You earthlings and your third dimension. It's cute.

[momebie]

Over on twitter getyourguns was musing about how X-Men: First Class had been labeled as Fantasy at the Scream Awards, because she considered it to be more Science-Fiction instead. matthewbowers responded to her and said that Science-Fiction and Fantasy are rarely crossed together. He contends that each has a set of tropes and themes that you never (or hardly ever) find in another. Insinuating, I think, that if something is mostly fantasy in essence you would be remiss to call it science-fiction regardless of the extra trappings or themes that read that way. And then there was kind of a dog pile of people telling him how wrong he is, which I feel bad about, because I think we're all dealing in semantics.

Art, by its very nature, will be interpreted differently by everyone. What I see as fantasy or sci-fantasy another might call science-fiction and another yet still may just call speculative fiction. I think that there's always going to be a certain amount of subjectivity in any attempt to place a genre on something. What I do not think is possible to ignore though, is the fact that for better or worse science-fantasy has become an actual genre term that people use. In some ways it doesn't matter whether or not I AGREE that something is science-fantasy, just that someone else thinks it is and has named it so. After all, I cannot tell you how many times something vaguely Victorian has been labeled steampunk and I've wanted to throw up my hands and go home.

What I AM interested in, however, is where people draw those lines. For instance, getyourguns thinks space is one of the science-fiction shorthands, while I think that a focus on or use of technology would be a more concrete one. I know that pointing at an apple and saying it's a banana doesn't make it so, but if it came off an apple tree and was long and curved and yellow I'd be inclined to admit that it did share certain characteristics with a banana that made it a new breed. Because no matter how many times we go around about it, if I find a different collection of themes and tropes to be more one than the other, another person and I can argue till our faces turn blue that they actually aren't and no one will budge. So I thought I'd get a hive mind going about it and see where the discussion takes us. There is no right or wrong answer here, and I mean that. (Though, feel free to argue amongst yourselves.) You can tackle all of them, or cherry pick the thing(s) you find most interesting.

* How do you define straight up Science-Fiction (hard or soft)?'
* How do you define straight up Fantasy (urban or dark or high or anything)?
*What themes or tropes do you find common in Science-Fiction that you think never appear in Fantasy?
*What themes or tropes do you find common in Fantasy that you think never appear in Science-Fiction?
*What do you believe a successful blending of the two would be?
*Do you think it's possible to blend them at all?
*Are there any works of art (movies/books/tv shows/cartoons/oil paintings/sculptures/hair collections...) that you feel DO successfully blend the two? [Aka, show your work for extra points.]

If you think there are any other questions that would add another layer to the discussion let me know and I'll add them to my list. I'm leaving this post unlocked, because I think it would be interesting to get a larger sample. Send your friends over! Anonymous commenting is on until someone starts being a jerk.

Comments

[blamebrampton.livejournal.com]

For me. Space doesn't work as a defining line, because Star Wars is very Fantasy, while Star Trek is usually more Science Fiction, but even then, both have elements that sneak a foot over into the other camp.

I think that the focus on technology in Science Fiction becomes defining when that technology is a solution in itself. Technology can be very important in fantasy 'Oooh! he has the Ring of Sauron/Sword of Power/Shiny thing of Whatsit!', but it is only as important as the wielder. In Science Fiction, humans are creatures against which the majesty of physics/engineering/invention can be writ large (even if they will sometimes be lucky in being able to conquer it, it's usually thanks to superior/alien tech), while in Fantasy, humans (or their equivalents, cf Hobbits, elves, gelflings) are the ultimate dominating force that can subdue threatening (usually technologically based (including magical tech, cf horcruxes)) powers (often with love, damn you Dumbledore!).

As to successful blendings, I think the film of 2001, A Space Oddessy, which starts out as hard-core science fiction, but ends with a fantastical re-envisioning of the birth of human beings as something beyond our individualistic selves worked really well. Of course, that could just be because I am a child of the 60s and that drug-taking crap is the visual language I grew up with ;-)

[lady-ganesh.livejournal.com]

Oooh, I like that distinction.

I wonder, though, where it would put something like Oryx and Crake?