as I said earlier, even the producers noticed the similarities between Adama and Ulysses, especially when you throw in stuff like Apollo, who helped Ulysses to get home in the original Odyssey, or Hera who started out hating humanity, but ended up defending it in the original Odyssey etc.

[Beskargam]

It's just that though... I think I heard a little too much about them in EU.

huh im just the opposite. I couldn't get enough of them in the EU. I loved how they were portrayed in the legacy arc. Not just warriors, but something more.

Also I never finished the Foundation series. I read the first two and loved them but never got around to reading more. I'm no literaty knoweldgable but I felt they were good because they were more an expirement in human psychology with a sci-fi setting/undercurrent.

[Pred the Penguin]

I think it was how they were portrayed... Instead of the most bad-assed warriors in the Galaxy. They felt more like plain mercenaries or soldiers with more than the average slice of honor.

I could be reading the whole thing wrong though.

Edit: Not to say that I don't enjoy reading about them, I just expected them to be developed differently.