Here's my opinion.

Core #1 is College Fantasy. There's a supercomputer in the basement that can produce real people (and toys) out of nothing. The food in the cafeteria has no relation to real food, and on the few times that it does count your classmates. The building we hang out in has a force field. All those fun things that would have been so cool instead of having to work on Calc 2 and whatever humanities requirement you're forced to take this semester.

It pretty much stays in that vein until Sonset, where it then diverges pretty seriously into high-energy Science Fiction. By which I mean that realism and science are followed, but not to the point where it gets in the way of a big-screen adventure.

At least until Twilight, where we've obviously gone into Science Fantasy in a big way.

-john, humorless toad
The difference between a violin and a viola is that a viola burns longer.
-Victor Borge