You've reached Chewbacca's voice mail; please leave a message.

3 November 2009

I'm reading Han Solo's Revenge, which I first read as a teenager in the 80s. (The book was published in 1979.)

In one scene, at a spaceport on a "highly industrialized, densely inhabited planet," Han has sent Chewie away on a task, but then a potentially dangerous meeting comes up:

His first impulse was to find Chewbacca [...] But if he had to hunt the Wookie among the guild halls and portmaster's offices, it could take the rest of the long Bonadan day.

What, they don't have cell phones in the Star Wars universe?

That's the peril of science fiction. Writers of SF can be so forward looking, but they're still rooted in their time, which makes for increasing "reality shear" over the years. George Lucas, and by extension, Brian Daley, imagined this advanced star traveling civilization in much detail, yet personal communications devices are conspicuously absent.

It's the kind of thing that becomes jarring in 2009, when even our primitive planet-bound civilization has nearly ubiquitous connectivity. For sure in densely inhabited places, where we're steeped in it. Cell phones are everywhere, along with Wi-Fi.

As a kid in 1984 (let's say), and likely for most other readers at the time, it didn't seem strange that a Captain and his First Mate would be out of touch. Especially at a spaceport on a highly industrialized world. (Maybe it's those silly IAA regulations to blame.)

In 2009, apparently, the missing technology is noteworthy enough to inspire a whole post on some blogs.

It gets even better later on. At the same spaceport, Chewbacca is on the Millennium Falcon and Han is stymied from entering by evildoers. How to get a message to him? No problem! Han sneaks into a nearby "cargo lifter" and flashes the headlights to send a message in Morse code.

(Who needs cell phones when you have idle cargo lifters and Morse code?)

But please, go on and tell me how you've been pointing out this and many other failures of imagination for decades, and also let's get into a heated Star Wars versus Star Trek discussion, noting that Star Trek had personal communicators in the 60s. :-)

Rubbing sticks together to make math on Mars.

by Scott Carpenter on 3 November 2009 at 5:23 pm
permalink | comments (7) | filed under miscellany
tagged: science fiction, star wars

Comments

After the collapse of civilization you'll find morose code very useful. And a generator.

Nice post.

Posted by Chad on 3 November 2009 at 7:43 pm

And a nice general purpose labor droid.

(I was going to edit your comment for a typo, but then "morose" seemed fitting for the end of civilization.) :-)

Thanks for stopping by, dude!

Posted by Scott Carpenter on 3 November 2009 at 7:49 pm

Almost got me with the spam repellent question: sum of 3+6. Had to use my abacus. I'm going to have to break out the typewriter and mail a letter to the author of this malarkey!

Posted by Shawn on 4 November 2009 at 10:28 am

Maybe I'll have to ratchet up the difficulty of the math question. It's meant to filter out "your kind," but clearly failed at that. :-)

Oh... and: thanks for visiting and commenting.

Posted by Scott Carpenter on 4 November 2009 at 10:33 am

C'mon, you are a 50 year old guy concerned about the absence of cellphones in a book called "Hans Solo's Revenge." Is the next post going to be about the absurdity of green eggs with ham?

Posted by Shawn on 4 November 2009 at 10:42 am

Excellent! Great idea. Stay tuned.

Posted by Scott Carpenter on 4 November 2009 at 10:47 am

The picture on the book cover looks like Han is going to "tap" Chewy in the back of the head..."Gangsta" style. I hate to burst anyone's bubbble, but Chewy does die in one of the later books......how could they kill Chewy off?!! AAAAWWWWHHHHHHHEEEEEWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!

Posted by Scott L. on 4 November 2009 at 10:52 am

You can follow any responses to this entry through the
comments feed.