Comparing Science Fiction: Back To The Future

Science fiction helps us explore new ways of thinking. It gives us a better perspective on humanity by helping us see into our past, present and future. The Illustrated Man by Ray Bradbury is a collection of science fiction short stories. The author uses stories set in the future that show human life in the future. He gives examples of innovative technology in every story, but also shows the reader that technology can be helpful or harmful. From creating a children’s playroom to making a human-like puppet without strings, the author shows how technology can be used for both good and evil. For example, in The Veldt and The Marionettes the main characters used it to deceive others. Conflict happened when technology was used in an unexpected

The themes pioneered by the hero’s initiation pattern in Greek mythology have become ubiquitous over time, and still remain a staple in Hollywood cinema (Lecture, 5/4). Despite the drastic shift in time and cultural norms, these themes and motifs related to what it means to be a hero are still prominent within Back to the Future’s (Zemeckis, 1985) main protagonist, Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox). While the end of his quest does not necessarily deem him a king, he discovers something considered infinitely more powerful in 1980’s America, a sense of identity and a willingness to embrace what the future holds. Despite Marty McFly’s questionable fashion sense and wise-cracking nature, he is an ideal hero, immediately comparable to Homeric heroes

Many people in the past and today believe the future will hold advancements in how humans live and what they use. The most common advancement is technology. Technology is the future, from the simplicity of turning on a light, to an advance development of a robot. The future is commonly told through sci-fi movies and through non fictional books such as the stories “The Sound of Thunder” by Ray Bradbury or “The Nethergrave” by Glaria Skurzynski. The story Nethergrave is better than The Sound of Thunder because it’s more entertaining, shows better imagery, and it’s ultimately easier to understand.

Bullying happens throughout many schools, and is a subject in many movies and television shows. One particular infamous bully is the character Biff Tannen in Back to the Future (Zemeckis). Tannen is a typical high school bully who spends his time tyrannizing the unpopular kid, George McFly (Zemeckis). He later resorts to bullying Marty McFly when he arrives (Zemeckis). A bully like Tannen uses fear to take control of groups of people the same way a dictator like Adolf Hitler does.

Science fiction is often written as a commentary on our world. Events that may occur in the future, things that may have been invented, technology that has advanced further than our imaginations. Books like Fahrenheit 451 and the short story of Harrison Bergeron talk about how our society could be controlled by one larger being. In order to make everyone equal, happy, and clueless. Knowledge is the power to understand, in both books it tells us how to think about how much we truly understand our society and why is the truth hidden and silenced from us.

Ray Bradbury, a distinguished science fiction author, once said, “.... A lot of intellectuals think science fiction is trivial. And it’s pivotal! People are walking around the streets with phones to their heads talking to someone ten feet away. We’ve killed two million people with automobiles.

Throughout the first semester of our English class, we have debated and discussed many key ideas of science fiction, all the way from an overreliance in technology to genetic mutations. We have discussed these ideas through the short stories, films, and books that we have read and watched. The most prominent aspect of science fiction that resonated and created the most interest for me was an overreliance in technology and the harmful effects of technology. People’s overreliance on technology helps destroy human interaction and basic human wants, needs, and desires. For my honors presentation my partner and I decided to discuss this idea through Ray Bradbury’s short story “The Pedestrian,” and the movie Wall-E. Both of these pieces of art have major connections to technology and the impact that it has on society.

Literature sounds too stuffy and high-browed an descriptor for Science Fiction as a genre. Science fiction is meant to be fantasy, something that is not real and does not strive to meet the literary aspirations of those who would write meaningful prose. Not to say that science fiction writers do not want to something meaningful, but even though the genre may be filled with writers who are degraded by "real" authors as a breed, does not mean that there are not classics that have been recognized as achieving a literary mark. It can be argued, because of the use of literary devices, that there are those science fiction novels that definitely reach the level anyone would consider literature, and among these is a book from Phillip K. Dick called The Man in the High Castle. This paper examines what literary devices were used in this book to make it both a work of science fiction and a work of literature.

The science-fiction film genre serves as an excellent medium for examining shifting power structures, social paranoia and Cold War politics during the 1950s. A number of films released during this period, including: Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), Them (1954) and Attack of the 50ft Woman (1958), are particularly symptomatic of the social and political atmosphere of the time. These films navigate not only narrative based issues such as the threat of aliens and science experiments gone wrong; but also wider issues of the time, such as the Cold War, changes in the US film industry, urbanisation, politics, the growing power of women and most significantly, social concern about nuclear energy.

Throughout this semester our literary material dealt with themes of technology, modernization, the imponderable bloom, human nature, and truth to name a few of the most overarching. Each text has woven an impression of the possible near future for humanity if the patterns we are creating continue at an exponential rate. Patterns such as consumerism, neglecting unpleasurable emotions, using drugs, and controlling the environment for our short term benefits will write an unsavory and inevitable future. Science Fiction often reflects on society by exaggerating their negative characteristics and advancements to seem far-out, but often it is ironic how close many aspects of the fiction are a direct reflection of the present condition. Even now, the possibilities of utopias and dystopias forming are not so out of reach. The ability of our culture to control an entire population with a self-satisfied culture of vices outfitted with technology is less and less science fiction as the years pass.

Most science fiction texts contain possible futuristic technology! That's why a lot of people enjoy reading science fiction stories or watching science fiction movies. Also people are curious about the future and hoping that it will be better than the present. “Back to the Future” is a great example of a science fiction movie. It tells about science and technology of the future, has true and false theories of science, and includes a contemporary issue.

In a genre whose name ostensibly welcomes innovation—science fiction—resistance towards technology may initially seem counterintuitive. This, however, is where it is essential to delve into the annals of history. Writers, after all, write what they know. In an 1948 essay, George Orwell wrote, “When you are on a sinking ship, your thoughts will be about sinking

Science fiction (SF) is a discourse in which the stories often explore fictional advancements and new discoveries in science and technology that presently seem implausible. SF alternately expands and redefines the familiar boundaries of our world, rendering possible things that would otherwise be impossible (Hughes 220). Compared to a genre, a discourse does not have a series of repeated tropes that apply to all its literature, it is instead united by some common core elements. SF is not just mere-storytelling and entertainment, rather, it is based in reality; in the real and familiar world we live in, however, it then goes beyond this reality to explore a potential new science, it also discusses the aftermath and consequences of this new development,

The “Back to the future” trilogy is by far my favorite of all time; especially the first one, that movie alone is on my Mount Rushmore of movies. The trilogy is about a teenager who accidently travels back in time prevents his parents from getting married which then prevents him from being born, so now he has to figure out a way to get back to the future and get his parents back together. The entire trilogy is great; even thought it has its bad moments, but hey, what trilogy does not? The series is a clever and fun string of movies that leaves you with a good feeling after watching them. Now with that being said, when you make a movie about time travel there are bound to be some mistakes and “Back to the future” is no exception. I can go

Moreover, the positive messages embedded in science fiction works can have powerful influence on the audience and the society, both locally and globally. In particular, most of the messages embedded are prompted by the past events of world history or by the contemporary social phenomena, and