Pixel Scroll 9/30 Bite Cycles

(1) Product placement. Would you like to guess what product is featured in The Martian?

Aston Martin, Omega, and Burberry will be among the brands proud to be associated with Spectre, the latest James Bond movie when it opens next month. But with product placement and promotional tie-ins now generating big bucks for movie-makers, brands eager to share a piece of the big-screen action now extend well beyond the usual suspects.

For proof, look no further than The Martian, the new sci-fi action adventure starring Matt Damon, which opens in the UK later this week complete with… an official potato. Though even this is not the most surprising in a recent series of increasingly bizarre promotional couplings.

…The end result is a promotional campaign for which the film studio used its connections with NASA to provide Albert Bartlett customers with an all-expenses-paid family trip to the Kennedy Space Center as a competition prize in a Martian-themed promotional campaign.

“They wanted exposure. They also knew that, while the film will have big appeal with single blokes, they needed a way to open it up to a wider, family audience,” Marcantonio explains. “Which means it makes sense at a number of different levels. Unlike when soft drinks companies tie up with just about any family movie they can find to reach kids, this tie-up is anything but spurious.”

Indeed. And for a more mundane reason, too. Because like the planet Mars, Albert Bartlett’s best-selling potato – the Rooster – is … red.

(2) Not all of the marketing has been a success.

Remember what I said the other day about not betting against David Gerrold when science fiction cinema is on the line?

His new Facebook post concerns The Martian.

So, here’s my review of The Martian…which I was supposed to see tonight.

The studio’s public relations department is run by idiots.

If you arrange a screening, and if you make passes available to hundreds of fans — warning them ahead of time that you have overbooked and nobody is guaranteed a seat is not an excuse. It’s a cop-out.

You don’t turn away a hundred or more people at the door and shrug it off and say, “Sorry.”

What you do is you say, “Let’s make it up to these people who came all this way and waited all this time.” You go to the management of the theater and say, “We want to schedule a second screening after the first one concludes so that no one goes home disappointed.” That not only gives you good PR with the audience but it helps generate good word-of-mouth three days before the film opens.

The movie might be good. I expect it will be. But the PR people just pissed off at least a hundred fans who waited two hours or longer in line. Not good. Just not good.

(3) Astronaut Clayton C. Anderson, who did get into a screening, wrote this review:

Having already read and enjoyed Weir’s excellent adventure, I was pleasantly surprised with the effective presentation of the novel on screen. Seeing beautiful Martian vistas, punctuated by mountainous terrain in variegated hues of orange, made it seem as if humans were already living there. The use of high-altitude and digitally accurate perspectives of the Martian surface pulled at my heart strings. And I loved that Andy Weir developed a relationship with NASA after publishing the novel, leading the push to involve the space program directly with Scott. The resulting emphasis on science provides an enjoyable balance between the film’s considerable entertainment value and its educational, inspirational, and technological references.

(4) A New Yorker cartoon contains the greatest proof yet of life on Mars….

(5) However, when Rush Limbaugh claims he’s unconvinced NASA found water on Mars, it’s not comedy, it’s tragedy.

RUSH LIMBAUGH: There’s so much fraud. Snerdly came in today ‘what’s this NASA news, this NASA news is all exciting.’ I said yeah they found flowing water up there. ‘No kidding! Wow! Wow!’ Snerdly said ‘flowing water!?’ I said ‘why does that excite you? What, are you going there next week? What’s the big deal about flowing water on Mars?’ ‘I don’t know man but it’s just it’s just wow!’ I said ‘you know what, when they start selling iPhones on Mars, that’s when it’ll matter to me.’ I said ‘what do you think they’re gonna do with this news?’ I said ‘look at the temperature data, that has been reported by NASA, has been made up, it’s fraudulent for however many years, there isn’t any warming, there hasn’t been for 18.5 years. And yet, they’re lying about it. They’re just making up the amount of ice in the North and South Poles, they’re making up the temperatures, they’re lying and making up false charts and so forth. So what’s to stop them from making up something that happened on Mars that will help advance their left-wing agenda on this planet?’ And Snerdly paused ‘oh oh yeah you’re right.’ You know, when I play golf with excellent golfers, I ask them ‘does it ever get boring playing well? Does it ever get boring hitting shot after shot where you want to hit it?’ And they all look at me and smile and say ‘never.’ Well folks, it never gets boring being right either. Like I am. But it doesn’t mean it is any less frustrating.

(6) GeekTyrant says this is the 10-foot inflatable Jabba the Hutt you’re looking for.

ilvr_sw_jabba_the_hut_inflatable

Here’s something that’s sure to piss off your neighbors: a ten-foot long, six-foot tall inflatable Jabba the Hutt, perfect for decorating your front lawn or as the centerpiece for that Star Wars-themed party you might be planning. You can bring it with you to wait in line for The Force Awakens, use it as a Home Alone-style distraction to make potential robbers think a large alien lives in your home…the possibilities are too numerous to entertain in one sitting.

“I say put a Santa hat on him and put him in the front yard,” is John King Tarpinian’s advice.

Or give him his own radio show.

From ThinkGeek for $169.99.

(7) Elizabeth Bear lets readers in on the drafting process…

(8) Rights to Heinlein’s “The Man Who Sold The Moon” have been acquired by Allen Bain’s firm Bainframe. It will be developed for television.

More details on Deadline.com:

Bain (Two Men In Town, Revenge Of The Green Dragons) founded Bainframe to tell stories that have “the power to inspire people to dream of a better tomorrow.” This is the shingle’s second rights buy, following Octavia E. Butler’s Dawn. 

…The Man Who Sold The Moon tells the tale of Delos D. Harriman, a businessman possessed by a dream to take humanity off-Earth. As a young entrepreneur, he starts a private space company to colonize the moon and create the home he never had. He is driven to the brink while single-handedly ushering the entire human race to its next evolutionary step.

“This story is inspiring because the private space race is happening now and will become a reality within a decade. This is not some far flung science fiction yarn. It is something we are going to experience in our lifetime,” says Bain. The timing coincides with yesterday’s announcement by NASA of strong evidence there is flowing water on Mars. “The Man Who Sold the Moon allows us to imagine how the space race will play out, but at its core it’s really a gripping portrait of a complex character with an impossible dream.”

Bain notes that Harriman’s journey is reminiscent of the current crop of space pioneers like Richard Branson (Virgin Galactic), Jeff Bezos (Blue Origin) and Elon Musk (SpaceX) who has credited Heinlein as an inspiration.

(9) WisCon posted a report in June about the results of the first con run under its new anti-abuse policy.

This year was the first convention where we had a formal procedure in place for what to do when individuals attending WisCon violate the code of conduct described in our anti-harassment policy. The policy is intended to be flexible to allow for different situations, but its basic idea is that if somebody reports a harassing behavior to Safety, the person responsible can be issued a warning and asked to do something differently (such as staying away from a place or person). If warnings aren’t attended to or harassing behavior escalates, the policy describes a few more options, including –– in the worst case scenario, which we hope to avoid –– that Safety and Chairs in consultation with available Anti-Abuse Team members can make a collective at-con decision to ban someone from WisCon.

Now that the convention is over, Safety has handed off their at-con reports to the full Anti-Abuse Team, which is reviewing reports that are still open post-con and evaluating how well the policy performed on- site. Here’s how things looked in our first year:

  • 11 issues relating to the anti-harassment policy were reported to Safety.
  • 4 attendees were issued warnings for harassing behaviors.
  • 1 disruptive non-member was escorted off the premises by hotel staff.
  • 1 person was banned, after several warnings, in response to reports both from multiple departments and from the hotel –– some relating to patterns of behavior going back several years.

(10) Curbed has a report on a film adaptation of J.G. Ballard’s High Rise coming to film festivals.

The novel begins with a truly surreal opening line—”later, as he sat on his balcony eating the dog”—and the story explores a societal breakdown similar to of-the-moment entertainment franchises such as The Walking Dead. But in J.G. Ballard’s 1975 High-Rise, the subject of a new film adaptation starting to make the festival rounds this month, the enemy isn’t some virus or the undead. The residents of a new London high-rise slowly regress and devolve into tribal infighting not due to some outside force altering their environment, but because of the environment itself. The tower becomes a character in the story, written as a symbol of the meticulous (and ultimately very fragile) class systems built up by society.

(11) Wired has interviewed David J. Peterson about his new book in “How To Invent A Language, From The Guy Who Made Dothraki”.

Some Conlangers Want to Keep Their Hobby Arcane

Peterson recognizes there are “definitely some negative aspects” to the growth in conlang popularity. He cites linguistic pioneer J.R.R. Tolkein’s The Lord Of The Rings as an example of the community’s instinct toward self-protection. “There were some people who reacted negatively [when LOTR was published] because they knew conlang would start to get more attention, and they didn’t want that,” he says. Until recently, the community has been a supportive niche for people with a very specific interest. But as television shows and films with created languages continue to pop up in more places, it’s no longer as heavily guarded.

His Book Aims to Codify Conlang Knowledge For Posterity

Constructed languages have existed for centuries, but the advent of the internet brought with it the listserv that created a true community of peers. Since then, the community has grown hugely—but as the internet has changed, a new generation of conlangers on various social networks has become more spread out and unaware of each other. “I’ve met dozens of conlangers on Tumblr, all new, all young, who have no idea that each other exist,” he says, “because they’re with the mass kind of shouting into the wind.” None of them know about the old conlang listserv, and now it’s an antiquated form of digital communication, so “they don’t want to bother with that.” Peterson worries about redundancies that would arise from the lack of connection. “They’re inheriting a kingdom they really don’t know the history of, and know nothing about,” he says. They’re reinventing every single wheel we already perfected.” The Art Of Language Invention is a way of bridging the gap between the old and new conlangers by becoming a codex of sorts, preserving knowledge of constructed language much in the same way ancient languages have been preserved throughout history.

[Thanks to Mark sans surname, Andrew Porter, Ansible Links, and John King Tarpinian for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Will R.]

343 thoughts on “Pixel Scroll 9/30 Bite Cycles

  1. 21ST CENTURY SCIENCE FICTION PART FOUR:
    DAISY, DAISY, LEND ME YOUR NOVEL, DO

    1. DISTINCTIVE LINGUISTICS
    Ancillary Justice, Ann Leckie
    Embassytown, China Miéville

    4. ZOMBIE VS. VAMPIRE
    The Girl with All the Gifts, M. R. Carey
    Fledgling, Octavia E. Butler

    5. ANOTHER TRICKY TRICHOTOMY
    Diplomatic Immunity, Lois McMaster Bujold
    Accelerando, Charles Stross
    Lock In, John Scalzi

    Interesting bracket..

  2. Finally, a category where I’ve read both books, remember them well enough to comment, and read Kyra’s post in time.

    1. DISTINCTIVE LINGUISTICS
    Ancillary Justice, Ann Leckie
    Embassytown, China Miéville

    As much as I like Justice (you had me at “she”), Embassytown strikes me as the stronger book. Aliens who talk out of their mouths and their butts simultaneously: what’s not to like?

    I don’t want to get too detailed because spoilers, but Miéville explores interesting aspects of language and cognition (and the relationship between them), gives us some genuinely alien aliens, and even provides a spoonful of story to make the Message go down. I’m not sure if there is character growth or just change, but either way it’s quite the ride.

    Some of the high points about the aliens:

    Svefg, gur jnl gung gur nyvraf jrera’g rira njner bs uhznaf hagvy n cnve nppvqragnyyl fnvq fbzrguvat fvzhygnarbhfyl, ng juvpu gur nyvraf ernyvmrq gung fbzrguvat jnf gurer.

    Frpbaq, gurve vanovyvgl gb pbzceruraq nofgenpgvba be svpgvba, gb gur cbvag gung gurl jbhyq fgntr gnoyrnhk gb cebivqr ersreragf.

    Guveq, gur jnl gung gurl yrnearq gb “yvr”.

  3. Alright, the mouthguard is in place.
    21ST CENTURY SCIENCE FICTION PART FOUR:
    DAISY, DAISY, LEND ME YOUR NOVEL, DO

    1. DISTINCTIVE LINGUISTICS
    Ancillary Justice, Ann Leckie

    2. SEARCHING FOR THE RUNAWAY
    Leviathan Wakes, James S. A. Corey

    3. NOT OUR WORLD — OR IS IT?
    Pass

    4. ZOMBIE VS. VAMPIRE
    Pass

    5. ANOTHER TRICKY TRICHOTOMY
    2 Diplomatic Immunity, Lois McMaster Bujold
    1 Accelerando, Charles Stross
    3 Lock In, John Scalzi

  4. Kathodus on October 2, 2015 at 12:16 am said:
    … I feel like Banks should be the Tolkien of the 21st Century SF brackets.

    Okay, okay, he’s on the kindle now.
    (How did I miss him?)
    Thanks.

  5. Jim Henley on October 2, 2015 at 5:41 am said:
    … Much as I loved spending time with Felix – I am a sucker for the Philip Marlowe type, magical or otherwise – I can see how stopping after five books is an artistic victory for Carey. He does stuff and then it’s done.

    This, so, so so much this.
    There are series where eventually I just looked at the whole lot, with no end in sight, and just said nope, it’s off to the library sale for the lot of you.

  6. @Lauowolf

    All my WoT books got stuck in a charity book collection. I did finally finish the series out of stubbornness but I’m now very leery of starting any other epic fantasy series that isn’t finished. In fact I think it sucked the life out of my fantasy reading entirely.

  7. 1. DISTINCTIVE LINGUISTICS
    Ancillary Justice, Ann Leckie

    2. SEARCHING FOR THE RUNAWAY
    Leviathan Wakes, James S. A. Corey

    3. NOT OUR WORLD — OR IS IT?
    Anathem, Neal Stephenson

    4. ZOMBIE VS. VAMPIRE
    The Girl with All the Gifts, M. R. Carey

    5. ANOTHER TRICKY TRICHOTOMY
    Diplomatic Immunity, Lois McMaster Bujold
    i

  8. 1. DISTINCTIVE LINGUISTICS
    Ancillary Justice, Ann Leckie

    2. SEARCHING FOR THE RUNAWAY
    The Lost Steersman, Rosemary Kirstein

    3. NOT OUR WORLD — OR IS IT?
    Anathem, Neal Stephenson
    Ouch.

    4. ZOMBIE VS. VAMPIRE
    Fledgling, Octavia E. Butler

    5. ANOTHER TRICKY TRICHOTOMY
    Diplomatic Immunity, Lois McMaster Bujold

  9. 1. DISTINCTIVE LINGUISTICS
    Ancillary Justice, Ann Leckie
    Embassytown, China Miéville

    5. ANOTHER TRICKY TRICHOTOMY
    2. Diplomatic Immunity, Lois McMaster Bujold
    1. Accelerando, Charles Stross

  10. @Lauowolf

    Okay, okay, he’s on the kindle now.
    (How did I miss him?)
    Thanks.

    I hope your experience with Banks is such that you aren’t put off of future recommendations I may make. I really do love Banks, though. Got into him through The Algebraist, then the Culture novels blew me away. I hope you enjoy them!

  11. 21ST CENTURY SCIENCE FICTION PART FOUR:
    DAISY, DAISY, LEND ME YOUR NOVEL, DO
    1. DISTINCTIVE LINGUISTICS
    Ancillary Justice, Ann Leckie

    2. SEARCHING FOR THE RUNAWAY
    The Lost Steersman, Rosemary Kirstein

    3. NOT OUR WORLD — OR IS IT?
    Abstain

    4. ZOMBIE VS. VAMPIRE
    The Girl with All the Gifts, M. R. Carey

    5. ANOTHER TRICKY TRICHOTOMY
    Diplomatic Immunity, Lois McMaster Bujold

  12. My attitude towards Banks is an unusual one. The first book by him I read, sometime in the mid-80’s, was “The Wasp Factory” and I loved it. LOVED it. I got tremendously excited when I heard a few years later he had written some science fiction novels, so I read one and just …

    Nothing.

    And I tried again later, on the strength of “The Wasp Factory”. And again. And again. And I just. I don’t know. They do nothing for me.

    Ah, well. One thing I’ve learned from the brackets is that there is no book or author that EVERYONE universally loves. There’s always a few people going, “Really? That one?” In this case, I’m on that side. In other instances, I’m with the bigger crowd. Taste is funny like that.

  13. I read “The Wasp Factory” after having read a few Banks novels. It struck me as something I would have loved in college. I also loved it when I read it, which would’ve been in my… early 30s? But it has that “edgy” and dark thing going for it that I particularly liked then. It reminded me a little of “And the Ass Saw the Angel”, by Nick Cave. Which I also love, but which a lot of people I know really dislike.

  14. 1. Ancillary Justice

    4. Fledgling

    Yeah, that’s all I feel competent to vote in, today.

  15. kathodus on October 2, 2015 at 2:01 pm said:
    It reminded me a little of “And the Ass Saw the Angel”, by Nick Cave. Which I also love, but which a lot of people I know really dislike.

    I thought it was trying too hard – and also I kept imagining Nick Cave reading it aloud and that was distracting rather than cool 🙂 Still I think there are things whose existence we should approve of even if they aren’t things we specifically like e.g. Nick Cave in general.

  16. Thanks, Cally!

    makes vroom-vroom noises with her toy steamroller

    gets dirty look from SJW tortie cat

  17. Oh, and pleeeeaaaaaaase consider putting “Cartoon History of the Universe” in the comic brackets. It’s not SF, but it is Science. All The Sciences. And so good.

  18. CHOTU does involve time travel in the framing. Sure, it’s imaginary time travel but that strikes me as a good enough excuse if we need one.

  19. @Kyra

    As much as I love Banks I’ve never been able to get through Feersum Endjinn (it’s the chapters written phonetically that throw me) So that taste thing can be fickle.

    I’ve still got a lot of his mainstream (non M) stuff to read. Some of that is quite close to sff as well of course, particularly Transition though apparently that did get an M in the US.

    Disclaimer. I used to see him on the train sometimes heading into Edinburgh so, you know… home team advantage

  20. Jim Henley wrote:

    Oh yeah, Castor has A Arc. By the end of Book 1 he has learned a thing, and in the subsequent books tries to act on it. By the end of Book 5, the full ramifications of that thing get worked out, such as the true nature of demons. I like the fact that the series goes somewhere morally and cosmologically. Much as I loved spending time with Felix – I am a sucker for the Philip Marlowe type, magical or otherwise – I can see how stopping after five books is an artistic victory for Carey. He does stuff and then it’s done.

    I agree that the series and Castor’s arc are at a reasonable stopping point, but a friend of mine who knows Mike Carey says that he is planning a sixth book. However, he has other projects to write first, so there’s no timeframe for this. (This is supposed to be just one more book, not an indefinite series.)

  21. @Vicki Rosenzweig:

    I agree that the series and Castor’s arc are at a reasonable stopping point, but a friend of mine who knows Mike Carey says that he is planning a sixth book. However, he has other projects to write first, so there’s no timeframe for this. (This is supposed to be just one more book, not an indefinite series.)

    I am completely okay with this. Thanks for the info!

  22. 21ST CENTURY SCIENCE FICTION PART FOUR:
    DAISY, DAISY, LEND ME YOUR NOVEL, DO

    In addition to the below, there was another mention for Best of All Possible Worlds (this bracket’s Bold As Love), and also shout-outs for The City & The City, Seveneves, Fortune’s Pawn, Grimspace, The Yiddish Policeman’s Union, and Eifelheim.

    1. DISTINCTIVE LINGUISTICS
    WINNER (seeded): Ancillary Justice, Ann Leckie – 38 votes
    Embassytown, China Miéville – 11 votes
    Some are beginning to see this bracket as a race for second place against Ancillary Justice, and they may be right. But if so, that race is a hard-fought battle, as you’ll see … Embassytown is the latest worthy novel to fall to AJ, but it reaches double-digit votes and was by far AJ’s toughest competitor yet, more than doubling what anyone else has managed against it.

    2. SEARCHING FOR THE RUNAWAY
    WINNER (tie): Leviathan Wakes, James S. A. Corey – 15 votes
    WINNER (tie): The Lost Steersman, Rosemary Kirstein – 15 votes
    A tie! Both much-loved books resolutely hold on and proceed to the next round. (This was one of the pairings where I was very invested in the result, and I’m glad that both my fave is going on and its opponent is not disappointed. I’m weird like that.)

    3. NOT OUR WORLD — OR IS IT?
    WINNER (seeded): Anathem, Neal Stephenson – 17 votes
    Farthing, Jo Walton – 15 votes
    A win for Anathem, but by a mere two votes. Anathem goes on, but Farthing was certainly a worthy opponent.

    4. ZOMBIE VS. VAMPIRE
    WINNER (tie): The Girl with All the Gifts, M. R. Carey – 12 votes
    WINNER (tie): Fledgling, Octavia E. Butler – 12 votes
    And in the ultimate showdown between Vampire and Zombie … neither goes down! They won’t die! They just keep coming! I swear I saw the bullets hit, but they just keep coming! Aim for the head! Aim for the – OH GOD IT’S TOO LATE THEY’RE

    5. ANOTHER TRICKY TRICHOTOMY
    Round 1:
    Diplomatic Immunity, Lois McMaster Bujold – 18 votes
    Accelerando, Charles Stross – 10 votes
    Lock In, John Scalzi – 8 votes

    Round 2:
    WINNER (seeded): Diplomatic Immunity, Lois McMaster Bujold – 24 votes
    Accelerando, Charles Stross – 11 votes
    And Bujold manages a convincing win over both Stross and Scalzi, emerging as one of the stronger contenders on the field.

  23. Down to two books I’ve read, and I liked both but wouldn’t pick either as best SF of a 15-year span. Ah well.

    Usually I’m not down to “nothing to strongly root for” ’til the last round, but they does how they goes.

    When we do the comics brackets, I don’t even know if I’ll be able to vote, half the time.

  24. @kathodus: Thanks for that link – not because I’m interested (after reading the description, but because when I searched for “Bold as Love” recently, because folks were talking about it here . . . I couldn’t tell which book it was. Whew – now I know! 😉

    @Kyra: Your summary post made me LOL even more than usual. The summary for #4 was priceless! And hey, 2 books I love are in the final round . . . uh, uh-oh. . . .

  25. And there goes the last book I really cared about. I liked Ancillary Justice and Diplomatic Immunity, but neither of them blew my socks off. I think I’ll just cheer from the sidelines for the next bracket.

  26. kathodus: Bold As Love is on sale for $2.99… at Amazon right now

    I don’t think that this is going to be “my kind of book”. But it was nominated for a BSFA and a Derleth, and it won the Clarke, so at that price I’m happy to give it a try (my library’s copy has been pinched — probably by Lydy). Thanks for calling attention to it.

  27. 1. DISTINCTIVE LINGUISTICS
    Ancillary Justice, Ann Leckie
    Embassytown, China Miéville

    Hey, with bonus hate for Embassytown! Yay.

    2. SEARCHING FOR THE RUNAWAY
    Leviathan Wakes, James S. A. Corey
    The Lost Steersman, Rosemary Kirstein

    Not difficult, but I did like Leviathan. Just not nearly as much as the Kirstein.

    3. NOT OUR WORLD — OR IS IT?
    Anathem, Neal Stephenson
    Farthing, Jo Walton

    So easy. Kyra, are you slipping?

    4. ZOMBIE VS. VAMPIRE
    The Girl with All the Gifts, M. R. Carey
    Fledgling, Octavia E. Butler

    Abstain.

    5. ANOTHER TRICKY TRICHOTOMY
    1Diplomatic Immunity, Lois McMaster Bujold
    3Accelerando, Charles Stross
    2Lock In, John Scalzi

  28. Arghh. Missed it by that much! Sorry, Kyra. Was at the theatre, watching The Martian. Holy crap! That movie! It got geek culture right. So much fun.

  29. It seems I’ve missed some talk of favorite comics, and I hope it’s not too late to mention a few of my own. I should note that except for the first rec, these are Very Not For Kids, and QC has its awkward moments but is generally okay in that respect.

    First, Questionable Content is a casually-SF webcomic that has just put their fifth collection up for sale. Much of it could be generic Today In Canada fare, except for the mechanical hand, space station, underground robot-battle ring, orbital-drop pizza delivery system, AI Jail (and probation)… You know, the usual.

    Dark Horse publishes Empowered, usually straight to trade paperback, and volume 9 is due any time now. (Some content gets published as actual one-issue comics, and there’s a collection of those as well.) I’m agonizing over whether to get it, because they came out with super (heh) hardbacks collecting volumes 1-3 and 4-6; I’m hoping for a 7-9 in the nearish future. It got off to a bumpy start (due to its origins in commission work), but it’s become a wonderful deconstruction of superhero tropes.

    Emp is what I’ve called a fourth-rate super on a third-rate team. She’s kind of a “Greatest American Hero” clone, with no inherent superpowers but a mystery suit that gives her an array of abilities. Trouble is, it’s a very thin, skintight suit that would make the Venom symbiote look forgiving, and Emp’s got serious body-image issues. (One of the earliest mini-episodes was her attempt to wear underwear under the suit. It didn’t go well.) Plus, the suit itself is fragile (although there’s more to that) and doesn’t work too well when damaged. A lot of the early stuff had her getting in a fight, the suit getting ripped, and the bad guys tying her up to make their getaway.

    However, there’s a knockout one-shot issue that involves an attempted robbery at a car show. On one level, it’s a thorough examination of how to effectively use cars in a supers fight, and that’s entertaining enough. The cars come from alternate timelines, though, so that adds some good old “what could have been” spice. Mix in college-age Emp explaining the automotive combat techniques (intercut with now-Emp’s demonstration) and an effective demonstration of why not to go cheap on your mechsuits, and… well, it’s a fantastic read. As noted, the series as a whole contains some rather NSFW content. Curiously, although there’s some nudity and references to some really warped/disturbing content (like the super whose powers came from catching an alien STD), cursing is blacked out.

    Finally, in the “for grown-ups but not quite sexually explicit” realm, in which you know who’s doing what to whom but don’t actually see certain bits… Three webcomics share characters but have distinct plotlines that only occasionally overlap, and I love the combination of screwball comedy and sexual adventure that they have in common. (They’re also quite LGBT-friendly.) The original, kind of an R-rated “Three’s Company” setup, is Ménage à 3. The two spinoffs are Sticky Dilly Buns and Sandra on the Rocks. No SF content, but damned fun stuff.

  30. Since others are still mentioning things, I’ll mention some of my fave webcomics (ongoing series, like print ones but not – these are not newspaper-style strips) that have F/SF content. Some of the comics below have periodic print comics and/or collected print trades, sometimes via Kickstarter. I recommend them all highly, though IMHO the creator didn’t stick the landing in “The Prince of Cats,” while Hotblood! and The End can be a bit slow at times.

    I’m not actually clear on whether webcomics count for recs or not (and it may be too late for recs for the list anyway, but maybe someone will check out one of these and like it).

    The Prince of Cats (finished; magical realism maybe?)
    Buying Time (unique Flash format – hush, it works well, people-who-hate-Flash; post-apocalypse w/gay protags)
    Demon of the Underground (post-apocolyps methinks, but not sure if this counts as F, SF, or neither)
    The End (SF)
    Galaxion (SF; been reading since the beginning!)
    Hotblood! (alt history with CENTAURS!)
    Namesake (fantasy; weird; occasionally confusing; well done)
    O Human Star (super well done SF)
    Sorcery 101 (alt history urbanish fantasy)
    Spindrift (fantasy)
    Vattu (fantasy)
    The Young Protectors (superhero with gay protag)

  31. BTW I also read print comics, but not nearly as many as back in the day. So many folks have rec’d things I enjoy, I’m not going to try to come up with a list – too difficult!

    @Rev. Bob: “Empowered” sounds like a fun premise, but I Google’d and the artwork reeeeeally doesn’t do it for me. Bummer! Also, I half-second your rec for “Ménage à 3”; I read the first I don’t know how many, and even read some of “Sticky Dilly Buns,” before it just got too repetitive and bored me . . . but despite not being F/SF, it has a lot of genre references (and IMHO pretty NSFW even if mostly you only see boobs). I guess I dropped out before “Sandra on the Rocks,” because I don’t remember that at all. Anyway, just my take on it, but I do second the rec for (earlier) “Ménage à 3”. . . .

  32. Pingback: Amazing Stories | AMAZING NEWS FROM FANDOM - 10-4-2015 - Amazing Stories

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