History Main / ShinyLookingSpaceships

** One brief aversion of this trope came about during WorldWarII, in a strange sort of RetroUpgrade was the RAF's De Havilland Mosquito a.k.a. 'The Wooden Wonder'. As the name suggests, it was almost entirely made of wood, due to rationing. It promptly proceeded to spend the rest of the war outflying everything else that took to the air, either by superior speed or superior handling. As Goring sourly noted in 1943, it was better than anything the Germans could put out (and considering some of the planes they had, this was an impressive feat...)

* The ''Endurance'' from ''Film/{{Interstellar}} adheres to this esthetic particularly on the outside, though her interiors are also well-lit and decorated in mostly lighter colours.

* The Minbari in ''Series/BabylonFive'', in keeping with their CrystalSpiresAndTogas/[[OurElvesAreBetter Space Elves]] characteristic. The Centauri, in keeping with their pompous BlingOfWar, has elements of this. [[AllThereInTheManual Narns have exotic looking ships to make them look more advanced than they really are]]. Human vessels on the other hand, are rather more functional-looking.

* In ''Film/TwoThousandOneASpaceOdyssey'', the ''Discovery'' and other spacecrafut in the film are nice and shiny looking. Averted in the sequel, ''Film/TwoThousandTenTheYearWeMakeContact'', where the ''Discovery'' is entirely covered with a thin layer of fine yellow dust having spent 9 years in orbit around Io, and the Russian ship ''Leonov'' looks significantly more practical and "used".

* The Ship of the Imagination in 2014's revival of ''Series/{{Cosmos}}'' is shiny enough that it acts as a mirror for the starfields, nebulae, and other wonders of the cosmos that Creator/NeilDeGrasseTyson travels to.

** And true to form, it seems that the Alliance removed a few lightbulbs when they performed their refit of the ''SR-2''. Of course, they might have intended to replace them, but where unable to do so as the refit was halfway completed when the Reapers invasion hit Earth, leaving much of the ship's interior [[USedFuture strewn with exposed cables, conduits, open panels, crates stuffed into every corner, and tarps covering unfinished areas.]] A few digs are made at Cerberus's ship design as being AwesomeButImpractical as well, indicating that Cerberus spent more time making the ship look good than they did making sure the design made sense.

* The Paranid ships in the [[VideoGame/{{X}} X-Universe]] are basically flying mirrors, and the Earth State/[[PlanetTerra Terran]] ships are blindingly white - typically the brightest thing in a sector. Boron fighters are {{Living Ships}} with iridescent hulls.

* The Paranid ships in the [[VideoGame/{{X}} X-Universe]] are basically flying mirrors, and the Earth/Terran ships are blindingly white.

* Way back in the day, airplanes were built out of wood and canvas, those being relatively strong, lightweight materials. As technology (and metallurgy) advanced, around WorldWarII, these planes gave way to stronger metal-bodied planes. These were initially painted in drab colors to make spotting them more difficult, but towards the end of the war, the Americans began shipping planes overseas in a bare-metal finish, since this saved a few hours in production (and made the planes slightly faster due to lower air resistance). Shiny chrome-looking jets would go on to be a staple of ColdWar aviation for decades to come, especially as radar negated any advantage in trying to visually camouflage the planes in flight, which was probably also both an inspiration and invokation of this trope in practice.

** Initially {{NASA}} wanted to add more aesthetic appeal to the Space Shuttle (probably to please taxpayers by showing off what their dollars paid for), painting the external tank a gleaming white. After the first two missions, however, they came to the conclusion that it was a waste of money (Especially since the tank, unlike the booster rockets, wasn't recoverable for reuse after launch). It wasn't just the cost of the paint or applying it, but the hundreds of pounds of additional weight it added, making each launch more expensive in terms of fuel and limiting payload size. So in the end function won out over shininess, and ever after the external tank remained unpainted.

* Toyed with repeatedly in ''TheInexplicableAdventuresOfBob''. A spectacular, [[CloseEncountersOfTheThirdKind Close Encounters]]-style chandelier ship [[http://bobadventures.comicgenesis.com/d/20080819.html arrives,]] and it's just a glorified tow truck. Riboflavin's rotund little [[http://bobadventures.comicgenesis.com/d/20091027.html escape pod]] is beautiful to Galatea, mostly because she ''expects'' it to be impressive. The trope is played straight with Princess Voluptua's [[http://bobadventures.comicgenesis.com/d/20090919.html royal yacht.]]

* The ginormous [[PowerGlows glowy]] flying saucers from ''CloseEncountersOfTheThirdKind'' are surely the brightest, shiniest spaceships ever put on film.

[[quoteright:350:[[StarWars http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Royalcruiser_1856.png]]]]

** And true to form, it seems that the Alliance removed a few lightbulbs when they performed their refit of the ''SR-2''. Of course, they might have intended to replace them, but where unable to do so as the refit was halfway completed when the Reapers invasion hit Earth.

* In keeping with the clean, futuristic aesthetic of ''MassEffect'', there are many ship designs that are shiny, spotless and strangely lacking in right angles. Most of these belong to the [[GreenSkinnedSpaceBabe Asari]] or the [[MechaMooks Geth]].
** The ''Normandy'' [=SR-2=] from [[MassEffect2 the second game]] is probably the best example from the series -- strangely enough, this was ''supposed'' to make Cerberus appear cold and clinical when compared to the original. [[BrokenAesop Little hard when the first ship was both dimly lit and suffered from a terrible combination of colours.]] Dark blue interior with bright yellow computer displays? Most of the crew probably had chronic migraine headaches from the eye strain.

The ''interiors'' of said ships are also often curiously spotless considering how many people are crammed into them for extended periods of time. This can be {{hand wave}}d away by having [[DirtForceField very efficient air filtering systems]], or micro/nanoscopic cleaner robots (or just really good visible-scale robots offcamera). It can also be answered with very dedicated crews (as aboard military vessels with many enlisted men and women to keep occupied), or -- as in the case of ''Series/{{Andromeda}}'''s early seasons -- the simple fact that the ship is mostly deserted. Or simply by saying that TheBridge is a place where only the CommandRoster goes and the {{Redshirts}} quarters are less pleasant.

->"''Now this is my idea of a spaceship - gleaming metal, flashing lights''..."

** Initially {{NASA}} wanted to add more aesthetic appeal to the Space Shuttle (probably to please taxpayers by showing off what their dollars paid for), painting the external tank a gleaming white. After the first two missions, however, they came to the conclusion that it was a waste of money. It wasn't just the cost of the paint or applying it, but the hundreds of pounds of additional weight it added, making each launch more expensive in terms of fuel and limiting payload size. So in the end function won out over shininess, and ever after the external tank remained unpainted.