“Live Free or Die Hard may work better for an audience that doesn't know much about the series is than it will for Die Hard die hards, who will be wondering who that impersonator is and what he did with the real John McClane. The original Die Hard came out of nowhere to blitz the 1988 summer box office. The fourth installment arrives with a weight of expectations that Atlas would have trouble shouldering and, when the dust settles in September, it's unlikely that Live Free or Die Hard will be one of this year's big success stories.” KnowsYearsMayRealHardStoriesBigsDiesWonderAudienceTroubleOfficeSummerExpectationsWeightOriginalsSeriesBoxesDustSettlingFourthSeptemberUnlikelyBox OfficeAtlasSuccess StoriesLive FreeBlitzImpersonators Author:James Berardinelli
“Any story worth telling relates to real life in some meaningful way. Scifi allows you to tell meaningful stories without seeming too preachy - it adds a metaphorical layer between the story and the real world. Scifi is dismissed as ungrounded fluff, but it's actually the opposite.” WorldWayRealStoriesOppositesAddMeaningfulReal LifeRelateReal WorldLayersScifiSeemingMetaphoricalFluff Author:Jane Espenson
“Note to reporters: The sanctimony thing probably works better on someone who has never broken real stories.” RealStoriesBrokenNotesReportersReal Story Author:Colin Flaherty
“The real origin of science fiction lay in the seventeeth-century novels of exploration in fabulous lands. Therefore Jules Verne's story of travel to the moon is not science fiction because they go by rocket but because of where they go. It would be as much science fiction if they went by rubber band.” IfsRealStoriesWould BeFictionNovelLandCenturyMoonBandScience FictionLaysExplorationFabulousRocketsRubberRubber Bands Author:Philip K. Dick
“What did a happy ending even mean in real life, anyway? In stories you simply said, 'They lived happily ever after,' and that was it. But in real life people had to keep on living, day after day, year after year.” PeopleYearsMeanSaidRealStoriesReal LifeHappy EndingsHappily Ever AfterEver AfterSimply Said Book:Afterworlds Source: Afterworlds
“He lived in a fantasy world. There was not a day when he didn't add some Mickey Mouse story about a club that wanted him. First of all, he came in and told me that Arsenal wanted to buy him, then the next week it was Manchester Utd, then the next week it was Real Madrid. He made it clear that he did not want to be at the club so, in the end, there was only one thing I could do - send him to Wigan.” WorldWantFirstsMadeRealEndsStoriesWantedNextFantasyClearOne ThingWeekFootballAddClubsMade ItManagersSoccerMiceChairmanManchesterArsenalNext WeekMickeyMadridFantasy WorldsReal MadridWigan Author:Joe Kinnear
“If a large number of people who are convinced alien abductions are real are hypnotising even larger numbers of others who suspect they might be, then it is likely there will be many alien abduction narratives flying around, as, indeed, there are. Of course, this is not proof they are not true, but it does provide a persuasive context for a simple psychosocial explanation. Hypnotism is a technique that triggers a mass storytelling project in which all the stories are linked.” PeopleIfsDoeRealStoriesMightCoursesSimpleNumbersProjectsMassConvincedProofTechniqueAstronomyFlyingStorytellingAliensNarrativeExplanationSuspectsLinkedTriggersLarge NumbersPersuasiveAbductionAlien Abduction Author:Bryan Appleyard
“You know I've been in these tabloids for years now. And at some point you just become a Zen master of it all. Most of these stories, you get probably 2 percent real fruit juice and the rest is just garbage with no nutritional value.” RealStoriesValuesPercentFruitGarbageJuiceFruit Juice Author:Brad Pitt