Pixel Scroll 3/16/19 Hit Me With Your Pixel Stick, One Weird Fandom Click Click Click

(1) FANS LOSE THEIR SHIRT OVER ELLISON DESIGN. A Harlan Ellison Facebook Fan Club member pointed out that a Hawaiian shirt seller on Etsy was offering a colorful fractal collage of Ellison images.

The first fan to respond made the mistake of saying admiringly, “I think I’m going to order it” and was instantly schooled how outraged Ellison would have been to discover someone attempting to profit from unlicensed sales of his image (nor without paying the photographers who took the pictures). Fans shared their ire with Etsy store owner Ed Seeman and the Ellison shirt was taken down. However, Seeman’s hundreds of other similar designs involving movie and TV celebrities, famous scientists, and classical composers, are still on offer. These include William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, John Williams, and “Stephan” King.

(2) THINGS WRITERS HAVE TO DO BESIDES WRITE. Jeff VanderMeer came up with one I haven’t heard before:

It looks like a hawk got a dove on the ground near one of the feeders while we were out. From the spread of feathers and lack of body or any parts, I think it’s a hawk rather than a cat. Honestly, I sure hope it was a hawk, because if it was a cat I have to get out the supersoaker, fill it with orange juice, and spend a lot of time quietly waiting in the shadows and I have so much else to do.

(3) JEDI FASHION STATEMENT. The Orange County Register blabs practically everything about one of Disneyland’s forthcoming Star Wars experiences: “Step-by-step preview of the lightsaber-building experience coming to Disneyland’s Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge”.

Padawan learners strong with the Force will be able to build their own lightsabers using scavenged parts from fallen Jedi temples inside a covert workshop hidden from the watchful eye of the First Order when the new Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge opens at Disneyland.

The build-your-own lightsaber experience will take place in Savi’s Workshop — Handbuilt Lightsabers when the 14-acre land debuts May 31 at the Anaheim theme park.

The new Galaxy’s Edge themed land will be set in the Black Spire Outpost on the planet of Batuu, located on the outer rim of the “Star Wars” galaxy. Every shop and restaurant in the village will have an extensive backstory and proprietor from the “Star Wars” universe.

The handbuilt lightsaber workshop will be run by Savi, who owns a space junkyard near the main entrance to Black Spire Outpost. The scrapper has been collecting lightsaber pieces from throughout the galaxy in hopes a true hero with the ability to assemble the parts would one day enter his shop. That day is today and that hero is you.

… Builders will choose from four lightsaber styles:

  • Peace & Justice, reflecting the Jedi style from the Republic era
  • Power & Control, a Sith style reflective of the Dark Side of the Force
  • Elemental Nature, using natural components like Brylark trees, Cartusion whale bones and Rancor teeth
  • Protection & Defense, incorporating components with ancient and mysterious motifs and inscriptions

(4) E.B. WHITE AWARD. “‘Bridge to Terabithia’ author Katherine Paterson wins E.B. White Award for literature” – the Burlington Free Press has the story:

Children’s-book author and Montpelier resident Katherine Paterson was announced Monday as the winner of the E.B. White Award, given once every two years by the American Academy of Art and Letters “in recognition of an exceptional lifetime body of work.”

Paterson, best known as the author of “Bridge to Terabithia,” receives $10,000 for the award that is given for achievement in children’s literature. The most recent winner, in 2017, was Judy Blume.

According to the biography on her website, Paterson has written more than 30 books, including 16 novels for children and young people. She won the Newbury Medal for American children’s literature in 1978 for “Bridge to Terabithia” and in 1981 for “Jacob Have I Loved.” She received the National Book Award in 1977 for “The Master Puppeteer” and 1979 for “The Great Gilly Hopkins.”

The Award jury members were Judy Blume and Alison Lurie.

(5) NEIL DEGRASSE TYSON SHOWS TO GO BACK ON AIR. Variety reports “Neil deGrasse Tyson Will Return to National Geographic After Assault Investigation” although little is said about what the investigation learned.

National Geographic Channel has completed its investigation into “Cosmos” and “StarTalk” host Neil deGrasse Tyson, and will move forward with both shows. The channel didn’t elaborate on its findings, however.

“‘StarTalk’ will return to the air with the remaining 13 episodes in April on National Geographic, and both Fox and National Geographic are committed to finding an air date for ‘Cosmos,’” the network said in a statement. “There will be no further comment.”

“Cosmos: Possible Worlds” and “Star Talk” have been in limbo for months, since Nat Geo launched an investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct against the famed astrophysicist.

Fox had originally scheduled the new season of “Cosmos” to premiere on Sunday, March 3, while Nat Geo had slated a second window to begin on Monday, March 4. Both networks later had to scrap those plans.

 (6) 2020 WORLDCON WEBSITE UPDATE. CoNZealand will unveil its changed website design on St. Patrick’s Day.

New Membership Site coming!

We are about to release our new Membership site. Barring any problems, we expect to open the site on March 17th, 2019, around 3PM NZST.

Our new system will include some new features.

  • New accounts will be created for Pre-supporting Members;
  • Membership upgrades will become available for Pre-supporting Members;
  • Lay-by instalment payments will become available for the purchase of new Memberships and to upgrade existing Memberships;
  • Existing membership numbers from our current online system will be increased by 2000. So if you are member #19, you will become member #2019. Because it’s the future. 
  • New fields will be added to the form to give people registering online the same options as those who registered on the paper form.

(7) DITILLIO OBIT. Writer Larry DiTillio, who became well-known to fans while serving as executive story editor on Babylon 5, has died at the age of 71. Before Babylon 5 he wrote for many TV shows, several of them also run by J. Michael Straczynski who recalled for Facebook readers their years of friendship and its end:

…Larry never pulled his punches, and that frankness requires stating that we did have our differences from time to time. Larry could be fractious, and I think he sometimes resented being brought on by me as a lieutenant. He was talented enough to be a show-runner on his own, and being constantly a second-in-command chafed to the point that he began carving out his own pocket universe in B5. He wanted to show that he could do what I was doing, which for me was never even a question, I just didn’t want him doing it when I was trying to tell a story in a straight line in a way that no one had ever done before. But things became increasingly difficult between us, the friendship strained and broke, and we parted ways after season two.

We didn’t speak again for nearly ten years. And that was very hard for me. I don’t make friends often or easily, and Larry was probably my closest friend, right alongside Harlan Ellison. We’d celebrated birthdays and went to conventions together, shared a love of comics and terrible movies and he even got me to do some gaming for a while, which was his greatest love, and we had dinner together more times than I can even begin to count. And now all that was gone, and I was lost.

Straczynski and DiTillio co-hosted local Pacifica radio show Hour 25 from 1987-1989, and I met him in the studio when I was there to promote Loscon. (I’d first met Straczynski when I recruited him to be on the 1980 Westercon program).

(8) TRIVIAL TRIVIA.

Sonic More Music wants to show you the picture:

In the early days of The Velvet Underground, Lou Reed and John Cale had a day job playing Batman and Robin at birthday parties.

(9) TODAY IN HISTORY.

  • March 16, 1961 –Walt Disney released The Absent Minded Professor to U.S. audiences.

(10) TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS.

[Compiled by Cat Eldridge.]

  • Born March 16, 1920 Leo McKern. Long involvement in the genre so I’ll be selective here. You probably know from his non-genre role in Rumpole of the Bailey where he was Horace Bailey, but I’m fond of him in three roles, the first being Professor Moriarty In The Adventure of Sherlock Holmes’ Smarter Brother, the second when he played, and this is a slight pun, Number Twothe chief administrator, of The Village in The Prisoner series, and the third being the great Swami Clang In Help!, a Beatles film which should be genre even if it’s not. (Died 2002.)
  • Born March 16, 1943 Susan Bay, 76. Also known as Susan Nimoy, wife of that actor. She portrayed Admiral Rollman in two episodes of Deep Space Nine: “Past Prologue” in the first season and “Whispers” in the second. Her only genre appearance, I believe, was in the Mr. Merlin series.
  • Born March 16, 1951 P. C. Hodgell, 68. Her best known work is the  Chronicles of the Kencyrath series with The Gates of Tagmeth being the current novel. She has dabbled in writing in the Holmesian metaverse with “A Ballad of the White Plague” that was first published in The Confidential Casebook of Sherlock Holmes as edited by Marvin Kaye. 
  • Born March 16, 1952 Alice Hoffman, 67. Best known for Practical Magic which was made into a rather good film. I’d also recommend The Story Sisters, a Gateway story, The Ice Queen, an intense riff off of that myth, and Aquamarine, a fascinating retelling of the mermaid legend. 
  • Born March 16, 1961 Todd McFarlane, 58. Best known for his work on The Amazing Spider-Man and Spawn. And let’s not overlook McFarlane Toys whose product could be fantastic or shitty depending on the mood of Todd on a given day. And, of course, Todd reached a deal after decades with Neil on unpaid monies due on books that Todd had done with him.
  • Born March 16, 1963 Kevin Smith. He was a New Zealand actor who was best known for being  Ares in Hercules: The Legendary Journeys and in its two related series – Xena: Warrior Princess and Young Hercules. He also voiced Ares for Hercules and Xena: The Animated Movie: The Battle for Mount Olympus. And it looks like his last role was as Valdemar in the abysmal Riverworld movie. (Died 2002.)
  • Born March 16, 1964 Gore Verbinski, 55. He is best known for directing the first three films of the Pirates of the Caribbean film franchise. I see he’s also responsible for Mouse Hunt (a delightful film), Rango (ok going downhill here) and hitting rock bottom, The Lone Ranger
  • Born March 16, 1966 David Liss, 53. Writer of Spider-Man: Hostile Takeover, novelization of Marvel’s Spider-Man whichis a 2018 action-adventure game. Comics writer, Black Panther: The Man Without Fear and Sherlock Holmes: Moriarty Lives series. Not at all genre but his trilogy of novels starting with A Conspiracy of Paper and featuring Benjamin Weaver, a retired bare-knuckle boxer, now a thief-taker, a cross between a PI and bounty hunter, are highly recommended by me. 
  • Born March 16, 1971 Alan Tudyk, 48. Best known, I think, as Hoban “Wash” Washburne in the Firefly metaverse. His current role is the very, very irritating villain Mr. Nobody in the excellent Doom Patrol series on the DC Universe streaming service. For at least the first several episodes, he narrated the episodeswhich was really annoying as it included references to everything meta including Grant Morrison and universe creating goat farts. They dropped that aspect mercifully. 

(11) BESIDES THE WRINKLE. At The Paris Review, Frankie Thomas’ YA of Yore column recalls “The Creepy Authoritarianism of Madeleine L’Engle”. It’s L’Engle’s mainstream YA novels that inspire the title.

…It was strange to go to school at night, and in a taxi with my father instead of on the bus. The book-signing took place in the elementary school gymnasium, noisier and more crowded than I’d ever seen it during the day; the event was open to the public and full of strangers. I carried two books for L’Engle to sign. One was my mother’s childhood copy of A Wrinkle in Time, which embarrassed me—surely everybody would bring that one!—but my mother had insisted. To correct for this, I also brought Troubling a Star, my favorite L’Engle novel and no one else’s. I hoped it would communicate to L’Engle that I was a different caliber of reader.

The line to meet L’Engle was so long, and I was so short. I couldn’t see her until it was my turn—then I was face to face with her. She was older than I’d expected. Her gray hair was cropped shorter than in her author photo. In my memory she looms quite tall even while seated at the book-signing table; I’ve always assumed this was the exaggerated perception of a very small nine year old, but apparently she was indeed very tall.

She smiled an impersonal smile at me, the same smile she must have smiled at thousands of other kids. She wrote her name, nothing more, inside my books. She did not say, “Wow, Troubling a Star? That’s an unusual choice!” She did not say “You are to be a light-bearer” or “You see things invisible to lesser mortals” or “I love you, Frankie, love you like my daughter.” If she said anything at all, I don’t remember what it was. The whole thing was over so quickly…

(12) SHH, IT’S A SECRET. Rebecca Lewis, in “Black Panther cast had no idea they were auditioning for a Marvel movie” on Metro was told by Winston Duke he auditioned for Black Panther using fake sides for a non-existent movie, and it wasn’t until Ryan Coogler showed up at his third audition that he began to realize he was auditioning for a Marvel movie.

(13) MEAN CUISINE. Clearly the demand is there!

(14) LOOK AT THE PRETTY PICTURES. SYFY Wire assembled an “Emerald City Comic Con Day 2 cosplay gallery”.

(15) EVOLUTIONARY ADAPTATIONS. For those keeping score at home, Adam Whitehead tells what all the Love, Death & Robots episodes are based on:

(16) FINDING 451. Parvati Sharma revels in the feeling of “When a book finds you” at The Hindu BusinessLine.

For a lover of second-hand books, buying a book pales in comparison to the sheer delight of chancing upon one

I was dying to read Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451. I’d discovered him through my mother and a cover-less paperback that contained her favourite Bradbury short story The Veldt, about two kids so addicted to their virtual reality (VR) nursery that they feed their parents to VR lions. But even at his most gruesome (and prescient?), Bradbury has a sheer open-mouthed enjoyment of the strange and unexpected — from him, I learned to love dystopia. I even tried to write it. “He chocked. He was chocking. He would be chocking until death,” I wrote, aged 11, before taking things to a grim conclusion: “Then suddenly his head burst”.

A world in which books were crimes? It was a dystopian vision that held a particular thrill — in such a world, I might be a criminal.

So I was burning to read it, Bradbury’s novel about a book-less future, but it did not occur to me to look for it in a bookshop. I was sure I would find it on the book-strewn pavements of Daryaganj in Delhi….

(17) THE SWARM. BBC explores “How swarming drones will change warfare”.

The swarm robots are coming and they could change the way wars are fought.

In February, the defence secretary said “swarm squadrons” will be deployed by the British armed forces in the coming years.

The US has also been testing interconnected, co-operative drones that are capable of working together to overwhelm adversaries.

Low-cost, intelligent and inspired by swarms of insects, these new machines could revolutionise future conflicts.

From swarming enemy sensors with a deluge of targets, to spreading out over large areas for search-and-rescue missions, they could have a range of uses on and off the battlefield.

But just how different is “swarm” technology from the drones that are currently used by militaries across the globe? The key is self-organisation.

(18) BEFORE YOU BUY. Looking for book reviews? There are links to all of these at Todd Mason’s  Sweet Freedom: “Friday’s ‘Forgotten’ Books and More”. The reviewer’s name comes first, then book title and author’s name.

  • Patricia Abbott: Sleep While I Sing by L. R. Wright; What It Might Feel Like to Hope by Dorene O’Brien
  • Paul Bishop: the Gunships series by “Jack Hamilton Teed” (Christopher Lowder) 
  • Les Blatt: Three Witnesses by Rex Stout 
  • John Boston: Amazing: Fact and Science Fiction Stories, April 1964, edited by Cele Goldsmith Lalli 
  • Ben Boulden: Snowbound by Richard S. Wheeler; Things to Come, January/February 1955, the catalog of the (Doubleday) Science Fiction Book Club 
  • Brian Busby: The Bright Path to Adventure by Gordon Sinclair 
  • Peter Enfantino and Jack Seabrook: Warren Comics (Creepy and Blazing Combat), October to December 1965, edited by Archie Goodwin
  • Will Errickson: The Manitouby Graham Masterton 
  • José Ignacio Escribano:Agatha Christie’s Secret Notebooks by John Curran
  • Curtis Evans: Swing, Brother, Swing by Ngaio March
  • Paul Fraser: The Great SF Stories 5 (1943) edited by Isaac Asimov and Martin H. Greenberg; Unknown Worlds, June 1943, edited by John W. Campbell, Jr. 
  • Barry Gardner: Kahawa by Donald Westlake
  • John Grant: The Secret History of the Pink Carnation by Lauren Willig; The Art Forger by B. A. Shapiro
  • Aubrey Hamilton: Death in the Quadrangle by Eilis Dillon
  • Rich Horton: Antic Hay by Aldous Huxley; PITFCS: Proceedings of the Institute for Twenty-First Century Studies edited by Theodore R. Cogswell; Bridge of Birds by Barry Hughart;
  • Jerry House: The Select (aka The Foundation) by F. Paul Wilson 
  • Kate Jackson: three novels by Michael Gilbert; 
  • Death in Store by Jennifer Rowe 
  • Tracy K: Turncoat by Aaron Elkins
  • Colman Keane: Cast the First Stone and Heart of Stone by James W. Ziskin
  • George Kelley: The Great SF Stories 7 (1945) edited by Isaac Asimov and Martin H. Greenberg
  • Joe Kenney: Cold Iron by “Robert Stone Pryor”
  • Margot Kinberg: The Division Bell Mystery by Ellen Wilkinson
  • Rob Kitchin: Winston’s War by Michael Dobbs
  • B. V. Lawson: The Port of London Murders by “Josephine Bell” (Doris Collier Ball)
  • Evan Lewis: Half Past Mortem by John A. Saxon
  • Jonathan Lewis: Journey into Fear by Eric Ambler
  • Steve Lewis: The Goodbye Look by “Ross Macdonald” (Kenneth Millar); “Eurema’s Dam” by R. A. Lafferty; Lemons Never Lie by “Richard Stark” (Donald Westlake); “Schroedinger’s Kitten” by George Alec Effinger
  • Mike Lind: Dashiell Hammett, Man of Mystery by Sally Cline
  • Todd Mason: best of the year horror fiction annuals for 2016
  • Jess Nevins: some women writers of horror from around the world 
  • John F. Norris: The Flight of the Doves by Walter Macken
  • Patrick Ohl: In the Best Families by Rex Stout (hosted by Kevin Tipple)
  • Scott D. Parker: Weird Western Tales, December 1973, edited by Joe Orlando
  • Matt Paust: The Trail to Seven Pines by Louis L’Amour; Ways of Looking at a Woman by Caroline Hagood
  • James Reasoner: “Blitzkrieg in the Past” by “John York Cabot” (David Wright O’Brien), Amazing Stories, July 1942, edited by Ray Palmer
  • Richard Robinson: A Blaze of Glory by Jeff Shaara
  • Gerard Saylor: Murdaland, #1 (2007), edited by Michael Lagnas
  • Jack Seabrook: “One More Mile to Go” by F. J. Smith, Manhunt, June 1956, edited by Scott Meredith 
  • Steven Silver: Convergent Series by Larry Niven
  • Victoria Silverwolf: Fantastic: Stories of Imagination, July 1963, edited by Cele Goldsmith-Lalli
  • “TomKat”: Challenge the Impossible: The Final Problems of Dr. Sam Hawthorne by Edward D. Hoch
  • David Vineyard: The Seven Sleepers by Francis Beeding

[Thanks to Cat Eldridge, Chip Hitchcock, JJ, Mike Kennedy, Martin Morse Wooster, John King Tarpinian, John A Arkansawyer, Michael Toman, Todd Mason, Carl Slaughter, and Andrew Porter for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Steve Davidson.]

43 thoughts on “Pixel Scroll 3/16/19 Hit Me With Your Pixel Stick, One Weird Fandom Click Click Click

  1. (10) “Degree Absolute!” (the first episode I saw of “The Prisoner” was the two-part finale (I’ve never been the same, since).

  2. Actually the Build Your Own Lightsaber ride/shop sounds kind of cool. I followed the links at the ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER and also read the article about Blue Milk, which sounds like the Star Wars version of butterbeer.

  3. Born March 16, 1963 — He was a New Zealand actor who was best known for being Ares in Hercules:

    Did someone’s name get left out here?

  4. An actor who needs no introduction? No, eh? Appertain yourself your favorite beverage!

  5. Bonnie McDaniel: Did someone’s name get left out here?

    No, that was deliberate. Mike is playing JEOPARDY – Pixel Scroll Edition.

    BZZZZZZZZTTTT

    The correct question is: “Who was Kevin Tod Smith?” 😉

  6. JJ: That’s a much better answer! (Must quickly go back and delete mine….)

  7. Sure, HELP! is genre. Paul is shrunk to Lilliputian size by an injection gone awry, and has to cover himself with a gum wrapper for modesty’s sake.

  8. (2)
    At a guess, the dove was got by a Cooper’s hawk. They’ll take birds up to pigeon sized – the smaller ones they’ll carry off to eat elsewhere, probably while perched on a branch in a tree.

  9. Rango was pretty good! Certainly better than most of the Pirates drek after the first movie.

  10. WIth regard to Leo McKern’s genre roles, my favourite remains his hard-boiled science columnist in Val Guest’s wonderful The Day the Earth Caught Fire (1961).

  11. David Annandale: That was a great role. I wish I could remember more of the circumstances, but I know I saw that aired on US tv sometime before the cable era. McKern had a good bit in Ladyhawke, too.

  12. (8) [With apologies to John Cale, Lou Reed, Mo Tucker and Nico]
    Sunday morning, Batman’s calling
    Robin’s just a restless weirdo by his side
    Early dawning, Sunday morning
    It’s just a wasted Joker close behind

    Watch out, he’s still behind you
    There’s always some cop around you who will call
    With nothing at all

    Sunday morning, Bat-signal warning
    I’ve got a feeling I don’t want to know
    Early dawning, Sunday morning
    It’s just that mob-boss you crossed, so long ago

    Watch out, crime alley’s behind you
    There’s always Alfred around you who will call
    About nothing at all

  13. (11) It’s possible that, at age 9, wanting so much out of the books and their author, possibly needing that much at that point, Frankie Thomas had unreasonable expectations for an author at a packed event.

    On the other hand, yes, there are reasons Wrinkle is her best-known and most-loved book.

  14. I thought Rango was great. Worked on it too, which was really exciting.

    15) Watched some of these last night. I had no idea they were based on stories already written. Some were good, some seemed really ‘thin’ and/or cliched. Scalzi’s Three Robots was great. Sonnie’s Edge was pretty bad, I thought, not helped by being deep in the uncanny valley. We stopped our binge after the cowboys in mech suits fighting the bugs from Starship Troopers. It seemed to go on way too long. The Witness was an interesting idea with a unique look – pretty sure it was live footage post-processed to look anime. Looking forward to watching the rest.

  15. Lis Carey says On the other hand, yes, there are reasons Wrinkle is her best-known and most-loved book.

    She written other interesting works such as the Katherine Forrester doulogy of The Small Rain and A Severed Wasp. Not genre, not comforting reading either.

  16. @Martin Wooster: @3 is much too serious for me, and seems like the sort of thing that could easily get into parent/child spats, but tastes differ; I don’t have to go, so I’ll listen from a safe distance.

    @Kip Williams: and on the opposite tack, there’s the mad scientist’s ray that expands everything except the ring. (Not a spoiler; it happens so early in the movie that it can’t be the solution.) IIRC, both of these were instanced the last time somebody raised the question. Help!may not have the pompous cheesiness common in officially genre movies of that period, but there were a lot of other set-in-the-present comedies that we now claim — see, e.g., @9.

  17. Finally saw Captain Marvel, hobbled to the theater. Liked it.

    @Cam Ha! Well done!

    15) Need to give these a try but my watchlist just grows and grows.

    13) Hey I am a scroll item. I continue to be delighted how there is such intersection between foodies and SFF. The days of “food pills or stew” in SFF works is long gone.

    10) Leo McKern is unquestionably my favorite Number Two.

  18. (11) I made the mistake of reading all of L’Engle’s Wrinkle in Time books a couple of years ago. Weird Christian stuff, for instance the one where they go back in time and help Noah build the Ark, and there are fallen angels and—wait for it—little Mastodons about the size of a small perky dog.

    Afterwards, gave all the books away to someone who might appreciate them. Maybe the Golden Age of reading L’Engle is 10…

  19. JJ on March 16, 2019 at 8:26 pm said:

    The correct question is: “Who was Kevin Tod Smith?”

    Wow, I had no idea that he was dead. On-set accident.

    Speaking of dead, Leonard was in
    one episode of The Twilight Zone
    , so I can ObSF his death.

    (And Rango is a better movie than anything listed, especially the PotC tripe.)

  20. @Andrew I. Porter: I loved the first three of the “Time Quintet” but either the last two were serious drops in quality, or I had aged out of the “golden age” for L’Engle, by the time those two arrived, because I really didn’t like them at all.

  21. Speaking of classic children’s SF – this article about lichen https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2016/07/how-a-guy-from-a-montana-trailer-park-upturned-150-years-of-biology/491702/ talks about the discovery that lichen includes a third species – a species of fungus of the type called basidiomycete. This name will be somewhat familiar to anyone who was a fan of “The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet” (the Mushroom Planet being named Basidium) and of Mr. Bass.

  22. I already have Disney reservations for my July birthday, which I intend to spend building my very own lightsaber. I think I want a protection one just in case they put high fructose corn syrup in that blue milk. Although I’d probably still drink it anyway, knowing me.

  23. @ Paul – just got back from watching Captain Marvel also. I always enjoy these Marvel movies. They’re good solid entertainment. Some better than others, but never terrible. This one I thought was awesome! Loved Brie Larson in it. And the de-aging tech on Samuel Jackson was incredible. If I didn’t know he was old, I would never have guessed.

  24. (1) FANS LOSE THEIR SHIRT OVER ELLISON DESIGN.

    I sure would like to see that whole “Ellison design”. I have made some Ellison images that are floating around. I was just wondering if any of my images were used. Not that there is anything wrong with that.

  25. If there are any Filers who are familiar with the days of the mimeograph, I had a question about the page design of The Acolyte fanzine from the 1940s.

    I’ve linked to an image hosted on my blog that’s part of a page from The Acolyte. The body text for the mimeograph stencil is a typewriter font. How did a zine publisher back then do that headline and byline?

  26. rcade: Those headings were made on the mimeo stencil using a stylus and a stencil lettering guide (see an example here.)

    I owned a set of guides, myself, and used them in producing my fanzines Prehensile, Scientifriction, and some early issues of File 770.

  27. There’s a bit about the Batman/Robin photo here, saying that it’s a genuine picture but ten years too late for the story to be at all likely.

  28. 10) Regarding Leo McKern: One of my treasured memories of Bruce Pelz was him presiding over the Westercon 44 Business Meeting in what I recall was the Student council room at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. (The current council chamber is much cooler looking.) The meeting was held around a hollow round table, and Bruce rolled his chair into the middle to preside, and, looking quite McKern-like in my mind, announced, “I am the new Number Two!”

  29. I have some lettering guides that were my father’s – engineers and drafters used them, too. (I also have his slide rule, and his calculator.)

  30. 10) I like Practical Magic the movie, but I find its title questionable: all the magic in it is either trivial, or blows up in the user’s face, or is meant to undo a said intheusersfaceupblowing.

    10bis) Tudyk is also currently the voice of Dangerboat in The Tick (Amazon version).

  31. Leaving aside Paul’s adventures on the floor, the whole plot of Help! revolves around a magical ring, with a major side-plot from two mad scientists, so yeah, it’s definitely genre.

  32. @Andrew–You are confused. There is no Time Quintet, only a Time Trilogy.

    Nor would I feel compelled to argue strongly with someone who says there is only the one book, though I would think them mistaken. But definitely not more than three.

  33. I had the first four of L’Engle’s time books (but no longer have Many Waters), and read the fifth. I think it is noteable that I have no memory whatever what even happens in the fifth, while I can still recite the poem from the third book. (Although I want to say “In Tara At this fateful hour” when it’s “AT Tara IN”, but I can only remember because the latter works better grammatically with “I place all heaven with its power”)

    I was never a fan of the earlier Austin Books, but A Ring of Endless Light had an influence on me. I tried a lot of her other books, either solo or loosely linked, including the ones written for adults, but the only ones I remember at all were a House Like a Lotus, which the article above correctly identifies as weirdly problematic in how it handles lesbianism, and the Arm of the Starfish.

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