Taking science fiction seriously
The Truth Is Out There: Christian Faith and the Classics of TV Science Fiction by Thomas Bertonneau and Kim Paffenroth (Brazos Press, $23.99 pb, 272 pages)
Thomas Bertonneau and Kim Paffenroth are both well-respected American academics and committed Christians. Readers should not be put off by the 50s “flying saucer” image on the cover. This very erudite book looks at the possible Christian content in six prominent television series: Dr. Who; Star Trek; The Prisoner; The Twilight Zone; The X-Files; and Babylon 5.
The introduction, “Science, Religion, and Storytelling,” is tantalizingly brief, especially the section on “Science and Religion,” which argues, in a nutshell, that Christianity, by sweeping away outlooks on the world based in magic, actually made science possible in the West. The claim is that there is not necessarily an opposition between science and Christian religion.
The lengthy six chapters which follow look at multifarious Christian themes in these television shows, which, when arranged together by the authors, can be seen as constituting a highly coherent description of the main elements of Christian faith. The six shows are used to illustrate the following themes, respectively: “Grappling with the ‘Powers’: Doctor Who in the Earthly and Celestial Dominions;” “Christian Virtues and Human Nature: Star Trek;” “Human Freedom: The Prisoner;” “Sin and Grace: The Twilight Zone;” “The In-Breaking Bedazzlement of Truth: The X-Files as Apocalypse;” and “Preaching the Word: Babylon 5 and the Universal Gospel.” Christianity is said to be the most decent and humane outlook – as opposed to old and new challenges to it such as paganism, gnosticism, scientism, modern totalitarianism and so forth. The work approaches, in some respects, or even builds on insights seen in the best work of classic Christian writers such as C.S. Lewis.
At the same time, the book also offers to science fiction readers a very able defence of a genre that is sometimes disparaged by the academy, literary circles and considerable sectors of popular culture. Indeed, the book expresses a great deal of hope in science fiction as one of the most probing and vital genres today, in television, film, as well as in writing. This valourizing of science fiction for its willingness to look at serious questions about humanity and its future, as well as pointing to its truly important role in the culture today, should be welcomed by all those persons interested and fascinated in that genre, regardless of their outlook on religion. The apparent seriousness of science fiction may be attested to by the fact that, even today, the new Battlestar: Galactica has been acclaimed by some critics as the best show on television.
The book also offers a fairly good description of each of the six television series for those who might not be conversant with all of them. The section on Star Trek, it should be pointed out, concentrates on the original series.
The conclusion, “Science Fiction, Contemporary Popular Culture and Gospel Theology” ends with a succinct description of the problems inherent in our media-dominated age, such as the descent to the lowest common denominator. However, it expresses the hope that such new media as the DVD and the internet may, to some extent, be able to change the baneful trajectory of a television-dominated society.
The book points the way towards a novel, salutary cultural criticism that could be carried out by various sharp adversaries of the current-day regime. The authors’ willingness to seriously consider aspects of pop culture puts them light-years ahead of such rather stuffy journals as The New Criterion and Modern Age. The authors are on the right track in trying to engage with pop-cultural phenomena that huge numbers of people, especially younger people, can recognize, rather than clinging to the stuffiness of old books that few people in our society can see as meaningful cultural referents.
The authors are taking into account the extreme thinness of education today, but are hoping to make an impact by writing about things current in the culture.
One would hope to see this type of cultural criticism – which need not necessarily be explicitly Christian – extended to more works of science fiction and fantasy, and various subgenres such as, for example, space-opera and cyberpunk. It could also be extended to other aspects of the culture, such as the pop-music of the 80s (today called “retro”) – which might be characterized as the last stand of a Eurocentric Romantic aesthetic in North American popular culture.
Although one may not agree entirely with the interpretations given to some of the television shows (for example, Interim readers might view Star Trek as rather more socially liberal than the authors do), they should be applauded for the endeavour to create a type of neo-traditionalist cultural criticism that has at least something of a “cutting-edge” feel to it.