Well I try to twist things into plausible territory. It's actually fun to do research and speculate. (see: "Speculative fiction") For example, in one world I created, humans created a donut-shaped planet to house the experiments they created [1] [2] I made it so the core is a fusion reactor to simulate the Earth's heat and tectonic shifts. I also angled the planet with respect to its sun (45 degrees slanted downwards and forward facing the sun) so that one side will be sunny while the other is dark. The planet rotates about itself on the same axis it rotates around the sun so despite the day/night changing, there is a pole that stays closest to the sun and a pole that stays the farthest away from the sun, creating two hot and cold poles (Earth has 2 cold ones). I also found a few physics studies discussing the specifics of how a planet like this could sustain itself without collapsing into a sphere. Gravity and speed rotation and such things, though there is no reason to mention those, ever. I learned gravity is stronger in the middle so that is where the oceans will be, mostly.
However, there are lots of things I'll have to wave away, like for example how genetic manipulation managed to create animal-human hybrids. Some of them have physiques that support flying (lighter frames and bone density) and other can breath underwater (yes, gills and some scales). With modern science this isn't possible. Oh, and there are also telekinesis powers and time-travel portals. But these are the only glaring supernatural element and I just gave them enough details and limitations to turn them into a mundane talent. The only thing that's missing is their "source".
I guess deeming a planet impossible / possible assumes that you're invoking the laws of Physics which were discovered on this planet and have known to hold true in the visible universe. This does not stop someone from imagining an alternate universe and setting a plot up there. As a reader, I am open to even accepting a universe that is in blatant violation of Newtonian physics as long as the said violation opens up creative plot possibilities.
My story has to be believable within the context of the story. Everything has a why although I may not express it to the reader. I have to know how it works so that if something "unbelievable" happens I've already established that things like that can happen. There was a Transporter movie (the 3rd one I believe) where the MC chooses to jump a ramp and hit the hook on a crane hanging some 50 feet off the ground while doing a "barrel roll" to remove a bomb from beneath his car. He must have passed a half dozen medians he could have straddled or about a million of other things to get rid of the bomb but they chose to do this. I think I spent the rest of the movie sighing. There's unlikely anything they could have done within the context of their world to justify this.
I could not agree more. A story should be logical (having inner logic) and if something differs from our world then it needs to have an explanation (even if only mentioned, not fully detailed)
1.) There's a lot to hate about Peter Chung. His anatomy is grotesque. Not amateurish, he knows what he's doing, just likes it grotesque. I've hated everything he's worked on. 2.) What makes you think anyone in Riddick or Pitch Black is breathing oxygen?
No, he's a Furian, they make that point several times in Chronicles. Why then should anyone else be completely human?
Well, not to be pedantic, but Furians are never indicated as a separate species. Calling Riddick a Furian because he comes from Furia can as easily be equated to calling me a Puerto Rican because I come from Puerto Rico. I'm not a different species just because of different location of birth, much as Mauve Leakey might like to argue the point. Mixed species aren't part of the mythos of the Riddick universe like it is in the Star Trek universe. Occam's Razor to the rescue: poor writing / low audience expectation of realism.
I don't know, I think you're making a huge assumption that anyone who looks human will breath oxygen in your sci-fi universe.
This is the right assumption. Why would anyone assume otherwise? If you write a story where totally alien-like creatures live on a planet at ultra-low temperatures no-one will assume that they breath air. Contrary to this if you write about human-looking creatures breathe methane you should clearly mention it to the reader, because without that they will definitely assume that these creatures breathe the same air as we do. @Wreybies : when I saw the eclipse scene in the first movie I wondered how could they survive on a planet so close to a big gas giant. Jupiter, for example emits strong radiation which is -at the distance pictured in the movie- lethal for a human even after a very short period. This paper describes it with some examples : http://zimmer.csufresno.edu/~fringwal/w08a.jup.txt later :
Whilst true, Jupiter isn't the only gas giant in our solar system. If we were to look for more realistic examples, I would suggest looking at Titan as an alternative - Surface radiation there is reduced by the thickness of the atmosphere which is why there are numerous papers on why it is one of the most suitable bodies in our solar system for future surface colonization. FWIW, Pitch Black isn't the only movie that has a habitable moon orbiting a gas giant - Pandora (Avatar) does, too. Which brings us neatly to floating rocks.... ...nope, I'm struggling to think of a naturally occurring phenomenon (that creates a strong magnetic field, as per the film) that could explain it. electrostatic thrust, maybe? Hydrogen-filled core? Witchcraft? I'm going to go with Witchcraft. NERD/off.
Excellent point. Also, lets add to this the epic solar radiation they enjoy from not one but three suns prior to the gas giant's ascending the horizon. Robert Sawyer's Quintaglio Ascension Trilogy suffers from this same gas giant moon error as well. In that series the Quintaglios (derived from tyrannosaurus rex) live on a moon in synchronous rotation with the gas giant it orbits, which they call The Face of God. More like the Face of Death.
Grrrr... I had forgotten about Unobtanium. That STINKS of lazy writing. Utterly stinks. It's as bad, if not worse than calling a planet prone to volcanism and scorching hot sunrises, Crematoria. FWIW, Unobtanium would never pass as a valid name for an element, mineral or anything remotely scientific- the nomenclature surrounding that sort of thing is very strict. As stupid as it sounds, I have looked with absolute seriousness at the procedure surrounding publishing a paper defining a new mineral species (Via the IMA, International Mineralogical Authority and CNMNC) and it is quite stringent. Naming something Unobtanium would be like naming a new mineral Whataloadofshite. It would never be allowed to happen. I'd never let something like that slide in my literary world
And I have to wonder how many sidelong looks were had with the producers, directors and Wayne Barlowe, who did the creature designs for Avatar. I say that for the following reason: Barlowe paid very close attention (as he always does) to certain traits in the lineages of the creatures on Pandora. It was clear that he was making use of paradigms found in the evolution of animals on Earth, like tetrapods having extremities that always end in no more than five digits, or mammals always having seven neck vertebrae. His creatures all came from a clear and well defined set of lineages in that film... except for the Na'vi. All the higher order creatures are hexapedal, even the flyers. The Na'vi are tetrapods. Everything appears to have an integument that is roughly equatable to that of an amphibian; there is no hair to be seen anywhere. The Na'vi have enviably lustrous lanky locks of head-hair. The creatures all have four eyes (two dominant, two smaller - perhaps going vestigial) but the Na'vi have only two eyes without even a hint of vestigial structure, not even an indentation of bone or anything to indicate where a second set of eyes was lost through time. Na'vi women have inexplicable, vague boob-bumps that don't appear to end in anything useful like a lactating nipple. I know Barlowe's work from other projects he has done. His ideas are often quite fanciful, but always explicable and internally logical. I have to assume he felt some resentment at the Na'vi falling away from his usual precision.
Since we're picking holes in Avatar, I'm going to point out one of my other annoyance of mine; why did the horse-things all sound like the Veloceraptors from Jurassic park? They used the EXACT same sound track. Ok going a bit off topic but I think the point is, James Cameron's Avatar i full of problems. Stupid Dances with Smurfs.
But it does wrap back around to the original reason I started this thread. Though it sounds like I disparage and disdain the idea of impossible worlds, I still very much enjoyed these stories of which we speak. Yes, even Dances with Smurfs. There are sexy sides to that story that speak to the writer of erotica in me. Shit, I'd'a let Jake Sully (in avatar form) play with my dinglehopper braid. True story. As ridiculous as it was, it was enjoyable. The impossibility of the worlds in the Riddick universe didn't really stop me from enjoying the softly fetish nature of those films. If anything bugged me, it was when the soft fetish aspect was broken. Like why at the end of Riddick does sappho Starbuck (sorry, Katee, but you didn't even try not to be Starbuck) groinfully give in to Riddick? That messed it up for me. Doms don't turn sub just because there's a dommier dom in the room.
Oh, don't get me wrong; I like Avatar. sure it's dumb and irritatingly preachy but the set-pieces were mindblowing and the effects are just stunning. Can't comment on the latest Riddick as I've not seen it.
Uhhhhhhh, you guys started partying here You're right, this can be an excuse for them, but only for this one thing. Several other logical problems are shining bright, like the ones already mentioned by you and Wreybies. Not a big loss, believe me Haha, why do monsters sound like pigs in Z category horrors? For me it is true only for Avatar but not the Riddick movies. It's true that I've seen all 3 but this is only because I tend to watch all and every sci-fi movies I can. The Na'vi should have a humanoid characteristic because the "sci-fi Pocahontas" story would not work otherwise. Let's speak a bit about what do you consider as "possible" worlds? For me the Alien films (first two) were in this category. Not everything was fine but at least they tried. I have read the books as well and I liked them too. I was really happy reading about how they felt when the artificial gravity was turned on (at least the writer mentioned that there is such technology available). Some things were a bit crappy like acid blood, but the setting was more realistic than most sci-fi settings. Maybe it's because it was dirty and not that "clean like a hospital" environment most movies depict. I loved the Caterpillar P-5000 Work Loader as it made a connection between "today" and "then".
What I found weird about Avatar is that the same thing you use to ride a flying creature is the same thing you use to have sex.
I know, but still, I can imagine Barlowe having a very sulky day when his meticulous creations were taken over by the rest of the design team. Design team- "No, no. Loose those extra arms. Are you crazy? Erase those eyes. And tits. She needs tits. Ok. Good. Now make her wear a bead-bra or something. She needs to have tits, but we can't actually see them." Barlowe- "...... fuck you. " Alien (the original) remains my all-time favorite sci-fi film. It works on so many levels. I liked the "dirty" aspect of it and the almost documentary style realism of the initial story, this long before it became an over-used trope in Hollywood, so it actually retains rather than looses a freshness no longer available because of over-manipulation of the style. The worlds themselves are very plausible with no real issues that violate my sense of "that can't work". LV-426 is refreshingly hostile and causticly uninhabitable. Acid for blood didn't really bug me so much as failure to follow conservation of mass and thermodynamics. The xenomorph eats no one prior to growing to the size of a man (conservation of mass out the door) - and NO, I don't accept that he was eating insulation or hull-plating since this isn't mentioned - and he grows to the size of a man within a day (thermodynamics out the window as well). I have admittedly waxed rhapsodic concerning these points of the film on many occasion.
IKR? It's like if your dong were some all-purpose ethernet cable. ETA: But, unappealing as that might be, it was at least internally consistent with the bio-system he had created. Boobs were not consistent.
James Cameron was on Inside the Actor's Studio once. Lipton asked him why the Na'vi women had breasts, and Cameron said, "They have breasts because this is a movie for human people." That got a bit of a laugh.
