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mr_squiddleIn dramatic fiction it is necessary, if the characters are at point A and wish to arrive at point B, to cipher logically through the gap between the two points. The author defines what is available to the characters to work with, and then shows the process by which those resources are used towards the goal, successfully or not. Omitting the process is in drama a cheat, and even in comedy only sometimes acceptable. Monty Python's Mr Pither can escape certain death by way of a "Scene Missing" title card by virtue of subverting expectations, but on the other hand Phineas and Ferb (to whom the laws of physics bend and are cartoon characters besides) need a giant map, a rubber band, two trees and an ox to escape a desert island.¹ Even in the world of television science fiction, whose makers believe that anything is possible because it's science fiction, the illusion of the reasoning process is still retained to the extent that the work pretends to be drama; at its best, TV SF still provides an illustration of valid reasoning process even if what's being reasoned with is nonsensical, by virtue of using internally coherent and consistent nonsense.
And then there's the work of Steven Moffat, in which the "Scene Missing" privilege is asserted for drama. The implied argument is that, as the audience has familiarity with the process, having "seen this bit" any number of times on any number of programmes, it can be taken as read; no longer being necessary to the entertainment it can be omitted, and to get from A to B it is sufficient merely to identify A and B; the reasoning process is replaced with a placeholder on the part of the writer, and simply conceded on the part of the audience, which would presumably otherwise be yelling "Get on with it!" at its collective screen, because, in its jadedness, the how of things no longer matters. Who cares?
The magnificent utility of eliding reason, of course, is that an absent thought process cannot reveal the flaws in one's plot, and saves considerable writing time.
For example, consider a cylindrical colony spaceship. In science fiction that manner of ship would acquire gravity by rotation, meaning that everyone would do their living at right angles to its axis. If instead it's simply a giant apartment building, whence the gravity? Acceleration would do it, but of course in the absence of acceleration the gravity goes away, and if the ship not only cancels its acceleration but starts backing up and going in the opposite direction everything not tied down will end up on the ceiling. Consequently if one has an apartment-building spaceship that undergoes that precise scenario but no one inside even notices, that spaceship has gravity generators.
The story-space of a ship with gravity generators is considerably different to that of a ship without them. If your protagonists happen to be equidistant between an enemy force (at one end of the ship) and their own escape vessel (at the other end of the ship) and have the advantage of a hyper-advanced multifunction device known to be capable of tricks like subsuming control of such a ship's control mechanisms, the notion of dialing up the G's under the enemy and trapping them under their own weight while your protagonists make your exit has to be raised, and if as the writer you find that solution in conflict with your predetermined plot-driven outcome you must adjust your premises to prohibit that solution, and then repeat that process of prohibition for all other related solutions²...unless of course you've done away with the process of reason.
I propose that the process of eliding reason while asserting drama shall henceforth be called "Cutting To The Feels".³
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¹ Harlan Ellison wrote a story in which he established that "with one bound, Jack was free" was a cheat...in order to use that solution. Harlan Ellison has also called Doctor Who the best science fiction show on TV. I think he did both of these things in the 1970s, and the latter when Douglas Adams was writing the show. So.
² If your plot has already established the relation of gravity to time,
and you have a Time Lord with a) a multifunction psychic screwdriver, b) two weeks with nothing to do, and c) readily available gravity manipulator technology, you gotta lotta 'splainin' to do...
³ Which reminds me of Steve Martin's minor classic of magical realism, L.A. STORY, in which his protagonist, trying to argue his girlfriend into not leaving him, says, "I know there's something that would make you stay! The right word, attitude, plan...but these are all tricks! So let's forego that! Let's assume that it happened..."⁴
⁴ She leaves him.
And then there's the work of Steven Moffat, in which the "Scene Missing" privilege is asserted for drama. The implied argument is that, as the audience has familiarity with the process, having "seen this bit" any number of times on any number of programmes, it can be taken as read; no longer being necessary to the entertainment it can be omitted, and to get from A to B it is sufficient merely to identify A and B; the reasoning process is replaced with a placeholder on the part of the writer, and simply conceded on the part of the audience, which would presumably otherwise be yelling "Get on with it!" at its collective screen, because, in its jadedness, the how of things no longer matters. Who cares?
The magnificent utility of eliding reason, of course, is that an absent thought process cannot reveal the flaws in one's plot, and saves considerable writing time.
For example, consider a cylindrical colony spaceship. In science fiction that manner of ship would acquire gravity by rotation, meaning that everyone would do their living at right angles to its axis. If instead it's simply a giant apartment building, whence the gravity? Acceleration would do it, but of course in the absence of acceleration the gravity goes away, and if the ship not only cancels its acceleration but starts backing up and going in the opposite direction everything not tied down will end up on the ceiling. Consequently if one has an apartment-building spaceship that undergoes that precise scenario but no one inside even notices, that spaceship has gravity generators.
The story-space of a ship with gravity generators is considerably different to that of a ship without them. If your protagonists happen to be equidistant between an enemy force (at one end of the ship) and their own escape vessel (at the other end of the ship) and have the advantage of a hyper-advanced multifunction device known to be capable of tricks like subsuming control of such a ship's control mechanisms, the notion of dialing up the G's under the enemy and trapping them under their own weight while your protagonists make your exit has to be raised, and if as the writer you find that solution in conflict with your predetermined plot-driven outcome you must adjust your premises to prohibit that solution, and then repeat that process of prohibition for all other related solutions²...unless of course you've done away with the process of reason.
I propose that the process of eliding reason while asserting drama shall henceforth be called "Cutting To The Feels".³
_____________
¹ Harlan Ellison wrote a story in which he established that "with one bound, Jack was free" was a cheat...in order to use that solution. Harlan Ellison has also called Doctor Who the best science fiction show on TV. I think he did both of these things in the 1970s, and the latter when Douglas Adams was writing the show. So.
² If your plot has already established the relation of gravity to time,
and you have a Time Lord with a) a multifunction psychic screwdriver, b) two weeks with nothing to do, and c) readily available gravity manipulator technology, you gotta lotta 'splainin' to do...
³ Which reminds me of Steve Martin's minor classic of magical realism, L.A. STORY, in which his protagonist, trying to argue his girlfriend into not leaving him, says, "I know there's something that would make you stay! The right word, attitude, plan...but these are all tricks! So let's forego that! Let's assume that it happened..."⁴
⁴ She leaves him.
