Science-Fiction Royalty

MM's take on the way monarchy is portrayed in much of science fiction. He's basically spot on, even though I love the genre. I just ignore the rampant republicanism.

From The Mad Monarchist (15 March 2012)

!!Reader Warning!! This post contains images which may not be appropriate for very sheltered children or people living in the state of Kansas. -MM

Royalty in Science-Fiction is a subject I have been asked about more than once but have been reluctant to address. For one thing, Sci-Fi fans tend to be a little on the dogmatic side and I really don’t know much about the genre. I liked “Quantum Leap”, “Battlestar Galactica”, “Dune” and the old “Star Trek” series (if there’s no Kirk, Spock or Scotty it ain’t Star Trek in my book) and I liked the old “Star Wars” films but that’s about it. So much of it always seemed too preachy, leftist, incomprehensible and, well, just silly for me to take seriously. However, in all fairness, I’ve also never been terribly fond of much of anything in the Fantasy genre which I know many monarchists absolutely love. I have heard many, many good things about “The Lord of the Rings” and “The Chronicles of Narnia” but I’ve just never had any interest in trying to get ‘into’ them. Lest any think I am being biased, most of the fantasy stuff I have liked (books or films) are ones that I either had to read back in my school days (z.b. “A Wrinkle in Time”, “The Neverending Story”) or watched with someone else when it was their choice. In fact, much of the same goes for Sci-Fi - I saw the “Star Wars” prequels but rest assured I did not pay a dime to see them, and I am thankful for that as I would have felt profoundly ripped off (my apologies to any fans).

Longtime readers will recall I have addressed monarchy in “Star Wars” before (here), so I will not be delving into that too deeply but will take a look at least at what Sci-Fi examples of dealing with monarchy that I am familiar with. Based on what little I have seen, I think there seems to be an assumption on the part of many monarchists that the Sci-Fi genre is more friendly towards monarchy than it actually is, perhaps because Sci-Fi is often lumped together with the Fantasy genre which, while I know even less about it, is probably more pro-monarchy than any other. It tends to be more ‘fairy tale’ in nature and fairy tales and monarchy absolutely go hand-in-hand. Sci-Fi, on the other hand, based on what I have seen, seems to be more hostile toward monarchy than not. In my experience, when dealing with royalty from outer space the norm seems to be that they are evil at worst, spoiled brats at best and, if they are female, very, very scantily clad. Even in the “Star Wars” spoof “Space Balls” the princess was portrayed as an immature, spoiled brat. This may be why those Sci-Fi selections I do like tend to have nothing to do with monarchy at all so say nothing negative or positive about it either way. One thing I do like is imagination and weirdness. That being so, there’s no better place to start than “Flash Gordon”.

Emperor Ming the Merciless

I can’t help it, when I think of Sci-Fi movies, I think of “Flash Gordon”. It took all the usual stuff I hate most about Sci-Fi and just went so extremely over-the-top with it I ended up actually liking it. I thought it was hilarious and a pretty fun movie. However, we do see the usual negative portrayal of monarchy on full display. I refer, of course, to one of the most famous fictional villains of all time; Emperor Ming the Merciless. In the big “Flash Gordon” movie he was played by the incomparable Max von Sydow and, according to George Lucas, we have Ming the Merciless to thank for inspiring his later monarchial and aristocratic villains The Emperor and Darth Vader in “Star Wars”. Yep, it all started with the vicious, sadistic and fashionably flamboyant Emperor Ming. I hate two things about the character of Ming the most: I hate that they made him a monarch of course and I hate that they went with the whole Fu Manchu, evil-Asian villain stereotype. As far as villains go, Ming the Merciless is about as villainous as they come. He’s really just pure evil. There’s no rhyme or reason for him, he’s just a sadistic jerk. He started pelting earth with death rays (and you can’t be a sci-fi villain without a death ray) just for kicks. He demands slavish obedience or death and those are the only options.

Princess Aura

We also get another anti-monarchy stereotype with “Flash Gordon” and that is in the person of Ming’s daughter Princess Aura. She’s evil, alluring and, from the look of her wardrobe, pretty chilly. Ming is just as merciless when it comes to his own daughter, his cruelty toward her only adding to his own villainy. Princess Aura, however, at least is not as pure evil as her father since she does sort of come around to being on the side of the good guys in the end. Though, that’s debatable, best as I recall it may have just been selfishness on her part but I do remember she ended up helping out the heroes and being severely punished for it. Not being an expert on all things Sci-Fi, I don’t know if she was the first space princess to wear a metal bikini as a costume, but I do know she wasn’t the last. That has become almost as standard as having a villainous emperor. So, there are Ming the Merciless and Princess Aura, two typical members of outer space royalty: evil, arbitrary and sadistic emperor and spoiled, barely clothed princess. Moving along then.

The Emperor

Enter the world of “Star Wars”, a movie which came out before “Flash Gordon” but which was a totally new franchise. “Flash Gordon” had been around since the 30’s and, in fact, George Lucas only came up with “Star Wars” because he was not allowed to do a “Flash Gordon” movie, which had been his first choice. In “Star Wars” we get all of the basic stereotypes but they take some time to come out. First, we once again have the villainous, arbitrary and sadistic emperor. In fact, in the original films, he didn’t even have a name, he was simply “The Emperor”. He is spoken of (with fear and trembling) in “Star Wars” but is not actually seen until “The Empire Strikes Back” and then only as a holographic image. I have heard they have since changed that image to that of the actor who later played the Emperor. If so, I would categorize that as George Lucas ruining something with his mindless tweaking. That first glimpse we get of the Emperor was very effective, very creepy. I am told it was made by superimposing the eyes of a chimpanzee on the face of a woman and then dubbing in a masculine voice. However they did it, I thought it worked great and if they changed that it’s only one more reason for me to skip the “re-mastered” versions.

How they bow & scrape on the death star

In “Return of the Jedi” we finally see the Emperor in person after already getting used to Darth Vader as the resident super-villain of the “Star Wars” universe. It says something about the Emperor that even the awesomely sadistic Darth Vader is considered to be a teddy bear compared to the Emperor. True, he lacks the sense of style of our friend Ming the Merciless, sticking to a simple black hooded robe, but he’s no less pure evil. Destroying whole planets just to set an example -done. Establishing a system of rule based purely on fear -done. Willing to sell-out your most devoted henchman in order to advance your cause -done. It was also in “Return of the Jedi” that we got another staple of sci-fi royalty: a space princess in a metallic bikini. Yes, to the eternal joy of frustrated nerds the world over, Princess Lea finally joins her objectified sisters of the golden bikini. Sure, it is only because she’s being held prisoner by a slug-like alien mobster but, hey, they had to work it into the story somehow right? Princess Lea generally fares better than most sci-fi princesses -but not by much. Our first introduction to her in “Star Wars” was, as usual, as a princess who, while certainly tough, determined and one of the good guys, was nonetheless spoiled, arrogant and just rather stuck-up, even going so far as to insult the men rescuing her for doing it improperly. Her image recovered in “The Empire Strikes Back” but it was also at that point that she stopped being so much a female heroine and more just the typical girl in a romance and by the next movie she’s in a metallic bikini with a dog collar chained to an alien mob boss. What a downward spiral.

Princess Lea

It is okay for Princess Lea to be a good guy because she’s fighting for the republic. Though, why there are princesses and lords and knights in a republic we are never really told. “Star Wars” is rather odd that way. Overall, the Empire comes off as being far more egalitarian than the Republic. We don’t see much of it but we are led to believe that there is the Emperor, Lord Vader and there the ‘upper class’ ends. Everyone else is simply military personnel and they advance on merit (you screw up, you die, someone who didn’t screw up gets your job -very meritocratic). On the other side we have a princess, of what we don’t know, as well as knights and eventually a queen. But, if I start getting into all the stuff there that makes no sense, we’ll be at this all day, so we’ll move on. I think I mentioned “Dune” at the beginning so why not toss that example in. Again, I’ve never read any of the books (I almost never read fiction, I have nothing against it, I just hardly ever do) but I liked the movie and I liked the more recent mini-series. However, there again we have the evil, dastardly Emperor and once again he also has a daughter who is spoiled, arrogant and so on but who does more or less come around to the side of the good guys. “Dune” may deserve a bit of a pass though because it is set in a purely monarchial, feudal sort of universe. There are no republics or republicans, there is an Emperor and then there are the aristocrats, some of whom are good (Duke Leto) and some of whom are bad (Baron Vladimir). I don’t think there was a princess in a metallic bikini, best as I recall, but there was certainly plenty of flesh being flashed in the mini-series lest anyone think “Dune” was above that sort of thing.

Finally we come to “Star Trek” and, as stated, I can only really speak to the actual, original show. The rest I’m not that familiar with. I’ve been told that the Klingons got an emperor in “Star Trek: The Next Generation” but, based on a little poking around I’ve done for this write-up, if that’s true no one seems to have noticed. Anyway, one thing you need to know about “Star Trek” and probably most pop-fiction these days is that anything called an “empire” is bad. If there are bad guys, they have an empire. So, in “Star Trek” the most frequently recurring bad guys were the Klingons and the Romulans. Neither have an “Emperor” but they are both referred to as empires. Why? Because they’re bad guys and that’s all there is to it. As best as I can recall, we only ever saw one monarch in “Star Trek” and that was in the last season episode “Elaan of Troyius”. In the context of just that last season of the show, I have to say it comes off as very anti-monarchy.

"Her Glory" The Dolman of Elaas

I present as exhibit A the issue of the reception of the reigning monarch of Elaas. Just to fill in; the USS Enterprise was charged with escorting the ruler of Elaas, known as the Dolman (and here I was thinking that was a Hungarian cavalry jacket) to the planet Troyius to marry the local ruler and end the war between the two worlds. When the Dolman is beamed aboard the only special consideration is that Kirk and company drop to one knee, and even that is only at the prompting of some surly bodyguards. Compare this to another episode in the same season (and probably the worst ever in my book) called “The Savage Curtain”. In that one, they beam up Abraham Lincoln (no joke) and even though Kirk himself says he doesn’t believe it can possibly be the real Abe Lincoln, he orders “presidential honors” be given which include a security detachment, a musical recording of salutary drums, a boatswain whistle to pipe the guest aboard and everyone in full dress uniforms. Now, compare that to when the ruling monarch of a sovereign planet beams up and the only special attention is a reluctant drop to one knee and some annoyed expressions.

Sadly, it gets no better from there. The Dolman of Elaas (played by France Nguyen) is basically a combination of the stereotypical sci-fi evil emperor and scantily-clad princess put together. Her preference seems to be to wear as little as possible, she is violent, spoiled, rude, petulant, vindictive and, well, rather dumb. She nearly kills the ambassador of her husband-to-be and tries to seduce Kirk into marrying her and using his starship to annihilate her enemies. Yeah, she’s a real peach. In the course of the episode we find out the Klingons are trying to thwart the mission by sabotaging the Enterprise and then showing up to blast it to bits after disabling the engines. The Dolman, totally unintentionally, helps to get the engines working again, allowing Kirk to smack the Klingons hard enough to convince them to give it up and go home. The Enterprise goes on and we are to assume the Dolman marries the ruler of Troyius and presumably everything works out thanks to Kirk teaching her that she has to treat people with courtesy if she doesn’t want everyone to hate her. As “Star Trek” goes, I thought it was one of the better episodes but it still manages to cram in every typical sci-fi prejudice against monarchy in under an hour.

Others may know some more positive examples to point out. As I said at the beginning, I like this or that but am no expert on the genre. I wouldn’t know Dr. What from Stuff I Lost in Space or Babylon Nine from Deep Space Five. The only sci-fi TV shows I ever watched had nothing to do with royalty or monarchy. The closest thing probably would have been Imperious Leader on “Battlestar: Galactica” and even that was just a robot in a lizard costume so I hardly think that counts. Based on what I have seen, the image is a very negative one and full of constantly repeated stereotypical characters. For all you sci-fi fans out there, feel free to make use of the comments box to let me know if there are better examples out there. From what I’ve seen, the genre has not been kind.