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PaperclipPerfector  8mo ago (text post)   28890 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 11, 2024

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It's more the "Humanity just showed up on the scene, they barely have history relative to the other species, but are surprisingly resourceful, which is how they are making a such splash, punching above their weight. Due to that, to other species sometimes they come off as admirable, sometimes as arrogant, sometimes as dangerous" that bothered me.

It's the approach that is the most conducive to telling a story with some action.

  • "Humanity has showed up on the scene, and everyone else is still learning how to make stone tools." What's the point of doing this story in space? Set it in the Andamans.
  • "Humanity has showed up on the scene, and they are so far behind that other civilizations find them quaint and appropriate human culture in various offensive ways if they don't simply squash them like cockroaches." Cool idea, but not an action movie. Also, Liu Cixin had already written that.
  • "Humanity has showed up on the scene, and everyone else is at about the same level of development despite being spacefaring civilizations for thousands of years." Requires quite a bit of handwaving, Fifth Element was like that, but they just intoned the MST3K mantra. People who like worldbuilding will loudly complain.

Trying to come up with a counter-example I end up refuting my previous claim that this characterizes all American stories, but another one of Roddenberry's creations - Earth: The Final Conflict - has humanity in a position that gives off the same vibes living at the American periphery does. At least that's how I remember it, it's been ages since I watched it.

Also, it's not like we absolutely need to have stories where we just showed up at the scene. Set it in the year 10K like Herbert. I don't know the first thing about Warhammer, but I assume 40K also comes from the approximate date?

40k, yes, it is often referred to as the 41st Millennium for that reason.

Set it in the year 10K like Herbert.

IIRC that's 10K their calendar, something more like 20k ours.

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