I’m pretty chill when it comes to my speculative fiction likes and dislikes. I understand there are things that I love but others might not. For example, Star Trek. Not everyone gets the awesomeness of Star Trek, and that’s okay. Or Harry Potter. I mean, it’s your loss, but if you’re not a Potterhead, we’re still solid.

However, there are a handful of pop culture moments that I consider dealbreakers. Like, if you don’t like them, we can still be friends, maybe even BFFs, but we’ll never be spec fic kindred spirits, because there’s a deep, fundamental level on which we’re incompatible.

Two quick notes:

• Yes, the whole “dealbreakers” idea is a reference to 30 Rock, a dealbreaker in its own right. (If you’re not familiar with the show and/or haven’t watched all the episodes so many times you have them memorized, here’s a reminder video from YouTube.)
• There are some things that I hate, and if you love them, that’s a dealbreaker for me, but I’m not here to crap on anyone’s fandom, so I’m going to keep this list positive and stick with the stuff I adore.

Okay, on with the show!

The Princess Bride

I’m starting with the easiest one since just about everyone I’ve ever met at least likes this movie.

For those who haven’t see it, how are things under that rock? The Princess Bride is about a grandfather (Peter Falk) who visits his sick, bed-ridden grandson (a very young Fred Savage) with a book. The grandson would rather eat Cheetos and play video games on his original Nintendo Entertainment System, but he humors his grandfather, and before long, is drawn into the tale of princesses and pirates, of giants and ruthless Sicilians and a hunt for a murderous, six-fingered man.

I first watched The Princess Bride when I was six or seven, and my love for it has never waned. As a Chicago girl, it still warms my heart to see Savage’s Bears jersey. Westley/Cary Elwes was my first crush. (Look at that pic up there! Wowza!) The phrase, “As you wish,” will always make my heart flutter, and to this day, I retain positive, fuzzy feelings toward all the actors who were in it.

That said, there are some individuals out there who have seen the movie, yet they can’t find anything to love in this fantastical, endlessly quotable confection of action, horror, comedy, and romance. Why? How? Tell me where the problems are in this flawless diamond of a film! In my book, The Princess Bride is as close to perfect as a movie can get, and I’m willing to die on that hill.

Galaxy Quest

There’s already been a fair amount of ink and spilled love for Galaxy Quest here at Speculative Chic (here and here and here and here and here…), so I’m not going to rehash all that goodwill. But this is my happy-making movie, the film that can just about always pull me out of even the funkiest of funks, and I will not hear a bad word said about it.

The Fifth Element

This movie is much more controversial since, in my experience, people either love it or hate it. I heart it to pieces.

Quick rundown: The Fifth Element is set in a far-off future wherein humans and aliens have mixed quite thoroughly, creating a crazy, quirky culture of cloning and opera and multipasses. Other than that, it’s just your basic story of a cabbie (played by Bruce Willis) getting sucked into a plot to take over the galaxy by a space-faring bad guy (Gary Oldman) and a reborn…something (Milla Jovovich).

Unlike Luc Besson’s more recent outing, Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, the worldbuilding in The Fifth Element happens at a much more subtle, organic pace, there’s chemistry aplenty between Willis and Jovovich, and the climax feels earned rather than tacked on. It’s a bright, brassy movie with a lot of broad, silly humor, and a naivete at its core that people either find cloying or charming. Me, I was sold from the start.

Donna Noble season of Doctor Who

I loved all of the seasons when Russell T. Davies was the Doctor Who showrunner. I liked Christopher Eccleston’s Doctor just fine. That said, I liked David Tennant’s Doctor even more, and while Billie Piper’s Rose Tyler and Freema Agyeman’s Martha Jones were fine companions both, I think the Russell T. Davies era hit its stride when Catherine Tate’s Donna Noble joined the Doctor in the TARDIS.

True, Donna started out loud and crass and incredibly self-centered. However, she wasn’t in love with the Doctor, which was a nice change after Rose and Martha, and even when Donna was kind of awful, there was always a fun chemistry between Tate and Tennant. I appreciated that Donna didn’t revere or idolize the Doctor; she saw him for the awesome, flawed alien that he was and vice versa.

What I love most about Donna is her arc. Over her season with the Doctor, her crassness and selfishness gave way to her smarter, stronger, more empathetic side, and she grew into a perfect best friend for the Doctor. He did his best to raise her up, and she did a wonderful job of keeping his ego in check, and by the time they reached their final episodes together, they were all but equals.

WARNING: MASSIVE SPOILER BELOW (Skip ahead to the next entry if you don’t want to know how Donna’s time with the Doctor ends)

I have a love/hate relationship with Donna’s “death.” The Doctor wiping Donna’s memories of their time together — when he returns her to the shallow, spoiled woman she once was — is perhaps the most heartbreaking pop culture moment I’ve ever experienced. I sob with every rewatch, and even thinking about it now makes my chest ache. So, I hate what becomes of Donna, but I also love how many feels her tragic ending gives me.

Saga by Brian K. Vaughn & Fiona Staples

Have you ever wanted a graphic novel series that mashes together science fiction and fantasy and violence and sex and love and revenge, all told through the framework of a classic Bildungsroman (aka coming-of-age story)? Then you’re either already reading Saga, or you need to pick it up post-haste!

Saga is a small story told on an epic scale, about a little family and it struggle to remain together through an intergalactic war. While its graphicness might not be to everyone’s taste — there’s quite a bit of cursing, gore, and nudity — Vaughn and Staples have created a blend of storytelling and artistry that definitely hits my sweet spot.

Uprooted by Naomi Novik

I think this might be another “you love it or you hate it” entry, as I haven’t found too many people with “meh” feelings about this book.

Uprooted is a stand-alone, high fantasy story that leans heavily on Novik’s Polish roots. Rim shot! (That joke is better/more painful if you’ve read the book.) Anyway, it’s told from the perspective of Agnieszka, a young woman taken by a wizard known as the Dragon, to be his companion/student.

Look, it’s a big book filled with careful storytelling and rich language. For some, the story moves too slowly. For others, the characters are too deeply flawed. I’ve read some of the complaints, and I can see where those readers are coming from. I really can! For me, though, I cried at the end, both because of the content and for the simple fact that the book was over, and I would never again be able to read it again for the first time, making it one of those books that I love to a truly irrational degree, warts and all.

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I have more, but I think that’s enough for one post. How about you? Are we kindred spirits, or are we destined to simply be friends traveling parallel paths through the spec fic world? What are your dealbreakers? Share!

Featured image from skeeze at Pixabay.com