No doubt, science fiction has evolved to become more sophisticated over the many decades since Hugo Gernsback, who published many military tales, had an award named for him. But mainstream sci-fi remains very war-focused and even the new Dune has shoot-em up elements. Ultimately, you’re right. Today’s fans and writers…

You’ve never met pro wrestling fans! Seriously. They’re the sci-fi fans of sports fans, highly ethically concerned.

I don’t know... defense contractors (or arms dealers, if you will) are technology companies. Kurt Vonnegut worked for GE, which made plenty of weapons systems. Amazing Stories has published so much military sci-fi. I guess I don’t really see the controversy. Raytheon supporting a science fiction awards program makes…

Wait, I got it. 15 years have passed, Rey has been using her Jedi mind trick powers to sell Death Sticks to people. It blows up huge. She’s the Queen of the South. That’s the new Breaking Bad Wars.

Well:

“I’m honestly asking: do kids today love the new sequel trilogy? Are there seven to eleven year olds out there who adore Rey and Finn and BB8 the way we loved Luke, Han, and R2 forty years ago? If there are, I’m all for them continuing their legacy. If not, bad on the studios for trying to push any more of this dreck…

Come on, the path forward is obvious.

I’d forgotten about her Mockingbird in Agents of Shield. Wasn’t she supposed to get her own show?

They’re going to do Thunderbolts in MCU, right? Tough without Introducing the Masters of Evil first, I suppose.

I really wish Hawkeye had more of his comic book origin -- circus performer turned arrow trick shot artist turned criminal for hire -- rather than the SHIELD background. Bobbi was the spy. He was the screw up.

I see where you’re coming from and yet... I still have fond memories of Vigo the Carpathian.

And then Tim Burton knocked the genre back where it belonged with Mars Attacks!, a perfectly devastating satire.

TBF, no alien civilization could become spacefaring without first getting apps approved by the Apple Store.

Aww, man... these aliens have MacPaint!

“Which is why it’s interesting to watch Chinese SF blockbusters like The Wandering Earth, where China is a dominant leader in renewable technologies and space travel, and all the other nations are just taking orders or hapless bystanders.”

Whoah, you write this entire (otherwise great) review and you don’t eveb mention Randy Quaid?

Yeah, but for the time a car is hooked up, from what I’ve read, it seems to the power company like a new house has sprung up on the block.

WAY back 2002, I covered a company called Windstar that wanted to put communications towers on top of NY buiildings to blanket the city In WiFi, mostly for first responders but eventually for everybody... the buiilding owners demanded such high rents to install the equipment that Windstar went bankrupt after spending…

The idea here is that the city had a nuclear power plant that could supply a quarter of its needs at Indian Point but the plant was recently sbut down and has not been replaced. Would have been nice to have it now.

Good points. Though, The US was an emerging nation once, too. Also, the economic and military might that make the US a hegemon now are kind of dwarfed by the powers of Krakoa, right? Maybe the message here is the old one about how power can never be trusted?