Science Fiction: What You Leave Behind

A genre is born
Science fiction was a genre born without a label. Authors like Jules Verne and Edgar Allen Poe wrote thrilling tales of terror and technology, but it wasn't until the pulps of the 1930s and '40s and the emergence of giants like Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov and Robert A. Heinlein that the idea of "science fiction" (often referred to as "Sci-Fi") became a category unto itself. Today, this literature of ideas and imagination (also encompassing whimsical and politically charged fantasies like those of J. R. R. Tolkien and C. S. Lewis or even the horror of writers like Stephen King and Clive Barker continues to engage the mind and speculate about the human condition in a variety of fantastic circumstances.

On the threshold of a new century and a new millennium, science fiction has become science fact. We live in a new millennium, a time charged with meaning in so many of the Sci-Fi adventures of the last hundred years. While it may not have turned out as it was envisioned (there are no weather control machines, flying cars, or personal jetpacks, it is indeed a wondrous time that would amaze and perhaps even terrify those imaginative souls who dreamed of a future so far away from their own time. What seemed like science fiction 100 years ago, from space travel to modern communications technology, is commonplace today. And thanks to the evolving technology of the Internet, we can explore our cultural history and build worldwide communities in ways that even science fiction might have failed to predict

As the genre prepares to reinvent itself for a new millennium, we thought it would be valuable to look at where science fiction has taken us in the last hundred years. From the distant past to the far future, the collective imagination that shapes science fiction has introduced us to an immense array of "stuff" that allows our own imaginations to run wild. Science fiction has shown us the full breadth and scope of the universe, but always brings us home to that most important place of all, the human heart.

The journey begins: Sci-Fi in the early 20th century
As we stood poised on the threshold of the last century, Jules Verne took us "20,000 Leagues Under The Sea" (1870) while H. G. Wells flung us into the far future via "The Time Machine" (1895). Martians invaded Earth in his 1898 novel, "War of the Worlds," while the infant medium of film took "A Trip To The Moon" (1902). Known as the "Big Three" architects of modern science fiction, Robert A. Heinlein (1907-1988), Arthur C. Clarke (1917- ) and Isaac Asimov (1920-1992) were visionaries of a high order. Ray Bradbury, the poetic soul of science fiction, was born in 1920 while Karl Capek debuted the play R. U. R. and introduced the world to robots. Gene Roddenberry, mastermind behind the pop culture phenomenon, "Star Trek," beamed down in 1921, and one of the first great futuristic dystopias, complete with female robot, debuted when "Metropolis" hit movie theaters in 1926.

Prophetic and paranoid: Sci-Fi in the 1930s-1950s
Sci-Fi adventurers Buck Rogers and Flash Gordon first appeared in newspapers in 1929 and 1934. H. G. Well's Martian invasion tale, "War of the Worlds," was vividly enacted on radio by Orson Welles in 1938, sparking a wave of hysteria. In 1947, what may have been an alien spacecraft crash in Roswell, New Mexico, fueled generations of Sci-Fi tales about extraterrestrial invasion and government conspiracies. George Orwell cautioned the world against totalitarianism with 1984, published in 1949. Arguably the birth of Sci-Fi cinema, "Destination Moon" and "Rocketship X-M" thrilled young and old alike in 1950, while a lesson in tolerance and peace was delivered by Klaatu in "The Day The Earth Stood Still" (1951). Isaac Asimov began his massive Future History chronicles with books about "Foundation" (1951) and a pair of robot detectives debuting in "The Caves of Steel" (1954). 1954 also saw the arrival of atomic mutations like "Godzilla" and the ants of "Them!" while Shakespeare's "The Tempest" was given the Sci-Fi treatment in the feature film "Forbidden Planet" (1956). Communism reared its ugly pod-like head in the allegorical "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" (1956), while in the real world, the Russians beat the U.S. to space when Sputnik launched in 1957. With paranoia at an all-time high, the stage was set for the eerie escapades of "The Twilight Zone," debuting on the CBS television network in 1959 for a five-season run and adding a new phrase to the American lexicon.

Do not adjust your television set: Sci-Fi in the 1960s
The '60s ushered in a new era in Sci-Fi with the debut of a certain time-traveling adventurer in the long-running BBC series, "Doctor Who" (1963-1989). In the U.S., mankind reached for the "Outer Limits" on ABC (1963), learned how to stop worrying and love the bomb in Stanley Kubrick's "Dr. Strangelove" (1964) and read about politics in space in the epic novel "Dune" (1965) by Frank Herbert. The most successful Sci-Fi franchise of all time launched in September 1966 with the debut of "Star Trek" on NBC, eventually spawning multiple films, TV spin-offs and a merchandising empire of galactic proportions. Charlton Heston learned you can't go home again in "Planet of the Apes" (1968), while Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke took us to the far reaches of the human experience in the seminal "2001: A Space Odyssey" (1968). Astronaut Neil Armstrong walked on the surface of the moon in 1969 (the culmination of the American Space Program, and with one momentous step, science fiction became science fact.

Mind-bending media: Sci-Fi in the 1970s - 1990s
Another Kubrickian vision brought us a dark near future in 1971's "A Clockwork Orange," while "Close Encounters Of The Third Kind" (1977) and "Star Wars" (1977) redefined the genre and gave birth to a new era in film-making. "Blade Runner" (1982) and "E.T." (1982) presented two very different views of Sci-Fi, while writer William Gibson created a new subgenre with his 'cyberpunk' novel "Neuromancer" (1984). In the final decade of the 20th century, the creator of "Star Trek," Gene Roddenberry, and Sci-Fi legend Isaac Asimov passed away while films like "Independence Day" (1996) and "The Matrix" (1999) put a new spin on some very old Sci-Fi themes. Television shows like "Babylon 5" and "The X-Files" took the genre to new heights of popularity, while the marketing genius of George Lucas pushed the relaunch of the "Star Wars" saga with "Episode I: The Phantom Menace" (1999) into the record books. With the year 2000 burned into the collective Sci-Fi psyche after a century of storytelling, we have high hopes that the dawn of the new millennium will launch us to newer heights of Sci-Fi adventure and excitement. Stay tuned!

Arnold T. Blumberg is a prolific science fiction, comic book and media journalist, serves as Editor for the Gemstone Publishing line of price guides, including the Overstreet Comic Book Price Guide and Hake's Price Guide to Character Toys, and is a Senior Editor for EON Magazine (www.eonmagazine.com). In his spare time he daydreams about sleeping.