Inception is kinda all about closure, which I’ll give you isn’t quite “social commentary” but its treading dangerously close to mental health commentary.
Interstellar is all about climate change, and the duty of humanity to fix their own mess, which are certainly social commentary points
Star Trek has social commentary and political commentary baked into its DNA, everything is an allegory for some real life issue they want to trick people into thinking about with an open mind, or from a new point of view
Star Wars, well, looking at when it came out the parallels to the Vietnam War are palpable but its dripping with anti-authoritarian messaging
Its funny, I was almost surprised to see Inception in your list. Not because I think its bad media, I think its pretty rad, but because it sort of feels more like a standard heist film with a science-y/fantasy-y gimmick. Certainly by my criteria it wouldn’t count as SciFi for the aforementioned lack of social/political commentary, but its an interesting edge case.
It’s not that I don’t understand there are political themes in sci-fi. It’s that it felt like I was being beat over the head with it in D9. Also, just not a big fan of being told something wild exists in a movie but it’s never exposed because the budget doesn’t allow for it.
If your sci fi isn’t making some sort of social or political statement, its not sci fi - its just sparkling futurism.
… wow, “sparkling futurism” is the phrase I didn’t know t needed, thx.
It classifies so much stuff perfectly!
Glad to be of service :D
Disagree.
That’s fair. What are some of your favourite sci fi pieces?
The apolitical gem, Star Wars!
For me, it’s the totally unallegorical Starship Troopers.
Inception, Interstellar, Star Trek movies, Star Wars (originals), probably some I’m forgetting.
Inception is kinda all about closure, which I’ll give you isn’t quite “social commentary” but its treading dangerously close to mental health commentary.
Interstellar is all about climate change, and the duty of humanity to fix their own mess, which are certainly social commentary points
Star Trek has social commentary and political commentary baked into its DNA, everything is an allegory for some real life issue they want to trick people into thinking about with an open mind, or from a new point of view
Star Wars, well, looking at when it came out the parallels to the Vietnam War are palpable but its dripping with anti-authoritarian messaging
Its funny, I was almost surprised to see Inception in your list. Not because I think its bad media, I think its pretty rad, but because it sort of feels more like a standard heist film with a science-y/fantasy-y gimmick. Certainly by my criteria it wouldn’t count as SciFi for the aforementioned lack of social/political commentary, but its an interesting edge case.
It’s not that I don’t understand there are political themes in sci-fi. It’s that it felt like I was being beat over the head with it in D9. Also, just not a big fan of being told something wild exists in a movie but it’s never exposed because the budget doesn’t allow for it.