Alasdair Wilkins, Author at Gizmodo

io9’s March Movie Madness Reaches The Elite Eight: 2001 Vs. The Empire Strikes Back – Polls Open Now!

It’s time to choose the sci-fi movie Final Four, and the choices have never been tougher. Star Wars has crushed everyone so far, but has it met its match in Arnold Schwarzenegger and Terminator 2? And can anything stop Serenity? We’re down to just eight films vying for a spot in our Final Four. And…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins and Meredith Woerner

Cobie Smulders talks playing Maria Hill in The Avengers. Plus could Viggo Mortensen be joining the Superman reboot after all?

Cobie Smulders confirms her role in The Avengers, as well as the catsuit she’ll be wearing.The Dark Knight Rises has found its street smart Gotham girl. Plus a rundown of the young actors in the mix for The Hunger Games! Spoilers from this point forward! Top image from Doctor Who. The Dark Knight Rises Juno…

Television Alasdair Wilkins

Why hydrogen reveals the temperature of dark matter

Hydrogen is the simplest of all atoms, and it’s easily the most abundant, accounting for 90% of all atoms in the universe. And this fundamental building block may have something to tell us about one of the universe’s great mysteries. That’s what theoretical astrophysicist Ethan Siegel argues over at his ScienceBlogs site Starts with a…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

The ancient world’s most amazing machine recreated with Lego

The Antikythera Mechanism is the world’s oldest computer, calculating the stars 2000 years ago. Now modern engineers have come up with the only possible improvement…they’ve rebuilt it with Lego. But is this the best science video of them all? Here’s a description for this particular video: The Antikythera Mechanism is the oldest known scientific computer.…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

Huge black hole is slowly destroying its neighboring star

This black hole is five times the mass of our Sun, and it’s getting bigger all the time, thanks to a normal star that has the colossally bad luck of being the black hole’s partner in a binary star system. This particular star system is what’s known as an X-ray binary system, which is any…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

No Ordinary Family’s forgotten episode is shockingly good

Thanks to Dancing with the Stars, the penultimate episode of No Ordinary Family was exiled to Saturday night, all but ensuring that nobody will see it. Which is a real shame, because this might actually be the show’s best episode. “No Ordinary Future” is the first episode I’ve seen in ages that makes me think…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

Mars’s Grand Canyon is as long as the United States

This is the Valles Marineris, believed to be the biggest canyon in the entire solar system. At nearly 2,500 miles long, it would stretch clear across the continental United States. Much like Mars’s highest peak, Olympus Mons, the sheer scale of Valles Marineris is almost incomprehensible. Depending on how you measure it, its total length…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

Two possible villains for the Superman reboot. Plus Joe Quesada talks Captain America, Thor, and The Avengers!

Two wonderfully villainous actors are rumored for roles in Zack Snyder’s Superman reboot. The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is already happening. Neil Gaiman talks Doctor Who, and Futurama is sticking around for a long time! Spoilers ahead! Top image from Thor. Superman Reboot Still no word on who they might play, but a pair of awesome…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

Zack Snyder explains the point of “Sucker Punch”

Sucker Punch goes inside an imprisoned woman’s mind for a dark, surreal fantasy adventure. We asked the cast and crew about the fiendishly complex story, the fine line between exploitation and empowerment, and the horrors of steampunk zombie war. Spoilers ahead! Sucker Punch follows Emily Browning’s Baby Doll (all the main characters are known exclusively…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

Nest stealing cuckoo birds are locked in evolutionary war with their would-be victims

Cuckoos don’t bother building their own nests – they just lay eggs that perfectly mimic those of other birds and take over their nests. But other birds are wising up, evolving some seriously impressive tricks to spot the cuckoo eggs. Cuckoos are what’s known as brood parasites, meaning they hide their eggs in the nests…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

Monty Python’s most disgusting sketch ever unlocks the secret of aggression

Do people become more aggressive when they are forced to bottle up their emotions? It seems like a simple enough question, but psychologists decided to find out in the most sadistic way possible, with a little help from Monty Python. Researchers at the University of Texas and the University of Minnesota wanted to figure out…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

The new Beast talks X-Men: First Class. Plus stunning Game of Thrones photos, and two new Doctor Who trailers!

New Hank McCoy actor Nicholas Hoult explains how he played the furry mutant in X-Men: First Class…right down to the CGI feet. Doug Liman’s Moon-centric heist movie is looking for actors, and Neil Gaiman clarifies the Sandman TV show rumors. Spoilers from this point forward! Top image from Captain America. X-Men: First Class Here’s a…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

The Red Square Nebula rips a hole in space-time

This might look like some weird cosmic gateway straight out of 2001: A Space Odyssey or a particularly trippy old-school Doctor Who adventure, but the Red Square Nebula is completely real. Just don’t ask astronomers to explain its bizarre shape. Even if its name sounds downright un-American, the Red Square Nebula has got to be…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

Could dying white dwarf stars be home to habitable planets?

In the search for Earth-like worlds, astronomers look for conditions that are roughly the same as those on our planet. But the assumption that most Earth-like planets will be found around stars like our Sun might not necessarily be true. As we recently discussed, it’s exciting times in the search for Earth-like planets, with the…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

The speed of light could turn the middle of the ocean into a stock-trading center

When the world’s financial giants begin creating vast artificial islands in the middle of the oceans to use as the hubs of stock-trading, it’ll all be because of the speed of light. High-frequency trading is a major – and extremely controversial – part of modern financial practice, in which computerized traders make extremely fast transactions…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

The beginning of the end for No Ordinary Family

Last night’s No Ordinary Family finally put its characters in mortal danger, featuring unlikely team-ups, minor moral quandaries, cheesy supervillains, and an utterly random Sara Bareilles cameo. Too bad it’s already too late. This episode found Eric Balfour’s animal-like supervillain killing off people with powers, which soon enough brings the Powells in his clawed crosshairs.…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

io9’s March Movie Madness Second Round Part Two. Polls are open now until 11 PM PST!

Time to pick the final eight teams for our scifi Sweet Sixteen. Can The Fifth Element upset 2001: A Space Odyssey? Who will survive the alien throwdown between Predator and Close Encounters? Which robots will prevail in Terminator vs. Wall-E? Only you can decide which of these sixteen movies will go on to the next…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins and Meredith Woerner

Casting reports for the Total Recall and Akira movies may freak you out

Zack Snyder rules out one possible actor for the Superman reboot, while lots of possible actors are in the mix for the new Total Recall and Akira movies. There’s a new picture of Green Lantern’s Abin Sur! Plus Fringe gets more trippy, and both Falling Skies and Terra Nova get new promos. Spoilers from here…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

X-ray machines in 1896 needed ninety minutes and 1,500 times the radiation

The first X-ray machines needed patients to sit still for well over an hour, they doused people with 1500 times the amount of radiation as today’s machines, and the pictures were fuzzy at best. But they were still absolutely amazing. One of the very first medical X-ray machines was built in early 1896, mere weeks…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

The stars dance with a spiral galaxy 80 million light-years away

Everything in this image is so far away that it defies our comprehension. And yet we’re also looking at two vastly different scales here, as stars from well within our own galaxy share space with a far distant spiral galaxy. This image from the Hubble Telescope is a simple but powerful reminder of how cosmic…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

Alasdair Wilkins

io9’s March Movie Madness Reaches The Elite Eight: 2001 Vs. The Empire Strikes Back – Polls Open Now!

Cobie Smulders talks playing Maria Hill in The Avengers. Plus could Viggo Mortensen be joining the Superman reboot after all?

Why hydrogen reveals the temperature of dark matter

The ancient world’s most amazing machine recreated with Lego

Huge black hole is slowly destroying its neighboring star

No Ordinary Family’s forgotten episode is shockingly good

Mars’s Grand Canyon is as long as the United States

Two possible villains for the Superman reboot. Plus Joe Quesada talks Captain America, Thor, and The Avengers!

Zack Snyder explains the point of “Sucker Punch”

Nest stealing cuckoo birds are locked in evolutionary war with their would-be victims

Monty Python’s most disgusting sketch ever unlocks the secret of aggression

The new Beast talks X-Men: First Class. Plus stunning Game of Thrones photos, and two new Doctor Who trailers!

The Red Square Nebula rips a hole in space-time

Could dying white dwarf stars be home to habitable planets?

The speed of light could turn the middle of the ocean into a stock-trading center

The beginning of the end for No Ordinary Family

io9’s March Movie Madness Second Round Part Two. Polls are open now until 11 PM PST!

Casting reports for the Total Recall and Akira movies may freak you out

X-ray machines in 1896 needed ninety minutes and 1,500 times the radiation

The stars dance with a spiral galaxy 80 million light-years away

Leaked Anthropic Model Presents ‘Unprecedented Cybersecurity Risks,’ Much to Pentagon’s Pleasure

Don’t miss out: Bitdefender, One of the World’s Best Antiviruses, Is Now on Sale

The Secret to Better Sperm? It’s Probably Already on Your Schedule

Lego Is Leaning Into Your Marvel Memories With a New Helicarrier Set

Toshiba’s 65-inch Smart Fire TV Now Matches 43-Inch Pricing After 44% Drop on Amazon

Kash Patel’s Email Account Hacked, Iran-Linked Group Takes Credit

Repair Workers Accidentally Stumble Upon Lost Remains of Legendary ‘Fourth Musketeer’

Dreame Aero Pro Wet Dry Vacuum Mop Drops 20% Shortly After Launch in the Spring Cleaning Sale

Darth Maul’s Legs, Ranked

April Set to Unleash Some Wild Weather Across Parts of the US, Meteorologists Warn

Sonos Play Review: Call It a Comeback

Sonos Era 100 SL Review: The Cheapest Way Into Wired Sonos Sound

Asus ROG’s Massive Swift OLED Gaming Monitor Epitomizes Excess in the Best Way

The Ikea Varmblixt Smart Lamp Fills a Donut Hole in My Life

Nothing Headphone A vs. Headphone 1: Which Pair of ANC Wireless Headphones Wins?

Asus ROG’s Cetra Open Wireless Gaming Earbuds Might Be Better Than Wearing a Headset

Nintendo’s Talking Flower Is Annoying as Hell. I Love It

Level Lock Pro Review: As Good as a Secret Smart Lock Gets

Apple Studio Display XDR Review: It Looks So Good, I Wish It Were an iMac

RayNeo Air 4 Pro Review: My Eyes Love These Video Glasses, but My Nose Disagrees