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It's a good time to like SF, TV and cinema

In his (mostly) spoiler free review of Rogue One (I just typed Rouge One - that's a very different film!) John Scalzi says:

In fact, for two films running the folks at Disney have produced two really top-notch Star Wars films, a feat that has not been managed in thirty-five years — or possibly ever, depending on whether you believe the original Star Wars, as epochal as it undeniably was, is actually good, which given its pastiche-heavy, merely-serviceable plot and script, and leaden acting and direction, is debatable.
Picking up on his remarks on the original - yes it was pastiche-heavy, but George Lucas brought SF to the cinema, and for that I am eternally grateful. Since then we've had plenty of effects heavy SF films, but we've also had some more subtle ones - Bicentennial Man, A.I., that one where the guy is on the Moon in an all white moonbase. On TV there seem to be a number of US based TV series which involve space travel, but for a really good programme which has some of the familiar tropes around artificial intelligence and what it means to be human, I've really enjoyed Humans on Channel 4. It's a good time to be around.
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