• Cartoonist Will Elder, a formative genius of MAD, has died at 87. Jeez, what a bummer... this guy was formative on my sense of humor.

• Josie and the Pussy Cats launch into outer space. NASA should probably avoid making the lift off procedure on their space ships trigger with the accidental throwing of a single lever.

• Arthur C. Clarke's last book will be The Last Theorem.

• Cinematical looks at the most famous scifi locations in the real world.

• The preview for tonight's episode of Battlestar Galactica looks surprisingly dramatic, given the plodding pace of the last six episodes.

Continue reading "Daily Scan: 05.16.08 - Emile Hirsch Fires His Agent; the Most Famous SciFi Locations in the World" »

• The drunken Darth Vader who beat up two Church of Jedi parishioners has been given a suspended sentence.

• ComicMix lists the worst supervillain names in comics. My favorite is the Hypno-Hustler.

• Darth Mojo has a fantastic post about the anatomy of Cylons up. Detailed down the coccyx servos.

• Browncoats, support your candidates with this Reynolds / Washburne 2008 campaign tee.

• Jericho fans are now claiming the post-apocalyptic drama was canceled because of a conspiracy theory involving Nielsen ratings. Give it up, people.

• io9 lists seven reasons why scifi book series outstay their welcomes. I'm just not going to read a "cycle" of anything, let alone some dippy fan wankery.

Continue reading "Daily Scan: 05.15.08 - Post-Apocalyptic Kid Movies; the Worst in Supervillain Names" »

• Eric Stotlz, some kind of wonderful himself, will be the first Cylon.

• io9 reminds us that aliens should always have poetic weaknesses.

• David Cronenberg to be remaking Timecrimes?

• Correction: Speed Racer didn't come in second on its opening weekend, it came in third. This groks: When I went to see it on Saturday, there were only two people in the theater, and one of them walked out halfway through.

• Wall-E's new sexpot girlfriend is based on an iPod.

• ABC is bringing the BBC's excellent time travel series Life on Mars to American screens... courtesy of a David E. Kelley remake.

Continue reading "Daily Scan: 05.14.08 - Alec Baldwin Pitches an Outer Space Romp; Is Cronenberg Remaking Timecrimes?" »

Girls can be geeks too, and proud of it. They'll debate the relative merits of Captains Kirk vs. Picard. And they'll talk about everything from George Lucas to the chest hair of Lost's Jack Shephard. You'll find these topics -- and much, much more -- on Pink Raygun, a fan site started in February 2007 that celebrates women as both science fiction fans and auteurs. The brainchild of Lisa Faryand John Dallaire, Fary says she launched the site because she couldn't find a place where women were having fun with scifi and "just enjoying the sheer geekery of it." Too often, "a woman who's interested in things like science, space travel, etc. has always been seen as an aberration," notes Teresa Jusino, one of the site's 15 writers. "Little boys are introduced to and encouraged in their interest, while little girls have to find it for themselves."

Continue reading "Site of the Week - Pink Raygun" »

• Dark Roasted Blend has a fantastic gallery of Soviet-era science fiction images.

• The director of The Pirates of the Caribbean will direct Bioshock. It will suck.

• Go listen to some Arthur C. Clarke reading 2001.

• io9 sees Captain America's shield in a still from Iron Man that looks slathered with an inch of Vaseline.

• A lot of information on the plot structure of Star Trek XI.

Continue reading "Daily Scan: 05.13.08 - Soviet-era SciFi; Star Trek XI Plot Details" »

• The Daily Mail has posted a surprisingly sympathetic tribute to William Shatner to help promote his latest autobiography.

• Roger Ebert speculates that scifi fanzines were the progenitors of blogs.

• Eric Stoltz is joining the cast to Ronald D. Moore's Battlestar Galactica prequel, Caprica.

• Speed Racer was simply destroyed this weekend at the box office. It deserved to be. It doesn't work on any level: As a racing film, the racing is too cartoonish to offer any excitement. As a living cartoon, it's better, but it just isn't a very funny or interesting one.

• Conclusive proof that Ronald Moore had no idea who the Final Five Cylons were as recently as the end of last season.

Continue reading "Daily Scan: 05.12.08 - Eric Stoltz Joins Caprica; Frank Miller Sets His Sights on Buck Rogers" »