Space opera fans, answer honestly. Would you rather read about:
massive fleet battles
political intrigue
cosmic horror
slow-burn romance
found crew family
Because I need all five together. 🚀
I adore parent/child story arcs in sci-fi and fantasy. It can save even a bad movie for me. There’s something powerful about people carrying generational pain all the way across the stars/Moors and finally choosing to heal.
Sometimes the real reason I read and write space opera is for that specific feeling of staring out into the stars and realizing how small, and yet how meaningful, people are. Without people the vast cosmos means nothing.
Strong female characters don’t have to punch someone every chapter. Intelligence, restraint, compassion, and maternal instincts are strengths too. Traits sorely missing in many modern stories.
Visitors allowed to walk the set of the 1701-D during TNG's original run often reported that something seemed to be missing. When questioned in detail, they realized it was the ubiquitous low-register ambient noise of the ship. Without it? The visitors were really thrown off.
If your space opera doesn’t include at least one scene where exhausted characters share a quiet conversation at 2 AM while the ship hums around them… what are we even doing?
There can never be enough sci-fi that balances wonder with terror. Beautiful nebula outside the viewport. Ancient unknowable horror underneath it. Or the silent sea of the moon...
Heroic men in sci-fi should be strong, protective, kind, loyal, and above all, not afraid to rescue a damsel in distress. Thank you Edgar Rice Burroughs.