Spinning out of their Eisner nominated run on Daredevil, Chip Zdarsky and Marco Checchetto’s Devil’s Reign will launch in December and see Kingpin’s bold scheme to take down every hero ranging from the Fantastic Four to the X-Men. Villains will rule and heroes will fall – and in anticipation of this upcoming crossover event, some of Marvel’s top artists have delivered a brand-new series of Villains’ Reign Variant Covers that transform your favorite heroes into some of the fierce foes that will take charge in the upcoming event. Witness unexpected mashups including:
That’s evident in the latest numbers from Parrot Analytics which reveal that Daredevil ranked fourth last week in viewer demand among all digital originals in the United States across all streaming platforms.
Demand for the sightless superhero series was surpassed only by three shows (Narcos, The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina and Stranger Things, all from Netflix) during the week ending Dec. 1, the chart shows. The chart measures “desire, engagement and viewership” with weighted values that, for example, would give heft to the total “likes” a show accumulates but not as much weight as the total number of actual viewings.
Jemisin was a dreamy kid, but she was practical, too. She didn’t think it was possible for a black woman to have a career as a fantasy writer. So when it came time for her to choose a profession, she followed the example of her mother, a psychologist who administered IQ tests. Jemisin studied psychology at Tulane and the University of Maryland and got a job as a career counselor specializing in what she describes as “at risk” populations — marginalized groups, first-generation students, older people having midlife crises. When she turned 30, she had her own crisis. Swimming in student debt, she decided to try to make a little side money from her lifelong hobby. “I thought, well I have this talent, I haven’t monetized it,” Jemisin recalls. “I don’t know if I can because I don’t think that the publishing marketplace is really interested in what I write, but if I can at least develop it to get a few hundred dollars a month, that will make a difference.”
Her first short story was published two years later, in 2004. The next year, an agent picked the manuscript of Jemisin’s first novel out of the slush pile. The agent, Lucienne Diver, was struck by the setting, a fantastical realm inspired by ancient Egypt, and by the characters, who were nearly all black. “I’ve been reading fantasy all my life, and so much sounds the same,” Diver tells me. “Nora’s book was not like anything else I’d ever read.”
Morph, the funny figure made of brown clay who lived in a microscope box, was the original star of Aardman Animations, who went on to create Wallace and Gromit, Shaun the Sheep and Timmy Time. “Made from a simple bit of clay, he’s practically a mascot for animation,” says the documentary.
Created by David Sproxton and Peter Lord, Morph has been on the go for four decades: from children’s TV with Tony Hart in the 70s to CBBC’s SMart in the 90s and his current YouTube channel full of claymation antics.
However, despite being synonymous with British animation, he isn’t profitable. Peter Lord says: He wasn’t a financial success really at all, which surprises everyone I think because he’s been a popular success, a cultural success but not economic.” Co-creator David Sproxton adds: “We’ve never made any money out of Morph and we still don’t, we just love doing him.”
(3) BLURB KARMA. Jeff VanderMeer has not forgotten!
Dude who 20 years ago w/o reading my novel at the time told me based on the title it was derivative of his own, and told me to come back in 20 years when I'd learned to be original…dude just asked for a blurb. Dude…is not getting a blurb.
The Blade Runner universe is expanding again with an anime series that will air on Adult Swim in the U.S.
The cable channel has partnered with Alcon Television Group and anime streaming outlet Crunchyroll to produce Blade Runner — Black Lotus, a 13-episode series inspired by 2017’s Blade Runner 2049, the sequel to Ridley Scott’s 1982 classic.
(5) 2019 NZ NATCON. GeyserCon 2019 is New Zealand’s 40th National Science Fiction and Fantasy Convention, to be held in Rotorua from May 31-June 3, 2019. They have posted their preliminary program schedule.
(6) UNUSUAL READING EXPERIENCE. John A Arkansawyer sends the link to The Cliff Nest with the recommendation, “I haven’t had a chance to give it the full read, but it’s an interesting idea and readable so far.”
The Cliff Nest is a book published as a serial of posts. The top main page will always show the latest published issue in the serial.
In order to start reading from the beginning, go to the story mode, which will sort the posts from the very first onward so you can read it like a book.
The book will include multiple cybersecurity and/or technical challenges which will invite the readers to look around the internet. Some are part of the story, while others will ask the readers to propose a solution with a character name that will tell the solution in the story.
The best proposed solution and character name (with minor adjustments to align with the story) will become part of the story.
Clearly Netflix is cleaning house, since this follows surprise cancellations in October of Iron Fist and Luke Cage. That just leaves Jessica Jones and The Punisher on Netflex’s roster of Defenders. Both have new seasons in the pipeline that are currently slated to air on Netflix as planned, according to Deadline’s sources. But they will, in all likelihood, be on the chopping block eventually as well.
All this further fuels speculation that Disney/Marvel may resurrect all the cancelled series when it launches its new streaming service. Indeed, the Netflix statement hints as much.
It took a fair amount of imagination for Hillenburg even to envision a career in animation. Born in Oklahoma to a teacher and a draftsman, he headed to Northern California’s Humboldt State University to study marine resources, before becoming a marine biology teacher at what is now the Ocean Institute in California. Yet his interest in drawing still beckoned like a call to the sea.
“Honestly, I hadn’t looked into the logistics and income. I just knew that’s what I wanted to do,” Hillenburg told me. “I thought, at least, I could get a job cleaning up somebody’s drawings. .?.?. Then there was ‘The Simpsons’ and ‘Ren & Stimpy’ — everyone was excited about the rebirth of the form” in the ’90s.
(9) KATZ OBIT. Gloria Katz (1942-2018): American screenwriter and producer, died November 25, aged 78. Genre credits include Messiah of Evil (1973; she and husband William Huyck were the uncredited directors), Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984), Howard the Duck (1986).
(10) TODAY IN HISTORY
November 29, 1959 — The Atomic Submarine premiered at your local drive-in
November 29, 1972 — Pong, a coin-operated video game, debuted.
(11) TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS.
[Compiled by Cat Eldridge and JJ.]
November 29, 1898 – C.S. Lewis, Writer from Ireland. There are, no doubt, folks here here who are far more literate on him than me. I’ve read The Screwtape Letters for a college course decades ago, and throughly enjoyed The Chronicles of Narnia also many years back, but that’s it for my personal acquaintance with him. I know individuals who have loved The Space Trilogy (Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra, and That Hideous Strength) and I’ve known ones who loathed it. Of the Inklings, I suspect I need not say anything, as all of you are fully aware of that group which has frankly become legend and in turn is fast becoming myth. There have been novels about them ranging from almost true to them to quite fantastical. Currently, there is a movie called The Inklings in production, though available details about it are scant. (Died 1963.)
November 29, 1918 – Madeleine L’Engle, Writer whose genre work included the splendid YA sequence starting off with A Wrinkle in Time, which won the Newbery Medal and a host of other awards, and has been made into a 2003 television film and this year’s film directed by Ava DuVernay. She produced numerous loosely-linked sequels, including A Wind in the Door, A Swiftly Tilting Planet, Many Waters, and An Acceptable Time. In addition to her fiction, she wrote poetry and nonfiction, much of which related to her universalist form of Christian faith. She was honored with a World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement in 1997. In 2013, Crater L’Engle on Mercury was named for her. (Died 2007.)
November 29, 1925 – Leigh Couch, Science Teacher and Member of First Fandom. Active in fandom, along with her husband and children, during the 1960s and 70s, she was a member of the Ozark Science Fiction Association and one of the editors of its fanzine Sirruish. She was on the committee for the bid to host Worldcon in Hawaii in 1981. She was honored for her contributions as Fan Guest of Honor at the first Archon, the long-running regional convention which grew out of that early St. Louis-area fandom. (Died 1998.)
November 29, 1942 – Maggie Thompson, 76, Librarian, Editor, and Fan who, with her husband Don, edited from the 1960s to the 90s the fanzines Harbinger, Comic Art, Rainy Days, and Newfangles, and wrote a column for The Buyer’s Guide for Comic Fandom. When this became the professional publication Comic Buyer’s Guide in 1983, because of their extensive knowledge of comics, she and her husband were hired as editors; after he died in 1994, she continued as editor until it ceased publication in 2013. Under their editorial auspices, it won two Eisner Awards and the Jack Kirby Award. Together they were honored with the Inkpot Award, and twice with the Comic Fan Art Award for Favorite Fan Writers.
November 29, 1950 – Kevin O’Donnell Jr., Writer who produced a number of genre novels and more than 70 short fiction works. He was chair of the Nebula Award Committee for nearly a decade, and business manager for the SFWA Bulletin for several years; he also chaired for 7 years SFWA’s Grievance Committee, which advocates for authors who experience difficulties in dealing with editors, publishers, agents, and other entities. He received the Service to SFWA Award in 2005, and after his death, the award was renamed in his honor. (Died 2012.)
November 29, 1964 – Don Cheadle, 54, Oscar-nominated Actor and Producer with a surprisingly-deep genre resume, especially for playing James “Rhodey” Rhodes War Machine in Iron Man 2 and 3, Captain America: Civil War, and the Avengers films Age of Ultron, Infinity War, and the as-yet-untitled #4. Other genre roles include Mission to Mars, The Meteor Man, and Volcano, and the televised-live black-and-white Cold War drama Fail Safe.
November 29, 1971 – Naoko Mori, 47, Actor from Japan who lives in the UK. Her first genre appearance was in Hackers, with the then-unknown Angelina Jolie and Jonny Lee Miller. Her performance as the character of Doctor Sato in the “Aliens of London” episode” of Doctor Who so impressed Russell T Davies that he brought her back as a regular character on the first two seasons of Torchwood. Other TV series appearances include episodes of Humans, Bugs, the British-American comedy-drama genre miniseries You, Me and the Apocalypse, and an SF series pilot called Three Inches, and the films Life and Maneater. She has also done voice characters for animated series and videogames, including Big Hero 6, Genji, Final Fantasy, and Dragon Quest.
November 29, 1976 – Anna Faris, 42, Actor, Writer, Producer, and Podcaster. Ahhh, I love franchise horror. She’s had a regular gig as Cindy Campbell in the first four Scary Movie films, and appeared in the horror films Lovers Lane and May. She had main roles in the odd superhero movie My Super Ex-Girlfriend, the ode to fanboy geekdom Mama’s Boy, and the SF comedy Frequently Asked Questions About Time Travel – and does a recurring character voice in the Alvin and the Chipmunks franchise count as genre? Her campy credentials no doubt were the inspiration for Air New Zealand to cast her in this quirky aircraft safety video.
November 29, 1977 – Chadwick Boseman, 41, Actor, Writer, and Producer who is principally known for playing Black Panther in in the Marvel Cinematic Universe movies Captain America: Civil War and Black Panther (for both of which he received Saturn nominations), Avengers: Infinity War, and the upcoming untitled Avengers 4. He had a main role on Persons Unknown, a one-season series which was sort of an ensemble version of The Prisoner. He played the bird god Thoth in the Gods of Egypt film, and had a guest role in an episode of Fringe.
November 29, 1980 – Janina Gavankar, 38, Actor and Singer with an impressive span of genre roles, including main roles as shapeshifter Luna Garza on True Blood and supernatural creature Leigh Turner on The Gates, recurring roles on The Vampire Dairies, Arrow, and Sleepy Hollow, and guest parts in episodes of Stargate Atlantis and Dollhouse. She voiced canon Star Wars character Iden Versio in the audiobook for Star Wars Battlefront II: Inferno Squad and its companion videogame, and provided additional character voices for Star Wars: The Last Jedi. She received a Behind The Voice Award nomination for her role in the videogame Far Cry 4, and appeared in an ad campaign for Microsoft as Ms. Dewey, the avatar of a Microsoft search engine who commented on the user’s searches.
November 29, 1982 – Gemma Chan, 36, Actor of Stage and Screen from England whose first genre appearances were the horror movie When Evil Calls and her portrayal of Mia Bennett on Doctor Who’s “The Waters of Mars”. She has had a lead role on the series Humans for the last three years, was a regular on Bedlam, and had a guest part in an episode of Sherlock. Genre film roles include Madam Ya Zhou in Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, and Quintessa in Transformers: The Last Knight; she’ll be Doctor Minerva in the forthcoming Captain Marvel film. Voice roles include the Watership Down miniseries as Dewdrop and the Revolting Rhymes movie as Snow White.
(12) COMICS SECTION.
From Publishers Weekly, a new installment ofTales from the Slush Pile. As always, hilarious but true. This week: what you hear at Thanksgiving from your relatives.
There’s no question that Margot Robbie, who launched her successful production company LuckyChap Entertainment in 2014, is a force to be reckoned with in the movie business… and that could be very good news for the DC Extended Universe.
For example, when asked by PrideSource if she was being mindful of Quinn’s sexuality in her upcoming Birds of Prey film, the actress/producer revealed that she’s been “trying” to bring the relationship between her character Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy to the big screen.
“If you read the comics you know that Poison Ivy and Harley have an intimate relationship. In some comics they convey it as a friendship; in other comics you can see that they’re actually sexually involved as a couple. I’ve been trying to – I would love to have Poison Ivy thrown into the universe,” Robbie told the site. “Because the Harley and Poison Ivy relationship is one of my favorite aspects of the comics, so I’m looking to explore that on screen.”
NASA announced Thursday that it has partnered with nine companies to enable the delivery of small scientific payloads to the lunar surface. No money was exchanged up front, but the space agency said these companies would now be eligible to “bid” for contracts to deliver select experiments to the Moon.
[…] The nine companies that earned the right to bid on what are called Commercial Lunar Payload Services contracts are:
Astrobotic Technology Inc.: Pittsburgh
Deep Space Systems: Littleton, Colorado
Draper: Cambridge, Massachusetts
Firefly Aerospace Inc.: Cedar Park, Texas
Intuitive Machines LLC: Houston
Lockheed Martin Space: Littleton, Colorado
Masten Space Systems Inc.: Mojave, California
Moon Express: Cape Canaveral, Florida
Orbit Beyond: Edison, New Jersey
[…] NASA said payload delivery could begin as early as 2019. These contracts do not have a time or quantity limit, and they have a combined maximum contract value of $2.6 billion during the next 10 years. The agency said it would look at a number of factors when comparing the bids, such as “technical feasibility, price, and schedule.”
Emily Blunt and Meryl Streep have now made three big-budget studio films together: 2006’s The Devil Wears Prada, playing a toiling assistant and her monstrous boss; 2014’s Into the Woods, as a peasant baker and the witch who cursed her womb; and now 2018’s Mary Poppins Returns, playing the enigmatic nanny and her gravity-challenged cousin Topsy, who’s perhaps the only person ever to disagree with Mary Poppins.
“It is a bit hilarious that we always play people who are contentious with one another,” Blunt laughs, looking back on her relationship with Streep that’s now into its second decade. “From Prada to the Witch and the Baker’s Wife and now to cousins who drive each other insane, I did finally ask her, ‘When are we gonna play lovers or something?!’” Blunt laughs again. “She said, ‘Dream on.’”
[Thanks to JJ, Steve Green, John King Tarpinian, John A Arkansawyer, Cat Eldridge, Chip Hitchcock, Mike Kennedy, Martin Morse Wooster, Carl Slaughter, and Andrew Porter for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Andrew.]
Since the publication of The Three-Body Problem, the first installment of Cixin Liu’s epic science fiction trilogy about making contact with an alien civilization, the series has gone on to earn the Chinese author enormous acclaim and legions of fans worldwide — including President Barack Obama. Next year, Tor Books will publish a new novel set in the same world, titled The Redemption of Time, but it won’t be by Liu. Instead, the book is written by Baoshu, an ardent fan of the series who originally published it online as a novel-length fan fiction story — one that became so popular that the trilogy’s publisher decided to release it as an official novel.
The most impressive thing that I found with the trilogy as a whole was the scale that Liu was writing at. Reviews and blurbs for the series teased that it spanned the entire future: from the 1970s all the way to the heat death of the universe, and he manages to do that, in a really interesting way.
(2) WEEKEND AUDIO PLAY. SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie touts “Something for the weekend, a 45-minute radio play from BBC Radio 4, free to listen to for next 4 weeks.”
Following an unspecified disaster the internet and power system has collapsed and been down for several years. Two people – grandfather and granddaughter seek to escape Britain for France. Global warming is the least of their problems.
This radio play reverses current immigration and Brexit concerns.
(3) JWC’S LONG VERSION OF WHO GOES THERE. John Betancourt has started a Kickstarter to fund publication of “Frozen Hell: The Book That Inspired The Thing”. He says, “It turned up in Campbell’s papers in a university archive. (Thanks for the discovery goes to Alec Nevala-Lee, who was researching Campbell at the time for his book, Astounding, which comes out in November.)”
In 1938, acclaimed science fiction author John W. Campbell published the novella Who Goes There?, about a team of scientists in Antarctica who discover and are terrorized by a monstrous, shape-shifting alien entity. The story would later be adapted into John Carpenter’s iconic movie The Thing (following an earlier film adaptation in 1951). The published novella was actually an abridged version of Campbell’s original story, called Frozen Hell, which had to be shortened for publication. The Frozen Hell manuscript remained unknown and unpublished for decades, and it was only recently rediscovered. Frozen Hell expands the Thing story dramatically, giving vital backstory and context to an already incredible tale. We are pleased and honored to offer Frozen Hell to you now, as Campbell intended it. You will be among the first people to ever read this completed version of the story.
Robert Silverberg will write the introduction.
How well is Betancourt’s Kickstarter doing? Well, with 42 days remaining, it has raised $11,592 of its $1,000 goal. So, rather well!
Trauma is not neat and pretty to deal with; it is not easily diagnosed, it does not vanish on its own, and its lingering effects can touch those around us. In the latest sequel to the long and winding Halloween series, trauma plays an important role in the narrative arc of famed final girl Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis). You might remember her from the original 1978 John Carpenter film, which saw her screaming, running, discovering her friends brutally murdered, then fending off a serial killer to protect the kids she was babysitting.
The 2018 version marks the 11th instalment in the horror series, which began in 1978.
The reviews, which have been published ahead of the film’s release on Friday, range between two and four stars.
(5) NOW HAUNTING THE MENU. Did you know Burger King has unleashed the Nightmare King burger? It has a green bun! They say that scientists have shown you get 3-1/2 more times the nightmares eating the Nightmare King than you do with the other fear-inducing items on the Burger King menu!
(6) VENOM. NPR’s Stephen Thompson, Glen Weldon, and Lars Gotrich discuss good and bad points in “Venom: Oh It’s Gooey, But Is It Good?” — all audio. good and bad points (mostly good) of differences from MCU epics.
In Venom, Tom Hardy plays Eddie Brock, an investigative journalist who’s trying to rebound from a major setback in his career. But Eddie’s plans are halted when he’s overtaken by a violent — and gooey — alien symbiote.
(7) BLOODY HELL. Ethan Alter, in the Yahoo! Entertainment story “MVPs of Horror: How Stanley Kubrick made the elevators bleed in ‘The Shining'”, has an interview with Kubrick’s personal assistant, Leon Vitali, who says the bloody elevator scene was a real short with a real elevator and could only be done on the first take because the set up was so complex.
From those ghostly twin girls to that chilling dog man, Stanley Kubrick‘s 1980 horror masterpiece, The Shining, is awash in terrifying imagery that seeps off the screen and into moviegoers’ nightmares to this day. But there’s one scene that scared the legendary filmmaker himself so much, he couldn’t be on the Overlook Hotel set the day it was filmed. That’s the iconic “elevator of blood” sequence, a static shot of an elevator door slowly opening as a veritable sea of the sticky red stuff comes pouring out, covering the walls, furniture, and even the camera lens.
Roach begins his history with Madrid’s and Barcelona’s turn of the 20th century humor magazines and goes on to chronicle its development and expansion to England, the States, and worldwide. It concludes with Spain’s contemporary gifted innovators like David Aja, Javier Olivares, and Guillem March. But his primary focus is on the 1970s and ’80s, an era he terms the “Golden Generation.”
This was when Spanish artists first caused a sensation in America, as Warren magazines began to publish Esteban Maroto, Luis Bermejo, Fernando Ferna?ndez, Jose Ortiz, and many others in its Creepy/Eerie/Vampirella horror comics line.
(9) TIL THE PIPS SQUEAK. Greedy bookstore landlord news from Publishers Lunch:
At a press conference at [NYC] City Hall on Wednesday promoting the Small Business Jobs Survival Act, bookseller Sarah McNally said that the landlord for her bookstore on Soho’s Prince Street — which will close and relocate at the end of June 2019 — wanted to raise her rent from $350,000 a year to $850,000 a year, reported by Politico’s Rosa Goldensohn on Twitter. The legislation would establish requirements for lease renewal terms. McNally noted, “It would’ve helped to have the non-binding arbitration and mediation.”
The city of San Francisco, in partnership with the nonprofit Working Solutions and the Small Business Development Center, gave 11 independent bookstores at total of $103,000 in grants. The Bookstore SF Program, dubbed “a pet project of the late Mayor Ed Lee,” aims to revitalize indies as community center, and also provides municipal services “including technical assistance on marketing, human resource consulting, and help negotiating long-term leases.”
It’s hoped their parallel observations can finally resolve some of the many puzzles about the hot, oddball planet.
(11) COWAN OBIT. James Cowan (1942-2018) passed away on October 6 reports Jack Dann. Cowan was the author of A Troubadour’s Testament, Letters From a Wild State, and the novel A Mapmaker’s Dream, which won the Australian Literature Society’s Gold Medal.
(12) TODAY IN HISTORY
October 19, 1953 — Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 was first published. Trivial Trivia: The true first is the paperback because the hardback was not shipped for another week.
October 19, 1979 — Meteor premiered, starring Natalie Wood, Sean Connery, and Karl Malden.
(13) TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS.
[Compiled by Cat Eldridge and JJ.]
Born October 19, 1903 – Tor Johnson (Karl Oscar Tore Johansson), Professional Wrestler and Actor from Sweden. especially known for his appearance in Plan 9 From Outer Space, although he had a number of other genre roles in films such as The Monkees’ Head, Mighty Joe Young, Ghost Catchers, The Unearthly, and Bride of the Monster, and a guest part in an episode of Rocky Jones, Space Ranger.
Born October 19, 1940 – Sir Michael Gambon, 78, Actor of Stage and Screen from Ireland who is best known to genre fans as Professor Albus Dumbledore from the Hugo-nominated Harry Potter films (a role he picked up after the passing of Richard Harris, who played the character in the first two films), but also had roles in Toys (for which he received a Saturn nomination), Mary Reilly, Sleepy Hollow, and the Hugo finalist Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. He has had guest roles in episodes of The Jim Henson Hour, Doctor Who, and Tales of the Unexpected, and played an acerbic storyteller or possibly tomb robber in Jim Henson’s The Storyteller. He has also done voice roles in animated features including Fantastic Mr. Fox, Paddington, and The Wind in the Willows, in which he voiced very nicely The Badger.
Born October 19, 1943 – Peter Weston, Writer, Editor, Conrunner, and Fan from England who founded the Birmingham Science Fiction Group (the longest-lived fan group in the U.K.), and chaired several conventions, including the 1979 Worldcon. His fanzines Zenith and Speculation received 8 Hugo nominations, and his memoir With Stars in My Eyes: My Adventures in British Fandom was a Finalist for the Hugo Award for Best Related Book. He was the TAFF delegate in 1974, was Guest of Honor at several conventions, was given a Lifetime Achievement Award by the long-running fanzine convention Corflu, and received the Doc Weir Award (the UK Natcon’s Life Achievement Award).
Born October 19, 1943 – L.E. Modesitt, Jr., 75, Writer of more than 70 novels and 10 different series, the best known of which is his fantasy series The Saga of Recluce. He has been Guest of Honor at numerous conventions, including a World Fantasy Convention.
Born October 19, 1945 – John Lithgow, 73, Actor of Stage and Screen and Producer with a multitude of genre appearances including lead roles in Twilight Zone: The Movie, Buckaroo Banzai, 2010, Harry and the Hendersons, and the TV series Third Rock from the Sun.
Born October 19, 1946 – Philip Pullman, 72, Writer and Scholar from England who is best known for the His Dark Materials series, the novels of which have received the Carnegie Medal and nominations for World Fantasy, Lodestar, Whitbred, and Prix Imaginaire Awards. He has been Guest of Honor at several conventions, including the Finnish Natcon.
Born October 19, 1948 – Jerry Kaufman, 70, Writer, Editor, Conrunner, and Fan who, while in Australia as the DUFF delegate, created a Seattle bid for the Australian Natcon which actually won the bid (temporarily, for a year, before it was overturned and officially awarded to Adelaide). He was editor of, and contributor to, numerous apazines and fanzines, two of which received Hugo nominations. With Donald Keller, he founded and ran Serconia Press, which published criticism and memoirs of the SF field. He served on the Board of Directors of the Clarion West Writers Workshop and served as Jurist for the James Tiptree, Jr., Memorial Award. He has been Fan Guest of Honor at several conventions, including a Westercon.
Born October 19, 1949 – Jim Starlin, 69, Comics Writer, Artist, and Illustrator. If you’ve seen Guardians of the Galaxy, you’ve seen the Marvel characters Thanos and Drax the Destroyer which he created. He also worked for DC and other companies over the years. He and Bernie Wrightson produced Heroes for Hope, a 1985 one-shot designed to raise money for African famine relief and recovery, which included contributions from genre writers such as Stephen King, George R. R. Martin, Harlan Ellison, and Edward Bryant. He’s also written a number of genre novels in collaboration with his wife Daina Graziunas. He has been nominated for a number of comics industry awards, winning an Inkpot Award and receiving a British Fantasy Award nomination for Best Comic. Last year he was inducted into the Eisner Award Hall of Fame.
Born October 19, 1951 – Peter Cannon, 67. To say he’s a Lovecraftian scholar is an understatement of the first order. Both of his master theses, A Case for Howard Phillips Lovecraft and Lovecraft’s New England, are considered exemplary fifty years on. His “You Have Been in Providence, I Perceive” looks at the strong influence of Sherlock Holmes upon Lovecraft. Cannon also wrote superb fiction; he did “Pulptime” in which Lovecraft, Frank Belknap Long and Holmes team up to solve a Lovecraftian mystery. He has written several short stories in the Cthulhu Mythos genre with an element of parody in them. Before you complain about what I left out, this is but a mere taste of his writings. Feel free to add commentary on what you like best about his work.
Born October 19, 1964 – J. Kathleen Cheney, 54, Writer who has appeared on the SFF scene in the last 10 years and has produced numerous novels and shorter works in six different series (the novel Dreaming Death is a particular favorite of JJ’s). Her novella Iron Shoes received a Nebula nomination, and the novel The Golden City was a finalist for Locus Best First Novel.
Born October 19, 1969 – Roger Cross, 49, Actor from Jamaica who moved to Canada. He played a lead role in the series Continuum and has had parts in genre films The Chronicles of Riddick, War for the Planet of the Apes, the remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still, X2, Doomsday Rock, Voyage of Terror, The Void, and the adaptations of Dean Koontz’ Hideaway and Sole Survivor.
In conjunction with the Fall South Pasadena Arts Crawl, the South Pasadena Public Library presents an exhibition featuring the artwork of 11 accomplished artists and illustrators. The artwork—much of it created specifically for this exhibition—is inspired by two beloved literary classics that are celebrating anniversaries in 2018: Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein marks its 200th anniversary and Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women its 150th.
The opening reception is Saturday, October 20, 7:00-9:00 p.m. in the Library Community Room at 1115 El Centro Street, South Pasadena, California, 91030. Throughout the following week the Library will host related programs, including a Louisa May Alcott living history performance, an artists’ panel discussion, a screening of Bride of Frankenstein (1935), an illustrated talk titled “Frankenstein Dissected” and a closing reception. For more information, visit the Library’s website: www.southpasadenaca.gov/library.
Frankenstein Meets Little Women: A Monster Mash is curated by performer and educator Valerie Weich. Weich founded Literary Lives, an educational performing arts outreach program for students and has performed throughout Southern California as Louisa May Alcott. Since 2012 Weich has been researching the lives of Mary and Percy Shelley and Lord Byron at The Huntington Library as an Independent Scholar in order to develop a new one-woman presentation about Mary Shelley, author of Frankenstein.
(17) FACES OF SCIENCE. Roald Dahl collaborator “Sir Quentin Blake brings science pioneers to life” – a local exhibit out of reach of most Filers, but article has several of the illos. These new works will be on display at London’s Science Museum from October 19.
Illustrator Sir Quentin Blake has brought his own unique style to pictures of some of the world’s most celebrated scientists.
Sir Quentin, known for humorous work in children’s books, has made a set of five works depicting 20 women and men.
Pilot Amy Johnson is there, as is spinning machine creator Sir Richard Arkwright.
The pictures were the idea of the Science Museum and will hang outside its Wonderlab: The Equinor Gallery.
(18) FANHISTORY. I missed reporting these Fanac.org features when they first came out –
Pacificon II (1964) Worldcon) – Hugos & Leigh Brackett, Edmond Hamilton Guest of Honor Speeches
Pacificon II, the 22nd World Science Fiction Convention, was held in Oakland, CA in 1964. In this [36 minute] audio with images, Toastmaster Anthony Boucher awards the Hugos (in under 7 minutes!), and Guests of Honor Leigh Brackett and Edmond Hamilton give their speeches. It’s great fun; Tony Boucher is witty and thoughtful, Leigh Brackett is open and sincere, and Ed Hamilton is surprisingly funny, with anecdotes and personal reminiscences. Learn the secret of the Boys Club of Science Fiction. Hear the tale of throwing a body out of a spaceship near Saturn. Get a real understanding of what it feels like to sell your first story.
Leigh Brackett wrote both SF and Mystery (and was cowriter of the screenplay for “The Big Sleep”). Edmond Hamilton appeared in print before the first SF magazine was published and was still publishing at the time of this speech. Of him, Tony Boucher says, “No one has ever destroyed so many suns so well.” This material was provided by The Southern California Institute for Fan Interests (SCIFI), and Jerome Scott, Director of Projects for SCIFI in LA.
MidAmeriCon (1976) Worldcon – Masquerade winners
MidAmeriCon, the 34th World Science Fiction Convention, was held in Kansas City in 1976. There were some very impressive costumes in the 1976 Worldcon Masquerade. This brief (7 minute 45 second) video brings you the award presentation for the winners (including “dishonorable mention”) and a look at the costumes and costumers. You’ll see Sally Rand, Bruce Pelz and Filthy Pierre among others. Don’t miss the Martian costume!
The “whistling” of the Ross Ice Shelf, Antarctica’s largest, is beautifully eerie. It’s also potentially a divining rod for changes to shelves’ composition that can be monitored in real time.
To arrive at their new recording, twelve scientists working on the ice shelf burrowed 34 tools for measuring seismic activity into it, expecting to monitor its internal vibrations. They noticed, however, that surface wind glazing over the “firn” — the top layer of snow of the shelf — was feeding the sensors below.
What was at first considered to be “inconvenient ambient noise,” as the glaciologist Douglas R. MacAyeal put it in a summation of the new findings, ended up yielding valuable insights about the health of the shelf itself. The shelf’s song changes as its surface does; strong storms can rearrange the snow dunes atop it, causing that ice to vibrate at different frequencies — how fast the seismic waves travel through the snow changes as air temperatures at the surface fluctuate, in turn giving scientists data on the shelf’s structural integrity. Meaning whether or not it will break up, and thus raise sea levels.
(20) PUNCH BROTHERS, PUNCH WITH CARE. Daredevil has become famous for its epic one-shot fight scenes. In episode 4, Daredevil fakes his way into prison to get information about The Kingpin, then has to fight his way out.
[Thanks to John King Tarpinian, Cat Eldridge, JJ, Martin Morse Wooster, Mike Kennedy, Chip Hitchcock, Carl Slaughter, and Andrew Porter for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Xtifr.]
In addition to moving toward Batman’s future in the upcoming final season of Gotham, it looks as though the FOX series will also be flashing back to Bruce Wayne’s past. Martha Wayne, Bruce’s mother who was murdered in the series premiere, will be returning in the second half of Season 5.
Actress Brette Taylor, who played Martha in the pilot, took to Twitter earlier this week to share a photo from the set. In the image, Taylor is sitting on a bench with Gotham stars Sean Pertwee (Alfred) and Cameron Monaghan (Jeremiah). Along with the photo, Taylor included the caption, “Takin a break with the gang,” and a hashtag for Martha Wayne, leading to speculation amongst fans that she would be appearing somehow.
While the photo simply indicates that she was on the set, ComicBook.com can now confirm that she is indeed filming Season 5, reprising her role as Martha Wayne.
(3) PENNSYLVANIA 221B. Rebecca Romney, in “The Art of the Painstaking Sherlock Recreation” on Crimereads.com, goes to the home of the Dobry family in Reading, Pennsylvania, where they have carefully reconstructed Sherlock Holmes’s flat. We learn in the piece that there’s a guy in Los Angeles who makes his living creating Holmes-related stuff for collectors.
The man holds up a thin, sharp instrument. “Do you know which story this is from?” he asks. I hesitate. I’m not even sure what it is, except that its end forms a wickedly curved needle.
I browse through my mental catalog of murder weapons and other questionable objects. I’m trying not to get distracted by the phrenological bust in the corner of the room, or the initials “VR” dotted onto one section of the wall in shapes that resemble bullet holes.
Denny Dobry smiles, takes pity. “It’s a nineteenth-century cataract knife.” Of course it is. Now I know what it’s from: the Sherlock Holmes story “The Adventure of the Silver Blaze.”
I’m in 221B Baker Street, the residence of Sherlock Holmes. But I’m not in London. I’m in Reading, Pennsylvania.
In its new series Short Treks, Star Trek is going where no version of the show has gone before: online-only content. But the first of four monthly installments, which dropped Thursday on CBS All Access, made sure to bridge the gap between the familiar and the unfamiliar.
“We Mete Out Justice With Beak and Talon“, by Jeremiah Tolbert in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction
Tolbert’s high-flying sci-fi tale is set in a near-future American city where law enforcement uses humans who are mentally linked to birds of prey to patrol the skies, sending them swooping in whenever they spot criminal activity. It’s a vividly told story; Tolbert skillfully draws you in to the strangeness of the joined human/bird mind-space, giving the reader dizzying new perspectives on the future of technology, and the future of police work. Thought-provoking and compelling.
(6) THAT STUFF YOU FIND IN BOOKS. At Mr. Sci-Fi, former Star Trek Writer Marc Zicree talking about the history of science fiction in novels. From Frankenstein to HG Wells.
(7) SABRINA. The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina premiere October 26 on Netflix.
Her name is Sabrina Spellman. Half witch. Half mortal. On her 16th birthday, Sabrina (Kiernan Shipka) has to make a choice between the witch world of her family and the human world of her friends. With her aunties (Miranda Otto, Lucy Davis), her cat Salem, and her boyfriend Harvey Kinkle (Ross Lynch), Sabrina will face horrors and new adventures in the mysterious town of Greendale. From the executive producers of Riverdale comes a haunting new tale.
(8) TODAY IN HISTORY
October 4, 2005 — Troma’s Rock’N’Roll Space Patrol Action Is Go premiered.
(9) COMICS SECTION.
Sound theology for dog lovers, heresy for SJW credential owners? — Non Sequitur.
A well-known logician appears in today’s Over the Hedge.
(10) TIS THE SEASON. Camestros Felapton shared this epic from the desk of Timothy the Talking Cat — “The Timarillion”.
…Without the trees, Heaven is in dire need of some lightbulbs but Feanor won’t let anybody else use his. It’s a moot point anyway because Mmmm had stolen them. Feanor vows bloody vengeance against Mmmm for stealing his lightbulbs and over-billing his therapy sessions.
Meanwhile, the gods invent the Moon and the Sun, which is a better plan than trees if you think about it….
In Ranomafana National Park in Madagascar, where there is incredible diversity of fruits of all shapes and sizes, there are certain plants that rely only on lemurs to spread their seeds. There are other plants that rely on birds and other animals.
The researchers gathered hundreds of ripe and unripe fruit samples from 30 species of plants. They separated them into two groups — the ones that rely on lemurs, and the ones that rely on the other animals — and tested the chemicals emitted to see whether the smells were different between the ripe and unripe samples.
“Stories are like people, Atticus. Loving them doesn’t make them perfect,” The Safe Negro Travel Guide publisher George Berry tells his nephew Atticus Turner in the beginning of Matt Ruff’s Lovecraft Country.
Berry is sort of an old wise man character in the novel, always there delivering helpful truths and constructive advice when needed. Here he is unraveling Atticus’s – and his own – conflicted feelings towards science fiction and fantasy literature. They are both in love with genre classics such as Edgar Rice Burroughs and H.P. Lovecraft but at the same time register that the authors and their works are deeply problematic, especially from the viewpoint of black readers which is what both men are.
I’m closing out my September reviews with a look at Motherboard’s Terraform, which brings four new looks at rather terrifying possible futures. As usual, the stories range from predictive to outlandish, but all of them lean toward warnings. Signs for people to read and pay attention to. Turn back now. Avoid this possible time when humanity has lost respect for our world and our selves. These are pieces look at the way things could be with an unblinking gaze and invite readers to look into that abyss. It’s a nice range of works, too, from far future space extinctions to much more grounded political sci fi, where corruption and injustice are only a step or two beyond what we have now. It makes for a strong month of stories, which I’ll get right to reviewing!
This sunshade has so many bees on it, we had to buy new computers that could handle the design! When you plop this in your window, it creates the illusion that your car is full of bees! Can you go in the carpool lane if you have a swarm of bees riding shotgun? At 50″ x 27-1/2″, this sunshade is big enough for most cars. It protects, cools and blocks out UV rays. Includes two suction cups for easy installation.
(16) BLADE RUNNER 2049 COMIC. Titan Comics announced that Blade Runner 2049 screenwriter Michael Green (Logan) will partner with long-term collaborator and comic writer Mike Johnson (Star Trek) to pen an in-canon Blade Runner comic series for Titan Comics and Alcon Media Group.
In addition to co-writing the screenplay for Blade Runner 2049, the critically-acclaimed sequel to Ridley Scott’s 1982 celebrated classic Blade Runner, Michael Green’s recent writing credits include Alien: Covenant, Murder on the Orient Express, the hit Starz series American Gods, and Logan, which earned Green an Oscar nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay in 2018.
Mike Johnson, Green’s co-writer on comics including Supergirl and Superman/ Batman, will co-write the Blade Runner series. A veteran writer of the Star Trek franchise, Johnson’s other comic credits include Transformers and Fringe
Shondaland is expanding. The prolific producer and showrunner Shonda Rhimes is teaming with Matt Reeves for a science fiction film and television series on Netflix. The pair will bring Blake Crouch’s upcoming novel Recursion to life on the streaming service.
The novel centers on a female scientist who creates technology that allows people to recactivate their most powerful memories and rewrite them.
Rhimes told Variety, “Projects like this are why I came to Netflix. The opportunity to explore a multi-genre universe in innovative ways is extremely exciting. Matt and Blake both have the tremendous ability to build compelling characters and imaginative landscapes and I am thrilled to work alongside them.”
Rhimes signed a multi-year deal with Netflix last year to create new content for the streaming service, while Reeves signed a first look deal earlier this year….
(18) DAREDEVIL TRAILER. Season 3 of Marvel’s Daredevil debuts on Netflix October 19.
Missing for months, Matt Murdock (Charlie Cox) reemerges a broken man, putting into question his future as both vigilante Daredevil and lawyer Matthew Murdock. But when his archenemy Wilson Fisk (Vincent D’Onofrio) is released from prison, Matt must choose between hiding from the world, or embracing his destiny as a hero.
[Thanks to Martin Morse Wooster, Cat Eldridge, John King Tarpinian, JJ Chip Hitchcock, Mike Kennedy, Carl Slaughter, and Andrew Porter for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Rob Thornton.]
