The Fourteenth of Green by Kanata is more what I would call SF. Science plays a central role in the plot, not just as set-up for the plot, and there is world building shown in dialogue, in the news cast, and in Rodney's technical means and limits.
There is also an ethical dilemma at the heart of the fic which is not only valuable for character insight, but which (more importantly perhaps) is relevant to the interests of people in developed countries.
After I wrote the comment above about Lavvyan's Dearest, I've thought some more about how best to explain what SF is to me/what I look for in SF (overlapping but not identical concepts). I don't think I explained it well at all.
The science in SF for me is not just hard science or the natural sciences. It is very much science ethics and history, sociology and anthropology. If SF is not a commentary on the real world and an exploration of tendencies in the real world, then it's not genuine SF to me. I don't consider space operas or fantastic fiction with improbable or impossible "science" that might as well be magic to be real SF.
Lavvyan's Dearest was not SF to me because it was a different genre, it explored an ethical dilemma that does not have much to do with science or social trends, but it did at least allude to a plot full of science and world building, so I can accept calling it SF.
Kanata's The Fourteenth of Green is what I would call SF.
I don't think this level of true SF-ness is common in SGA fics at all, like you also point out Cathy. I'm not really surprised by that, because the canon itself is not true SF according to my definition - I think The Fourteenth of Green is a genre shift, and a difficult to accomplish genre shift at that. Romantic dramas are far easier to construct, and unlike SF which must say something new to be good, romance is good when it tells the same story over and over again with small variations.
I am reminded of another fanwork with genre shift, but this one had a more obvious connection to canon that Kanata's sifting out of the transformation and infection themes in the show: Open Secrets of the Pegasus Galaxy by yevgenie
I don't mean obvious in the sense of more people able to come up with the concept or it being easier to come up with, I mean more obvious in the sense of me being able to understand the connection to canon better.
I've read more meta about atrocities of war in SGA than I have about transformation and identity, and that is probably a large part of why. It's a bit strange to me, now that I think about it: Ford → Wraith juice Ford Sheppard → Bug Sheppard Teyla → Wraith hybrid Teyla and later Wraith queen Teyla Weir → Asuran Weir Carson → clone Carson McKay → ascending McKay and later brain squid McKay
And on and on. Transformation fics, doppelgänger fics (robots, alternate timelines, clones, AIs) and ascension fics are popular, mostly for kink and melodrama, less commonly for ethical examinations of loss, grief, obsession and quality of life.
Hmm, and it's also interesting to me that Kanata mentions infection but makes a point of dismissing it as a theme for The Fourteenth of Green. I like that! It's actually one of the more tiresome themes in SGA. I hate that whole paranoid fear of the political or religious extremists among us and the way it ties in with the cultural influence of racial and sexual minorities.
no subject
There is also an ethical dilemma at the heart of the fic which is not only valuable for character insight, but which (more importantly perhaps) is relevant to the interests of people in developed countries.
After I wrote the comment above about Lavvyan's Dearest, I've thought some more about how best to explain what SF is to me/what I look for in SF (overlapping but not identical concepts). I don't think I explained it well at all.
The science in SF for me is not just hard science or the natural sciences. It is very much science ethics and history, sociology and anthropology. If SF is not a commentary on the real world and an exploration of tendencies in the real world, then it's not genuine SF to me. I don't consider space operas or fantastic fiction with improbable or impossible "science" that might as well be magic to be real SF.
Lavvyan's Dearest was not SF to me because it was a different genre, it explored an ethical dilemma that does not have much to do with science or social trends, but it did at least allude to a plot full of science and world building, so I can accept calling it SF.
Kanata's The Fourteenth of Green is what I would call SF.
I don't think this level of true SF-ness is common in SGA fics at all, like you also point out Cathy. I'm not really surprised by that, because the canon itself is not true SF according to my definition - I think The Fourteenth of Green is a genre shift, and a difficult to accomplish genre shift at that. Romantic dramas are far easier to construct, and unlike SF which must say something new to be good, romance is good when it tells the same story over and over again with small variations.
I am reminded of another fanwork with genre shift, but this one had a more obvious connection to canon that Kanata's sifting out of the transformation and infection themes in the show:
Open Secrets of the Pegasus Galaxy by
I don't mean obvious in the sense of more people able to come up with the concept or it being easier to come up with, I mean more obvious in the sense of me being able to understand the connection to canon better.
I've read more meta about atrocities of war in SGA than I have about transformation and identity, and that is probably a large part of why. It's a bit strange to me, now that I think about it:
Ford → Wraith juice Ford
Sheppard → Bug Sheppard
Teyla → Wraith hybrid Teyla and later Wraith queen Teyla
Weir → Asuran Weir
Carson → clone Carson
McKay → ascending McKay and later brain squid McKay
And on and on. Transformation fics, doppelgänger fics (robots, alternate timelines, clones, AIs) and ascension fics are popular, mostly for kink and melodrama, less commonly for ethical examinations of loss, grief, obsession and quality of life.
Hmm, and it's also interesting to me that Kanata mentions infection but makes a point of dismissing it as a theme for The Fourteenth of Green. I like that! It's actually one of the more tiresome themes in SGA. I hate that whole paranoid fear of the political or religious extremists among us and the way it ties in with the cultural influence of racial and sexual minorities.