[Nakai]

Ok i would like to know what ever one thinks of the Energy sword and weather it has been used to much in Sci-Fi?For most of the people out in the world(or the U.S) the best type of this weapon is the lightsaber(lightsabre) and some "hardcore" fans think the Energy sword now belongs to Lucas,thoughts?

[pox]

I can honestly say I've not come across it once... except for a short I wrote in school.

I've avoided the star wars canon though...

Where else does it crop up? I've seen plenty monofilaments, some energised in one way or another... but I can't place any swords per ce.

Is there some kind of secret cache of star wars aping sci-fi books sold exclusively within the borders of the USA?

[JimF]

I can honestly say I've not come across it once... except for a short I wrote in school.

I've avoided the star wars canon though...

Where else does it crop up? I've seen plenty monofilaments, some energised in one way or another... but I can't place any swords per ce.


Looks like it was inspired by an episode of Far Out Space Nuts (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0072499/)starring Bob Denver. (yes Gilligan)

http://moongadget.com/origins/lightsabers.html

Far Out Space Nuts, television series 1975-1976: Chuck McCann, who played Barney, said that Lucas was working on the same film lot in the early '70s, and wandered into the studio cafeteria one day to see the Space Nuts cast sitting around having lunch wearing various alien costumes - he believes that was the influence for the Cantina scene.1 McCann further suggests that the lightsaber was inspired by the "laser sword" from the Space Nuts episode Tower of Tagot, pictured above left. (Okay, I added the glow effect; in the original it looks like a glass stick on the end of a flashlight) Lightsabers were called "laser swords" in the first draft of Lucas' script and several concept paintings. Bob Denver's orange jumpsuit even looks like Luke's X-Wing pilot outfit!! (They were both probably influenced by Airforce flight suits.)

Actually that page has some interesting history on where the lightsaber may have come from.

Jim

[Ramirez]

I don't think it's been used that much, but the popularity of Star Wars definitely takes away the originality of the weapon itself. The person who uses the weapon and how they use it would dictate the originality. Or maybe the lightsaber isn't the elite weapon. Imagine someone with a sword constructed in a different manner that has the unique ability to deactivate lightsabers. Or maybe the context. If you have the lightsabers deflecting lasers then it will definitely be reminiscent of Star Wars. However, if you have lightsabers integrated into a fantasy world of melee weapons, it can bring it a whole new type of edge. Or maybe even lightsabers integrated into a world of magic. The possibilities are endless.

[Nakai]

I think i read some where that it was Isaac Asimov who came up with the lasersword,but then again i'm not sure.


as the website says.

"A Wikipedia contributor has identified what I suspect is probably the strongest inspiration on the idea of the lightsaber: the "force-blade" from the Lucky Starr series of science fiction juveniles, originally published 1952-1958 by Isaac Asimov (1920-1992) under the pen name "Paul French." The force-blade is "a short shaft of stainless steel" which can project a force field that can cut through anything, making it "the most vicious weapon in the galaxy." Asimov's force-blade expands on his earlier invention of "a penknife with a force-field blade," first used in his Foundation novel (1951). Visit Wikipedia's lightsaber page to read Asimov's original description of a force-blade."

sorry i don't know how to quote.

[psikeyhackr]

the strongest inspiration on the idea of the lightsaber: the "force-blade" from the Lucky Starr series of science fiction juveniles, originally published 1952-1958 by Isaac Asimov (1920-1992) under the pen name "Paul French." The force-blade is "a short shaft of stainless steel" which can project a force field that can cut through anything, making it "the most vicious weapon in the galaxy.".

When the first working laser was reported in 1960, it was described as "a solution looking for a problem." But before long the laser's distinctive qualities—its ability to generate an intense, very narrow beam of light of a single wavelength—were being harnessed for science, technology and medicine.
http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/284158_townes.html

Asimov's force blade was before the invention of the laser. So the light saber became a combination of the imagined and the real.

I was recently posting about SF:BST and SF:ASW

Science Fiction: Before Star Trek and Science Fiction: After Star Wars.

The 60s impacted us with REAL TECHNOLOGY that made different futures possible. But Asimov's forceblade did not present the contradictory physics of a beam of light stopping at a fixed distance. I don't know how much lightsabers or laserswords are used because I won't read anything that has them.

SF:ASW tends to make science irrelevant.

A laser is an energy beam so it depends on what the writer says it can do.

psik

[Nakai]

yes i agree with you on all points there.science fiction after SW became a sort of horse that any one can kick and ride (i have nuffing against horses).

[livens]

Ill comment on the original question, and say NO. Simply because I have never once ran across an 'energy sword' in all of the science fiction books I have read.

And the only one I have ever heard of was in the Star Wars films. (Ive never read a SW book and never will.)

It sounds like you have ran into them, and often, so let me ask you this: In what books beside SW have you been reading about them?

[psikeyhackr]

(Ive never read a SW book and never will.)

WHAT!?!?!

You just haven't lived. :eek: :D

I tried 3 in the 80s. I manged to finish one.

Star Trek isn't good enough to READ. It is somewhat surprising the The Empire Strikes Back is so good as a movie.

psik

[Sparrow]

Ok i would like to know what ever one thinks of the Energy sword and weather it has been used to much in Sci-Fi?For most of the people out in the world(or the U.S) the best type of this weapon is the lightsaber(lightsabre) and some "hardcore" fans think the Energy sword now belongs to Lucas,thoughts?

Just think for a moment, how utterly stupid a lightsaber is.

They travel at faster than light speed across the galaxy in ships that we can only imagine, and to do what... have a sword fight.

You know what you do to someone who whips out a lightsaber on you?
You remove them from the realm of the living by any number of means, because after all, you can travel at light speed so you have ample technology at your disposal to take care of a person waving a sword at you.