[Intrepid Homoludens]

Episode VII: Revenge of the Writers
The New York Times
By HENRY FOUNTAIN
Published: May 1, 2005

MILLIONS of "Star Wars" fans are awaiting the release of "Revenge of the Sith" later this month, the sixth and final film in George Lucas's epic series. In it, the young hero Anakin Skywalker is seduced by the dark side and becomes Darth Vader.

Science fiction writers, however, are awaiting the release for a different reason. To them, "Star Wars" is nothing more than a space opera, and if the big guy in the black cloak is finally singing, that means the show is over. The saga continues no longer.

"That's the past of science fiction you're talking about," said Richard K. Morgan, the British cyberpunk-noir writer whose most recent novel is "Market Forces."

Mr. Morgan is one of a newer breed of science fiction writers who have moved far beyond the whiz-bang technological vision of Mr. Lucas's blockbusters.

"It's just such a huge shame," he said. "Anyone who is a practitioner of science fiction is constantly dogged by the ghettoization of the genre. And a lot of that comes from the very simplistic, 2-D Lucasesque view of what science fiction has to offer."

If truth be told, sci-fi writers say, their work and "Star Wars" never had much in common.

Like science itself, science fiction has evolved since the days of H. G. Wells and Jules Verne in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Since the end of World War II, the genre has shifted its focus from space and time travel to more complex speculations on how the future, whatever its shape, will affect the individual.

That shift has only accelerated in recent years, as biotech and genetic engineering have moved to center stage in science and captured writers' imaginations, and as the lines between science fiction and other genres begin to blur. "We're starting to look inward, rather than outward," Mr. Morgan said. "There are exciting and scary things going to be happening in our bodies."

One problem with "Star Wars," science fiction writers say, is that it is not, ultimately, concerned with science, but rather with a timeless vision of good and evil. Mr. Lucas has said that his story, especially the journeys of his central characters from innocence through trials by fire to wisdom and acceptance, were rooted in Joseph Campbell's comparative studies of world mythologies, and especially in his popular book, "The Hero With a Thousand Faces."

What Mr. Lucas may have seen as eternal, however, science fiction writers have tended to see as antique.

"It started out 30 years behind," said Ursula K. Le Guin. "Science fiction was doing all sorts of thinking and literary experiments on a totally different plane. 'Star Wars' was just sort of fun."

"It takes these very stock metaphors of empire in space and monstrously bad people and wonderfully good people and plays out a bunch of stock operatic themes in space suits," she said. "You can do it with cowboy suits as well."

Science fiction, on the other hand, "is a set of metaphors," Ms. Le Guin said. "It's useful for thinking about certain things in our lives - if society was different in some way, what would it be like?"

The narrative is not the only thing that feels dated (or archetypal, if you're a fan) in "Star Wars." The science, too, often feels stock.

Larry Niven, the author of the "Ringworld" series and other works, noted that the faster-than-light travel in the films is very familiar. And that's not surprising. "Most writers, if they need to get somebody between two points faster than light, they invent their own hyperdrive," said Mr. Niven, who counts himself among the inventors. As a filmmaker, though, Mr. Lucas had an advantage. "They did special effects and made you believe it," Mr. Niven said.

Those effects were a double-edged light saber, however. The first "Star Wars" film helped usher in an era of highly technical filmmaking where character development sometimes took a back seat.

"We're still stuck with this legacy of - 'Oh yeah, sci-fi, that's when you have a big budget and lots of special effects,' " Mr. Morgan said.

Ray Bradbury said that the end of "Star Wars" was long overdue. Mr. Lucas should have quit while he was ahead, Mr. Bradbury said - perhaps 28 years ago, when the first movie came out to critical acclaim.

"The problem was he made a sequel," Mr. Bradbury said. "People have tried to get me to do a sequel to 'The Martian Chronicles,' but I've never done it. Sequels are a bad idea."

Mr. Lucas, of course, made sequels - and prequels - in spades. As if hyperdrive rendered historical continuity irrelevant, the first "Star Wars" film was actually Episode IV, and the last is Episode III. In the eyes of nonfans, of course, it doesn't really matter where one lands in the saga; after the second film ("The Empire Strikes Back") the whole thing went downhill.

"I fell asleep during the third one, when they brought out the Care Bears," said Mary Doria Russell, author of "The Sparrow" and "Children of God." The third movie, "Return of the Jedi," was the one that had those dancing, furry little creatures called Ewoks.

That kind of cute, sunny woodsiness seems particularly out of place in current science fiction. For as sci-fi has turned inward, it has also turned darker. "It's a rather quieter and more disturbing kind of science fiction," Mr. Morgan said.

"Star Wars" can hardly be called quiet or disturbing. But there is a film, made around the same time as "The Empire Strikes Back," that does fit that description: "Blade Runner." Many people, including Mr. Morgan, consider the film, directed by Ridley Scott, to be one of the best sci-fi movies ever made, because it was as much about what's inside as what's outside. It, not "Star Wars," was truly ahead of its time.

"You've got the gun battles and all that stuff," Mr. Morgan said, "but the movie is very much about internal factors, like robots yearning to be humans."

"And even now, 20 years later, it still looks like the future," he added. "That's a neat trick."

What do you guys think?