Star wars is without a doubt my favourite sci fi universe with the 40k mythos being a close second.

What makes it for me is the fact that lucas's 'used future' look makes the world(s) seem believable, little things like having to bang the falcons panels to make it work (percussive maintainance), carbon scoring, dirt and grease everywhere... rebel flight suits with oil patches on the knees... the fact Lukes speeder is worth less when he tries to sell it because a newer model has come out.

I can live with the plot inconsistancies and i'd even take the prequels over other movie franchises because of this beleivable universe.

As a kid i liked Buck Rogers and Battlstar galactica but the originals dont really hold up so well know. the remake of BSG started off quite well but then just became a lame soap opera punctuated by cool space fights (except 'razor' that was an epic episode)

I dont hate star trek but its always been too peaceful , too clean, too many non violent and unrealistic solutions.

Star gate i coudl never get into past the movie, dont know why...

Other sci fi i love is the Aliens franchise and Firefly... i guess i just love the dirt

So what makes you go for your 'brand' of sci fi?

(oh and l like blakes 7 and Dr who from the 70s and 80s which were actually quite clean but hilariously low budget.. i think i like them for nostalgia reasons and the fact that most the scripts are really really good and original at the time)

I honestly go back and forth between Star Wars and Star Trek. Wars is always my favorite for games, but if you want to do some thinking about morality and societal structure then Trek is not a bad option. If I want epic action with characters I've known since I was 12 then Star Wars is my go-to.

For about a year now I have been reading as much old(40+yr) sci-fi as I can get my hands on. There are a lot of other great universes out there(The Integral Trees! WUT)and I would encourage Star Wars fans to diversify. It'll make you appreciate some aspects of Star Wars even more. Someone needs to dig up that "what are you reading" thread!

I love michael moorcock old sci fi, some of its so wierd.

Also Harry Harrison's 'stainless steel rat' books.

My wife really likes Asimov but im not massively into 'hard sci fi', which is wierd as i love Iain M Banks's sci fi, particularly his 'culture' series.

I love how the tech in the culture makes the star wars universe look like its using bows and arrows.

Star Wars is not my go-to for Sci-Fi .. It is one of my favourites and dear to my heart (mostly since X-Wing/TIE Fighter share the honour of being one of major vectors that got me into PC gaming) but it is more akin to Tolkien at this point - which is a must know and appriciate but not exaclty something I would start a war for...

So what makes you go for your 'brand' of sci fi?

Babylon 5 (without its spin-offs) for me is a go to choice for an Epic Narration in the Televison category, runner up here is Star Trek Deep Space Nine ... They make such good use of their setting and do awesome world-building which commulates in the wide arcs that come togehter in the end very well (this were nBSG messed up horribly; the ammount of DeM they pulled to finish the show is mind numbing). B5 earns extra points because JMS & Co did less of the "sufficent progress in one area will sort out all problems" that Star Trek relied on; also the use of some oddball episodes to futher the world building (e.g. "And now for a word" which I hold is the perfect entry point for a newcomer) was a very good move.

Star Trek TOS owns the crown when it comes to Episodic Narration in Televison; but that mostly due to a grandfather clause (also I don't like episodic narration all that much, due to its constrains of format [e.g. return to a status-quo in the end])

As far as video games go, nothing has beat FreeSpace at it's own game (pun intended). While the first installment of the series was pretty formulaic and very bread-and-butter military aliens-vs-humans Sci-Fi, the second one made a massive dash ahead when comes to narration and world building.

(Note: FreeSpace does earn a lot of points because a lot of question marks still stand when comes to it's universe - which I like very much as it allows you to fill the gaps with various explainations that can happily coexist in community of fans. "Exposition is a scalpel not sledgehammer" )

As books go, I favour a "varied menu" that allows me to appricate the diversity more than anything else and don't exactly have a favourite.

Lightsabers.

Star Wars is not my go-to for Sci-Fi .. It is one of my favourites and dear to my heart (mostly since X-Wing/TIE Fighter share the honour of being one of major vectors that got me into PC gaming) but it is more akin to Tolkien at this point - which is a must know and appriciate but not exaclty something I would start a war for...

So what makes you go for your 'brand' of sci fi?

Babylon 5 (without its spin-offs) for me is a go to choice for an Epic Narration in the Televison category, runner up here is Star Trek Deep Space Nine ... They make such good use of their setting and do awesome world-building which commulates in the wide arcs that come togehter in the end very well (this were nBSG messed up horribly; the ammount of DeM they pulled to finish the show is mind numbing). B5 earns extra points because JMS & Co did less of the "sufficent progress in one area will sort out all problems" that Star Trek relied on; also the use of some oddball episodes to futher the world building (e.g. "And now for a word" which I hold is the perfect entry point for a newcomer) was a very good move.

Star Trek TOS owns the crown when it comes to Episodic Narration in Televison; but that mostly due to a grandfather clause (also I don't like episodic narration all that much, due to its constrains of format [e.g. return to a status-quo in the end])

As far as video games go, nothing has beat FreeSpace at it's own game (pun intended). While the first installment of the series was pretty formulaic and very bread-and-butter military aliens-vs-humans Sci-Fi, the second one made a massive dash ahead when comes to narration and world building.

(Note: FreeSpace does earn a lot of points because a lot of question marks still stand when comes to it's universe - which I like very much as it allows you to fill the gaps with various explainations that can happily coexist in community of fans. "Exposition is a scalpel not sledgehammer" )

As books go, I favour a "varied menu" that allows me to appricate the diversity more than anything else and don't exactly have a favourite.

I dont think i gave babylon 5 a proper chance really but i only hear good stuff about it. Might have to give it a go with a fresh perspective.

Computer game wise its Fallout3/Fallout New Vegas all the way for me. I love free choice sandbox games where you can be good or evil.

I like 'dark forces', 'xwing' and 'tie fighter' but all the other str wars games sort of left me a bit cold. Probably because when a lot of them came out I was more into drinking and going to gigs than gaming for a period of a few years (the only gaming i did was tabletop warhammer and 40k while at uni)

I think the thing about Star Wars is that its EVERYONE'S universe. By that I mean, in Trek you have to go to Star Fleet Academy to have a purpose in Life, in BSG you're still part of a ship crew, and let's not get started with Stargate or Buck Rogers.

In SW, even some street urchin or dirt farmer can become something great - and they start out living in some hole just like we do. No gleaming sterile Enterprise here, just a bunch of dirty, lost, po' folks trying to get by.

Star Wars is space opera, so it has the attractions and drawbacks of opera: overwhelming stage design, beautiful music, a harebrained plot, cheesy dialogue and bad actors. With Star Trek, you don't even get the overwhelming stage design. Battlestar Galactica gets a mention for most economical use of a clip, what else can you say about a movie where the best acting is done by Cylons.

Science Fiction in movies?

Blade Runner.

The original Alien. Silent Running. Outland. Firefly.

I actually like ST more than SW, or at least they're pretty even. ST doesn't have the same plot over and over again.

Well SW has one long plot and is six (three if you're a purist) movies whereas ST (and i assume we're talking films here as you cant compare the TV show to a set of movies in fairness) was more disjointed and i believe written by different people.

But you know as lame as jar jar and ewoks were they seem like sci fi gold compared to the ST film where they go to earth back in time to save whales.... that was truly terrible.

wrath of kahn is probably the only ST 'original' film i like. Nemesis and the ones from the picard era were all pretty good and unlike most people i really like the remake of the kirk era

Well SW has one long plot and is six (three if you're a purist) movies whereas ST (and i assume we're talking films here as you cant compare the TV show to a set of movies in fairness) was more disjointed and i believe written by different people.

But you know as lame as jar jar and ewoks were they seem like sci fi gold compared to the ST film where they go to earth back in time to save whales.... that was truly terrible.

wrath of kahn is probably the only ST 'original' film i like. Nemesis and the ones from the picard era were all pretty good and unlike most people i really like the remake of the kirk era

Wow....... The Voyage Home, First Contact, and Undiscovered Country are all better than any of the SW films imo (I actually don't care for the SW films to much). Nemesis, Final Frontier, and Into Darkness were all pretty horrible imo.

But I was actually talking about all of ST vs. all of SW. Look at all the main story arcs of SW and you'll see they are for the most part the same recurring Jedi Vs. Sith.

EDIT: Lol I always loved ST because it was more than just endless combat.

As far as video games go, nothing has beat FreeSpace at it's own game (pun intended). While the first installment of the series was pretty formulaic and very bread-and-butter military aliens-vs-humans Sci-Fi, the second one made a massive dash ahead when comes to narration and world building.

(Note: FreeSpace does earn a lot of points because a lot of question marks still stand when comes to it's universe - which I like very much as it allows you to fill the gaps with various explainations that can happily coexist in community of fans. "Exposition is a scalpel not sledgehammer" )

Freespace! Freespace 2 is near the top of my all-time favorite games. It pains me to this day that we couldn't get a Freespace 3 to get some closure on the series

The space battles in that game were epic. I've played most of the space sims that exist, and this one I feel is the best.

As for the topic at hand, I do like the gritty visual appeal of Star Wars (which gets lost in the prequal trilogy, sadly). Just like the OP, it's the same reason that I like the Alien franchise: It's just more believable that these worlds are real, because they look lived in.

Exactly the Star Trek utopia always looked very fake and lame to me.

And no star trek film is better than any of the OT star wars films

just no!

But comparing all of star treks tv shows and films (what 50 years of serialised weekly TV and twenty movies or whatever) to six films is like comparing apples to pianos...

of course its going to be more varied if you've 1456 hours more film time to show that universe in

I think the thing about Star Wars is that its EVERYONE'S universe. By that I mean, in Trek you have to go to Star Fleet Academy to have a purpose in Life, in BSG you're still part of a ship crew, and let's not get started with Stargate or Buck Rogers.

In SW, even some street urchin or dirt farmer can become something great - and they start out living in some hole just like we do. No gleaming sterile Enterprise here, just a bunch of dirty, lost, po' folks trying to get by.

This is exactly why Fire Fly is sooo much better! It has all those aspects but lacks the poor scripting and stories of Lucas.

I like most sci-fi series, usually for different reasons. SW is not my favorite but I don't think I have a favorite really.

I honestly go back and forth between Star Wars and Star Trek. Wars is always my favorite for games, but if you want to do some thinking about morality and societal structure then Trek is not a bad option. If I want epic action with characters I've known since I was 12 then Star Wars is my go-to.

For about a year now I have been reading as much old(40+yr) sci-fi as I can get my hands on. There are a lot of other great universes out there(The Integral Trees! WUT)and I would encourage Star Wars fans to diversify. It'll make you appreciate some aspects of Star Wars even more. Someone needs to dig up that "what are you reading" thread!

I have to agree on the differences between Trek and Wars. I'm a huge Trekkie because it was the first science fiction show I watched, but I went bonzo-loco over Star Wars when it came out in theaters.

"Integral Trees"! OMG I forgot about that book...

I love michael moorcock old sci fi, some of its so wierd.

Also Harry Harrison's 'stainless steel rat' books.

My wife really likes Asimov but im not massively into 'hard sci fi', which is wierd as i love Iain M Banks's sci fi, particularly his 'culture' series.

I love how the tech in the culture makes the star wars universe look like its using bows and arrows.

I love the Stainless Steel Rat. When I grow up I want to be just like "Slippery Jim" DiGriz. Having someone like Angelina for a wife wouldn't be bad either... rrrawr.

I also like Niven's "Tales of Known Space", and the "Ringworld" series. My tastes in sci-fi vary widely though. I do like the hard stuff, and have read all the classic authors of Asimov, Heinlein, and Clarke. Also way back to Wells and Verne. Unfortunately most of the stuff I see now in bookstores doesn't interest me as it's seems pretty "cookie cutter" in characters and plot.

TV is hit or miss. Mostly miss. Other than Dr. Who, I can't think of a science fiction show that I've watched regularly since Star Trek Enterprise (disappointing) went off air. For cartoons I watched Clone Wars and am currently watching Rebels.

I think the reason I like Star Wars more than other sci-fi is that it is an "everyman" sort of show. You don't have to be one of societies elite to have an impact and play a part in the grand scheme of things. Plus as has been mentioned before, it just has a little 'gritty-er' feel to it that makes it seem a bit more 'real' than something that's all clean and pristine.

Interestingly the intial drafts of ANH were less combat focussed but Lucas was told that it was bit like his previous fim american graphitti in being a teen film IIRC

Exactly the Star Trek utopia always looked very fake and lame to me.

And no star trek film is better than any of the OT star wars films

just no!

But comparing all of star treks tv shows and films (what 50 years of serialised weekly TV and twenty movies or whatever) to six films is like comparing apples to pianos...

of course its going to be more varied if you've 1456 hours more film time to show that universe in

Wellllllllllllllll, I don't know about NONE of the Star Trek being better than any OT Star Wars films. Wrath of Khan I would put above Return of the Jedi. It's got grit and is a pretty badass movie with a badass villain.

Exactly the Star Trek utopia always looked very fake and lame to me.

And no star trek film is better than any of the OT star wars films

just no!

But comparing all of star treks tv shows and films (what 50 years of serialised weekly TV and twenty movies or whatever) to six films is like comparing apples to pianos...

of course its going to be more varied if you've 1456 hours more film time to show that universe in

I'm probably gonna get a lot of hate for saying this but I never really thought the Sw films were that great. Sure they're good, but they're not the OMG! big deal everyone makes them out to be. Btw ST isn't all clean and pristine, that's just Federation ships . Take a look at DS9 and Voyager species/tech, or a Klingon ship .

I prescribe to the school of thought that distinguishes Star Wars from other science fiction

The thing about Star Wars is that technology (or any kind of science for that matter, given how loud space is ) has very little presence in the stories. A Science Fiction piece is something I feel has to deal with the potential of mankind achieving a greater technological prowess and the issues we may face going into the future.

So Starwars I'd say is more fantasy, and the OT is an example of **** good fantasy (prequels are a good example of schlock )

Science Fiction I'd say is something more along the lines of 2001 A Space Odyssey, Blade Runner (Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep), Star Trek (at least the original & next gen which I've seen, and definitely not the new movies ) Battlestar Gallactica, and Firefly + Serenity.

Close call. wrath of kahn is the *only* ST film i think comes close to the OT as being as legendary but then i guess when it comes to iconic i think SW just has stronger achetypes.

Its not a great film but i love the SW vs ST fans battle in 'fanboys'

Exactly the Star Trek utopia always looked very fake and lame to me.

And no star trek film is better than any of the OT star wars films

just no!

But comparing all of star treks tv shows and films (what 50 years of serialised weekly TV and twenty movies or whatever) to six films is like comparing apples to pianos...

of course its going to be more varied if you've 1456 hours more film time to show that universe in

Wellllllllllllllll, I don't know about NONE of the Star Trek being better than any OT Star Wars films. Wrath of Khan I would put above Return of the Jedi. It's got grit and is a pretty badass movie with a badass villain.

Wow so much like for Wrath of Khan. I honestly would have expected First Contact to be more popular.

EDIT: Now if we are gonna talk about TCW and Rebels, yea.... I'll take ST series (except that horrible Enterprise) over SW series.

Exactly the Star Trek utopia always looked very fake and lame to me.

And no star trek film is better than any of the OT star wars films

just no!

But comparing all of star treks tv shows and films (what 50 years of serialised weekly TV and twenty movies or whatever) to six films is like comparing apples to pianos...

of course its going to be more varied if you've 1456 hours more film time to show that universe in

I'm probably gonna get a lot of hate for saying this but I never really thought the Sw films were that great. Sure they're good, but they're not the OMG! big deal everyone makes them out to be. Btw ST isn't all clean and pristine, that's just Federation ships . Take a look at DS9 and Voyager species/tech, or a Klingon ship .

Again i think SW has more recognisable archetypes and is more iconic.

More people are going to recognise 'darth vader' when shown a picture of him than say 'khan'... vader just resonates evil

Equally SW has a mysticism that quite universal that ST doesnt really have. There is no real 'wonder' in ST..just a tricky problem that is usually sorted out by rejigging the teleporter

They scratch different itches for me. Star Wars is more Science Fantasy. Star Trek is Science Fiction. Star Wars is more about the characters, emotions, and struggle between good and evil. Star Trek deals with politics, ethics, morals and even reaches into religion at times. Both are different. The new Star Trek films feel more like Star Wars however.

Exactly the Star Trek utopia always looked very fake and lame to me.

And no star trek film is better than any of the OT star wars films

just no!

But comparing all of star treks tv shows and films (what 50 years of serialised weekly TV and twenty movies or whatever) to six films is like comparing apples to pianos...

of course its going to be more varied if you've 1456 hours more film time to show that universe in

Wellllllllllllllll, I don't know about NONE of the Star Trek being better than any OT Star Wars films. Wrath of Khan I would put above Return of the Jedi. It's got grit and is a pretty badass movie with a badass villain.

Wow so much like for Wrath of Khan. I honestly would have expected First Contact to be more popular.

EDIT: Now if we are gonna talk about TCW and Rebels, yea.... I'll take ST series (except that horrible Enterprise) over SW series.

Wrath of Khan is a very good film, its probably the only ST film i can remember very well (other than nemesis because i watched it last month), that stuck with me after wathcing it as a kid.. its got menace, betrayal, emotion.

All the other ST films i've seen but honestly they all blend into one whereas SW was sort of carbon scored onto my psyche from about 6 years old onwards when i first saw ANH

Exactly the Star Trek utopia always looked very fake and lame to me.

And no star trek film is better than any of the OT star wars films

just no!

But comparing all of star treks tv shows and films (what 50 years of serialised weekly TV and twenty movies or whatever) to six films is like comparing apples to pianos...

of course its going to be more varied if you've 1456 hours more film time to show that universe in

Wellllllllllllllll, I don't know about NONE of the Star Trek being better than any OT Star Wars films. Wrath of Khan I would put above Return of the Jedi. It's got grit and is a pretty badass movie with a badass villain.

Wow so much like for Wrath of Khan. I honestly would have expected First Contact to be more popular.

EDIT: Now if we are gonna talk about TCW and Rebels, yea.... I'll take ST series (except that horrible Enterprise) over SW series.

Wrath of Khan is a very good film, its probably the only ST film i can remember very well (other than nemesis because i watched it last month), that stuck with me after wathcing it as a kid.. its got menace, betrayal, emotion.

All the other ST films i've seen but honestly they all blend into one whereas SW was sort of carbon scored onto my psyche from about 6 years old onwards when i first saw ANH

You should try re-watching First Contact, it is a very well done story.