In the Hutong
Damn if winter isn't finally here
2104 hrs.
In June of this year, Wil Wheaton, who played the teenage nerd-cum-Starfleet officer Wesley Crusher in the science-fiction television series Star Trek: The Next Generation, spoke at a ceremony to induct the late Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry into the Science Fiction hall of fame.
Whatever your personal feelings about Wil, Wesley, Star Trek, or the citizens of Trek Nation, you have to give credit to Wheaton for hitting what made Star Trek the single most successful science fiction franchise ever (40 years, 11 motion pictures, 5 separate TV shows, and so many books, magazines, stories, conventions, clubs, and fans that they defy counting).
Ensign Crusher Speaks
What struck me was how he captured both the lure and the powerful socio-political value of science fiction as a genre:
"There are countless examples here of the real power that science fiction has to address current events in a way that's safe and acceptable for most audiences, while speaking very seriously about them to those who look beyond the spaceships and rayguns to the ideas behind the stories. Whether it was written one hundred years ago or just published last month, science fiction can give us warnings about the future, hope for the future, or just blissful escape into the future, visiting fantastic worlds that are light-years away – and as close as our bookshelves and televisions."
He then put the 1966 premiere of the original show into its historical context - a nation falling deeper into a war it didn't understand, locked with another rival in a staredown contest with civilization at stake, while the country tore itself apart at home. He then explained what the show did - something the suits at NBC did not expect:
It wasn't a particularly optimistic period for our nation, and there wasn't all that much going on to feel good about. Then, on September 8, 1966, a new show debuted. The network thought they were buying ‘Wagon Train to the stars,' but just two commercial breaks into the show, it was clear that this was something new and different. As episodes aired over the following weeks and months, it was undeniable that this show, set in the future but reflecting so much of the contemporary world, was breaking new ground each week. Like all great science fiction, it held up a mirror and showed us our failings and triumphs – not by beating us over the head with a message, but by making that message easy enough to discover for those who cared to see it. Star Trek dared to do this during an incredibly turbulent time, when it was risky to even acknowledge that the mirror existed, much less hold it up on network television.
Popular science fiction in America found its birth during the nation's most desperate hour - the Great Depression - and has seemed to be most robust when the times have been the most confusing. The genre is infused not so much by powerful optimism as it is a literary haven allowing us to ponder our fears without wallowing in them. What comes out is a belief that the future is ours to create.
Boldly Going
As an avid fan of science fiction and China, it has been a lot of fun watching the growth of Chinese science fiction. There are a half-dozen magazines, probably a half-million hardcore fans, and a growing interest in the genre.
But political overtones are tough to avoid, and a lot of science fiction is a allegorical social critique. In "Sci-Fi Ascendant" in the September 2006 edition of Seed magazine, Mara Hvistendahl wrote:
But this tendency to propose new ways of living—what James Gunn, director of the Center for the Study of Science Fiction at the University of Kansas, calls an "inherent critique of society"—means that the genre's position could still be somewhat tenuous in China. Certain subject matter is off-limits; one of Gunn's novels was translated into Chinese but couldn't be published because it dealt with student protests. The censors have reason to be wary: Much of Chinese science fiction has been inspired by political events, from the Cultural Revolution to the 1978 Democracy Wall to the Tiananmen Square protests.
None of which means that the growth of science fiction in China will slow - on the contrary, I suspect writers will simply use more care in their words. If the Science Fiction World website and the links from it are any indication, there is a lot going on.
But unlike the US, what I suspect will drive interest in science fiction in China will not be film or television, but games.
If you've ever played a game - I mean, really played it to the point where it begins to intrude on the edges of your reality - you find that it begs to be explored in other ways. Books, stories, fan fiction, illustrations, manga, and even the funky new art of machinima (stories told in the context of a game, and recorded as animated shorts - check out Red vs. Blue) grow from such immersion, and have this remarkable tendency to lead one off to explore other areas of "speculative fiction."
Watch what happens when Blizzard drops World of Starcraft II into the gaming world in the coming months. I suspect that will bump Chinese science fiction up another notch.
I don't see the next Star Trek movie making it into China, though. Here in China, the underlying messages of Trek, Star Wars, and much of the western science fiction canon would likely be considered borderline subversive.