I was very disappointed when I finally learned how a nuclear power plant worked because I assumed there was some really cool way to turn nuclear energy into electricity (apparently this is still challenging to do at power plant scale).
RTGs are even more hilariously stupid simple. They are literally just lump of radioactive material that is slowly decaying by itself and heating a thermocouple, producing electricity. No moving parts, no complicated reactor chambers and systems, no nothing.
Yeah, I was ameliorated when I learned about RTGs, since they're solid state but it's still heat based. I assumed if you knew how to split that atom that somehow magically meant you could also convert it to electron current.
