Why were space sci fi shows like B5 heavily stigmatized by the mainstream?

[Looney]

Originally Posted by Springer

. I'm not into superheroes so I never read JMS' comics work. I would watch the Changeling though if I get chance. And his horror novels from the 80s are decent.

OOOPSSS can't believe I missed this for so long.

You should really look into some overviews of what JMS' comics are about. They are definitely not entirely about Superheroes nor are they always a very typical Superhero story when they are.

[Jan]

Originally Posted by Looney

OOOPSSS can't believe I missed this for so long.

You should really look into some overviews of what JMS' comics are about. They are definitely not entirely about Superheroes nor are they always a very typical Superhero story when they are.

Well said. If you liked JMS' horror novels, you might enjoy Midnight Nation. I liked Dream Police and the Adventures of Apocalypse Al for comedy (after a fashion), too.

[CmdrShep2154]

Originally Posted by Looney

Ohhhhhh this opens a whole can of psychology worms. LOL

While Ubik has a point that today it is more accepted by the mainstream, I disagree to the degree. I think mainstream society is more accepting of certain types of Science Fiction - mainly that involving superheroes, but I don't see them really getting behind Space Based Science Fiction, with the exception of Star Wars which I feel falls more into a Fantasy Category.

Time will create change. The whole table top / role playing angle is sooo connected to that. One need only look to when those games came into existence. Then look to who grew up playing them. Then look to who started gaining a hand in the influence of pop culture. I mean that can completely wrap up the argument. People who shunned those things in the past have been replaced by people who played them or were accepting of them.

With Space based Science Fiction I think there might actually be psychological issues connected with why people still don't flock to see Star Trek or something closer to a more believable future for humans in Space. On the flip of that they seem all too ready to watch things that involve our future near extinction by things from Space or by other means. They don't want to see a new Space Opera, but they do want to see how we fight back against the Aliens or Zombies that nearly killed off the human race. And they will go in droves to see humans who have superpowers in Space or wherever else.

What kind of psychological issues?

Do people feel powerless nowadays and this causes them to go to superheroes or post apocalyptic settings rather than deep space sci fi?

[Looney]

I didn't mean anything like specific psychological issues. I meant the psychology of people becoming SciFi fans and the psychology of people shunning SciFi fans for so long and the psychology of people and pop culture somewhat gravitating toward the medium now and for what reasons and to what degree and so on and so forth and the sociological ramifications and a whole lot of other big words I can use to keep this sentence going forever.

I do feel that to a degree many people are being drawn toward apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic stories these days. And we should be honest that it is due to the fact that people are writing those stories these days. Oddly enough you would have thought they would have been more popular when the threat of global annihilation was on people's minds every day during the Cold War. That threat still exists BUT our current reality might be more frighting. Thanks to F.P.F. (For-Profit-Fear - someone copywrite that for me...Jan I am looking at you.) we are now exposed to almost every injustice, tragedy, and horror that happens in the world on a daily basis. This has made the world smaller and become an every day reminder of just how terrible things can be.

[Looney]

Surprised this conversation died. Is this a case of something I mentioned on JMS News? I mentioned how strange it is that this pandemic has given many of us more free time than we are accustomed to and yet we are not coming to these places to discuss more. I am totally guilty of this as well. I don't check here nearly as often as I did when I was super busy. Now there is some weird psychology for you.

[Looney]

Okay fine, so you don't want to talk. You don't have to tell me twice.

[Looney]

Still trying to pump some life into this one.....


I had a big long post, but I broke it down in more simple terms.

In the past people were conditioned to certain expectations in their entertainment through limited access. As the entertainment industry as grown and evolved people have become more conditioned to having an open mind and better understanding of narratives because of increased demand and enormously increased access to different varieties stories. People are conditioned now more than ever in the past, especially the pre-cable television past, to desire a wider variety from their entertainment than just the formulas fed to them by a handful of entertainment corporations. Because people were conditioned by the industry they stigmatized things that didn't fit within the parameters of the formulas they had been conditioned to. People are still conditioned by corporations, but now more than ever people are aware the conditioning is happening.

[I know that isn't short, but you should have seen what I wrote before - a basic history of television and expanding entertainment knowledge.]