AMC has announced that it has greenlit a new documentary series under the working title of “James Cameron’s Story of Science Fiction.” From acclaimed filmmaker James Cameron, the series will explore the evolution of sci-fi from its origins as a small genre with a cult following to the blockbuster pop-cultural phenomenon we know today.
During each of the six one-hour episodes, Cameron will introduce one of the “Big Questions” that humankind has contemplated throughout the ages, and reaches back into sci-fi’s past to better understand how our favorite films, TV shows, books, and video games were born, and where the genre – and our species – might be going in the future. Cameron and his contemporaries, who have helped to fuel sci-fi’s spectacular growth over the last several decades, debate the merits, meanings, and impacts of the films and novels that influenced them.
“With this series, we are going back to the origins of sci-fi, following the DNA of these ideas back to the source. Without Jules Verne and H.G. Wells there wouldn’t have been Ray Bradbury or Robert A. Heinlein, and without them, there wouldn’t be Lucas, Spielberg, Ridley Scott or me. As a filmmaker who specializes in science fiction, I’m interested in exploring the struggles and the triumphs that brought these incredible stories to life and seeing how art imitates life, as well as how science fiction imitates and sometimes informs science,” said Cameron.
Cameron is no stranger to sci-fi. Before becoming a filmmaker he was a self-proclaimed “sci-fi nerd.” His love of the genre would lead him to direct some of the some of sci-fi’s best-known films including Aliens, Terminator, The Abyss and Avatar.
“When I was a kid, I basically read any book with a spaceship on the cover and I saw 2001: A Space Odyssey many, many times,” said Cameron. “The movie inspired me to become a filmmaker. I liked the special effects, but I really loved the ideas and the questions behind them: How will the world end? Will technology destroy us? What does it mean to be human?”
Seattle’s Museum of Pop Culture (MoPOP), which houses the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame, is consulting on the series, which is scheduled to debut on AMC in 2018.
