Comments on: 7 Popular Motifs of Cheap Science Fiction

By: Ed Coonce

Ed Coonce — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 03:35:08 +0000

How about a future where extreme tiddleywinks is a contact sport and Satan lives with his daughter Amanda in East Hell, a neighborhood on the other side of Quaintsville? A future where intelligent chimps roam the city, and armed girl scouts hold up a liquor store? It’s all on my website, http://www.bergenbugle.com.

By: Sam

Sam — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 23:43:14 +0000

yes some sort of airships in the novel, that apparently caused the demise of British Rail, making it even harder to get to Cold Comfort farm.

By: Narrelle

Narrelle — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 05:06:09 +0000

Oh, I forgot – all alcoholic drinks in the future are green. Sometimes they are blue, but mostly they are green. It’s like alcohol vanished for a thousand years and then they found the recipe for Creme de Menthe and Blue Caracao and thought “Let’s stop right there. What else could we possibly want?”

By: outlandinstitute

outlandinstitute — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 01:01:27 +0000

Hello people – Big White Void, good call there Tim. I think Hyperspace/Swirly Voids is also a good choice, fozmeadows.

I had a few more on my original list that I didn’t include in the article, which were coloured skies (I couldn’t seem to find any examples when I went looking for that one), and perspex tubes which I just forgot to include (some good perspex tube work includes the Doctor Who stories Pyramids Of Mars and Destiny Of The Daleks, and the videoclip for Video Killed The Radio Star).

Narrelle: I think Data didn’t use contractions either, did he? Honestly aliens and robots, they’re not that hard.

Sam: Seriously, there are zeppelin taxis in Cold Comfort Farm?

By: Sam

Sam — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 09:13:35 +0000

Or if faced with the daunting expense of period costume and science fiction, just make the science fiction disappear altogether. The adaptation of Stella Gibbon’s Cold Comfort Farm dropped the video-conference phones, zeppelin taxis, Mayfair slums and the Anglo-Nicaraguan War of Gibbon’s 1930s ‘near future’. Perhaps it was because they could only afford the steam train…

By: fozmeadows

fozmeadows — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 05:43:52 +0000

Ah, the Pylean exploding collars. God love ‘em. I was wondering where I’d seen that done. Swirly voids (as opposed to white ones) feature prominently in the Key to Time arc of the old Tom Baker Dr Who, which I’m watching at the moment. There was this whole thing in hyperspace, where hyperspace was just…blue. And swirly. Also, they used little flahes of light as a race of tiny nano-robotic judges. V. cheap. Although, they do make up for it with fun plots and good dialogue. (Although Mary Tamm as Romana could be less helpless.)

By: Narrelle

Narrelle — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 00:59:44 +0000

They used the old exploding collar trick in a couple of episodes of Angel set on an alternate world, which made me feel very nostalgic. Actually, that whole humans-as-slaves story line was kind of Planet of the Apes. And then Cordie ended up being hailed as a princess. Well, before they were going to make her mate with the Gruselag and then kill her. It was all so very 1930s schlocky SF, but with vampires!

Also, you mustn’t forget that you can easily make someone “alien” by painting them a funny colour and/or insisting that they never use contractions when they speak. Cally was humanoid but always said “I do not understand” and “I cannot agree” and “I would like to have a proper part, please, so I will leave this series and fine a real job”. Spock was green. As I recall, he *also* never used contractions, so that made him *doubly* alien.

By: びっくり

びっくり — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 23:22:42 +0000

Awesome. Makes me want to go out and buy up a few DVDs to watch ASAP.

By: Sam

Sam — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 09:34:06 +0000

And not just restricted to cheap science fiction, but period costume drama too – I remember Sally Potter saying in a Q&A that they couldn’t afford a steam-train for Orlando – but amazing what you can do with a soundtrack and a smoke-machine.

By: Tim

Tim — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 01:22:57 +0000

Don’t forget the Big White Void option, in which our heroes are moved sideways outside space and time into a (cheap) featureless white void. It filled a whole episode of Doctor Who: The Mind Robber (1968) when another story fell through and left a hole in the budget.

And while they’re in that void, they could battle, I don’t know, invisible telepaths. While walking against a scary wind.

Tim
http://blog.aerohaveno.com/