A Sound Of Thunder Vs. Nethergrave
Science fiction is a genre based on future technological advancement and has been a very successful and influential; I’m going to compare “A Sound of Thunder” to “Nethergrave”, two selections of said science fiction, to answer the question of which ones better by looking at their use of science fiction elements. “A Sound of Thunder” by Ray Bradbury takes place in a future where time travel has been invented and a dictator has just been defeated in the presidential election. When the main character, Eckel, travels back in time to kill a tyrannosaurus rex and strays from the path he has to deal with unforeseen consequences back in the future. “Nethergrave” by Gloria Skurzynski is about Jeremy, the laughing stock of his school, unable to do any
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“A Sound of Thunder” uses a simple, if overused, theme about how little thing can have a big consequence. Eckel saw what his small mistake when he looks down and saw “Embedded in the mud, glistening gold and green, was a butterfly, very beautiful and very dead.” (Bradbury 299). Because of that butterfly, his whole world is different, hence, little thing, big consequence. Not the most original, but easy to find, “Nethergrave” on the other hand is quite the opposite. “Nethergrave” has a theme of; people will lie to you and it easy to make a wrong decision when you’re down. Now that’s fine, that’s a better theme than “A Sound of Thunder”, but they keep it to hidden. After knowing what it is you can see examples of it like, for the first half of the theme, “Dr.Ded. He isn’t a boy like you. He isn’t a boy at all. He’s a fifty-two-year-old stroke victim. He can’t walk.” (Skurzynski 323) but without knowing what the theme it would have been hard to spot that, especially for the second half of the theme. It’s okay to have a hidden message but this is just ridiculous, you have no direction and no starting/endpoint, it was so hard to find you had to send webmails out to help people. I would like to have given this to “Nethergrave” for a better theme but it was just way too hard to
“A Sound of Thunder” uses a simple, if overused, theme about how little thing can have a big consequence. Eckel saw what his small mistake when he looks down and saw “Embedded in the mud, glistening gold and green, was a butterfly, very beautiful and very dead.” (Bradbury 299). Because of that butterfly, his whole world is different, hence, little thing, big consequence. Not the most original, but easy to find, “Nethergrave” on the other hand is quite the opposite. “Nethergrave” has a theme of; people will lie to you and it easy to make a wrong decision when you’re down. Now that’s fine, that’s a better theme than “A Sound of Thunder”, but they keep it to hidden. After knowing what it is you can see examples of it like, for the first half of the theme, “Dr.Ded. He isn’t a boy like you. He isn’t a boy at all. He’s a fifty-two-year-old stroke victim. He can’t walk.” (Skurzynski 323) but without knowing what the theme it would have been hard to spot that, especially for the second half of the theme. It’s okay to have a hidden message but this is just ridiculous, you have no direction and no starting/endpoint, it was so hard to find you had to send webmails out to help people. I would like to have given this to “Nethergrave” for a better theme but it was just way too hard to