Andrew Liptak

Learn How To Doof With Funny Or Die

Mad Max: Fury Road has certainly caught on this year, but one of the most memorable points of the film was the Doof Warrior, the blind rock star with a flamethrower guitar. Funny or Die has a funny short that teaches you how to ‘doof’. The most important thing to remember? Play the hits and…

Here’s the 2015 British Fantasy Award Nominees

Begun in 1972, the British Fantasy Awards (originally named the August Derleth Fantasy Awards) have been presented annually by the British Fantasy Society. The BFS just announced their finalists for the award. Here’s the nominees: Best Fantasy Novel (the Robert Holdstock Award) City of Stairs, Robert Jackson Bennett (Jo Fletcher) The Relic Guild, Edward Cox…

Watch The History Of Aliens In Film Starting In 1902

Digg has compiled a really cool video that looks at how we’ve used aliens in films, starting with 1902’s A Trip to the Moon and going all the way to 2014’s Guardians of the Galaxy. This isn’t a comprehensive look by any stretch of the imagination, but it’s interesting to see a bit of a…

Divers Discover Enormous Squid Egg Mass Off The Coast Of Turkey

Earlier this month, a team of divers swimming off the coast of Turkey discovered something unexpected: a 4-meter wide gelatinous mass of what turned out to be one of the biggest mass of squid eggs ever discovered. The divers weren’t sure what they had discovered, but once the video was posted online, they got a…

Explore 25 Lost Cities With This Video 

The world is a really big place, and throughout human history, we’ve built and then lost a whole bunch of major cities. Over on the Mental Floss YouTube channel, John Green assembled a list and a bit of background on 25 cities from around the world that have been lost. Most have been found by…

In a recent piece for Grantland, Sean T. Collins explores how Hellboy has been destroying the world since 1994, and how he upended the traditional superhero comic along the way. He traces a bit of history behind Mike Mignola’s comic universe, and how the story is drawing to a close.

Can A Home Drone Kill You? The Mythbusters Test With A Chicken Says Yes

Tonight’s episode of Mythbusters, Flights of Fantasy features two very different types of flying machines: drones and a Lockheed U-2 spy plane. Show hosts Adam Savage and Jaime Hyneman took a couple of minutes to chat with us about the episode and the rest of the newly-rebooted season of the show. Tonight’s episode sees the…

James Cameron’s Deepsea Challenger Damaged In Transit

In 2012, James Cameron made history when he became the third person to visit the Mariana Trench. After the trip, he donated his submarine, Deepsea Challenger, to the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. The institution was in the process of loaning the vehicle out when it caught fire while in transit. https://gizmodo.com/james-cameron-has-donated-his-record-breaking-submarine-459240423 The Deepsea Challenger was…

Fly Through The Solar System At The Speed Of Light With This Video

Space is really, really big, and there’s been a couple of great videos out there that show off the relative size of objects. This video puts the scale of the solar system into real perspective by showing how it takes you pass through the solar system at the speed of light. Light travels 299,792,458 m/s,…

FX Releases Hilarious Tribute To Archer Voice Actor George Coe

George Coe, who voiced Woodhouse on Archer, passed away earlier this week at the age of 86. The actor was known for his work in film and television, and his most recent role on FX’s spy show has been amazing. The network has put together a funny tribute of some of the butler’s best moments.…

The University of Iowa Brings Fanzines To The Digital World

The University of Iowa has an extensive and growing archive of Science Fiction and Fantasy publications, and now, they’re beginning to digitize their collection of fanzines. https://gizmodo.com/university-of-iowa-receives-18-000-volume-science-ficti-1712901055 The University has been working to preserve the fan-printed publications, and under the supervision of curator Peter Balestrieri, archivists have begun to photograph each document. It’s no small…

Read This Excellent Interview With Samuel R. Delany Over On SF Signal

Over on SF Signal, John Stevens has a really interesting interview with SF Grandmaster Samuel R. Delany. In it, they discuss a recent re-release of Delany’s first three novels, genre literature and his career. Here’s a snippet: Q: In Kim Stanley Robinson’s introduction to the tribute volume STORIES FOR CHIP he discusses the feeling that…

Batman V Superman Trailer Is So Better With Always Sunny In Philadelphia

Man of Steel was pretty grim and serious, and it looks like Batman v Superman is going to have about the same tone. Over on YouTube, user Albert Lopez decided to lighten things up by recutting the trailer for the upcoming movie with Always Sunny In Philadelphia’s song, Dayman. The juxtaposition works surprisingly well, with…

On Sunday, Claudia Alexander, who helped lead the Galileo and Rosetta spacecraft missions, died at the age of 56. In addition to her work with NASA, she was a prolific writer, authoring scientific papers, children’s books and science fiction. Read her obituary over on the New York Times.

This Week, Killjoys Goes To A Very Dark Place

Up to this point, I’ve been pretty happy with Killjoys being a fun, reasonably lighthearted show that points to the occasional social message. In this week’s episode, Glitch in the System, the show turns dark, fast. This week’s episode starts off with the crew jetting about in space, near an asteroid field. They’ve got a…

Here’s The Names Of The New Ghostbusters

Paul Feig took to twitter yesterday evening and dropped some new information about the upcoming Ghostbusters movie, revealing the names of the headline characters. Based on the image that he linked to, Kristen Wigg will be playing Erin Gilbert and Melissa McCarthy will be playing Abby Yates. According to IMDB, Kate McKinnon is playing Jillian…

Books Are Quirky And Charming In This Supercut Of Wes Anderson’s Films

Books hold a special, significant place in Wes Anderson’s films, and The A to Z Review has put together a neat supercut of the various points throughout his films where books are featured. Watching it, it’s interesting to see just how important books are to Anderson’s films, and how much the director draws upon a…

Garfield Plus Saga‘s Lying Cat Is Just The Best

I really loved Garfield Minus Garfield, which is exactly as it sounds: Garfield with its titular character stripped out. What happens when you replace Garfield with Saga’s Lying Cat? Absolute brilliance. Read the rest here.

Hubble’s Portrait Of The Crowded Quintuplet Cluster

This latest image from the Hubble Space Telescope is utterly stunning: it’s of the Quintuplet Cluster, named for its five brightest stars. Up until 1990, we had no idea that this existed: because it’s so close to the center of the galaxy, dust has blocked our view of it. This image was taken by observing…

Concept Trailer For Momentum Film Is Fast And Furious With Flying Cars

This neat concept trailer has been flying around the internet the last couple of days: it’s a story of a hover car racer who has to choose between his family and the potential for fame, and it features some pretty cool flying cars. Queue the obligatory “Now this is podracing!” puns, but this looks like…