{"id":5005,"date":"2011-04-30T00:21:39","date_gmt":"2011-04-30T07:21:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/josemarquez.com\/xsml\/?p=5005"},"modified":"2011-04-30T00:21:39","modified_gmt":"2011-04-30T07:21:39","slug":"why-thrillers-set-in-space-are-often-more-vivid-than-those-set-on-earth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/2011\/04\/30\/why-thrillers-set-in-space-are-often-more-vivid-than-those-set-on-earth\/","title":{"rendered":"Why thrillers set in space can be more vivid than those set on Earth."},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I came of age at a time when outer space was a potent symbol in popular culture. <\/p>\n<p>This quote from an <a href=\"http:\/\/bldgblog.blogspot.com\/2011\/04\/spacesuit-interview-with-nicholas-de.html\">interview<\/a> with historian Nicholas de Monchaux sheds light on why:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>[T]he space of outer space is\u2026 a space that humans cannot actually encounter without dying, and so must enter exclusively through a dependence on technological mediation.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>If space is death, the space ship is also a casket \u2013\u00a0a vessel in which to cross the river Styx. In movies like <em>2001<\/em> and <em>Alien<\/em>, the protagonists mostly fight to live yet they are always already entombed, enveloped by the void of space.<\/p>\n<p>What makes these movies thrilling is not a suspension of disbelief but the directness with which they can summon our innermost fear by projecting us into limbo; floating, weightless, ghosts in purgatory.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I came of age at a time when outer space was a potent symbol in popular culture. This quote from an interview with historian Nicholas de Monchaux sheds light on why: [T]he space of outer space is\u2026 a space that humans cannot actually encounter without dying, and so must enter exclusively through a dependence on&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5,10],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5005"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5005"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5005\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5005"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5005"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5005"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}