Tag Archives: Archipelacon

Pixel Scroll 5/2/25 Beneath The Scrolls Of Pixels

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(1) SEATTLE WORLDCON 2025 CHAIR APOLOGIZES. Kathy Bond today posted an “Apology and Response From Chair” at the Seattle Worldcon 2025 website to address the brewing controversy about the committee using ChatGPT as part of its process for screening program participants.

Bond had initially defended the practice (see “Responding to Controversy, Seattle Worldcon Defends Using ChatGPT to Vet Program Participants”. Additional coverage here – “Seattle Worldcon 2025 ChatGPT Controversy Roundup”.)

(2) 2025 LOCUS AWARDS SHORTLISTS. The 2025 Locus Awards finalists have been posted at Locus Online. See the full list at the link. The Locus Awards winners will be announced June 21 during the in-person Locus Awards Ceremony, held in Oakland, California.

(3) PUPPIES AIN’T WHAT THEY USTA BE. In “Locus Slate Shenanigan Update” Camestros Felapton scores Jon Del Arroz’ efforts to push his picks onto the Locus Awards shortlist.

Early in April I posted about an attempt by Jon Del Arroz/Fandom Pulse (and others) to game the Locus voting with a last minute slate. So how did the JDA slate perform?

OK, I have to do some complex data crunching here. Well, my provisional results come out at a whopping 0% of JDA slated works made it….

(4) 2025 EDGAR AWARDS. Mystery Writers of America announced the winners of the 2025 Edgar Awards on May 1. 

Publishers Weekly reports the ceremony was marred by the use of AI images, and this is being compared with the Worldcon’s own LLM kerfuffle.

An opening video, surveying treatments of the genre on the big and small screen, was narrated by a creepy AI version of Humphrey Bogart, complete with imperfect lip-syncing, later followed by one featuring an even creepier, black cat-holding, artificially-generated Edgar Allan Poe.

(5) ELRIC’S EARS: THE DEFINITIVE ANSWER. Cora Buhlert has written an article about Elric of Melniboné for the Seattle Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow Blog, which got responses from both Michael Whelan and Michael Moorcock, settling the question whether Elric has pointed ears or not. “Fantastic Fiction: Elric of Melniboné: Tortured Elf Emperor with a Cursed Sword”.  See their comments at the link.

…Elric was born out of a conversation between John Carnell, editor of the British magazine Science Fantasy, and the young writer Michael Moorcock, wherein both proclaimed their love for the sort of fantasy adventure stories—soon to be called “sword and sorcery”—that had been published in the pulp magazine Weird Tales some thirty years earlier but were considered hopelessly passé by the early 1960s. Carnell remarked that he would be open to publishing “that Conan stuff,” so Moorcock wrote The Dreaming City, the first Elric story, which appeared in the June 1961 issue of Science Fantasy…

(6) MURDERBOT ADAPTATION Q&A. It was not a case of “needs more cowbell”, but of adding backstory for a couple characters. “Murderbot’s TV adaption will feature major changes. I talked to the creators about how those decisions were made” at The Escapist.

…“I think everything that’s in the book is in the show basically,” explained Paul Weitz. “We early on got in touch with Martha Wells kind of as fans and, so there are things that are added to the story, sort of like filling in the cracks, but anytime that we had an idea like that, we would call up Martha and say, ‘Hey, here’s what we’re thinking of, what do you think?’ And she’d either say, ‘Oh, that’s a cool idea’ or ‘Well, maybe think about this instead. That was a huge, huge relief.

“I think that part of the thing for us was never feeling like we were like we were padding stuff,” he continued as he explained why they made the changes they did….

(7) CLARKE AWARD SUBMISSIONS STATS. The administrator has posted “The complete judges’ reading list for the Arthur C. Clarke Award 2025” at Medium.

…This year our judges received 112 eligible submissions from 49 UK publishing imprints and independent authors.

If you’re interested in how this compares to previous years, you can see past lists and analysis here: clarkeaward.medium.com

The TLDR though is this is pretty much a Goldilocks Zone year. Not the highest ever numbers received, but not worryingly low, and more on par with where we’ve landed in terms of recent submissions history for both books received and publishers entering.

A caveat as always about our terminology: this is a simple list of submissions of eligible books received, not a ‘long-list’ or other form of juried selection, but simply those books sent to our judges for them to consider as potential future Arthur C. Clarke science fiction book of the year winners….

(8) MEMORY LANE.

[Written by Paul Weimer.]

Iron Man film (2008)

By Paul Weimer: “I am Iron Man”

Although the Hulk movie preceded it, Iron Man started the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and for good or ill, the modern age of superhero movies. I can’t claim to know that was going to happen at the time–but I was excited. My movie-watching friend Mike, although well versed in horror and some comics, had no idea who Iron Man was. He had never read any of his comics and didn’t know his deal. So sitting in the movie theater with him, previews rolling, I explained Iron Man’s story (as I had gotten it fifteen years earlier, first). He was fascinated, I sold him on the idea that although Iron Man was maybe C-Tier (compared to Spidey, and Hulk and other high well known Marvel Superheroes), this could be fun.

And then we settled in to watch.

Shorn of the need to set up any mythology (although it effortlessly does), future movies, or refer to previous continuity (except for the credit cookie scene with Fury), Iron Man I is still in my top tier of Marvel movies. The story is straightforward enough, and Robert Downey Jr. (who was still somewhat damaged goods, remember) redeemed his entire career playing Tony Stark. Having read the comics, when I saw Obadiah Stane show up, I realized, but didn’t tell my movie going partner, just what was in store. 

“Icing problem?”

“You might want to look into it.”

Favreau’s direction, Matthew Libatique’s cinematography are excellent in use of color, lighting and imagery. 

I think that the real best relationship in this movie is not between Downey and Paltrow (although her Pepper Potts is every inch what is needed for the role) but between Downey and Bettany (who does the voice of JARVIS). Bettany once again (like in Master and Commander and A Knight’s Tale) plays the second part of a double act to more well known actor with charm, humor and a lot of fun. Forget Vision and Scarlet Witch (sorry Elisabeth Olsen), the Iron Man/JARVIS is where it’s at. Their sometimes acidic and always funny relationship is what makes the beats of the movie really sing. 

Just writing this piece has the Black Sabbath song running through my head. 

And hey, this is the movie that launched a movie franchise…and at the same time, in the world of comics, catapulted Iron Man to A-Tier. 

When, movies later, Downey says “I am Iron Man” and does his snap and defeats Thanos at the cost of his own life, that was all originally set up and grounded from the original Iron Man movie. 

(9) COMICS SECTION.

(10) ARCHIPELACON 2 IS DRAWING NEAR. Finland’s national convention and this year’s Eurocon, Archipelacon 2, The Nordic SF and Fantasy Convention, announced today over 700 memberships have been sold, out of a total maximum of 1 000. 

The convention will take place in Mariehamn, Åland on 26-29 June, at the Alandica Culture & Congress Centre. The second Archipelacon is a follow-up to the now legendary first edition, which was held in the same venue in 2015. 

We have a stellar lineup of Guests of Honour: Ann VanderMeer, Jeff VanderMeer, Mats Strandberg, and Emmi Itäranta. For full presentations please visit our website https://archipelacon.org/guests-of-honour/

Preparations for the event are in full swing. Last minute programme proposals can be submitted via the programme form, but please hurry if you have suggestions. The form can be found here.

The final programme will be published in early June. 

We are also looking for volunteers. If you are interested in making Archipelacon 2 happen, please sign up on our website at https://archipelacon.org/volunteer/

Archipelacon 2 is financed by sales of memberships and T-shirts, vendor table rentals, as well as grants. This year’s event has received grants from PAF, Suomen Kulttuurirahasto, and Svenska Kulturfonden. We thank our sponsors for their generous support!

(11) PSYCHED OUT? “NASA’s Psyche Mission Suffers Strange Glitch on Its Way to a Metallic Asteroid” reports Gizmodo.

The Psyche spacecraft launched nearly two years ago and is currently on its way to rendezvous with a unique asteroid in an effort to understand the origins of Earth. Although it’s still a few years away from orbiting the asteroid, which bears the same name, the Psyche mission has run into an issue with its propulsion system that forced it to power off its thrusters.

NASA engineers with the Psyche mission are investigating the root cause of a recent decrease in fuel pressure in the spacecraft’s propulsion system, an issue that needs to be resolved before mid-June so that it doesn’t affect the mission’s trajectory. “The mission team has chosen to defer thrusting while engineers work to understand the pressure decrease,” NASA wrote in an update.

Psyche launched in October 2023, beginning a 2.2 billion-mile journey to a metal-rich asteroid located in the main belt. The spacecraft began firing its thrusters in May 2024, using a solar electric propulsion system that relies on solar energy to generate power for four electric thrusters. On April 1, the spacecraft detected a pressure drop in the line that delivers xenon gas to the thrusters, which went from 36 pounds per square inch (psi) to about 26 psi, according to NASA. In response to the sudden decrease, the spacecraft automatically powered off its thrusters…

(12) ROCKY AT 50. “’The Rocky Horror Picture Show’ turns 50: cult classic will be back in theaters and released on Blu-ray in 4K Ultra HD” reports 6ABC of Philadelphia.

“Let’s do the time warp again!” This year marks the 50th anniversary of the musical film “The Rocky Horror Picture Show.” To celebrate the occasion, a newly restored and remastered version of “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” will be let loose in 4K Ultra HD, along with the debut of a new anniversary logo.

Audiences were first introduced to the movie in 1975 and it quickly became a cult classic. It’s based on the musical play by Richard O’Brien, and has continued to grow with late-night screenings, fan costumes, and has created a unique moviegoing experience with dance parties. To this day, “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” still makes history as the longest-running theatrical release of all time.

The Walt Disney Studios Restoration team oversaw the 10-month project to digitally scan and preserve the film.

(13) VIDEO OF THE DAY. “The Rocky Horror Picture Show ‘Time Warp’” (1975).

[Thanks to Andrew Porter, John King Tarpinian, Chris Barkley, Nina Törnudd, Cat Eldridge, SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie, Mark Roth-Whitworth, Steven French, Kathy Sullivan, Teddy Harvia, and Mike Kennedy for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Mark.]

Pixel Scroll 10/28/24 John Pixel Is Dead, He Scrolled On His Head

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(1) DETECTING AI-GENERATED TEXT. [Item by SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie.] The rise of large language model AI provides not only boons in tidying up text (of particular benefit to some users such as those with English as a second language or those suffering from, say, dyslexia) but comes with issues when used nefariously by those wishing to pass off AI generated text as their own creativity. Manual checks on text come with the risk of relatively high false positives as well as false negatives. Mandatory archiving all AI generated text comes with both compliance and privacy issues, so this leaves digital watermarking.

AI-generated text (and images) is already causing problems in science with fake paper submissions and also in science fiction where magazine editors have been receiving AI-generated works causing some bodies to come up with rules to govern their use, or banning, AI, one recent body doing so is the Horror Writers Association.

The latest issue of Nature has as its cover story (and an accompanying editorial such is this subject’s importance) on a new digital watermarking system developed by researchers at Google DeepMind in London. Their system is called SynthID-Text. File770 readers interested in this should check the original, open access, paper (I am not a computer scientist and this is definitely outside my comfort zone) but the way it works is to generate ‘tokens’ which are synonym words generated from the text’s context. A number of tokens are needed for the system to work.

Both the researchers and Nature say that this research is an important step in establishing an effective watermarking system, but both the researchers and Nature also clearly note that there are still many hurdles to overcome. For example, it is possible to wash out such digital watermarks by simply running through the AI-generated text through another large-language-model AI.

Currently, both the US and EU are considering legislation and respective bodies to oversee AI. China has already made digital watermarking mandatory and in the US the state of California is thinking of doing the same.

Meanwhile, DeepMind has made SynthID-Text free and open access. Yet, as said, the hurdles are great and there is still a long way to go. As the Nature editorial makes plain, ‘we need to grow up fast’.

The paper is Dathathri, S. et al ((2024) Scalable watermarking for identifying large language model outputs. Nature, vol. 634, p818-823.

The editorial is Anon. (2024) AI watermarking must be watertight to be effective. vol. 634, p753.

(2) OPEN LETTER. Literary Hub reports “Hundreds of Authors Pledge to Boycott Israeli Cultural Institutions” – among them are Jonathan Lethem, China Miéville, Junot Díaz, Marilyn Hacker, Suyi Davies Okungbowa, and Carmen Maria Machado. They have signed an open letter titled “Refusing Complicity in Israel’s Literary Institutions”, text available at Google Docs. It says in part:

…We have a role to play. We cannot in good conscience engage with Israeli institutions without interrogating their relationship to apartheid and displacement. This was the position taken by countless authors against South Africa; it was their contribution to the struggle against apartheid there.

Therefore: we will not work with Israeli cultural institutions that are complicit or have remained silent observers of the overwhelming oppression of Palestinians. We will not cooperate with Israeli institutions including publishers, festivals, literary agencies and publications that:

  1. Are complicit in violating Palestinian rights, including through discriminatory policies and practices or by whitewashing and justifying Israel’s occupation, apartheid or genocide, or
  2. Have never publicly recognized the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people as enshrined in international law. 

(3) CHANGING OF THE TAFF GUARD. Michael J. “Orange Mike” Lowrey imparts the latest Trans-Atlantic Fan Fund news:

Sarah Gulde has returned home “after many days” and has as of today taken over North American TAFF admin duties, allowing Mike Lowrey to retire.

Sarah Gulde, of course, was the 2024 TAFF winner and went to the Worldcon in Glasgow.

(4) THE WITCHING HOUR GOES HIGHBROW. Midnight book release events began to market Harry Potter, and initially most (but not all) subsequent ones were for genre works. Not anymore. Publishers Weekly points out that Sally Rooney’s Intermezzo and Haruki Murakami’s The City and its Uncertain Walls, translated by Philip Gabriel have or will get the midnight treatment this year: “Literary Publishers Embraces the Midnight Release Party”.

The midnight book release party, which sees patrons descending on bookstores at 12 midnight to get their copy of a buzzy new book, is a relatively recent phenomenon. Still, it has evolved considerably in its short lifespan. The rise of the midnight release in the book business can be traced back to J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series, which debuted in the U.S. in 1998. But it was the strict embargo put on the fourth book in the series, before its publication in 2000, that helped popularize the late-night bookstore gatherings.

While this trend began with books for younger readers—Stephanie Meyers’s Twilight series and the final installment of Suzanne Collins’s Hunger Games series also got the midnight release treatment—it hasn’t stayed that way. In the years since, bookstores have held midnight release events for the likes of David Foster Wallace’s The Pale King, Harper Lee’s Go Set a Watchman, Thomas Pynchon’s Bleeding Edge, and Margaret Atwood’s The Testaments….

(5) ARCHIPELACON 2. The week after Midsummer will be the highlight of the European sci-fi summer of 2025! This will be when the 2025 Eurocon, or Archipelacon 2, comes to Mariehamn in the Åland Islands of Finland.

Date and venue: June 26–29, Culture and Congress Center Alandica (Strandgatan 33, Mariehamn).

“We wanted to organise a second Archipelacon because the first one was so great that people still get dewy-eyed remembering it. Mariehamn is exactly the right place for this type of event. It is a place where land and sea, Finland and Sweden, small town idyll and world history all come together,” says Karo Leikomaa, chairperson of Archipelacon 2.

Guests of Honour:

Ann VanderMeer (USA): editor, anthologist, acquiring editor for Tor.com and Weird Fiction Review, and Editor-in-Residence for Shared Worlds.

Jeff VanderMeer (USA): writer, environmental activist, and friend of many baby raccoons. Has recently published Absolution, the fourth part of the award-winning Southern Reach Trilogy. The New York Times calls it “his strangest novel yet”.

Mats Strandberg (Sweden): purveyor of fine Swedish horror, set in the most mundane of environments: conference centres, care homes and the very weird world that exists on board the massive passenger ferries between Finland and Sweden. His book Blood Cruise (Färjan) will be made into a TV series by the Swedish public service broadcaster SVT, set to be broadcast in late 2025.

Emmi Itäranta (Finland) writes her books in both Finnish and English. Her debut, The Memory of Water (Teemestarin kirja), was produced as a feature film in 2022 and set the tone for her work, which often explores environmental themes. She has since published two more novels, The Weaver (Kudottujen kujien kaupunki), and The Moonday Letters (Kuunpäivän kirjeet). Her books have been translated into more than twenty languages. 

“Being selected as the 2025 Eurocon is a great honour, and also recognition of the work that the Finnish and Nordic fandom has done. The first Archipelacon proved that large international conventions can be organised in Finland, and Worldcon 75 in Helsinki in 2017 demonstrated what Finnish, Nordic and international fandom can achieve together,” says Leikomaa.

Archipelacon 2 memberships are on sale on the con’s website.

Memberships are capped at 1,000. By the beginning of October, well over half of the memberships had already been sold.

Adult membership costs 40 euros, for 13–26-year-olds the membership fee is 20 euros, and for children 5 euros. The price will remain the same all the way.

(6) HOLD THE PHONE. “Publication of The Martian Trilogy Will Be Delayed” — here’s Amazing Stories’ official announcement.

The Martian Trilogy’s release will be delayed and Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki’s introduction to that book has been removed from the contents.

This follows the release of serious allegations made against Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki of “unethical behavior and bad faith dealings” by Erin Lindi Cairns, a South African author, which has since been supported by statements from others, including a detailed statement by Jason Sandford.

This is a huge blow to the team that worked on this book, to John P. Moore’s legacy, and to the science fiction community at large, as this will delay the release of what is considered to be an important chapter in the history of Black science fiction and its contributions to the genre…

They are now looking at a mid-2025 release date.

(7) GABINO IGLESIAS REVIEWS. Yesterday we had the link to the September column, which is why we are able to come back so soon with the link for Gabino Iglesias’ next New York Times column “New Horror for Readers Who Want to Be Completely Terrified” (behind a paywall). In October he reviewed Yvonne Battle-Felton’s new novel, Curdle Creek (Holt, 292 pp., $27.99), Kevin J. Anderson’s Nether Station (Blackstone, 308 pp., $27.99), Nick Cutter’s The Queen (Gallery, 374 pp., $28.99), and Del Sandeen’s debut, This Cursed House (Berkley, 374 pp., $29).

(8) KEEPING UP WITH THE JONESES. California’s governor has a proposal to encourage film and TV productions to stay in-state. “Newsom To The Rescue: Governor Supersizes California’s Film & TV Tax Credits To Get Hollywood Back To Work” – Deadline has the story.

… In an announcement this afternoon at Raleigh Studios, the Governor will reveal that he aims to boost the state’s tax credits from their present level of $330 million a year to around $750 million annually, I’ve learned

The whooping increase will not take place immediately, and is subject to approval by the Democratic majority legislature in the Golden State’s 2025-2026 budget. However, in this election year of close down ticket races, Sunday’s announcement is intended to swell confidence locally for an industry and a workforce that has seen production in L.A. and across the state dramatically shrink and jobs dry up over the last year or so, sources say….

… Also, besides the more than doubling of California’s credits, which were established in their current form in 2014, the increase will make the Golden State the top capped source for production tax incentives in the nation — at least on paper. Presently, with a $280 million expansion last year, New York state offers about $700 million in capped incentives. However, that number is augmented by a patchwork quilt of other offsets and exemptions available to productions in various specific jurisdictions in the Empire State.

While states like New Jersey, Nevada, and Utah have been putting more tax credit money on the table, Louisiana and Georgia still remain among the top rivals to California. Coming out of the shutdown of production during the 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes and industry wide layoffs and cost-cutting measures, the Peach State, like California, hasn’t anywhere near fully rebounded. Having said that, while California has more production than anywhere else overall, Georgia, especially Atlanta, still attracts more big budget productions on average that anywhere else in the U.S.A.

It doesn’t hurt that costs in Georgia are generally much lower than on the West Coast, and that the state has an uncapped incentive program that ranges from around $900 million to $1.2 billion per annum. Movies or TV shows that shoot in the Southern state receive a 20% base transferable tax credit. As accounting execs at Disney, Netflix and everyone else in town will tell you with no small sense of disbelief, productions also easily receive a 10% Georgia Entertainment Promotion “uplift” if they include the state logo in their credits for five seconds or, according to the Georgia Department of Economic Development, an “alternative marketing promotion.”

This new increase recommended Sunday by Gov. Newsom will certainly shake up the tax credit status quo….

(9) THE OTHER CHOSEN ONE. Variety tells what happens when “Timothée Chalamet Makes Surprise Appearance at Lookalike Contest”.

A sea of 20-something boys, with a mix of defined jawlines, hazel eyes and mops of curly hair congregated at New York City’s Washington Square Park on Sunday afternoon to take part in a Timothée Chalamet lookalike contest. But in a surprise twist, around 30 minutes after the contest kicked off, the real-life Chalamet made a surprise appearance in the middle of the crowd.

Chalamet snuck his way through the packed mob, hiding behind a black mask and baseball hat, before sneaking up on two doppelgangers posing for photos. Once he got to the middle, he took off his mask for the big reveal as shrieks quickly erupted across the park….

… The lookalike contest was promoted the past few weeks through flyers posted across the city, in addition to a public Partiful invitation promising a $50 cash prize for the winner. By Sunday morning, the event had more than 2,500 RSVPs.

Chalamet pulled up behind one of the more popular lookalikes, 22 year-old Spencer DeLorenzo who spent much the afternoon posting for photos. At one point, he was even hoisted on a chair as the crowd cheered him on…

(10) MEMORY LANE.

[Written by Cat Eldridge.]

Media Anniversary: It Came From Outer Space film (1953)

Seventy-one years ago It Came From Outer Space premiered, the first in the 3D films that would released from Universal-International. It was from a story written by Ray Bradbury. The script was by Harry Essex.

Billed by the studio as science fiction horror — and I’ll get to why in the SPOILERS section — it was directed by Henry Arnold who would soon be responsible for two genre classics, Creature from the Black Lagoon and The Incredible Shrinking Man, the latter of which as you might remember won a Hugo at Solacon in 1958.

HORROR, ERRR, SPOILERS, ARE ABOUT TO HAPPEN. BEWARE!

Amateur sky watcher (as played by Richard Carlson) and schoolteacher Ellen Fields (as played Barbara Rush) see a large meteorite crash near the small town in Arizona. Being curious and not at cautious (who is in these films?), they investigate.

Putnam sees the object and knows it is a spacecraft but everyone else laughs at him. People start disappearing. (Cue chilling music.) The sheriff opts for a violent answer, but Putnam wants a peaceful resolution.

In the end, a Bradburyan solution happens, atypical of these Fifties pulp SF films and the aliens get what they need to leave without anyone, human or alien, dying. 

YOU CAN COME BACK NOW FROM UNDER THE TABLE. 

The screenplay by Harry Essex, with extensive input by the director Jack Arnold, was based on an original and quite lengthy screen treatment by Bradbury off the fore mentioned story by him. It is said that Bradbury wrote the screenplay and Harry Essex merely changed the dialogue and took the credit. There is no actual written documentation of this though, so it may or may not be true. You know how such stories get their beginning. 

It made back twice its eight hundred thousand budget in the first year. 

Many, many critics took to be an anti-communist film about an invasion of America. However, Bradbury pointed out that “I wanted to treat the invaders as beings who were not dangerous, and that was very unusual.” 

Twenty years ago, Gauntlet Press published a collection of essays about It Came from Outer Space. Bradbury contributed an introductory essay plus a number of other pieces. There’s also the four screen treatments Bradbury wrote before the final screenplay along with photos, original ads, marketing posters, reviews and quite a bit more. 

Final note: It Came from Outer Space is one of the classic films mentioned in the opening theme (“Science Fiction/Double Feature”) of The Rocky Horror Show theatre performance and the film.

It Came From Outer Space is streaming on Peacock and Prime.

(11) COMICS SECTION.

(12) WITNESS THE SCOPE OF MARVEL’S NEW ULTIMATE UNIVERSE. An epic connecting cover by Josemaria Casanovas will run across every Ultimate series over the next few months, starting with this week’s Ultimate X-Men #8.

The second year of Marvel Comics’ new Ultimate Universe is on the horizon. To celebrate, a special connecting cover by acclaimed artist Josemaria Casanovas will run on upcoming issues of each current Ultimate title—Jonathan Hickman and Marco Checchetto’s Ultimate Spider-Man, Bryan Hill and Stefano Caselli’s Ultimate Black Panther, Peach Momoko’s Ultimate X-Men, Deniz Camp and Juan Frigeri’s Ultimates, and the just announced fifth ongoing Ultimate series, Chris Condon and Alessandro Cappuccio’s Ultimate Wolverine. An homage to Jim Lee’s iconic X-Men #1 cover, the breathtaking 6-part piece teases upcoming storylines and characters from future issues—including the long-awaited return of the creator of this exciting universe, the Maker.

Check out the full piece below. For more information, visit Marvel.com. [Click for larger image.]

(13) MOOMIN IN THE MUSEUM. [Item by Steven French.] Ahead of next year’s 80th anniversary of the Moomin stories, the Helsinki Art Museum is putting on an exhibition of Tove Jansson’s paintings, including a number of large murals (and if you look closely at Party in the City, from 1947, you can see a certain big nosed, pot bellied figure, hidden away beside a vase on the edge of the festivities!). “Tove Jansson murals, with hidden Moomins, seen for first time in Helsinki show” in the Guardian.

The exhibition, entitled Paradise, at the Helsinki Art Museum focuses for the first time on the murals and frescoes Jansson was commissioned to paint on the walls of factory canteens, hospitals, nurseries and even churches – long before Moominmania conquered the world and the adventures of Snufkin, Snork Maiden and Little My became a Finnish secular religion.

“By the end of her life, Tove was most famous as a writer,” said the artist and author’s niece, Sophia Jansson, now president of the board of the company that manages her copyright. “But she always saw herself first and foremost [as] a painter. It was only later that her reputation as the ‘Moomin woman’ overtook her.”

See more information about the exhibition at the Helsinki Art Museum website.

Tove Jansson: Bird Blue, 1953 (detail). © Tove Jansson Estate. Photo: HAM / Maija Toivanen.

(14) A LOT OF THIS GOING AROUND. Another publication won’t be telling you their pick for President: “The Starfleet Gazette Will Not Be Endorsing a Candidate for President of the United Federation of Planets” — McSweeney’s Internet Tendency has the scoop.

… The Starfleet Gazette will not be endorsing a candidate in the upcoming election for president of the United Federation of Planets. This decision was not made lightly, but neither of the two candidates—decorated Starship Voyager Captain Kathryn Janeway or The Borg—has shown us a real path to endorsement, and we must stay true to our priorities: journalistic integrity and not pissing off The Borg….

(15) WHEN EYES RETURN FROM ORBIT. Futurism reports “Space Tourist Alarmed When Vision Starts to Deteriorate”. But it was a short-lived phenomenon.

Scientists are still trying to understand the toll that spaceflight takes on the human body.

With SpaceX’s civilian Polar Dawn mission, which lasted five days and wrapped up last month, we’re getting an opportunity to observe the effects on more or less average humans — rather than the elite, highly trained government astronauts who are normally the ones that spend so much time in orbit.

Some of what they’re reporting sounds a little worrying. At the top of the list: inexplicably malfunctioning eyeballs.

“My vision acuity started to deteriorate those first few days,” Scott “Kidd” Poteet, a former US Air Force pilot who served as pilot of the mission, told CNN of the journey.

… As it turns out, Poteet’s faltering vision wasn’t the end of the crew’s optic oddities. Jared Isaacman, the mission’s commander and a billionaire entrepreneur, told CNN he saw “sparkles or lights” when he closed his eyes, a mysterious symptom related to space radiation that other astronauts have reported…

… What caused Poteet’s vision to deteriorate is likely a condition known as spaceflight associated neuro-ocular syndrome, or SANS. This is believed to be the result of a microgravity environment, which causes the optic nerve to swell, and fluids in the eye and brain to shift.

SANS is still poorly understood. All four crew members wore high-tech, cyberpunk-looking contact lenses to measure intraocular pressure throughout the mission, in the hopes of teasing out its causes.

Poteet said his vision quickly returned to normal once he was back on Earth. But as SpaceX engineer and the mission’s medical officer Anna Menon told CNN, the effects — if unaddressed — could be disastrous in the long term….

(16) TOP SF BOOKS – MAYBE? [Item by SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie.]  BookPilled has just re-ranked his top 15 SF books. Like or dislike his ratings, the titles are interesting. I’m guessing that most of you will have nearly all the books in his top chart, and even if you haven’t you will probably know of them. Personally, it was good to see a Bob Shaw in the mix. Alas, poor old Alan Dean Foster…  There are one or two authors in Pilled’s list I have not read, but that might be a Brit-N.America divide thing (?). Anyway, see if you agree with him… “Ranking All the Books from Every Top 15 Sci-Fi List”.

[Thanks to Chris Barkley, Cat Eldridge, SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie, Michael J. “Orange Mike” Lowrey, Steven French, Kathy Sullivan, Teddy Harvia, Mike Kennedy, Andrew Porter, John King Tarpinian for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Patrick Morris Miller.]

Pixel Scroll 7/11/20 Hello Pixel, Hello Filer, Here I Am At Camp 770

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(1) COOL RUNNING. Archipelacon 2, the Nordic science fiction and fantasy convention in Mariehamn, Finland in 2025, is also a bid for Eurocon for 2025. (Cheryl Morgan added, “but not Worldcon, the venue is too small and they are much too sensible.”)

(2) PLAN B. Ian Sales, in “Reading diary 2020, #8” briefly gave some thought to reviewing the books on the Clarke Award shortlist before realizing it would be more interesting to tee off on US fandom.

…The Clarke commentary no longer takes place. An attempt to reinvigorate it several years ago with a shadow jury was loudly condemned by US fans who plainly didn’t understand what a shadow jury is and equally plainly hadn’t bothered to find out. Despite all claims to the contrary, fandom is not a community. Once upon a time, it was an emergent phenomenon of the stories’ existence. Now it’s just a part of the marketing machine, and, happily for the publishers, it costs them nothing. Five stars means less than one star. Giving a book five stars just makes you a fucking mug. And everything is dominated by the US, a nation which seems congenitally incapable of recognising that other countries exist and they do things differently there (yes, I know, that’s a time-based reference, not geographic one; but never mind). True, science fiction is an American mode of fiction, and the single largest market for its creations, so its dominance is hardly surprising. But us non-USians, while we may appreciate the genre output of the US – the stories, the novels, the films, the TV series – we don’t actually give a shit about what US fans think. Science fiction fandom is not one giant global family. It never has been. And it never should be. Vive la différence.

(There actually are bunch of good reviews in the post, once you get past this.)

(3) WINDYCON CANCELLATION. Chicago-area’s Windycon will not take place this year now that they’ve reached agreement with their facility.

Out of concern for the safety for our members, guests, and staff, Windycon 47 in 2020, originally scheduled for November 13-15 is cancelled for this year by mutual agreement with our hotel.

All room reservations will be automatically canceled by the hotel beginning Monday, 7/13.

If you have purchased a membership, dealer tables, or space in the art show for Windycon 47, we will refund your money or roll over your payments for Windycon 47 in 2021, per your preference.  Please contact us at registration@windycon.org to let us know.  Dealers, please contact dealers@windycon.org for your preferences, and artists, please contact artshow@windycon.org. 

If you haven’t contacted us by August 1, 2020, then memberships will be automatically refunded.

If you have a membership that was rolled over from Windycon 46, that membership will automatically be rolled over to the convention in 2021.

There may yet be some online activities which will be held during Windycon 47’s original timeframe.  Should this come to pass, information will be posted on the Windycon website and via social media channels.

Windycon 47 will now be held at the Westin in Lombard, Illinois on November 12-14, 2021, COVID-permitting, featuring all of the guests from 2020.

If you have any questions, please contact the ISFiC board at: board@isfic.org. 

(4) STORYGRAPH. Someone has invented a tool that could massively accelerate the growth of your Mount TBR, judging by Cole Rush’s “Interview with Nadia Odunayo, Founder of The StoryGraph” at The Quill To Live

Welcome to our special interview with Nadia Odunayo! Nadia is the founder of The StoryGraph, an online service that helps you find books to fit your mood. After you read the interview, head over to The StoryGraph to sign up and find your next read!

What is The StoryGraph and what does it do for readers?

The StoryGraph is a website that helps you to find perfect books for you based on your mood and the types of books you like to read.

Our magic feature is “Ordered for you.” Users fill out a short survey — it takes anywhere from 1 to 5 minutes to fill out — letting us know their favourite sorts of books to read, down to specific topics, types of authors, themes, genres etc. — and we order all of the books on our website for them based on how well they match their preferences.

Combine that with our filter menu, where you can filter down by moods, pace, genres, book size, and more, and you’re never more than a few clicks away from your next perfect book!

(5) DRIVE-IN FAVORITE. Did you see this coming? Deadline says it’s making the cash registers ring again: “‘Empire Strikes Back’ Leads At The Weekend Box Office Again, 23 Years After Sequel’s Special Edition”.

For the first time since the February 1997 reissue, Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back is leading at the box office this weekend after clocking an estimated $175K at 483 locations. Empire should end the weekend with a 3-day take in-between the high $400K and low $500K.

(6) DON’T PANIC. Huffpost urges, “Don’t Fall For The ‘Cancel Culture’ Scam”. And proceeds to document inaccuracies in the open letter signed by over 150 writers, including J.K. Rowling.

On Monday, 153 prominent writers, academics and public figures signed their names to a statement entitled “A Letter on Justice and Open Debate.” According to the signatories, “The free exchange of information and ideas, the lifeblood of a liberal society, is daily becoming more constricted.”

While the letter itself, published by the magazine Harper’s, doesn’t use the term, the statement represents a bleak apogee in the yearslong, increasingly contentious debate over “cancel culture.” The American left, we are told, is imposing an Orwellian set of restrictions on which views can be expressed in public. Institutions at every level are supposedly gripped by fears of social media mobs and dire professional consequences if their members express so much as a single statement of wrongthink.

This is false. Every statement of fact in the Harper’s letter is either wildly exaggerated or plainly untrue. More broadly, the controversy over “cancel culture” is a straightforward moral panic. While there are indeed real cases of ordinary Americans plucked from obscurity and harassed into unemployment, this rare, isolated phenomenon is being blown up far beyond its importance.

(7) CLARON CONVERSATIONS CONTINUE.  The next two installments of the Clarion Conversations are scheduled for July 15 and 16.

The Future is Queer – July 15, 5:30pm PT / 8:30pm ET (Register here.)

This week, our guests are José Iriarte, Jordy Rosenberg, and Nicasio Andrés Reed, moderated by Ellen Kushner. The conversation, named in honor of the Delany-Kushner-Sherman “The Future is Queer” scholarship for Clarion students, will explore speculative fiction through the eyes of these four writers whose work centers queer stories and experiences, the writers who inspired and paved the way for them, and what the future of the field looks like.

We encourage attendees of tonight’s conversation to make a contribution to the Delany-Kushner-Sherman/The Future is Queer Scholarship, which recognizes the continued work of Samuel R. Delany, Ellen Kushner, and Delia Sherman as active LGBTQ writers in the field of science fiction and fantasy, and their contributions as Clarion faculty members who have been particularly supportive of LGBTQ students over the years. The scholarship provides financial support for Clarion students who self-identify as part of the broader queer community. In addition, it recognizes the need for more queer representation in speculative literature, and the many hardships queer writers face due to employment, home, and financial discrimination. Our hope is that the Delany-Kushner-Sherman scholarship will help more queer writers attend the Clarion Workshop.

Remembering Octavia/Writers of Color at Clarion – July 16, 5pm PT / 8pm ET (register here)

This week, our guests are adrienne marie brown, Lisa Bolekaja, and Senaa Ahmad, moderated by Shelley Streeby (Clarion Workshop Faculty Director). The focus this week is to highlight the contributions of writers of color in the Clarion community, looking back to early student Octavia E. Butler and to the future through the eyes of these three writers, including two Octavia E. Butler Memorial Scholars—a scholarship for Clarion students of color sponsored by the Carl Brandon Society.

The Carl Brandon Societyhas tirelessly dedicated itself to increasing racial and ethnic diversity in the production of and audience for speculative fiction. We encourage attendees of tonight’s conversation to make a contribution to the Butler Scholarship Memorial Fund.

Videos of the first two panels are available on YouTube.

(8) MEDIA BIRTHDAY.

  • July 11, 1997 — Contact premiered. It was directed by Robert Zemeckis with production by him and Steve Starkey. It‘s  based off Carl Sagan’s 1985 novel of the same name with the screenplay by James V. Hart and Michael Goldenberg. Jodie Foster is the protagonist with an extensive supporting cast of Matthew McConaughey, James Woods, Tom Skerritt, William Fichtner, John Hurt, Angela Bassett, Rob Lowe, Jake Busey and David Morse. Contact won the Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation at BucConeer, beating out Men In Black, Gattaca and Starship Troopers. The rough consensus of the critics was that it had great ideas, quite flat characters. Box office wise, it never earned back what it cost to make. The audience reviewers at Rotten Tomatoes currently give it a 78% rating. 

(9) TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS.

[Compled by Cat Eldridge and John Hertz.]

  • Born July 11, 1899 – E.B. White.  Essayist at Harper’s and The New Yorker.  Three revisions of Strunk’s 1918 Elements of Style (1959, 1972, 1979) which thus since 1959 has also borne White’s name.  Letters, 1976 (Winship Award); Essays, 1977; Poems & Sketches, 1981.  For us, Stuart Little, Charlotte’s Web(Newbery Honor), The Trumpet of the Swan.  Amer. Acad. Arts & Letters Gold Medal, Presidential Medal of Freedom, Wilder Award, Nat’l Medal for Literature, Pulitzer Prize.  (Died 1985) [JH]
  • Born July 11, 1913 – Harold McCauley.  Five dozen covers, a hundred interiors for Amazing, Fantastic, Imagination, Other Worlds, Universe.  Here  is a cover for the August 1940 Fantastic.  Here is the May 1952 Imagination.  Here are some images from the Grapefruit Moon Gallery (the stern man with a staff is HM’s cover for Empire of the Atom).  See Di Fate’s note on him in Infinite Worlds.  The Quaker Oats man has his face. (Died 1977) [JH]
  • Born July 11, 1913 – Cordwainer Smith.  Forty short stories; even the titles are strange – “Scanners Live in Vain”, “Golden the Ship Was – Oh! Oh! Oh!”, “Think Blue, Count Two”.  Translated into Croatian, Dutch, French, German, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Romanian, Russian, Spanish.  Under another name (and he used others too) he was Sun Yat-sen’s godson, earned a Ph.D., knew six languages, studied brainwashing and psychological warfare.  We may understand him some day.  (Died 1966) [JH]
  • Born July 11, 1920 — Yul Brynner. The Gunslinger in Westworld and its sequel Futureword.  He would also play Carson, a human warrior in the post-apocalyptic The Ultimate Warrior. I don’t think we can consider The King and I genre or even genre adjacent…  If we do, he played Prince Mongkut in the short-lived Anna and the King as well. (Died 1985.) (CE)
  • Born July 11, 1925 — David Graham, 95. The voice of Daleks in the early years of Doctor Who including two non-canon films, Dr. Who and the Daleks and Daleks’ Invasion Earth 2150 A.D.; his voice work made him a sought-after worker and he’d be used on Thunderbirds, Asterix & Obelix Take On Caesar, Timeslip, Moomin, Stingray and even the recent Thunderbirds Are Go. (CE)
  • Born July 11, 1954 – Sarah Prince.  Ceramicist, photographer, graphic designer.  Voice and handbell choirs.  Co-chaired Ditto 6 (fanziners’ convention, named for a brand of spirit duplicator – I’ve used it myself and “spirit duplicator” still sounds fantastic).  Here (Mark Olson photo) she is at Boskone 28.  (Died 2017) [JH]
  • Born July 11, 1956 — Amitav Ghosh, 64. Author of the absolutely brilliant The Calcutta Chromosome: A Novel of Fevers, Delirium and Discovery which won the Arthur C. Clarke Award. Really just go read it and we’ll discuss it over a cup of chai masala. (CE)
  • Born July 11, 1958 – Alan M. Gutierrez, 62.  A hundred sixty covers, forty interiors.  Here is the Spring 1983 Rigel.  Here is The Infinite Sea.  Here is the April 2005 Analog.  Here is Fuzzy Ergo Sum.  Here are some starship concept sketches.  [JH]
  • Born July 11, 1959 — Richard James Bleiler, 61. Genres breed academics. One of them is this bibliographer of speculative fiction, crime, and adventure fiction. Among his papers are “The Fantastic Pulp Fiction of Frank Belknap Long” which appeared in Gary Hoppenstand’s Pulp Fiction of the ’20S and ’30S and “Forgotten Giant: A Brief History of Adventure Magazines” which was published in Extrapolation: A Journal of Science Fiction and Fantasy. (CE)
  • Born July 11, 1976 — T.L. Morganfield, 44. She is as she says “An Aztec geek; whether it’s history or mythology, I devour it all. It’s a love affair that began in college and has taken over my fiction writing life.” And that’s why I’m recommending her Bone Flower trilogy which is at genre adjacent if not genre. Her Aztec West series bring the Aztec gods into the Old West and is quite entertaining in a weird sort of manner. (CE)
  • Born July 11, 1984 – Marie Lu, 36.  Nine novels, five New York Times Best Sellers, some adapted to graphic novels and video games; they are young-adult futuristic dystopias.  Here is a January 2020 interview for The Writer.  [JH]

(10) COMICS SECTION.

  • Non Sequitur shows a suspicious case of news not going viral.

(11) MOVING IN A NEW DIRECTION. “Julia Sawalha ‘devastated and furious’ at Chicken Run sequel ‘ageism'” reports BBC.

Actress Julia Sawalha has said she is “devastated and furious” at not being in the Chicken Run sequel, claiming she was told her voice sounds “too old”.

Sawalha, who played Ginger the chicken in the 2000 animated original, said she felt she had been “unfairly dismissed”.

The actress said she had “officially been plucked, stuffed & roasted” after being told the role was being recast, but wished the film “the best of luck”.

The BBC has asked Aardman Animations and distributor Netflix for comment.

In an open letter, the Absolutely Fabulous and Cranford star said she had been “informed out of the blue” that the producers of Chicken Run 2 were recasting Ginger.

“The reason they gave is that my voice now sounds ‘too old’ and they wanted a younger actress,” she wrote.

Sawalha responded by filming herself speaking some of her old dialogue and sending the video to the sequel’s producers.

She said she had received a “very kind” response from an unnamed “creative” – who said the recasting would still go ahead.

(12) SHE ADORES THE DOCTOR. BUT NOT THAT DOCTOR. Galactic Journey’s Lorelei Marcus will tell you “This is how I fell hard for handsome, clever, talented teen idol of the century: Tony Randall.” [JULY 10, 1965] “SINCE I FELL FOR YOU” (A YOUNG TRAVELER’S CRUSH).

… He’s at his best though, when he is playing Dr. Lao; specifically when he drops the stereotypical façade of a foolish Chinese man and becomes the traveled scholar underneath. Suddenly he is standing straight and tall, almost regal in his confidence. His voice is deep and carrying, but his demeanor is kind, wise, and gentle. He speaks in a perfect and precise manner and his words discuss the magical secrets of the universe. I hadn’t known it at the time, but despite all the makeup and effects, this role was one of the closest to Randall’s true self.

At this point, I was awed by Randall’s performance in the movie, but felt little beyond that. Dr. Lao was a few thousand years too old for my tastes, and I had yet to see the man behind him more clearly. Then my father’s and my weekly Password viewing happened to feature a very special guest. I was quite excited, not necessarily because it was Tony Randall on Password, but simply because it was an actor that I recognized and admired. At least, that’s how it started.

I was folding laundry while watching the TV, and I found my attention frequently drifting away from my linens and to the man on screen (no, not host Alan Ludden.) Randall was fascinating to watch. He always sat with perfect poise and spoke with wonderful rich tones. And he was absolutely erudite, forcing me to pull out a dictionary a few times. His brilliance aided in his gameplaying as well, as I believe he is the only player in Password history so far to win four games in a row!

(13) LANSDALE INTRO ONLINE. Joe R. Lansdale, in “The Missing Link Between Golden Age Detectives, Hardboiled Noir, And Hallucinogenic Adventure” on CrimeReads, has an introduction to a new edition of Joel Townsley Rogers’s The Red Right Hand. a novel Lansdale says is “a genre slider, a brain teaser, a liar and a truth-teller at the same time.” 

… Clues and odd impressions pile up like plague victims, and from time to time the answer to the riddle seems close at hand, as if you could reach out and grasp it. Then the answer that seemed so clear wriggles from your grasp like an electric eel and slithers into darkness.

(14) STARRING ATTRACTION. At The Eloquent Page, Pablo Cheesecake entertainingly reviews “Random Sh*t Flying Through The Air by Jackson Ford”.

Please note, this is a direct sequel to The Girl Who Could Move Sh*t With Her Mind. It is entirely possible that if you have not read book one in The Frost Files series then this review will contain something akin to minor spoilers. Don’t say I didn’t warn ya!

Teagan Frost’s life is finally back on track. Her role working for the government as a psychokinetic operative is going well and she might even be on course for convincing her crush to go out with her. But, little does she know, that sh*t is about to hit the fan . . .

A young boy with the ability to cause earthquakes has come to Los Angeles – home to the San Andreas, one of the most lethal fault lines in the world. If Teagan can’t stop him, the entire city – and the rest of California – could be wiped off the map.

For reference, before we begin, I’m going to refer to this book henceforth as Random Sh*t. I can’t be bothered typing Random Sh*t Flying Through the Air all the time. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a brilliant title for a brilliant book, but it’s wearing me out. The prospect alone of having to repeatedly type it out is giving me the fear.

(15) UNDER THE HARROW. Andrew Mather reviews a sequel in “Harrow The Ninth – Sure, Ok, Yeah” at The Quill To Live.

God, it’s like assembling a fusion reactor without a manual. I am honestly surprised at my perceived commercial success of Tamsyn Muir’s The Locked Tomb series. Not that it is bad in any way – in fact, we gave book one a stellar review and listed the series as one of our top Science Fantasy books of all time. It’s just that these books are so confusing that you will literally never understand what is happening, which is usually a huge turn off for most readers. I am pleasantly surprised that the general public has collectively decided these books are worth the time and effort.

So, Harrow The Ninth, the second book in the series, is coming out soon. You might be sitting on your couch right now, browsing this review on your phone, and thinking “oh a Harrow review, maybe he will say the books get less confusing.” Well reader, no, unfortunately, I cannot say that because I don’t understand half the plot, and the other half I do understand is basically all spoilers.

(16) UNSEEN THINGS. Looks like Trump’s Space Force has a head start on the Border Patrol. The New York Times reveals “Beyond the Milky Way, a Galactic Wall”.

Astronomers have discovered that there is a vast wall across the southern border of the local cosmos.

The South Pole Wall, as it is known, consists of thousands of galaxies — beehives of trillions of stars and dark worlds, as well as dust and gas — aligned in a curtain arcing across at least 700 million light-years of space. It winds behind the dust, gas and stars of our own galaxy, the Milky Way, from the constellation Perseus in the Northern Hemisphere to the constellation Apus in the far south. It is so massive that it perturbs the local expansion of the universe.

But don’t bother trying to see it. The entire conglomeration is behind the Milky Way, in what astronomers quaintly call the zone of avoidance.

An international team of astronomers led by Daniel Pomarède of Paris-Saclay University and R. Brent Tully of the University of Hawaii announced this new addition to the local universe on Friday in a paper in Astrophysical Journal. The paper is festooned with maps and diagrams of blobby and stringy features of our local universe as well as a video tour of the South Pole Wall.

It is the latest installment of an ongoing mission to determine where we are in the universe — to fix our neighborhood among the galaxies and the endless voids — and where we are going….

(17) BEYOND ELEMENTARY. At Nerds of A Feather, Paul Weimer’s “Microreview [book]: The Sin In the Steel by Ryan Van Loan” points out a new book’s connection to a strong literary tradition.

…Going into the novel, I did not quite realize that this was going to be a twist on a Sherlock adventure, and it was a delight to meet Buc and Eld on Holmes and Watsonian  terms. The author takes this further than I expected–giving Buc a use of a drug in order to focus and think in a productive way, and making Eld a veteran Who Has Seen Things.. The youthful nature of the protagonists (Buc is 17 and Eld a couple of years later) puts them between a “Young Sherlock Holmes” and a Traditionally aged Holmes and Watson.

(18) WOKE IN TIME FOR BREAKFAST. Vogue tells why “OffLimits Is a New Cereal Brand for the Conscious Breakfast Lover”.

…Emily Miller, author of the cookbook Breakfast and host of “Breakfast Club,” which hosts tours of famous breakfast spots around New York City, is launching a new cereal brand today called OffLimits. There are two flavors: DASH, which is made with Intelligentsia coffee and cacao, and ZOMBIE, a recipe that includes relaxing adaptogens like pandan, vanilla, and ashwagandha. The flavor’s names also represent fictionalized characters created by Miller. They represent moods and emotions like anxiety and depression. She crafted these personas in order to humanize cereal branding, which—despite how sugary or fattening it may be—has often shouted eat this and you will be better and stronger! DASH is also the very first female cereal character ever created in the industry.

(19) TUCKERIZED. Fanac.org has posted Part I of the Bob Tucker Interview that Dick Smith conducted for Chicon 2000.

Dick Smith’s interview of Wilson “Bob” Tucker was done for the 2000 World Science Fiction Convention, Chicon 2000 (with videography by Tom Veal, chair of Chicon 2000!). In this low key conversation, Tucker tells wonderful stories about 60 years of fandom, from Chicon 1 in 1940, to his only stint as convention Artist Guest of Honor, to the origin of the Tucker Hotel, to Claude Degler and more. There’s history. There’s “smoothing”. There are intriguing hints of stories not told. Here’s your chance to sit down with a ghiant of fandom, and listen to Dick Smith draw out his stories of our fannish past.

[Thanks to John King Tarpinian, JJ, Cat Eldridge, John Hertz, Martin Morse Wooster, Chip Hitchcock, Mike Kennedy, Michael Toman, and Andrew Porter for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Kendall.]