The
Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams is a satirical piece of
sci-fi literature, most likely aimed at showing the
reader that other sci-fi
novels and TV shows use things that are unfathomable in order to entertain the
reader. Adams conveys sci-fi ideas that are absolutely
insane in his novel, all while somehow making the reader swallow it, letting it
slide as possible. At the same time, this satirical novel has some moments that
make the reader want to laugh out loud, causing them to forget about all the
unbelievable things happening. In short, Adams has
created a brilliantly insane world where anything that’s definitely impossible
is possible.
Let’s
start with the Guide itself. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
itself is a book within the book. It’s also the standard repository of all
knowledge and wisdom in the universe. This could easily be compared to all
those fancy databases found in the computers in
star Trek, and since the interface is graphical, it can be compared
to the Holocrons within Star Wars as well. The only difference
between these things and the Guide
really is that the Guide contains a
slew of inaccurate, ridiculous, and sometimes useless information. The entry in
the Guide for the Earth is just
“Mostly Harmless.” What kind of description of that? It tells the reader just
about nothing about the Earth—hell,
it doesn’t even tell the reader that it’s a planet! Care to elaborate, Ford
Prefect?
The
weaponry is similar to other sci-fi works as well. Star Wars had their blasters, and Star Trek had their phasers. Stargate:
SG-1 had those laser guns that shot once to stun, twice to kill, and thrice
to vaporize. All of the weapons killed the victim by zapping them dead. So,
what better name to give the blasters in Hitchhiker’s
Guide than the Kill-O-Zap gun! So, what’s it do? What do you think? It
kills your victim by zapping them dead. Yes, it hurts. It seems to be used by
the law enforcement officers of the
universe as the standard weapon, as two
cops were firing on Arthur Dent’s (the main character) party when they were
checking out the planet Magrathea.
Alien
races? Check! The Hitchhiker’s Guide to
the Galaxy has your standard sci-fi races, but they are much different than
those you would find in Stargate: SG-1,
Star Trek or Star Wars. All of those had serious
races that many tolerated as
equal and got along very well with, and were humanoid for the most part. The
races in Hitchhiker’s Guide are
tolerated as equal and are humanoid for the most part but they aren’t really
serious…unless you count the Vogons as being seriously bureaucratic. They are a large, green-skinned race that
have horrible hygiene and are nothing more than a bunch of bureaucrats. They
can’t do much of anything without filling out the proper paperwork to do so,
then waiting 4-6 months, hoping that the paperwork is actually found and sent
back. They are also the worst poetry writers in the universe—their works can
actually kill the person who wrote them! Zaphod Beeblebrox is an unknown
species of humanoid, but he’s got two heads and three arms. Why? No one’s sure.
But he does not prove in any sense that two heads are better than one, for he’s
a complete idiot.
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy is
trying to tell the reader that sci-fi books use overdone clichés all the time,
so Douglas Adams had to do it in a satirical sense. He pulled it off well. I
could be mistaken however; he could be trying to say that the Universe is a fun
place. If that’s the case, then you’ll need this fish in your ear.
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