I love science fiction & i have done pretty much my whole life but i also like there to be some truth when i watch a SF movie, especially when it's set in the not to distant future.Star Trek is excellent at making complex technology seem feasible & believable.I remember watching Independace Day for the first time & marvelling at the special effects but some parts of the story where absolute tosh.I mean Jeff Goldblums character manages to write a computer virus in a few hours on an average laptop that manages to crash the aliens whole defensive computer network!!!! no chance.They must be thousands of years more advanced than us & they don't have Norton Antivirus software.I'd be interested if anyone else has seen a movie that left you feeling the same way.Stu

Hi All.

Old Gene usually had an answer for most things! The monitor sensor is a good one but wouldn't apply to exterior shots of starships (unless of course the whole program is being 'relayed' on a Starfleet subspace relay!! )
The lack of scientific fact goes right back to the very early days of the American 'pulp sci-fi' comics. I remember one comment in a book on the history of sci-fi that a member of the public complained to the writers of I think the Buck Rogers comics that in one story his solid gold spaceship was trapped by a giant magnet and that gold isn't a magnetic metal! The reply was that on Earth gold isn't magnetic but on plant so and so it was! And there was me thinking gold was an element and the same on any planet!
I can think of two instances where the laws of physics were obeyed and to great effect, the first was in a film, I think it was called Robo-Jox, a long time ago now but a sort of 'Battletech' homage involving huge battle robots with a pilot, used to fight duels to the death instead of open warfare between nations. During the duel the robots jetted off into low orbit and fought with lasers and missiles in space, this sequence was completely silent and really brought the feeling of 'being there' up front.
The second scene was in the Dr Who episode where the Doctor, Rose and Captain Jack were defending a space station against a Dalek attack. Who could forget that scene where one of the station staff was left to control something or other in a secured room with a big window looking out into space. She senses something behind her, turns slowly around to see a Dalek move into position outside the window. She stares at it, it stares back and then in total silence the ear-lights flash four times - and everybody knows exactly what it just said.
And then the window blows out!!
Sometimes when it's done right, who needs sound effects!!

A lifelong 'Who-ist'

Robin