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Is This the Worst Moment in the Fantastic Four Movie? God, I Hope So.

Fantastic Four has premiered in the U.K., and audience reviews are hitting social media. The verdict seems to be that it’s not particularly good, but there’s one “Thing” we just learned about the movie that is just astoundingly awful. Spoiler warning, obviously. Well, goddamn. I really though Batman V. Superman was gunning for the most…

Explore Mars as the Curiosity Rover, Using This Handy Simulator!

This new simulator lets you direct the Curiosity rover on its missions around Mars—whether you want to send it to drill into the dust, explore new terrain, or just catch it in the somewhat awkward position of capturing a selfie (like you see above). Oh, Curiosity, we’ve all been there. Experience Curiosity is a new…

What Basic Things Have We Been Doing Wrong All Our Lives?

A single tweet tore the jewelry-wearing faction of the Internet apart after the image above went out with the caption, “After my nineteen years of living I have now realized that you are supposed to take the plastic part off.” Holy shit. Debate is still raging over whether the plastic earring back should be removed—some…

The Almost Perfect World War II Plot to Bomb Japan with Bats

Imagine: a quiet, tense night in the middle of wartime. A plane rips through the air above your city, rupturing the stillness. The bay doors open, and out whistles a bomb. It drops and drops. Everyone braces. But when it explodes, the city is filled not with the flash of impact, but with hundreds and…

Dashing New Species of Peacock Spider Just Wants to Get Funky

He’s got a bright blue mask, flashy racing stripes, and dance moves he’s ready to use on some lucky lady. Say hello to Maratus personatus, a newly-named species of peacock spider from Western Australia. Like all other known peacock spiders, this blue-faced guy has a distinctive courtship dance. But unlike other peacock spiders, he doesn’t…

One of Our Favorite Short Film Makers Just Landed His First Feature Film

We’ve really enjoyed the futuristic short films of director and special effects artist Hasraf ‘HaZ’ Dulull, and now we’ll get to see what he can bring to a feature-length film. Dulull has already started filming Origin Unknown, a scifi thriller about a mysterious object spotted on Mars. ScreenDaily broke the news that Dulull, who directed…

Watch the Moon cross the face of the Earth in this incredible video

Here’s an absolutely stunning video that shows our Moon fly by and cross the face of our Earth. The detail is incredible, the size difference is dramatic, and it’s just lovely to see the phenomenon happen from outside Earth. We see the Moon streak the sky every night, this is what it looks like from…

Giant LED Numbers Make It Easy To Track an IndyCar’s Race Position

Even a seasoned race fan can have a hard time knowing what position every single car on a track is in. So starting this past weekend the Verizon IndyCar Series introduced giant LED numbers on every car indicating its current race position, and other metrics fans might be interested in. The two-digit panels—positioned on both…

Nichelle Nichols is Hitching a Ride on NASA’s SOFIA Research Aircraft

Nichelle Nichols, the iconic Lieutenant Uhura from the original Star Trek, will be continuing her lifelong partnership with NASA by taking a ride on their airborne research platform. Nichols will be the first non-essential personnel to ride along with Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA) this September.

Bingewatching History: I Relived 16 Depressing Years Of The Daily Show

On September 12, 2000, Jon Stewart started The Daily Show’s Headlines segment with the following joke: “The GOP accused of using subliminal advertising. Bush says, ‘Why would we advertise underwater?’” After a run of jokes about then-candidate George W. Bush, Stewart chuckles, “He’s making it so easy.” Laughs were easy in the late summer of…

See Where Every US State Gets Its Energy From

Thanks to Obama’s Clean Power Plan announced earlier this week, each state in the US has been charged with plotting a way to a cleaner energy future. While the goal for the entire country is to reduce carbon emissions from power plants by a third by 2030, as you can see from this map, some…

Google’s Fixing the Hangouts Hack With ‘Biggest Software Update Ever’

Security researchers scared the shit out of Android users last week when they revealed a vulnerability that let hackers control your phone with a single text. In a session at Black Hat, Google’s Adrian Ludwig just explained exactly how it’s being fixed, calling it the biggest software update in history. He seems pretty chill about…

io9 Book Club Is In Session: Let’s Talk About Naomi Novik’s Uprooted!

Welcome to the monthly meeting of the io9 Book Club. This month, we’ve read Uprooted by Naomi Novik. Jump into comments to get started talking about it! What is this io9 Book Club all about? We meet once a month to discuss a book we’ve all read together, and then we have an online chat…

Frequent consumption of spicy foods has been linked to longer life. A 7-year study of nearly a half-million people in China shows that eating spicy foods one or two days a week can reduce death by as much as 14%. But correlation is not causation, leading some to question the study’s findings. Image credit: chrizzel_lu/Pixabay/CC0

Germany Backs off Treason Charge for Journalists with Leaked Documents

Germany’s Justice Minister Heiko Maas just fired the country’s top prosecutor Harald Range. This came in the wake of a public battle over how Range was handling a treason investigation launched against journalists who released government documents about a surveillance program. The German justice ministry has been investigating two journalists from Netzpolitik.org on a possible…

Sleepy Hollow Drops the Headless Horseman for Season 3. Wait, What?

We knew Sleepy Hollow was going through a pretty major retooling for season 3 after its troubled (and frequently boring) second season.But this might be the biggest change of all—the show is also dropping its iconic villain, the Headless Horseman, as well. But frankly, I’m kind of cool with it. First of all, let’s remember…

A New Report Reveals Inequality In Hollywood Is Worse Than We Thought

The ongoing debate about equal representation in movies is more important now than ever—but it turns out we didn’t really realize just how bad the situation really was. It turns out that, according to a new report, if you’re not straight, white, male—or in the case of a Marvel movie, named Chris—in Hollywood, you’re screwed.…

You’ll Fight Over BTTF Monopoly’s Tokens Before the Game Even Starts

No board game is more effective, and more efficient, at tearing apart families and friendships than Monopoly. And with USAopoly’s new Back to the Future edition, you’ll be fighting before you even roll the dice as players attempt to lay claim to the DeLorean, hoverboard, or Nike powerlace sneakers tokens. The other three tokens—Einstein, a…

Investigators: Plane Debris Is “Conclusively” From MH370

Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak has confirmed what many pundits have been claiming since last week: Investigators agree that the flaperon discovered on Réunion Island belongs to Malaysia Airline Flight 370, which disappeared in March of 2014. The piece of a jet’s wing that washed up on a remote island off the coast of Madagascar…

India’s Porn Ban Reversal Is Essentially Bullshit

Today’s headlines are triumphantly declaring that India’s government walked back its sweeping ban of internet porn sites. But that’s not quite true—for all intents and purposes, online porn is still banned in India. Let’s take a look at the devil in the details. Following widespread condemnation of a ban on 857 pornographic websites, the government…