# "Sense of Wonder" moments in sf/fantasy **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 23, 2015, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297 "2015-09-23T14:26:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2015, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297/1 "2015-09-23T14:26:07Z")
Several things I’ve read speak of “Sense of Wonder” moments in science fiction (or, occasionally, fantasy). It’s a moment where the world you are presented with changes incredibly, and generally for the better, in a dramatic way. And the protagonist (and you) are presented with the endless possibilities that have opened up. The classic example is the Change of Scale at the end of each of the books of E.E. “Doc” Smith’s _Lensman_ series, which starts out ostensibly being about interplanetary pirates, but at the end of the first book is revealed to be backed by interstellar alien bad guys, and the scale broadens to interstellar travel and the polycrystalline Lens, and each successive book broadens the scale still further, until by the end you’re dealing with Galactic Empires. A more familiar example is in the first of the movies of **The Matrix** , after Neo takes the Red Pill and wakes up in The Real World. My personal favorite is when the wall at the back of Morbius’ study slides open in **Forbidden Planet** , and we learn about the Krel and their lost civilization. Although this is a common trope, I don’t really know of many more examples of this. I suppose you could consider when Jake Sully wakes up in the Na’vi body in **Avatar** , but that hasn’t got the resonance I get from the others (despite the following sequence of the paralytic Jake discovering not onl;y his legs, but his Na’vi body that follow). Anybody got any other candidates? ---
**Author:** ![Nonsuch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nonsuch/32/2922_2.png) [@Nonsuch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nonsuch)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2015, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297/2 "2015-09-23T14:38:09Z")
[“They should’ve sent … a poet!”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3deNVM3EWIc&t=1m57s) ---
**Author:** ![mage-girl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/cc9497/32.png) [@mage-girl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mage-girl)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2015, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297/3 "2015-09-23T14:38:18Z")
Oh my Gosh. In the original Jurassic Park movie, when we first see the Brachiosaurus, that was so amazing. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Master\_Wang-Ka](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/master_wang-ka/32/3325_2.png) [@Master\_Wang-Ka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Master_Wang-Ka)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2015, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297/4 "2015-09-23T14:40:10Z")
I will second the brachiosaurus, but for all the wrong reasons. It was a tremendous moment, the first time we see a dinosaur in a movie about dinosaurs, but my thought, many years ago, in the theatre, was “Well, that’s it. Now they can put any damn thing in the world on the screen.” ---
**Author:** ![Athena](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/35a633/32.png) [@Athena](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Athena)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2015, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297/5 "2015-09-23T14:43:48Z")
> [@mage-girl](#): > > Oh my Gosh. In the original Jurassic Park movie, when we first see the Brachiosaurus, that was so amazing. 🙂 > [@Master\_Wang-Ka](#): > > I will second the brachiosaurus, but for all the wrong reasons. > > It was a tremendous moment, the first time we see a dinosaur in a movie about dinosaurs, but my thought, many years ago, in the theatre, was “Well, that’s it. Now they can put any damn thing in the world on the screen.” I’ve often tried to explain that moment to people who are young enough to not remember a time when special effects technology wasn’t nearly good enough to do things like show a fookin’ dinosaur that look absolutely real on the screen. They don’t get it. The sheer jaw-dropping that happened the first time people saw that bronto was a thing in itself. Nobody had seen anything like that before. It was not just a sense of wonder in the story itself; it was a sense of wonder in the real world as much if not more. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2015, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297/6 "2015-09-23T14:51:29Z")
> [@Athena](#): > > I’ve often tried to explain that moment to people who are young enough to not remember a time when special effects technology wasn’t nearly good enough to do things like show a fookin’ dinosaur that look absolutely real on the screen. They don’t get it. > > The sheer jaw-dropping that happened the first time people saw that bronto was a thing in itself. Nobody had seen anything like that before. It was not just a sense of wonder in the story itself; it was a sense of wonder in the real world as much if not more. I’m a big fan of stop-motion, and had seen practically all of Ray Harryhausen and Willis O’Brien’s work (and Jim Danforth, and David Smith, et al), so I could appreciate a good dinosaur on-screen. Jurassic Park was the first serious CGI attempt, and it was mind-boggling. There was no strobing, no difference is quality between the dinosaur and its surroundings, and the skin was not merely textured, but it could move and sag on its own in a way animation models never could. Mind, artists lie O’Brien and Harryhausen had gone to extremes in making and animating their models – they built “muscles” under the skin to imitate the motionms of living creatures. They put air bladders in to allow them to breathe. The painstakingly detailed the skin and then used tricks to bring out that highlighting. There were other subtler thinghs they did, as well. but nothing they did could create such a totally “real” dinosaur as JP did. I think that brachiosaur scene was made precisely to impress animators and fans of animation, just as the opening scenes of _Pinocchio_ were said to be made to impress animators. I thought of that scene as an impressive technical achievement, not as a “Sense of Wonder” moment, but I guess it qualifies. ---
**Author:** ![TCMF-2L](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tcmf-2l/32/16553_2.png) [@TCMF-2L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TCMF-2L)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2015, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297/7 "2015-09-23T15:04:03Z")
George Lucas gives us a spaceship passing overhead. It passes, passes, still passing… Still passing… TCMF-2L ---
**Author:** ![Master\_Wang-Ka](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/master_wang-ka/32/3325_2.png) [@Master\_Wang-Ka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Master_Wang-Ka)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2015, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297/8 "2015-09-23T15:06:47Z")
**Athena** and **CalMeacham** , I must respectfully… totally agree with you. I tripped over the Skeleton Battle scene from Jason and the Argonauts when I was five, channel surfing. Not long after that, I saw Dinosaurus! and King Kong for the first time. Stop motion was da bomb, back in the day, and it still is… but it’s time consuming, and therefore expensive, and why bother when you can get the same effect with Video Toaster, or even better photorealism with Industrial Light and Magic? But when I saw that brachiosaurus… I will admit to being impressed. I am told that Phil Tippett, upon seeing that scene, thought, “Well, there went my entire career.” It took a while for someone to produce UNimpressive CGI effects. Or to overuse them. Or to use them in such a way that destroyed suspension of disbelief… ---
**Author:** ![The\_Stainless\_Steel\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_stainless_steel_rat/32/5727_2.png) [@The\_Stainless\_Steel\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Stainless_Steel_Rat)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2015, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297/9 "2015-09-23T15:15:04Z")
I heartily second the Brachiosaur and the opening of Star Wars with the Star Destroyer. As for books…I would have to say Larry Niven’s Ringworld, a ring a million kilometers wide circling a star, with space for literally millions of civilizations…wow. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2015, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297/10 "2015-09-23T16:14:34Z")
Pullman’s _His Dark Materials_ trilogy, when it starts off being the adventures of a willful young girl, Lyra, and escalates into the archetypcal showdown for the fate of the species for all eternity. A traitorous witch who was one of her adversaries tortures one of the loyal witches to find out what fundamental role it is that Lyra represents in the conflict. It turns out she is Eve, and the religious establishment fears she will bring about the “fall”. She enters the underworld and, while there, changes what death will mean to everyone from this point forward. ---
**Author:** ![Nonsuch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nonsuch/32/2922_2.png) [@Nonsuch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nonsuch)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2015, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297/11 "2015-09-23T16:18:32Z")
If we’re considering books, I always loved this passage of _The Hobbit,_ when Bilbo gazes upon Smaug and his hoard for the first time: > [@](#): > > To say that Bilbo’s breath was taken away is no description at all. There are no words left to express his staggerment, since Men changed the language that they learned of elves in the days when all the world was wonderful. Bilbo had heard tell and sing of dragon-hoards before, but the splendour, the lust, the glory of such treasure had never yet come home to him. His heart was filled and pierced with enchantment and with the desire of dwarves; and he gazed motionless, almost forgetting the frightful guardian, at the gold beyond price and count. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2015, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297/12 "2015-09-23T16:21:44Z")
In the director’s cut of _Dark City_, the first time you see the full extent of the City. ---
**Author:** ![John\_DiFool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_difool/32/19543_2.png) [@John\_DiFool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_DiFool)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2015, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297/13 "2015-09-23T16:23:14Z")
If films are on topic, I was and remain blown away by the ending of [The Quiet Earth](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2hnfTqQKO0). [**SPOILER WARNING** for the video…] ---
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2015, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297/14 "2015-09-23T16:26:30Z")
> [@TCMF-2L](#): > > George Lucas gives us a spaceship passing overhead. It passes, passes, still passing… Still passing… > > TCMF-2L We brake for nobody ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2015, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297/15 "2015-09-23T16:31:48Z")
This is kind of the “anti-” sense of wonder, but by the ending of **The Walking Dead** pilot, I was in awe–I felt _The guys that made this aren’t screwing around, we’re going to see just how much “fun” this new world is_. Particularly the horse getting taken down at the end; did not see that coming. ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2015, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297/16 "2015-09-23T16:41:05Z")
> [@TCMF-2L](#): > > George Lucas gives us a spaceship passing overhead. It passes, passes, still passing… Still passing… > > TCMF-2L > [@YogSosoth](#): > > We brake for nobody Even if you can’t stand the show, [this opening](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gz8UYqLp-o) is very well done. ---
**Author:** ![Simplicio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c37758/32.png) [@Simplicio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Simplicio)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2015, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297/17 "2015-09-23T16:46:55Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > I thought of that scene as an impressive technical achievement, not as a “Sense of Wonder” moment, but I guess it qualifies. It’s my favourite because it works as both. In the real world, it was a sense of wonder because, as **Wang Ka** says, the movie going audience realized “now they could put any damn thing on the screen”. And in the movie, Dr Grant whose spent his life scraping in the dirt for dead scraps of dinosaurs first sees that technology has brought the real thing to life. ---
**Author:** ![Morbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/morbo/32/389_2.png) [@Morbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morbo)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2015, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297/18 "2015-09-23T16:54:20Z")
I enjoyed the scene in **Galaxy Quest** where Tim Allen (and the audience) first see the vista of space when the Protector ship pulls back the covering to zap him home. ---
**Author:** ![Smeghead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f1d935/32.png) [@Smeghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smeghead)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2015, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297/19 "2015-09-23T17:00:58Z")
Reading (I think) Ben Bova’s “Exiles” series - a trilogy about a group of people who get kicked off Earth and end up heading out to the stars in a generation ship. At the end of book two, the ship arrives at the planet they were heading for and they discover it’s not that great. After some discussion and plot, they decide to head toward a different star and hope that planet is better. On the very next page (I was reading a single-volume edition), you flash forward hundreds of years, and the people living on the ship have degenerated from a technical civilization to a bunch of ignorant savages to whom the ship is the entire universe. It was an incredibly jarring transition when I read it the first time. ---
**Author:** ![Habeed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a587f6/32.png) [@Habeed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Habeed)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2015, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297/20 "2015-09-23T17:35:08Z")
Here’s a sense of wonder in more modern media. In Kerbal Space Program, the first few times you set up an interplanetary transfer to another planet, and you hit the time acceleration button, and the sun swirls around your spacecraft as days, weeks, months pass, the other planet slooooowwwwly getting closer, a faint spec eventually visible surrounded by nothing but blackness. This is the point that you realize that space is actually really really huge, and that travel “merely” inside the same solar system is an incredible accomplishment. It makes me wish for a computer game that doesn’t cheat with space brakes and bullshit ftl drives, but lets you experience this from inside some massive realistically simulated spacecraft similar to the Discovery from 2001. All the switches in the game would be functional, etc. You would be able to warp time but would have to survive all the simulated real world constraints of such a journey. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sense-of-wonder-moments-in-sf-fantasy/732297.md?page=2)