No.
Next!

But thank you for putting the REAL Nikita there instead of the fraud.

@Plague:
Amen - can't stand that 'La Femme Nikita' nonsense

I'd say that some Spy films and franchises are, Alias clearly is, whereas the Bourne series isn't (although stretches technology to it's limits). Mission Impossible probably crosses the boundary, whereas who knows about the Bond films - they're all over the place.

Little bit of a stretch, Charlie, even by generalized, unspecific parameters of what sci-fi is.

I think the law of 5's applies here.

I'm gonna agree with Theoban on this one.

Most spy movies aren't even close to what real espionage is. The original James Bond novels were sort of based on reality, but the movies? Not even close for the most part.

A spy movie based on reality would put everyone asleep.

I'd have to say all spy movies touch on sci-fi aspects, some more than others. Even the Bourne movies which don't have a lot of spy-tech but deal with a man who has lost him memory and is in search of his true self is straight out of Philip K. Dick.

The sci-fi ones are. You might as well ask if all Action Movies are Sci-fi because many of them happen to be fantasical. But for every Moonraker, there is a Soldier of Orange.

so... no.

I think a lot of them qualify -- not as hard SF, but as the SF that gets covered here. I mean, if Star Wars and the X-Men qualify with their magical DNA, it's pretty tough to see how the Bond movies don't.

And I for one would like to see some coverage of Get Smart. Mostly if it involves pictures of Anne Hathaway.

Oh, wow, this is probably the only chance I'm gonna get to say this on io9, so here goes...

Quantum of Solace is the worst James Bond title ever!

This made me think of Michael Caine's old Harry Palmer-franchise. It started out with straight-forward Cold War spy goodness, but then escalated into pure Sci-Fi with the third installation "The Billion Dollar Brain". So, some of them definitely are.

@extracrispy: Come on.. Octopu...

Nah you're probably right. But for some reason I dig it. I hope it will make more sense in the film.

Personally, I don't think even Bond applies. Maybe if Bond was created in glass test tube and genetically incapable of feeling pain or remorse and while being a sex machine to all the ladies...

Then we're talking.

I think it all depends on how much of a purist you are when using the term SF.

Science Fiction has just become an umbrella term for anything involving the future, aliens, tech and biology. So I don't see why SOME spy stuff can't be classes as coming from a sci-fi setting, since Star Wars is just fantasy in a sci-fi setting and BSG is The Bold And The Beautiful in a sci-fi setting. (Don't flame me, I'm a fan of both!)

Yes, most of them are. Memory wipes, tech, augmented military training fall under SciFi.

So much SciFi should fall under fantasy now the true definition has been smeared over.

So the basic question is, do gadgets count as science fiction? And if so, when do said gadgets become fiction and not reality. But on the flip side, when does action become so ridiculous that it too is fiction? And we go from action to action-fiction?!? AH THE QUESTIONS!

Fuck thinking, I need a drink.

I consider anything where people do not act like real people sci-fi. Usually it involves hyper violence as in Ichi the Killer and Dobermann, neither of which you would find in the sci-fi section. The reason: complete distortion of the sciences of sociology and psychology. Totally irrelevant to this thread, but I just thought I'd put it out there...

Spy kids is definitely sci-fi, but it is just a (sideways) evolution of the spy genre, not the sci-fi genre. Impossible gadgets equals sci-fi, simple as. You don't need much sci-fi in something for it to count. It's just that most people can absorb a certain amount of unreality before they start to feel like the film they're watching is sci-fi.
Austin Powers: Spy; Time travel; Fembots; Sci-fi... Ever see it on a list of comedy sci-fi films? I haven't.

I have to agreed with many so far and issue my resounding "eeeh....?" as my answer to this question. Some spy stuff is certainly SF; I remember James Bond once being described as "several minutes in the future," a notion which covers all the tech. But it's very hard to make a sweeping claim about movies with spies in them. Then again, it's very hard to make a sweeping claim of any kind of SF (as we regularly see in the io9 comments).

Is CSI sci-fi? We don't even have half of the equipment they use on that show.

@Plague

YES! next after you next...
sooooo... ummmm next?

Reality is SF these days, except when it's Fantasy.. But you need dope for that.

Nope. There's nothing even remotely "science fiction" about spy movies. To me, sci-fi isn't bound by a set of guidelines and rules, but by a "feel." (Yes, I'm going all Colbert on you.) Spy movies do not have that feel to them. Just because James Bond has a car that flies and a watch that removes women's clothing, it doesn't make it sci-fi.

Complete and utter-nonsence! Spy movies for the most part are science fact. We are just unaware of the current CIA technologies.

I vote "some are," mostly because there isn't a "no" option. There is "no, except Moonraker." Why is Moonraker science fiction? It's been a while, but don't they go up in space shuttles? To an orbiting space post? Don't we have both, thereby negating the fiction part? Ok, Moonraker had a way bigger space post, several years before ISS, but still not that science fiction feel, as Sharpless states.

It approaches science fiction if your car flies. Not amphibious, because that exists. But we've been promised flying cars for 80 years and still no flying cars available from the auto dealers in my town! So to me, those flying cars are science fiction.

Oh, ages since I've watched Moonraker, so I suspect there may well be some fantastic scifi weapon, but I still would file the movie in the action section of my local videostore. Hell, nobody slices out sections of Star Trek TNG DVDs to put holodeck episodes in with the Classic Detective tv shows.

If superhero fantasies are counted here as SF, I see no reason to exclude most spy flicks I've ever seen.

I'm troubled by the statement, "___ is just ___ in a SF setting." The best SF is good because of the writing and the characters, not the setting. Things like Asimov's Foundation stories and Vinge's A Deepness In The Sky. This is true of most fiction, not just SF. It sounds really boring to have a story that consists of nothing but a "SF setting"...whatever that means.

This would make any movie with non-existant or exaggerated technology science fiction, right? So Firefox, blue thunder, The Hunt for Red October, those are all science fiction. Also, any historicaly innacurate movie takes place in an alternate universe, which is pretty much any movie that takes place in the past.

Would a movie about Bothans stealing the plans of a secret weapon be a spy movie? ;)

@StrangelyBrown: yes

It depends greatly on what the definition of "SF" is, which is apparently a religious issue. Given the diversity of the faiths adhered to and the vociferociousness of the adherents, the question of whether or not spy movies are "SF" is at best undecidable and at worst excellent trolling material.

Or is it the other way around.

Any fiction may happen in an alternate universe, so it's all science fiction? Right?

I'm with Nudemanatee, forced to take a option that wasn't simply "No".

They're Spy-Fi (not Sci-Fi)

The cross-over aspects of spy thrillers, from Ian Fleming to Tom Clancy, are very evident. Using technology that is speculative is obviously a component of science fiction. And the setting does not have to be the future, as we can see with alternate histories that are both historical and sf/f.

I love that you've got La Femme Nikita up there... I spent a semester in a graduate level philosophy class discussing cyborgs, and that movie came up over and over and over.

I do however, think that we might be confusing our semantics when we say that spy stories are science fiction. A LOT of science fiction, as we know it has roots in earlier "genres"... It's like trying to suggest that hard-boiled detective novels are sci-fi because Jonathan Lethem wrote sci-fi in that style, or because one is featured on BSG. I think it's more that the tropes that sci-fi is especially good at exploring are also abundant in spy stories.

I think a lot of "Spy Fi" certainly is close enough for forums like this -- I'd certainly say that "Alias" would count, for example.

And I think James Bond isn't really that far off from technological Superhero characters like Batman or Iron Man.

So if the question is whether or not you should write about "Get Smart" or James Bond here... yes, I'd certainly agree that it makes sense from time to time. It's probably a case-by-case basis -- but I'd rather count the "heightened reality" spy fiction stories than not count them.

Perhaps, more to the point. Get Smart and any Bond movie are movies that this Sci-Fi nerd will go see. And want to talk about or read about. So, I would like to see some coverage in i09 just for that. By the way, "Iron Man" rocked.

Spy movies are a continuum, ranging from mysteries on one end, to sci fi on the other. The Spy Who Came in from the Cold -- mystery. Hunt for Red October -- sci fi.

You know, I have one simple request. And that is to have sharks with frickin' laser beams attached to their heads! But noooo, we have to settle for ill tempered Sea Bass. Oh well, that's a start.

Nien!