Sci-Fi

Four Theories About Creatures from High-Gravity Worlds

Don’t support crappy science fiction where every planet has the same gravity as Earth. Astronomers say the planets most likely to support life are ten times the size of Earth. When we finally meet aliens, they’ll envy the spring in our step. Movies and other media are squandering the awesome story potential of creatures from…

“What’s That Supposed to Mean?” on Flash Gordon

In Friday’s episode of dimension-hopping serial Flash Gordon, a bizarre ritual involving dudes from Burning Man and a scorpion reveals all. Except to Ming, the bad guy who is supposed to rule dying planet Mongo like a tyrant but in fact acts like a prissy bureaucrat. He and his “deviate” advisor Rankol are trying to…

Humans Become Beautiful Ponies for Aliens in The Mount

Charley is a very good mount. He always keeps his hair shiny, and exercises his legs as much as possible so his Hoot will be proud of how fast Charley can run. He’s seen what happens to bad mounts — they have to wear sharp metal bits in their mouths, and sometimes they are whipped…

Science Fiction Farts of Death

Fart danger is everywhere recent science fiction. First there was Greg Bear’s novel Vitals, in which an evil Soviet conspiracy leads to targeted biological mind-control attacks. How do you know somebody has been taken over by mind-controlling bacteria? They start farting. Doctor Who took this idea a step further. In “Boom Town,” which aired during…

Never Forget the Glory of the Wankhers

Here, in full color, is exhibit A for why it’s hard to sell science fiction novels. What exactly is a graphic designer supposed to do with a book that literally has the word “wank” in the title? Maybe put a Dracula-headed guy in a purple robe and have him hold a teeny lizard guy in…

Nothing Like an Alien Death Orgy Where Rich Eat Poor

Poor Bill. He’s just found out that his rich Beverly Hills family is actually a bunch of incestuous, polymorphous aliens who have raised him for food. Now his parents and their rich alien friends have kidnapped him and his friend David, and are going to eat them in a giant orgy. That just one tiny…

Dark Prophesy From NASA Photographer

Tyranny, one of the most visually haunting science fiction flicks available on the Web, comes from the imagination of a guy who spends his days photographing real-life science. John Beck Hofmann is director of photography at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab, and that makes his tale of government conspiracies and machine-induced prophetic visions even more interesting.…

Telepathic Alcoholics More Common In Books Than Movies

Why can’t movie science fiction be as creative as the books? Brendan at Balancing Frogs just read a collection of 1950s science fiction novellas about ancient telepathic civilizations, crystalline alien explorers and super-advanced humans who despise their primitive Earth cousins. Each story has at least one loopy plot twist. Why can’t the movies have that…

Poll: Is Tin Man Fantasy or Science Fiction?

With new miniseries Tin Man, the SciFi Channel has dressed up the old Wizard of Oz tales for the modern, science-fictional age by injecting initials (Dorothy is DG, Oz is “the O.Z.”) and making all the characters seem a little bit Farscape. So is Tin Man fantasy or science fiction? Take the poll and be…

Dream-Eaters and Three-Sexed Aliens in the Five Greatest World-Building Novels

What would weather be like if you lived in a planet-sized bag of oxygen? What would reproduction be like if there were a third sex who combined the genetic material of two other sexes by linking them at the neurological level and giving them braingasms? What would scientific progress be like in an anarchist-feminist society?…

NPR Wants Scifi Novels On Your Bedside Table

NPR’s Nancy Pearl, who has probably written enough words about science fiction to fill a couple of Del Rey compendiums with, has laid out of a list of her recommended reading. While technically only two of the books on her list are science fiction, you can’t really argue with Frederik Pohl and Joe Haldeman. Neal…

Time Travel Is Like Heroin in Primer

Four corporate drones trying to spinoff a cool startup accidentally discover time travel in Shane Carruth’s dark SF flick Primer, a Sundance hit in 2004. Carruth’s tale explores what happens when time travel doesn’t work quite the way you’d expect — to travel back in time 6 hours, you have to sit in a cramped…

The Only Good Science Fiction Poems Ever Written Are By Jessy Randall

She’s not exactly your typical science fiction writer, but Colorado poet Jessy Randall has done what precious few poets have ever done well: beautifully capture the way our emotional lives in the modern world have become infused with the imagery and alienness of science fiction. I just heard Randall give a reading in support of…

Battlestar Galactica Fans To Join Strike, Meet Disappointment

Pity fans of Sci-Fi Channel’s Battlestar Galactica who plan to join the show’s writing staff on picket lines this Friday lured by rumors that a lengthy strike may result in the show’s fourth and final season being aired in full earlier than initially expected and without the traditional mid-season break. Talking last week, show producer…

The Bad Astrology And Universe Today forum has a hilarious list of the Top 5 Sci-Fi Aircraft That Would Fall Like A Rock. Turns out the laws of aerodynamics still apply, even in the future. Image by Franz66

Chuck Joins Journeyman On Endangered List

NBC is starting to get rope burn from sticking out its neck for science fiction. Last night’s episodes of Heroes, Journeyman and Chuck all hit series lows. Now it’s not just Journeyman in danger of cancellation, but Chuck also. ‘Heroes,’ NBC Lineup Continue To Get Clobbered [SyFyPortal]

Can A “BaadAssss” Time Traveler Prevent The Apocalypse?

A second-generation blaxploitation director plans to tackle science fiction. Mario Van Peebles is writing and directing The Uniter, an epic about a political fugitive from the future who journeys back to our time to prevent an apocalypse in 2012. The time traveler aims to stop the disaster before it happens by training a 13-year-old to…

Ron Moore Gets His Auteur On

Ronald Moore will go the Joss Whedon route, directing an episode of Battlestar Galactica which he wrote. But the bad news? Galactica season four is now officially airing in April.

The 50 Million Dollar Dame: Jaime Sommers, Coed

Evil Islamofascists are implanting neural chips into the brains of American POWs and turning them into what Jaime calls “human car bombs,” though there’s less exploding and more shooting and stabbing than this implies. To solve the problem, Jaime goes undercover as a British exchange student at the local university, a twist that allows actress…

Must Read: Jack Kirby’s Fourth World Omnibus

Must-read comics are futuristic classics that shouldn’t be missed. Of course, not every must-read is perfect. That’s why we’ve rated them 1-5 on the patented “crunchy goodness” scale. Title: Jack Kirby’s Fourth World Omnibus Date: 2007-2008 (Four volumes reprinting material from 1971-1983) Vitals: The great unfinished epic of superhero comics, Kirby (co-creator of the Fantastic…