Lauren Davis

Horror Meets Narnia in Ursula Vernon’s New Novel — and She’s Serializing it Online

When Baba Yaga offers to give you your heart’s desire, you should really think twice about accepting. Summer, the absurdly sheltered protagonist of Ursula Vernon’s new novel Summer in Orcus, encounters the witch and lands in a dangerous fantasy world. And you can read all about it for free online. Hugo Award-winning cartoonist and author…

How The 100 Became A Fantastic Show While You Weren’t Watching

When The 100 premiered last year, it looked a lot like any other science fiction show on The CW: a bunch of pretty people acting out a concept that had a tinge of social awareness. But this season, the show broke out of its post-apocalyptic reenactment of Lord of the Flies and became an interesting,…

Why Ahsoka Tano Is the Best Thing to Happen to Star Wars in 20 Years

Tomorrow, Lucasfilm will release final season of Star Wars: The Clone Wars on Netflix*, but the season won’t include an arc centered on one of the show’s main characters, Anakin Skywalker’s Padawan Ahsoka Tano. That’s a shame, not just because Ahsoka’s growth has been one of the most compelling aspects of the series, but also…

Paul Reubens Will Play the Penguin’s Father on Gotham

Back in 1992, Paul Reubens played Oswald Cobblepot’s snooty father in the movie Batman Returns. Now Pee-Wee Herman will play a different version of the Penguin’s dear old dad, this time on Gotham. Entertainment Weekly reports the news from NYCC’s Gotham panel, where Robin Lord Taylor, who plays Oswald Cobblepot/the Penguin, was excited to announce…

We Want to Read a Comic Book About These Amazing Samurai Frogs

Sometimes we see character designs that just, ahem, leap off the page, begging to become stars in a larger story. That’s how we feel about Conor Nolan’s “Lilypad 7,” an amphibious crew who come from an alternate version of feudal Japan. We asked Nolan where these designs came from, and he responded over email: It’s…

Watch Puppet Freddy Krueger Sing His Nightmare Version of “Dream a Little Dream of Me”

The latest episode of the puppet web series Glove and Boots has a Halloween theme, guest starring a felt version of Nightmare on Elm Street’s Freddy Krueger. When Mario eats too much junk food before bed, his subconscious summons up a crooning Krueger. [via Neatorama]

What if Your House Insisted on Choosing Your Roommate?

Finding a new roommate is complicated enough when the only people making the decision live inside the house. In this kooky animated short, a trio of oddball roommates have to let their sentient house in on the process. Marie de Lapparent and Marie de Lapparent, another pair of animators from Ecole des Métiers du Cinéma…

How Pee Led to One of the 17th Century’s Most Important Chemistry Breakthroughs

You probably just flush your urine down the toilet, but some European alchemists used it in their experiments, and in the process made a scientific discovery that helped modernize the world. In this video from the American Chemical Society’s Reactions series, “How Pee Brought You The Modern World,” host Darcy Gentleman explains how alchemist Hennig…

Photos From the Apollo Missions Have Been Turned Into a Brilliant Stop-Motion Film

While flipping through photos in the Project Apollo Archive, Vimeo user harrisonicus noticed that the act of clicking the “Next” button created a sort of stop-motion animation. So he decided to turn the photos into a little film, sending us to the moon with the Apollo missions. As for the music, there “Lift Motif” by…

A Dark Animated Comedy About Pest Exterminators on an Alien Planet

What’s the line between genocide and pest control? The two exterminators in the animated short Bûche Royale view themselves as ordinary working stiffs on a foreign planet, but their coworker patter is punctuated by the systematic eradication of a native species. Sarah Amrani, Aline Lesage, and Lucy Vallin made Bûche Royale at Angoulême’s Ecole des…

Charlie Brown Actually Makes a Pretty Great Indiana Jones

What if Indiana Jones met every challenge with a cry of “Good grief!”? Artist Chris Thornley, also known as Raid 71, casts the Peanuts gang as characters from the Indiana Jones films. You can purchase the limited edition three-print “Charlie Jones” set from New York’s Bottleneck Gallery for $45. You can also see more of…

George R.R. Martin’s Novella About a Werewolf Collections Agent May Become a TV Show

Now that we’re five seasons deep into Game of Thrones, another George R.R. Martin story may be coming to television: The Skin Trade, Martin’s 1989 novella about a detective trying to solve a gruesome murder case and a collections agent who suffers from lycanthropy. Over on his blog, Martin has announced that Cinemax has optioned…

In the Webcomic Peritale, a Fairy with No Magic Tries to Pass Her Godmother Test

In the world of Mari Costa’s webcomic Peritale, the most exciting job a fairy can have is that of godmother, making sure that fairytales come true. Few want that job more than young Periwinkle, but there’s one hitch: She has no magical powers. Periwinkle Poulaine isn’t like the other fairies in her class. She can’t…

Every Burp in Rick & Morty Collected in One Nauseating Video

The folks at Digg decided to celebrate the end of Rick & Morty’s second season with this compilation of Rick’s gaseous emissions. Just a warning: You may feel slightly sick after watching them all in a row. [via Geeks are Sexy]

Wes Anderson’s next film will be a stop-motion movie about dogs. The director is returning to his Fantastic Mr. Fox medium, but Indiewire notes it’s a funny choice of subject, given Anderson’s propensity for killing dogs in his movies.

Matt Damon Does Even More Science in Deleted Scene From The Martian

If you didn’t get enough of Matt Damon’s Mark Watney sciencing the shit out of his accidental home in the feature cut of The Martian (and to be honest, we could always watch more), here’s an entry from Watney’s video diary that didn’t make it into the film. /Film notes that, with all of the…

These Stunning Illustrated Sea Dragons Are Part Fish and Part Tree

The Leafy Sea Dragon (Phycodurus eques) is a real fish, a relative of the sea horse with appendages that look like seaweed. Here, artist Piper Thibodeau imagines fanciful versions of sea dragons that grow terrestrial foliage, giving them a different tree-inspired look for each season. Thibodeau is a freelance character designer and concept artist, and…

A Surprising Animated Love Story About Giant Robots from Outer Space

When giant robots conquer the Earth, a lone man finds himself on the run from a marching horde of mechanical titans. He soon finds himself face-to-face with a redheaded engineering genius and one of the massive invaders. Guess which one he makes a love connection with? Valentin Watrigant, François Guery, Elsa Lamy, Aurelien Fernandez, and…

Walking Dead Creator’s New Exorcism Show Outcast Looks Thoroughly Creepy

We’ve got two TV shows based on Robert Kirkman’s zombie comic The Walking Dead, and now Kirkman’s exorcism comic Outcast is getting the small screen treatment as well. And if the latest trailer is any indication, it’s going to be a moody ride, punctuated by terrible violence. Cinemax showed this new trailer at its NYCC…

Age of Ultron is So Much Funnier with James Spader’s Dialogue from The Office

Before he loaned his voice to the genocidal robot Ultron in the latest Avengers movie, James Spader played the enigmatic CEO Robert California on The Office. And when you put Robert California’s words in Ultron’s metal mouth, the results are delightfully unhinged. The folks at Red Letter Media came up with this inspired mashup. Now…