Charlie Jane Anders, Author at Gizmodo

Will the Star Wars comics start blowing chunks soon?

One of the major bright spots of Star Wars in the past decade has been the consistently excellent comics published by Dark Horse. From the Old Republic era to the far-future Legacy storylines, Dark Horse has consistently made the Star Wars comics better than they had any right to be. (With maybe the exception of…

Movies Charlie Jane Anders

The Star Trek-Middleman Crossover You’ve Been Cautiously Excited For!

The last time Javier Grillo-Marxuach returned to the world of his gone-too-soon TV show and comic, The Middleman, it was for a bizarre crossover with Doctor Who. Now, a year later, he’s bringing us an even more bizarre crossover with Star Trek… well, sort of. Let’s just say if you can’t decide whether Khan or…

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China arrests 500 people for believing in tomorrow’s Mayan Apocalypse

Here in the United States, we’re mostly treating tomorrow’s scheduled End of Days as a bit of a joke — but in China, it’s deadly serious. At least, serious enough for the Chinese government to round up and detain 500 members of the Church of Almighty God, a Chinese religious sect, for spreading the notion…

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Could this be next year’s most haunting movie?

Check out a brand new trailer for Vanishing Waves, the Lithuanian erotic science fiction romance that’s been sweeping festivals and winning tons of awards. Vanishing Waves hits U.S. theaters in 2013, and we honestly can’t wait. Check out the NSFW redband trailer, which came out last summer, here. Here’s the official synopsis: Have you ever…

Trailers Charlie Jane Anders

You can own a perfect replica of River Song’s sonic screwdriver and diary!

This is no ordinary collectible. This handmade replica of River Song’s own personal sonic screwdriver was constructed personally by Nick Robatto, the man who’s made all the sonic screwdrivers for Doctor Who. There are no prefab parts here, and he’s only making 15 of them for Quantum Mechanix. If you’re a bonkers Doctor Who fan…

Television Charlie Jane Anders

9 Joyful Ways to Demolish Your Favorite Genre

Genres don’t have to be comfortable old pairs of socks. Genre storytelling can be thrilling and unexpected — and one major way to seize the element of surprise is to bust out of genre boundaries, like a rocket sled crashing through the walls of dreamland. Drop some nanotech into that literary story. Nuke the fairy…

Movies Charlie Jane Anders

NASA’s brand new spacesuit prototype really does look like Buzz Lightyear

Check out these pictures of NASA’s brand new prototype Z-1 spacesuits — do they remind you of anything? As Slashfilm points out, there’s a striking resemblance to Buzz Lightyear — almost as if someone at NASA was a Toy Story fan. These pics come via Tested, which also explain that the Z-1 will soon be…

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Jennifer Egan joins the million-dollar author club

Jennifer Egan’s A Visit from the Goon Squad included a science-fictional section set in the future — and won the Pulitzer Prize. And her Twitter story “Black Box” was the best thing in the New Yorker’s recent science fiction issue. So we’re cautiously hopeful that she’ll continue moving in that direction for her next two…

Books & Comics Charlie Jane Anders

Who would win in a fight: Superman, or the Death Star?

The Death Star is the most powerful battle station ever constructed. And it’s virtually indestructible — once you take care of that one tiny reactor vent thingie, that is. But meanwhile, Superman is also impervious to most weapons, has insane super-strength and can travel at Mach Infinity. And he’s already polished off Warworld a couple…

Movies Charlie Jane Anders

I wrote a science fiction story, and parts of it came true by the time it got published

My story “Intestate” is up now at Tor.com — it’s one of the weirdest things I’ve ever written, sort of an attempt to do something like The Royal Tenenbaums except with mad science. But perhaps the strangest part is how much has changed since I was writing “Intestate,” back in the heady days of 2011.…

Books & Comics Charlie Jane Anders

Joss Whedon wanted the Wasp and an extra villain in The Avengers

The Avengers was one of our favorite movies of the year, in large part because it avoided excessive clutter, with just one villain and mostly characters we’d met in previous Marvel Studios movies. But now, it turns out that if Joss Whedon had gone with some of his earlier ideas, the film could have been…

Movies Charlie Jane Anders

Best and Worst Science Fiction/Fantasy Movies of 2012

This was a pretty good year to be a fan of genre movies. More and more low-budget movies had the courage to tackle science fiction and fantasy themes, and meanwhile Hollywood seemed to step up its game a little. But at the same time, there were still tons of boring sequels and prequels, and mountains…

Movies Charlie Jane Anders

The Self-Published Space Opera Book Series That’s Become a Best-Seller

One space opera book series has been at the top of the Smashwords section of Media Bistro’s self-published bestseller list for the past several weeks: Randolph Lalonde’s Spinward Fringe books, which include eight volumes thus far. The series follows Captain Jacob Valance, a hired gun with amnesia who searches for clues about his past while…

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Does technobabble give rise to pseudoscience?

Over at the Guardian, writer/comedian Simon Dunn raises a compelling question: when science fiction writers or creators insert junk science or “technobabble” into their stories, are they doing the same thing as the people who promote pseudoscience with a straight face? And isn’t technobabble basically the same sort of mumbo jumbo as people use to…

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This Week’s Comics: Which is Cooler, Nazi Werewolves or Nazi Supervillains? Plus Brian Bolland’s Judge Dredd!

In this week’s comics, a “bionic amnesiac” discovers his true purpose, and a freedom fighter mounts a daring rescue in a dystopian city. We get to see the Mirror Universe version of Star Trek’s Captain Pike! Meet the woman who can see the future of anything she tastes! And there’s a droolworthy hardcover collecting all…

Books & Comics Charlie Jane Anders

This erotica book might actually be the year’s most dangerous science fiction anthology

The best short fiction has an element of danger to it. You should fear for the protagonists — but even more than that, you should fear the abyss they’re suspended over, and what it represents. And short erotica needs more, not less, danger than other types of fiction, because it’s about the loss of control…

Books & Comics Charlie Jane Anders

Share Doctor Who memories… and give to alzheimer’s research

This is a really neat idea. The book Behind the Sofa collects celebrities’ memories of the Doctor Who moments that scared them most. And it’s raising money for Alzheimers Research UK. The 100 celebrities who’ve contributed include: Comedians Al Murray, Stephen Merchant, and Bill Oddie; actors Lynda Bellingham, Nicholas Parsons, and Rhys Thomas; writers Neil…

Books & Comics Charlie Jane Anders

8 Signs That Pop Culture Is Finally Done With the Apocalypse

The world has ended, civilization has collapsed, the undead hordes have overrun everything. We’ve seen the apocalypse so many times, even Roland Emmerich is bored with it. So what comes next? We’ve still got some apocalyptic movies to look forward to next year, and post-apocalyptic TV shows like Revolution and Walking Dead are coming back…

Movies Charlie Jane Anders

Games Workshop gets someone’s book yanked from Amazon for using the term “Space Marine”

Who owns the term “space marine”? According to Wikipedia, the term was first used in 1932 in a story called “Captain Brink of the Space Marines” by Bob Olsen — but now, Warhammer 40K owner Games Workshop is claiming to have a trademark on the longstanding term. M.C.A. Hogarth has been selling a serial called…

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Exclusive First Look at the Cover for Part 3 of John Scalzi’s Human Division!

John Scalzi is trying a huge new experiment in serialized publishing, putting out his new Old Man’s War novel The Human Division as a series of weekly ebooks. https://gizmodo.com/tor-will-serialize-john-scalzis-next-old-mans-war-novel-5924189 We’ve got the exclusive reveal for the third book, “We Only Need the Heads,” which goes up on January 29, 2013. And here’s the description as…

io9 Charlie Jane Anders

Charlie Jane Anders

Will the Star Wars comics start blowing chunks soon?

The Star Trek-Middleman Crossover You’ve Been Cautiously Excited For!

China arrests 500 people for believing in tomorrow’s Mayan Apocalypse

Could this be next year’s most haunting movie?

You can own a perfect replica of River Song’s sonic screwdriver and diary!

9 Joyful Ways to Demolish Your Favorite Genre

NASA’s brand new spacesuit prototype really does look like Buzz Lightyear

Jennifer Egan joins the million-dollar author club

Who would win in a fight: Superman, or the Death Star?

I wrote a science fiction story, and parts of it came true by the time it got published

Joss Whedon wanted the Wasp and an extra villain in The Avengers

Best and Worst Science Fiction/Fantasy Movies of 2012

The Self-Published Space Opera Book Series That’s Become a Best-Seller

Does technobabble give rise to pseudoscience?

This Week’s Comics: Which is Cooler, Nazi Werewolves or Nazi Supervillains? Plus Brian Bolland’s Judge Dredd!

This erotica book might actually be the year’s most dangerous science fiction anthology

Share Doctor Who memories… and give to alzheimer’s research

8 Signs That Pop Culture Is Finally Done With the Apocalypse

Games Workshop gets someone’s book yanked from Amazon for using the term “Space Marine”

Exclusive First Look at the Cover for Part 3 of John Scalzi’s Human Division!

‘Butt Birth’-ing Rhinoceros from Ace Ventura Sequel Sold at Auction for a Whopping $60,000

The Ryan Gosling Sci-Fi Streak Will Continue Until Morale Improves

Study Challenges Popular Theory on Why Primordial Bugs Were So Darn Huge

Ewan McGregor and Anne Hathaway’s Mystery’s Sci-Fi Film Has Its First Trailer

Scientists Just Found the Salt Limit That Pushes Your Heart to the Breaking Point

White House Social Media Just Had Its Covfefe Moment

Roborock F25 Ultra Steam Wet Dry Vacuum Is Now at Its Lowest Price, but Only During the Spring Sale Window

This $450 Semi-Dumb Phone Is Barely Even a Phone

Startup Successfully Ignites World’s First Fusion Rocket

Shokz OpenDots One Earbuds Hit Their Lowest Price Yet Across All Color Options, Including the New Ones

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