The Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game franchise says it won’t allow artists to use artificial intelligence technology to draw its cast of sorcerers, druids and other characters and scenery.
D&D art is supposed to be fanciful. But at least one ax-wielding giant seemed too weird for some fans, leading them to take to social media to question if it was human-made.
Hasbro-owned D&D Beyond, which makes online tools and other companion content for the franchise, said it didn’t know until Saturday that an illustrator it has worked with for nearly a decade used AI to create commissioned artwork for an upcoming book. The franchise, run by the Hasbro subsidiary Wizards of the Coast, said in a statement that it has talked to that artist and is clarifying its rules.
“He will not use AI for Wizards’ work moving forward,” said a post from D&D Beyond’s account on X, formerly Twitter. “We are revising our process and updating our artist guidelines to make clear that artists must refrain from using AI art generation as part of their art creation process for developing D&D.”…
(2) WALK RIGHT IN, FALL RIGHT DOWN. Cora Buhlert’s new Masters-of-the-Universe-Piece Theatre story is “The Uninvited Guest”.
YouTube trumps TikTok as the most popular online platform for young people to discover new books, according to a report by Nielsen BookData.
Nielsen, which provides data for the Bookseller’s UK Bestsellers chart, conducted a survey in November 2022 that revealed 34% of people aged between 14 and 25 find new reads using the video platform YouTube.
TikTok and Instagram were used by 32% and 27% of participants respectively, and online book retailer websites were visited by 33% of respondents. This data comes after reports that “BookTok” – the corner of TikTok in which creators share book recommendations – is driving sales of particular authors and genres that are popular on the platform. Its YouTube counterpart, BookTube, similarly features videos of users discussing their favourite titles and “hauls” of books they have recently bought….
(4) BEST EVER. ScreenRant picked the “10 Greatest Anthology TV Shows Of All Time, Ranked” and despite the list not being restricted to genre, there are seven sff and horror shows on it. The Twilight Zone is ranked number one.
Although most television series follow a single story over the course of several seasons, there are some shows called anthologies that change up the plot from episode to episode or season to season, and these can be some of the most successful series to date. Anthologies may not be the most popular form of television, but they certainly stand out for their distinct format and ever-changing stories. In fact, some of the most popular and lauded television series from the past to now are anthology series.
The following list offers ten of the best anthology television series to ever appear on-screen. This is a particularly diverse bunch of shows that range in release date, genre, and form. Though they each have the anthology structure in common, each show offers their own unique take on the concept, and more than that, their own important story. Whether it’s a silly comedy, a gruesome horror, or peek into true crime, each of these anthology series is popular in its own right and for good reason. For those interested in diving into anthologies, this is the ultimate place to start.
Working for the BBC in the early 70s, I made a Junior Points of View episode in which kids said they thought most BBC children’s programmes were patronising rubbish. Soon after I was at a get-together for TV people where Monica Sims, the head of BBC children’s programmes, challenged me to do better. I said: “Give me a time slot and budget, and I will.” Lewis Rudd, the Independent Television equivalent, overheard and asked: “Did you mean that?”
We had lunch and he said: “We need an answer to Doctor Who.” Twenty years earlier, I’d been enrolled at a boarding school full of German kids. We were all the best of friends, and knowing that only seven or eight years earlier our fathers would have been trying to kill each other in the second world war made me think that we must be the next stage of human evolution. That was the inspiration for the idea I pitched to Lewis – kids who had special powers, but who were unable to use them to kill or do harm.
These “Tomorrow People” were telepathic and telekinetic, and could teleport or “jaunt” from one place to another via hyperspace. They became aware of their abilities after “breaking out” – deliberate shorthand for puberty. I wanted kids watching at home to feel that they too might be a Tomorrow Person, and that it was OK to feel different….
Nicholas Young, played John
…Some of the spacecraft looked quite good even though they were built out of plastic cups from the canteen painted silver. But the aliens were often ridiculous. It’s difficult to act with a straight face against a puppet with an aerial on its head or something that looked like a Dalek on Viagra.
In the early days, when Tomorrow People were seen floating in hyperspace, we’d be standing on one foot in front of a yellow screen – then the yellow would be electronically overlaid with a star field or psychedelic effects. Later, we were hung on wires which could clearly be seen on TV. We looked like Thunderbirds puppets. I said: “Why don’t you paint the wires yellow?” Someone covered them with yellow gaffer tape and bingo! They disappeared….
(6) BOARDGAME OF THE YEAR. [Item by Cora Buhlert.] Spiel des Jahres (Boardgame of the Year) is a huge deal in the boardgame world and the 2023 winners were just announced.
The 2023 Spiel des Jahres is Dorfromantik: Das Brettspiel (Romantic village: The boardgame) by Lukas Zach and Michael Palm, published by Pegasus Spiele.
The 2023 Kinderspiel des Jahres (Children’s Boardgame of the Year) is Mysterium Kids by Antonin Boccara and Yves Hirschfeld.
Radio Bremen interviews of one the winners, Lukas Zach who is a local. (They were not interested in interviewing Germany’s first ever Hugo winner, who also happens to be a local…)
(7) ROBERT OSBAND DIES. The American Space museum announced that long-time volunteer Robert “Ozzie” Osband, a fixture at Space View Park rocket launches for four decades, died August 6 at the age of 72.
…In 1976, when one of his favorite authors, Robert A. Heinlein, was going to be Guest of Honor at a World Science Fiction Convention, Mr. Osband journeyed to Kansas City.
In his suitcase was his copy of Heinlein’s Have Space Suit, Will Travel—a novel about a teenager who wins a secondhand space suit in a contest—and his ILC Dover suit.
Because if you wanted to get your copy of Have Space Suit, Will Travel autographed, and you happened to own a secondhand space suit, it would be a shame NOT to wear it, right?…
(8) WILLIAM FRIEDKIN (1935-2023). [Item by Dann.] William Friedkin died August 7 of heart failure and pneumonia. He was 87. The director’s most noteworthy genre work was The Exorcist. Other works include an episode of The Alfred Hitchcock Hour, an episode of The Twilight Zone, an episode of Tales from the Crypt, and horror movies The Guardian and Bug. Friedkin also directed The French Connection for which he won an Oscar.
(9) TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS.
[Compiled by Cat Eldridge.]
Born August 7, 1933 — Jerry Pournelle, 1933 – 2017. Some years ago, I got an email from a J. R. Pournelle about an SF novel they wanted Green Man to review. I of course thought it was that Pournelle. No, it was his daughter, Jennifer. And that’s how I came to find out there was a third Motie novel called, errrr, Moties. It’s much better than The Gripping Hand was. His best novel is of course The Mote in God’s Eye which he wrote with Niven. And yes, I’ve read a lot of his military space opera when I was a lot younger. At that age, I liked it. I expect the Suck Fairy with her steel toe boots wouldn’t be kind to it now if I read any of it, so I won’t. He had a number of Hugo nominations starting at Torcon II for “The Mercenary” novella followed by a nomination at DisCon II for his “He Fell into a Dark Hole” novelette. The next year at the first Aussiecon, The Mote in God’s Eye got nominated and his Extreme Prejudice novel also got a nod. MidAmericaCon saw Inferno by him and Niven get nominated and his “Tinker” novelette also was on the ballot. Lucifer’s Hammer with Niven got on the ballot at IgunaCon II and his final nomination was at ConFederation for Footfall with Niven. Oh and at MidAmericaCon II, he got a nomination for Best Editor, Short Form. And yes, I was a devoted reader of his Byte column. (Died 2017.)
Born August 7, 1936 — Richard L. Tierney. A Lovecraftian scholar. Coauthored with David C. Smith, a series of Red Sonja novels which have Boris Vallejo cover art. Some of his standalone novels riff off the Cthulhu Mythos. Unless you read German like Cora does, he’s not available digitally on at the usual suspects. (Died 2022.)
Born August 7, 1957 — Paul Dini, 66. First, he is largely responsible for the existence of Batman: The Animated Series, Superman: The Animated Series, The New Batman/Superman Adventures, Batman Beyond, and yes Duck Dodgers And Tiny Toons as well. He’s recently been writing for the Ultimate Spider-Man series which is quite good. He co-authored with Pat Cadigan, Harley Quinn: Mad Love. He’s responsible for the single best animated Batman film, Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker, as he wrote it. If you see it, see the R rated version.
Born August 7, 1957 — Lis Carey, 66. A prolific reader whose reviews fill the shelves at Lis Carey’s Library. She is also a frequent Filer, contributor of numerous cat photos and even more book reviews. She is a longtime member of NESFA, and chaired Boskone 46 in 2009. (OGH)
Born August 7, 1960 — Melissa Scott, 63. I think the first work I read by her was Trouble and Her Friends which holds up well even now. I’m also fond of Night Sky Mine and The Jazz. I see that she has an entire series set in the Stargate Atlantis universe. She won the Astounding Award for Best New Writer, and four Lambda Awards, the first for Trouble and Her Friends, a second for Shadow Man, a third for Point of Dreams and a fourth for Death by Silver.
(10) COMICS SECTION.
Eek!shows an unexpected fan of a well known sff movie franchise.
Speed Bump is there when a librarian fields a controversial request.
(11) MASS QUANTITIES. The New York Times looks into “The Complicated Estates of Obsessive Collectors”. “When collectors die, their families face a lot of decisions, including what to do with a hundred Superman figurines.” Some familiar names quoted here.
“More times than I can remember, a spouse or child has said to me, ‘If he wasn’t dead, I’d kill him all over again for leaving me with this mess,’” said Greg Rohan, the president of Heritage Auctions.
Most people tend to know what to do with traditional investments after someone dies, he said, but when it comes to baseball cards, first-edition books, coins and other collectibles, the loved ones dealing with the estate can be stumped (and annoyed).
If some collectors of, say, vinyl figurines, seem to have a gene that spurs them to dedicate entire rooms of their home to inanimate rubbery friends, they are also, in many ways, just like everyone else. “People don’t want to think about dying,” said Maggie Thompson, 80, a former senior editor of Comic Buyer’s Guide, which was a newsmagazine that covered the comic book industry. “I realize as I look around my rooms, my family is not going to know what things are.”…
(12) FREE READ. Cora Buhlert has a story called “Rest My Weary Bones” in the July 2023 issue of Swords and Sorcery Magazine.
It seems I’ve barely rested at all when the call comes… again.
Rise and shine, sunshine. Time for battle, time for war, time to smite the enemy and hear the lamentations of their women… if I could still hear properly, that is. ‘Cause hearing doesn’t work very well, when you’re essentially a skeleton.
For that’s exactly what I am these days: A skeleton….
(13) IT’S IN THE BAG. Geek Grind Coffee is another outfit that tempts fans to buy its products on the strength of its clever and intriguing genre packaging. But that’s not the only recommendation:
…More than 600 women involved in the cooperative are leaders of their own farms, heads of households or in managegment with our organiztion. Geek Grind is strongly focused on promoting women in leadership, ownership and success in coffee. We do this because of the need….
(14) TRIVIAL TRIVIA. [Item by John King Tarpinian.]
Truman Capote is at the same cemetery as Ray.
Non-genre trivia is that the crypt that Truman is in was originally for Johnny Carson. In his final years Truman Capote lived at the Malibu home of Joanne Carson who was one of Johnny’s ex-wives.
What if the original Star Trek was a comedy? Or, better yet, what if the intro for this comedy was set to the theme song to Friends? This intro re-imagines one of the world’s top science-fiction shows as one of the hottest comedies on television. Captain Kirk, Mr. Spock, and Dr. McCoy will always be there for you!
[Thanks to Chris Barkley, Michael Toman, Cat Eldridge, Daniel Dern, Dann, Peer, Bill Higgins, Cora Buhlert, SF Concatenation’s Jonathan Cowie, Mike Kennedy, Andrew Porter, and John King Tarpinian for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Andrew (not Werdna).]
(1) BULLISH ON JOCK. PropStore is holding an auction of alternate movie posters by Jock.
In “Poster Boy”,
“Mondo artist Jock talks us through five of his most impressive posters, all of
which are part of the Prop Store Movie Poster Auction on March 26.”
Guardians of the Galaxy
This was an idea-led design choice. That technique of cutting out the bodies was more common in old ’50s and ’60s American magazine illustration. The goal with doing that was to elevate what would just be a drawing of the characters standing there into something that’s more design-led and more interesting.
How does your poster-design process start? I think posters often work best if there’s an idea behind them, rather than just being an illustration of the characters in a cool position. For my most recent Star Wars posters, for example, I chose a scene from the films that we all know and love, but tried to present it from an angle that we haven’t seen before. The only thing about trying to come up with an idea is you can’t force it. You’ve just gotta kind of noodle and doodle until you maybe have an idea for something.
(2) A LITTLE NUDGE. The discussion here is an
example of one of the social dynamics at work on the Hugo Awards. It begins
with this tweet —
How many Hugo Awards in a row is enough for a project? How many before you ought to step back and let the rest of your field be showcased?
(3) LIU ADAPTATION TO SMALL SCREEN. AMC has given a two-season
pickup to Pantheon, a sff drama from Craig Silverstein. The series is based on short stories by Ken Liu.
Written by Silverstein (Turn: Washington’s Spies, Nikita), Pantheon is set in a world where uploaded consciousness is a reality. The first season centers on Maddie, a bullied teen who receives mysterious help from someone online. The stranger is soon revealed to be her recently deceased father, David, whose consciousness has been uploaded to the Cloud following an experimental destructive brain scan. David is the first of a new kind of being: an “Uploaded Intelligence” or UI, but he will not be the last, as a global conspiracy unfolds that threatens to trigger a new kind of world war.
(4) SFF SHOW AXED. YouTube is moving
away from scripted originals, and Impulse
is a casualty.
…YouTube has canceled the sci-fi series Impulse after two seasons, making it the latest casualty in the video platform’s changing strategy for original programming. …
Impulse, developed by Jeffrey Lieber (Lost, NCIS: New Orleans) and with a pilot episode directed by executive producer Doug Liman, premiered in June 2018. It centers on 16-year-old Henrietta “Henry” Coles (Maddie Hasson), who has the ability to teleport but can’t control where she ends up. It’s based on a novel of the same title by Steven Gould.
(5) AND THESE TWO NEVER GOT ON THE
AIR. Meanwhile, Disney has changed its mind about a planned Muppets
revival, and scrapped a Tron adaptation before anyone even knew they
were doing one. The Hollywood Reporter has the story in “Bob
Iger’s Next Priority? Streamline Disney+ Development”.
In a sign of the challenges, Disney+ has developed then scrapped three original series in the past year: scripted comedy Muppets Live Another Day from Adam Horowitz, Eddy Kitsis and Josh Gad; Disney villains drama Book of Enchantment from Michael Seitzman; and, per sources, a never-announced Tron adaptation from John Ridley. Two other projects — TV series based on High Fidelity and Love, Simon — were moved to Hulu over their adult thematic content that executives weren’t comfortable showing on the family-friendly Disney+.
Doctor Whois unique among current popular genre series in that it’s technically been around for nearly 60 years, officially kicking off on November 23, 1963….
And that can cause issues, because 1963 was a very different time, for television and the world in general. So was 1977, when Tom Baker was starring as the Fourth Doctor. That’s when the show aired the serial “The Talons of Weng-Chiang,” starring John Bennett acting in yellowface as villain Li H’sen Chang, a stage magician aided by Mr. Sin, a cyborg from the 51st century known as the Peking Homunculus.
Yeah, it’s bad. And did we mention that, in the serial, Chinese people are referred to as “inscrutable ch**ks”? It’s very bad.
“It is really hard to watch because yellowface is so unacceptable now,” said Emma Ko, a screenwriter and spokeswoman for British East Asians in Theatre and on Screen. “When you are somebody who was called a “ch**k” in your childhood, as I have been, it is so hard to hear that word and not feel immediately a trigger reaction of how wrong it is.”…
(7) DOING WHAT COMES
SUPERNATURALLY. [Item by Martin Morse Wooster.] In “Michael
Koryta and Alma Katsu on Horror, Craft, and Reinvention” at CrimeReads,
horror novelists Koryta and Katsu interview each other on their new novels,
Katsu’s The Deep and Koryta’s The Chill (written as by Scott
Carson), as they ask each other about their backgrounds and how they ended up writing
horror. Alma
Katsu has lived in the Washington D.C. area and has been a guest at Capclave.
Alma Katsu: After establishing yourself in mystery and crime, I have to ask, what drew you to horror for The Chill? What was the appeal? Does everyone secretly—or openly—love horror?
Michael Koryta: Love of the storytelling world where the past is encroaching on the present. A ghost story invites the past right in and treats it as if it never left. In my experience, that’s really how we live our lives—every move made in the present is shaped by memory, right? On individual and societal levels. The idea of kicking open a door that allows the past to wander in and be active is always appealing to me. For some reason, I’m particularly drawn to this when the natural world is involved in the story. The idea of turning on a faucet in Queens and receiving water that comes from a reservoir in the Catskills where once a town existed is both intriguing to me and fundamentally eerie. Drink up!
I don’t think everyone loves horror, which is a shame, because they should. A little paranoia is good for the soul. It seems so unimaginative to not be afraid of the dark.
What about you? Why are you writing for the warped minds like mine?
Katsu: I lived in a strangely Gothic world as a child. I grew up in a very spooky house in a spooky town in Massachusetts. The house was an old Victorian, long neglected, which meant it had all these period details that, being a Service brat, I’d never seen before. Pocket doors that disappeared into the walls, twisty stairs leading up to an attic filled with old trunks left by previous occupants. Overrun by mice, so the walls talked to you every night. Growing up in a house like that definitely cements the notion that the past is a frightening place.
(8) BLACK WIDOW FINAL TRAILER. Black Widow arrives in theaters May 1.
“At some point we all have to choose between what the world wants you to be and who you are.”
(9) POMERANTZ OBIT. Earl Pomerantz, a two-time Emmy winner who wrote and produced for such
comedies as The
Mary Tyler Moore Show, The
Cosby Show, Taxi and The Larry Sanders Show, has died. “Earl
Pomerantz, Producer and Emmy-Winning Screenwriter, Dies at 75”. He wrote two episodes of Amazing
Stories — “Fine Tuning” and “Mummy Daddy”.
(10) TODAY IN HISTORY.
March 10, 1978 — Return from Witch Mountain premiered. The sequel to Escape to Witch Mountain, it was written by Malcolm Marmorstein and is based on were characters that created by Alexander Key who also wrote the novelization of the film. Ike Eisenmann, Kim Richards, and Denver Pyle reprise their roles from the first with Bette Davis and. Christopher Lee being the baddies here. Neither critics (40% rating) or audience (50% rating) at Rotten Tomatoes were particularly fond of it. You can see it here.
March 10, 1995 — VR.5 premiered on Fox. It featured a cast of David McCallum, Anthony Head, Lori Singer and Louise Fletcher. It was created by Jeannine Renshaw. Executive producer Thania St. John stated that in press releases, “VR.5 will try to capture that same, creepy feeling of the X-Files” which was the lead-in to this series. It lasted a total of thirteen episodes with only ten shown in its first run. There is no audience rating at Rotten Tomatoes but the aggregate critic rating is very high 75%. You can see the pilot here.
(11) TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS.
[Compiled by Cat Eldridge.]
Born March 10, 1891 — Sam Jaffe. His first role was in Lost Horizon as the High Lama and much later in The Day the Earth Stood Still playing Professor Jacob Barnhardt. Later on we find him in The Dunwich Horror as Old Whateley, voicing Bookman in Bedknobs and Broomsticks, playing The Old-Man in The Tell-Tale Heart, and in his last film, appearing in Battle Beyond the Stars as Dr. Hephaestus. John Sayles wrote the script oddly enough. (Died 1984.)
Born March 10, 1905 — Richard Haydon. He’s here as he was in The Lost World, the 1960 film version, as Prof. Summerlee. He showed up in the same year in The Twilight Zone in “A Thing About Machines” as Bartlet Finchley. And he’d be Solicitor Herr Falkstein in Young Frankenstein. (Died 1985.)
Born March 10, 1918 — Theodore Cogswell. He wrote almost forty science fiction stories, most of them humorous, and was the co-author of a Trek novel, Spock, Messiah!, with Joe Spano Jr. He’s perhaps best remembered as the editor of the Proceedings of the Institute for Twenty-First Century Studies in which writers and editors discussed their and each other’s works. A full collection of which was published during 1993 except, as EoSF notes “for one issue dealing with a particularly ugly controversy involving Walter M. Miller”. (Died 1987.)
Born March 10, 1938 — Marvin Kaye, 82. Currently the editor of Weird Tales, he has also edited magazines such as H. P. Lovecraft’s Magazine of Horror and Sherlock Holmes Mystery Magazine. The Fair Folk anthology which is most excellent and which he edited won a World Fantasy Award.
Born March 10, 1958 — Sharon Stone, 62. Damn, she’s the same age I am. She’s been in three genre films, her first being Total Recall where she played the ill-fated Lori Quaid. Her next was Sphere where she was cast as Dr. Elizabeth “Beth” Halperin, and last was in, errr, Catwoman where she was Laurel Hedare, an assassin.
Born March 10, 1969 — Paget Brewster, 51. She was Jenny Spy on The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle, and most of her genre roles have been voice roles: Lana Lang on Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Lois Lane on Justice League: Gods and Monsters and Poison Ivy on Batman and Harley Quinn.
Born March 10, 1977 — Bree Turner, 43. She’s best known for her role as Rosalee on Grimm. She also starred in the pilot episode (“Incident On and Off a Mountain Road”) of Masters of Horror. She was in Jekyll + Hyde as Martha Utterson. Confession time: I got through maybe three seasons of Grimm before giving up as it became increasingly silly.
Born March 10, 1979 — Fonda Lee, 41. Her Jade City novel was a finalist for a Nebula Award for Best Novel and won a World Fantasy Award. Its sequel. Jade War, was published last year. And her Cross Fire novel was named Best YA Novel at the 2019 Aurora Awards for best Canadian speculative fiction.
(12) COMICS SECTION.
Macanudo is making perfect sense interpreting a Philip Dick title!
[…] Meanwhile, lawmakers were given new instructions on how to protect themselves at the Capitol, with the House’s attending physician asking them to stop shaking hands or touching people during greetings — he recommended the split-fingers Star Trek greeting instead.
Slowly but surely, we’re starting to find out more about the Lord of the Rings TV show. Amazon’s series – the rights for which are rumoured to have cost the streaming service $250 million – may not yet have a release date, but there’s plenty of information out there: cast members, filming location, and news of a second season renewal have all been revealed.
Whether you’re a Tolkien diehard or someone who’s just eager to head back to Middle-Earth after watching the movies, we’ll break down what to expect from the Lord of the Rings TV show below. To Mordor!
(15) GET AN EARFUL. The GraphicAudio trailer makes Wasted Space,
Vol. 1 sound pretty appealing.
Billy Bane is a prophet who got it all wrong, and the galaxy has been burning ever since. All he wants is to waste away in the darkest corner of space with his best pal Dust, a supercharged Fuq bot. But when a new prophet comes calling, Billy is summoned to save the galaxy he’s at least partially responsible for destroying.
Too bad he couldn’t care less.
Michael Moreci (Roche Limit, Wonder Woman, Black Star Renegades) and Hayden Sherman (The Few, Cold War, John Carter: The End) have thrown Philip K. Dick in a blender with Preacher. Take a sip and get wasted.
(16) AHMED’S LATEST. Coming from Marvel in June:
MARVELS SNAPSHOTS: CIVIL WAR #1
Written by SALADIN AHMED; Art by RYAN KELLY; Cover by ALEX ROSS
In the heart of the Civil War event, a human story unfolds. A S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, doing his best to do the job with honor—but is that even possible? A young, low-level Super Hero, trying to help his neighbors—but that’s not even legal any more. The two come together in a story that’ll test their commitment, ideals, hopes, and dreams.
Featuring Captain America, Giant-Man, Maria Hill, and more, Kurt Busiek recruits Hugo-Award-winning writer Saladin Ahmed and all-star Ryan Kelly to uniquely retell this iconic Marvel story.
(17) DON’T LOSE THAT NUMBER. [Item by Rob Thornton.] Evidently,
speculative fiction is gaining traction within many music communities. William
Gibson was asked by Wire Magazine,
which is one of the leading underground music magazines (behind a paywall), to
take part in the Invisible Jukebox and identify a series of recordings by ear
alone.
Invisible Jukebox: William Gibson: Can the visionary science fiction author hack The Wire’s mystery record selection? Tested by Emily Bick…
Steely Dan
Kid Charlemagne
[(from The Royal Scam [ABC 1976]).
“Kid Charlemagne. I have it on my iPhone.
You’re a real Steely Dan fan, right?
Yeah, I was a Steely Dan fan from the day the 45 “Rikki Don’t Lose That Number” came out and continue to be this day. Lyrically, it was unlike anything I’ve ever heard, and it continues to be. Back in the later 80s I would be in the supermarket shopping. Sometimes I’d be the only male shopper, and “Hey Nineteen” would come on the Muzak. And so I’m listening to this, and looking around me are all these lovely young mothers, and I’m thinking holy shit, does nobody scan the stuff for what the lyrics mean, because this is the most deliberately sexually perverse and shocking material. Sometimes I hear younger people say, “Oh, Steely Dan. Everything’s been sanded off. It’s all smooth, it doesn’t sound like human beings are making it.” And then when you listen to the lyrics….
They got their name from a double-headed dildo, so you really can’t expect much else.
….That days were shorter tens of millions of years ago is hardly a revelation. The new study is important in that it improves the accuracy of pre-existing estimates, while providing a new way of studying the past.
“Previous estimates were based on counting daily laminae [growth layers] similar to the ones we did chemical analyses on,” de Winter told Gizmodo. “This [previous] counting yielded roughly the same number of days per year, but with different countings yielding differences up to 10 days due to human error and the difficulty in recognizing daily layers by eye.”
Key to the research was a single fossil shell belonging to Torreites sanchezi, a rudist clam. Now extinct, rudists were shaped like boxes, tubes, and rings, and they filled an ecological niche currently occupied by coral reefs. T. sanchezi grew very quickly as far as hinged, or bivalve, mollusks are concerned, exhibiting thin layers of daily growth rings.
Here’s a new view of Anak Krakatau, the collapsed Indonesian volcano that generated the 22 December tsunami that devastated local coastlines.
The picture was assembled from radar images acquired on Wednesday by the ICEYE-X2 satellite.
This is a small innovative spacecraft from Finland that will soon be part of a large orbiting network of sensors.
The volcano continues to evolve, following the cone’s catastrophic failure.
Its original height of 340m was reduced to just 110m in the disaster, but further eruptions have since begun to re-model the remnant structure.
“This image indicates the edifice is in a building phase, with the crater no longer connected to the sea as it was in images from a week or so ago,” observed Prof Andy Hooper from Leeds University, UK.
… In The Postman Always Rings Twice, for example, the fictional Twin Oaks Tavern is at the center of much of the action. The story in Cain’s debut novel revolves around the tavern’s owner, Nick Papadakis (“the Greek”), his younger wife, Cora, and Frank Chambers, a drifter they hire to help out at the place; Cora and Frank get involved and conspire to kill the Greek. The Twin Oaks is a roadhouse in the mountains above L.A., with a gas station and motel joining a restaurant to make Papadakis’s little empire. Places like that were common in the 1930s and ’40s but aren’t today, so the few that are left are treasures. Newcomb’s Ranch is one of them.
Newcomb’s opened in what is now the Angeles National Forest in 1939, only a few years after Cain wrote Postman. It’s a cheery, ranch-style wooden building set among pines, on winding Angeles Crest Highway about an hour north of Glendale, where the Papadakises would travel to do their shopping.
Newcomb’s Ranch is a popular weekend destination for motorcyclists who stop for lunch after roaring up Angeles Crest Highway, and I enjoyed the drive up as much as they do. It’s a gorgeous journey into the San Gabriel Mountains; if you go in winter, you might be fortunate enough to encounter trees flocked with snow and low-hanging clouds settling around the peaks.
[Thanks to Rich Horton, JJ, Mike Kennedy, Cat Eldridge, rcade, Chip
Hitchcock, John King Tarpinian, Andrew Porter, Martin Morse Wooster, Daniel
Dern, and Michael Toman for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File
770 contributing editor of the day Contrarius.]
We’ve seen some people discussing this statement and saying we’re refusing to rename the award. Of course it’s easy to read what we’ve written in that way; our apologies. While this post focuses on the reasons why we have not immediately undertaken to rename the award, our thinking is ongoing and tentative, and we are listening carefully to the feedback we are receiving. We are open to possibilities and suggestions from members of our community as we discuss how best to move forward. You can contact us at [email protected].
My favorite part of writing SFF is inviting the reader to explore new worlds with unearthly mechanics, magic systems, or zoology that entrance the imagination. But what imprints a story on the reader’s soul is the ability to relate to the experience. The real world contains multitudinous experiences, cultures, and viewpoints. It’s important to reflect that in our stories, even if we are zooming in on a more intimate story.
Avoiding monoculture by creating characters who have different experiences makes a story feel vibrant, more faithful, and realistic. When those characters interact, it adds conflict, tension, and opportunities to create real magic.
Look, if I wanted to watch dead-eyed, expressionless creatures sniping at one another over backstories I can’t follow without consulting the Internet, I’d watch Real Housewives.
Okay, that’s done. Now let’s get serious. Let’s talk Gelflings.
…Real talk: Gelfling are … bad. Boring. Lifeless. Dull.
On their own, they’d be generic enough — a first-pass attempt at your garden-variety Tolkien-adjacent high-fantasy race. But as soon as you place them — as do both the original 1982 The Dark Crystal film and Netflix’s new, 10-episode prequel series — at the center of a world as gorgeously wrought, breathtakingly detailed and astonishingly elaborate as that of The Dark Crystal, they become something even worse: They’re basic.
…When Henson and Co. create wildly inhuman, or un-human, creatures, we’ll blithely accept them, whether their eyes are ping-pong balls (C. Monster, K.T. Frog) or their mouth’s that of a toucan with a skin condition (assorted Skeksis). Pigs, podlings, bears or bog monsters — it doesn’t matter. We cheerfully buy into the illusion, not only because these women and men are so skilled in the art of design and puppetry, but because we know that we’re tourists wandering through someone else’s imagination — we assume things look and act different, there.
But Gelfling? They’ve got disturbingly human-like faces, and we know how those work. And even though the art of Gelfling-animatronics has evolved in the 37 years since the film — eyebrows now knit, cheeks now dimple — Gelfling as a race remain permanent residents of the darkest depths of the uncanny valley.
We learn very little about it in The Testaments. We hear of one who mostly shuts himself in his study, away from his family, to work all day. We learn that a high-ranking government official serially kills off each of his teenage wives once they get too old for his tastes, then seeks out new targets. We learn that another respected man is a pedophile who gropes young girls.
So. We know that Gilead men are at best nonentities, at worst monstrous. Beyond that, they are chilly, dull, uninterested in the women around them — to the point that they also seem kind of dim. Mostly, they lurk just outside the frame, threatening to swoop in at any moment to wreak havoc.
And that absence only emphasizes that the women of Gilead are more fascinating than ever. The Testaments, Margaret Atwood’s follow-up to her classic novel The Handmaid’s Tale, returns to that dystopic theocracy 15 years later via three protagonists: Agnes, a girl in Gilead who from a young age rejects marriage, though her parents intend to marry her to a powerful Commander. Daisy is a Canadian girl repulsed by Gilead, raised by strangely overprotective parents. And Aunt Lydia — yes, that Aunt Lydia — has near-godlike status as one of Gilead’s founding Aunts and spends her days quietly collecting dirt on Commanders and fellow Aunts.
Telling much more about how the lives of Agnes, Daisy and Aunt Lydia do and don’t intersect would be to spoil the fun of The Testaments. The book builds its social commentary on gender and power into a plot-driven page turner about these women’s machinations as they deal with their stifling circumstances.
“Fun” is a loose term here, of course. As with The Handmaid’s Tale, The Testaments contains a lot of gut punches (as one may have gathered by now, what with all the murderous, pederastic men everywhere).
And a lot of the time, it’s women administering these gut punches to each other. Despite the awful men everywhere, one of the main themes The Testaments explores is how women hurt one another — whether it’s friend versus friend, Aunt versus student, or even mother versus daughter.
…Handmaids are in the public eye again thanks to the hit TV series — and the frequent appearance of silent, red-robed protesters at political events. Now, Atwood is returning to the world of Gilead, the repressive theocracy she created out of the ruins of present-day America. The Testaments opens 15 years after the events of the first book, and follows an old familiar character as well as introducing some new voices. As for what happens to Offred … well, no spoilers here.
… She continued, “I have fully been told, ‘If you just like do yourself a favor, and don’t go out holding your girlfriend’s hand in public, you might get a Marvel movie.'” The writer noted how the actress looked “almost amused at the memory.” Although Stewart kept it vague about where that directive came from, she added, “I don’t want to work with people like that.” (Marvel did not immediately respond to Yahoo Entertainment’s request for comment.)
“Literally, life is a huge popularity contest,” she added.
The 29-year-old credited a younger generation with helping give her the confidence to step out publicly with a romantic partner. “I just think we’re all kind of getting to a place where — I don’t know, evolution’s a weird thing — we’re all becoming incredibly ambiguous,” she explained. “And it’s this really gorgeous thing.”
The award-winning Broken Earthbooks by N.K Jemisin will be adapted into a roleplaying game. Earlier this month, Green Ronin Publishing, the maker of tabletop RPGs based on The Expanse, Lazarus, Dragon Age, and A Song of Ice of Fire, announced that had signed a licensing agreement with Jemisin to publish a new game based on her Hugo Award-winning series. The new game will use a modified version of Green Ronin’s Chronicle System, the same game system used by A Song of Ice and FireRoleplaying. Tanya DePass and Joseph D. Carriker will co-develop The Fifth Season RPG, which will be released in Fall 2020.
(8) TODAY IN HISTORY.
September 4, 1954 — Captain Midnight debuted on television.
History records that it was on this fateful day back in the year 1966 that Gene Roddenberry — believing he had captured lightning in a bottle — took a copy of Star Trek‘s “Where No Man Has Gone Before” to play for the crowds gathered at the World Science Fiction Convention in Cleveland, Ohio. How was the program first received? Well, let’s just say that Gene couldn’t sate their appetites, and — before the event was all over — crowds also demanded to view the black-and-white print the man also brought along of the original Trek pilot, “The Cage.” So it goes without saying that many folks credit September 4th as the serendipitous birth of the franchise.
September 4, 1975 — Space:1999 premiered on this day.
(9) TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS.
[Compiled by Cat Eldridge.]
Born September 4, 1905 — Mary Renault. ISFDB only counts her Theseus novels as genre (The King Must Die, and The Bull from the Sea). Is that right? I’m not familiar with her full body of work to say if it is or is not correct. (Died 1983.)
Born September 4, 1916 — Robert A. W. Lowndes. He was known best as the editor of Future Science Fiction, Science Fiction, and Science Fiction Quarterly (mostly published late Thirties and early Forties) for Columbia Publications. He was a principal member of the Futurians. A horror writer with a bent towards all things Lovecraftian ever since he was a young fan, he received two letters of encouragement from H. P. Lovecraft. And yes, he’s a member of the First Fandom Hall of Fame. (Died 1998)
Born September 4, 1924 — Joan Aiken. I’d unreservedly say her Wolves Chronicles were her best works. Of the many, many in that series, The Wolves of Willoughby Chase featuring the characters of Bonnie Green, Sylvia Green and Simon is I think the essential work to read; even though The Whispering Mountain is supposed to a prequel to the series I don’t think it’s essential reading. The Wolves of Willoughby Chase is certainly the one in the series I see stocked in my local bookstores. (Died 2004.)
Born September 4, 1924 — Ray Russell. His most famous story is considered by most to be “Sardonicus” which was published first in Playboy magazine, and was then adapted by him into a screenplay for William Castle’s Mr. Sardonicus. In 1991 Russell received the World Fantasy Award for Lifetime Achievement. (Died 1999.)
Born September 4, 1928 — Dick York. He is best remembered as the first Darrin Stephens on Bewitched. He was a teen in Them!, an early SF film which is considered the very first giant bug film. He showed up in myriad Alfred Hitchcock Presents, several episodes of Twilight Zone and has a one-off on Fantasy Island. He voiced his character Darrin Stephens in the “Samantha” episode of The Flintstones. (Died 1992.)
Born September 4, 1957 — Patricia Tallman, 62. Best known as telepath Lyta Alexander on Babylon 5, a series I hold that was magnificent but ended somewhat annoyingly. She was in two episodes of Next Generation, three of Deep Space Nine andtwo of Voyager. She did uncredited stunt work on further episodes of the latter as she did on Voyager. H’h to the latter. Oh, and she shows up in Army of Darkness as a possessed witch.
Born September 4, 1975 — Kai Owen, 44. Best known for portrayal of Rhys Williams in Torchwood, the Doctor Who spin-off I stopped watching after the first two series. He reprised his characters in the Big Audio auidiodramas.
Born September 4, 1999 — Ellie Darcey-Alden, 20. She’s best known for playing young Lily Potter in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2. She’s also celebrated here for being Francesca “Franny” Latimer in the Doctor Who Christmas special “The Snowmen”, an Eleventh Doctor story.
(10) COMICS SECTION.
Bizarro gets silly with a classical literary reference.
The Argyle Sweater gets silly with a pop culture TV reference. (Do you detect a trend?)
(11) PAYING THE FREIGHT. Arc Manor has begun a Kickstarter
appeal, seeking $30,000 to publish “Robert
Heinlein’s Unpublished Novel”. They have already announced the ebook
and a hardcover will be released in March 2020.
We now have the unique opportunity to publish a brand new novel by this great author titled The Pursuit of the Pankera , A ‘parallel’ book written about the parallel universes introduced in book The Number of the Beast, published in 1980….
The Pursuit of the Pankera is an 185,000 word novel with the same characters as The Number of the Beast. The two books share a similar beginning, but where the existing book goes off on a totally unrelated tangent (almost becoming a satire of science fiction and neglecting the original conflict), The Pursuit of the Pankera remains focused on the original conflict and works itself towards a much more traditional Heinlein ending. In many ways, it hearkens back to some of the earlier Heinlein novels.
YouTube has been fined a record $170m (£139m) by a US regulator for violating children’s privacy laws.
Google, which owns YouTube, agreed to pay the sum in a settlement with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC).
The video-streaming site had been accused of collecting data on children under 13, without parental consent.
The FTC said the data was used to target ads to the children, which contravened the 1998 Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (Coppa).
“There’s no excuse for YouTube’s violations of the law,” said FTC chairman Joe Simons.
He added that when it came to complying with Coppa, Google had refused to acknowledge that parts of its main YouTube service were directed at children.
However, in presentations to business clients, the company is accused of painting a different picture.
(13) BATMAN BY TWILIGHT. Ramin Setoodeh, in the Variety story “Robert
Pattinson on Becoming Batman and Why ‘The Lighthouse’ Is Just Weird
Enough”, has a long
interview with Pattinson (it was Variety’s cover story) where he says he loved
the Tim Burton movies as a kid and “You feel very powerful
immediately” when you don the Batsuit.
…“Rob definitely has a darker side and is comfortable working in that space,” says Robert Eggers, the director of A24’s “The Lighthouse,” which screens this week at the Toronto Intl. Film Festival and opens in theaters on Oct. 18. “And he has good taste in cinema. I think a lot of directors he likes are doing stuff that isn’t run-of-the-mill Hollywood.”
But in the past few months, Pattinson’s career has taken another turn as he’s begun gravitating back toward the stormy clouds of movie stardom. He spent most of his summer in Estonia making the Nolan film, which arrives in theaters in July 2020. And of course, despite his concerns, he was cast in “The Batman,” the Warner Bros. tentpole from director Matt Reeves that will start shooting this winter and debuts in June 2021.
(14) CHANGING OF THE GUARD. Meanwhile
in the actual comic books, Bleeding Cool’s Rich Johnston speculates “DC
Comics is About to Give Us a Black Batman”. He says it’s likely DC will introduce a black Batman in 2020 although
it’s unclear who will don the Batsuit.
The hot gossip coming out of comic book shows this weekend from a number of prominent sources, is that in the summer of 2020 leading into 2021, DC Comics is planning to bring us a black Batman. Not Bruce Wayne, but someone else donning the cowl and cape.
Who this new Batman will be, I don’t know. All I have been told is that it won’t be Duke Thomas, the young man previously teased as taking on the role of Robin and Batman to come.
Marvel Comics has given us a black/Latino Spider-Man with Miles Morales, popularised in the Into The Spider-Verse movie. Sam Wilson took on the role of Captain America, reflected in the Avengers: Endgame movie. And Nick Fury has been replaced in the Marvel Universe by his black son, Nick Fury, Jr, reflecting the casting of Samuel L Jackson in the Marvel movies. While in Doomsday Clock, DC Comics’ unauthorised sequel to Watchmen, the new Rorschach is a black man, and son of the original Rorschach’s psychiatrist. It looks like the mainstream DC Comics Universe may be heading in a similar direction with Batman.
Mickey’s Halloween Party is retiring to Florida. Disneyland’s wholesome, long-running, kid-focused, trick-or-treating event was a favorite for Disney fans (of all ages, we don’t judge) who were allowed to go to the parks IN COSTUME, which is normally against the rules.
This year, Disney is replacing the SoCal event with something slightly more sinister: the Oogie Boogie Bash, themed around Nightmare Before Christmas villain Oogie Boogie. It’s also switching parks, with the monster taking over California Adventure. Don’t worry, you can still dress up.
It’s a darker take on Halloween, with a focus on villains, and a storyline that involves Oogie Boogie casting a spell to take over the park.
The change may help keep both parks full, since Disneyland will no longer have to shut down early on event nights. It’s also a chance to age up the vibe from just being for the tykes, according to Disney show director Jordan Peterson, with some spookier attractions meant to appeal to the tween and even teen audience.
(16) SPECULATIVE THRILLER NEWS. John Marks, in “Seven
Techno-Thrillers To Read As Our World Crumbles” on CrimeReads,
says that there’s no better way to prepare for global environmental or
technological collapse than reading a novel by Ernest Cline, Michael Crichton,
or Andy Weir.
Authors, like me, who write speculatively about tech, are only limited by our imaginations. And that’s why we are fascinated by it, because it offers limitless potential.
Often it is far more of a challenge to create characters and worlds that are overshadowed by tech that goes askew than tech that gets it right.
What happens when automation that has been designed to assist humanity starts working against it? That question has been the basis of two of my six novels, The One and most recently, The Passengers.
(17) SMOKE GETS
IN YOUR REPLICANT EYES. From 2013, the Blade Runner trailer redone
in classic black-and-white noir style.
[Thanks to JJ, Cat Eldridge, Chip Hitchcock, John King Tarpinian,
Martin Morse Wooster, Mike Kennedy, Brian Z., Rich Horton, David Doering and
Andrew Porter for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770
contributing editor of the day Hampus Eckerman.]
As you may know, our Community Guidelines describe which content we allow – and don’t allow – on YouTube. Your video Immigration and War was flagged to us for review. Upon review, we’ve determined that it violates our guidelines and we’ve removed it from YouTube.
Please note that this removal has not resulted in a Community Guidelines strike or penalty on your account.
Sincerely, – The YouTube Team
And:
As you may know, our Community Guidelines describe which content we allow – and don’t allow – on YouTube. Your video Voxday Darkstream 04.25.2018 The Problem with Jordan Peterson was flagged to us for review. Upon review, we’ve determined that it violates our guidelines and we’ve removed it from YouTube.
And:
As you may know, our Community Guidelines describe which content we allow – and don’t allow – on YouTube. Your video Voxday Darkstream 04.28.2018 The Culling of the Cucks was flagged to us for review. Upon review, we’ve determined that it violates our guidelines and we’ve removed it from YouTube.
Over the past few years, we’ve been investing in the policies, resources and products needed to live up to our responsibility and protect the YouTube community from harmful content. This work has focused on four pillars: removing violative content, raising up authoritative content, reducing the spread of borderline content and rewarding trusted creators. Thanks to these investments, videos that violate our policies are removed faster than ever and users are seeing less borderline content and harmful misinformation. As we do this, we’re partnering closely with lawmakers and civil society around the globe to limit the spread of violent extremist content online.
… We’ve been taking a close look at our approach towards hateful content in consultation with dozens of experts in subjects like violent extremism, supremacism, civil rights, and free speech. Based on those learnings, we are making several updates:
…Today, we’re taking another step in our hate speech policy by specifically prohibiting videos alleging that a group is superior in order to justify discrimination, segregation or exclusion based on qualities like age, gender, race, caste, religion, sexual orientation or veteran status. This would include, for example, videos that promote or glorify Nazi ideology, which is inherently discriminatory. Finally, we will remove content denying that well-documented violent events, like the Holocaust or the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary, took place.
…In addition to removing videos that violate our policies, we also want to reduce the spread of content that comes right up to the line. In January, we piloted an update of our systems in the U.S. to limit recommendations of borderline content and harmful misinformation, such as videos promoting a phony miracle cure for a serious illness, or claiming the earth is flat. …Thanks to this change, the number of views this type of content gets from recommendations has dropped by over 50% in the U.S.
…In the case of hate speech, we are strengthening enforcement of our existing YouTube Partner Program policies. Channels that repeatedly brush up against our hate speech policies will be suspended from the YouTube Partner program, meaning they can’t run ads on their channel or use other monetization features like Super Chat.
YouTube did not name any specific channels or videos that would be banned. But on Wednesday, numerous far-right creators began complaining that their videos had been deleted, or had been stripped of ads, presumably a result of the new policy.
…The kind of content that will be prohibited under YouTube’s new hate speech policies includes videos that claim Jews secretly control the world, that say women are intellectually inferior to men and therefore should be denied certain rights, or that suggest that the white race is superior to another race, a YouTube spokesman said.
Channels that post some hateful content, but that do not violate YouTube’s rules with the majority of their videos, may receive strikes under YouTube’s three-strike enforcement system, but would not be immediately banned.
A Google search shows a number of other YouTube accounts represent they still host Vox Day’s banned videos.
