It’s probably not a surprise given the first season was so well-received by both critics and viewers, but Netflix will be bringing back Neil Gaiman adaptationThe Sandman for more episodes.
When I’m an old lady I’ll still be informing young people that Halloween never existed in this country until the 90s /early 00s when people who sell us stuff realised they could use it to sell us more stuff, and Halloween-themed stuff suddenly appeared in shopping centres without warning and was relentlessly marketed to children, and adults saw right through it and disliked it (“what’s this American sh*t, why are there pumpkins and witches in shop windows this never used to be a thing”) until they got used to it and young generations grew up thinking Halloween had always been a thing here even though kids born just a decade earlier had to be taught about it by the TV or school. Also it trampled over our pre-existing Fun Cultural Event When Kids Get Dressed-Up which had never needed to be marketed so aggressively and therefore became less relevant
I don’t mind at all if you love Halloween but it’s so weird to see my younger cousins convinced that it was always a thing in France when I remember being taught at school what trick or treating was, like “let’s learn about cultural traditions that are exotic and fun and different from ours!!” and I’m not old. Millennials literally saw Halloween get astroturfed into our culture with no explanation when shopping centres just went “from now on this is something we’ve always done” and we had no choice but to be like well OK I guess 🤷♀️
SAME THING IN AUSTRALIA! It was not a thing when I was a kid! Now you can buy pumpkin-themed buckets in the supermarkets for kids to put lollies in!
The Netherlands, and this is the reason I have the whole tag blacklisted.
And in Ireland, FFS, where the damn thing was invented… sure enough, in about the same timeframe, the US version of it was imported here and now has significantly overlaid the traditions and customs of the original native holiday. …Not completely, yet. But it’s trying, and gaining ground every year.
It’s like the Cat of Dream said. The old way was made as if it had never been… as if the new way was the way it has been from all time: as if “It was ever thus.”
Even those who don’t work in Hollywood understand the challenges of being in a visual effects-heavy movie or series, like reacting to characters or scenery that aren’t actually seen on set. But Marvel Entertainment recently shared a behind the scenes look at the making of She-Hulk: Attorney at Law, and what Tatiana…
The way that phones charge up is changing: It’s no longer the case that plugging your handset into a power socket will juice it up straight to 100 percent as quickly as possible, and that’s because the newest phones have a selection of smart features to charge up their batteries in a more intelligent way.
DuckDuckGo launched a web browser for macOS in beta today, offering privacy-minded web surfers a new way to browse. The browser uses a variety of techniques to protect your information from snooping websites and even includes some innovative tools, including Duck Player, which is supposed to let you watch YouTube with…
Studio Ghibli’s beloved 1988 animated film My Neighbor Totoro has come to life on the London stage in alimited offering through January 21, 2023. It joins the expansion of Ghibli’s world in the realms of theme parks and other stage adaptations of Hayao Miyazaki classics, and features the work of the film’s original…
Meddelandetjänsten Signal kommer ta bort möjligheten att skicka och ta emot SMS och MMS från sin Androidapp. Som anledning anger Signal att SMS-stödet inte längre är rimligt eller vettigt.
Företaget utvecklar resonemanget i sitt blogginlägg och nämner tre specifika anledningar: prioritet av säkerhet och integritet (SMS är okrypterade och relativt osäkra), att gränssnittet ska vara tydligt och lättförståeligt, samt att användare inte ska råka ut för oväntade SMS-avgifter.
Endast användare som utnyttjar Signal som standardapp för SMS påverkas av förändringen. Den skaran behöver byta till en annan SMS-app, exempelvis Google Messages.
Do you know what the broadcasters do to showrunners who disclose significant things? They don’t just kill us. They make it so we have never existed. And our shows vanish with us. Hit shows like Headless Joe, Too Many Godmothers, Crab Hand Roll Mysteries and Where are my Knees? are now lost to the world, because their showrunners couldn’t keep secrets. You don’t want that to happen to me and Good Omens.
Master storyteller Mur Lafferty is back, and in her new novel Station Eternity, she confronts the question of what would really happen if the one thing that always happened around you, was the one thing you wish would never happen…
MUR LAFFERTY:
I am of Generation X, and grew up with Murder She Wrote, watching Jessica Fletcher solving mysteries in her Angela-Lansburiest way. And even though we loved watching those mysteries, one joke became common: Jessica Fletcher was clearly the most successful serial killer in history. Why else would she conveniently “be around” to solve murders that frequently happen around her?
As I got into more and more murder series, every story had the same thing: an amateur sleuth would happen across a murder and then solve it. Sometimes in a “sexy, exciting” way, like Miss Fisher, or sometimes in a “gentle, wholesome, eat your strawberry-scones” way, like Father Brown or Miss Marple. Midsomer Murders was the exception as those folks were homicide detectives, but their cozy English county had a per capita murder rate 248 times higher than England and Wales.
The amateur sleuth is a trope, but it’s accompanied by another trope: no one ever mentions how it’s weird that murders always happen around our sleuths? They don’t even have to wander far from home before encountering a body–but if they do go on vacation, people die then too. I hadn’t found anyone that addressed this obvious thing.
It also bugged me how the protagonists in these stories are well liked among friends, if not local law enforcement. I always thought if Jessica Fletcher came visiting, people should run screaming.
But if that happened, it would suck. Life would be really lonely. And so Mallory Viridian was born.
In classic amateur sleuth style, Mallory is conveniently around for murders, and almost always solves them. Unfortunately, because of this, she is not a popular person. She can’t keep a job, so she makes a living novelizing her cases. She has no friends. Most of her family is dead. She stays away from her neighbors. Forget about a love life. And she’s terribly lonely.
But hey, I’m a science fiction writer, so I like to solve problems with outrageous spacey stuff. I was inspired by these mystery stories but also Babylon 5*, and I wanted a space station with a lot of aliens who don’t think much of humans and weren’t too keen on them visiting en masse.
But they’ll take an ambassador. And someone who asked for sanctuary. And someone with a really weird, murdery problem. So Station Eternity, a sentient space station, allows three humans aboard to live among species like alien hive minds and rock folks with surprising abilities. Among her new community, Mallory hopes whatever makes murders happen around her applies only to humans.
When writing, the hardest thing I had to puzzle out was the actual murder magnet curse/ability. If I directly addressed the “murders happen around this person” effect, I needed to address why it happens. It took a lot of editing, and of course I’m not going to spoil it here, but I hope I stuck the landing.
What I loved about this project was exploring the fish out of water story. Having only three humans on a station presents problems; even small issues like finding a hairdresser or dentist, or realizing that even with auditory tech to translate language, our humans can’t read alien script or body language. It’s challenging to create aliens that both are alien and also characters that readers can relate to, but a fun challenge.
Station Eternity is my nerdy love letter to these classic cozies, using aliens and space to understand their most persistent, unspoken, trope. I hope folks find it fun and appropriately murder-filled.
* J Michael Strazynski wrote for Murder She Wrote and created Babylon 5. If anyone can get a copy of Station Eternity into his hands, I’d be much obliged.
The flight from LAX to DFW did not go as planned. Emerson Collins, an actor from Los Angeles, remembers the noises started before the plane even took off: strange grumblings, a weird sound like somebody was on the verge of throwing up. They were coming from the plane’s loudspeaker. Flight attendants assured…
We’re only a few weeks away from The Winchesters, the Supernatural prequel about Sam and Dean’s parents, premiering on The CW. For those of us well-versed in the original show, it might seem that the past has already been addressed in the original. That’s not the case, says Jensen Ackles, producer on The Winchesters who also played Dean on the mothership series.
Buy it Now
In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Ackles along with his wife Danneel and showrunner Robbie Thompson delved into the details of the new show, including how it brings something new to the Supernatural universe without changing what’s come before (or after, within the timeline of the two series).
“A lot of people are like, ‘Hang on, are you changing the lore? Is this like Back to the Future, where Dean and Sam are going to start to disappear in the picture?’ It’s not,” Jensen said. “We obviously don’t want to change anything that was experienced on what we lovingly call the mothership.”
“You can’t recreate Supernatural, you just can’t,” Thompson said later on in the article. “What we wanted to do with this show was shine a light on new corners of the Supernatural universe.”
Danneel also acknowledges that having Supernatural fans immediately jump on board for The Winchesters is a “big ask,” but asked fans to give the new show a try. “Everybody who’s involved in this project loves this show. We have lived this show for 15 years; it’s a family member. So just trust us that we’re going to take care of it.”
You can read more about the show, including the introduction of its ensemble cast, at the EW link above.
The first thirteen-episode season of The Winchesters premieres Tuesday, October 11 on The CW.
Electrical extension cords are tremendously useful for powering devices when your gadget’s power cord isn’t long enough to reach an electrical outlet. Normal extension cords have a so-called male plug that goes into the wall and a female plug at the end where you can plug in your device. There’s absolutely no reason…
By elenalodir
ROCK PAPER SCISSOR LIZARD SPOCK.
It's Simple: Scissors cuts paper, paper covers rock, rock crushes lizard, lizard poisons Spock, Spock smashes scissors, scissors decapitates lizard, lizard eats paper, paper disproves Spock, Spock vaporizes rock, and as it always has, rock crushes scissors.
The Chicon 8 committee stated today that prior to the 2022 Worldcon they received threats to murder two program participants, one of whom has gone public. Last week, shortly before the start of the convention, Chicon 8 received an anonymous … Continue reading →
The guys at The Popcast dropped the following Stargate-related video today.
So I thought I’d address it.
Now I want to preface this blog entry by making it clear that the topic of discussion is Stargate, and Stargate alone. Although the new Lord of Rings series is referenced in the video, I am in no position to comment on it given that I haven’t watched the show.
Also, before we get started, I want to give a shout out to the Popcast channel that does a fantastic job of covering science fiction in general, but also produces Stargate-focused videos that are as entertaining as they are insightful. Give them a follow and subscribe at The Popcast.
Alright. A little background first –
Stargate aired its final television episode in May of 2011 with Stargate: Universe’s “Gauntlet”. At the time of its production, we were operating under the likelihood that we would receive an order for a third and final season – but that ended up going away like the Stargate: Extinction Atlantis movie and that 11th season of SG-1 for Apple before it. The franchise had produced three movies and 17 seasons of television (over 300+ episodes!) over its 14+ year run, making it one of MGM’s most valuable I.P.’s. And, even though the consecutive production run had ended, we all knew it was only a matter of time before Stargate came back, in one form or other. I assumed sooner than later. That was over eleven years ago. So let’s go with later.
One thing that has become very clear in that time is the resilience and enduring spirit of the existing fanbase. Over a decade since its last episode aired, Stargate continues to regularly trend on social media (as most recently as last week, in fact). The fandom is still very much out there, still very much eagerly – somewhat wearily after all this time – awaiting the franchise’s return. I can’t help but point out what a wonderful thing this is – to have an existing worldwide fanbase ready and willing to not only watch your new show, but support it online, ready to make tremendous noise in the lead-up to launch.
But – eleven years. I suppose it’s not that surprising it’s taken this long. And I’m sure the existing fandom had something to do with it given a creative misstep could risk alienating and losing them, turning passionate vocal supporters into equally passionate and vocal detractors. But I’ve always held that problem is easily addressed by offering viewers the best of both worlds – for new fans who know nothing about Stargate, a fresh start series that is simple to jump aboard and watch without being privy to past shows; for the existing fanbase, an in-canon series that offers the prospect of Easter eggs and guest spots from familiar faces. Guys, they’re the same show! And who knows. Maybe there’s even the option of going the new Star Trek route and offering multiple Stargate shows. Something for everyone.
I was heartened, back in 2018, to hear that SG-1. Atlantis and Universe co-creator Brad Wright was in discussions with MGM about a franchise relaunch. I wasn’t privy to the details of the development, but I do know that a deal was finally closed and Brad did write a pilot script. The script was written for a specific potential home, went through a couple of drafts – and then, as so often happens in Hollywood, personnel changed and things went radio silent. Understand that, in this business, radio silence is never a good sign.
Eventually, the MGM sale to Amazon was finalized and Brad’s script, I assumed, made its way there. Months ago. And still, radio silence.
All three shows are now available on Amazon Prime as of September, and that’s a very good sign. An even better sign would be for Amazon to reach out to Brad and either move forward on his pilot or scrap it and ask him to come up with something else. As I mentioned, the pilot I read was written for a specific potential home – but now, Amazon is the NEW potential home. If they’re not feeling the existing script, I’m sure Brad would have no problem hearing them out and going back to the drawing board for a new take. Which is what I hope will happen. Eventually.
Of course, there is the possibility that Amazon decides to go another way. Yes, Brad Wright was instrumental in turning the Stargate into MGM’s most successful television franchise and having him at the helm would ensure a series that would appeal to new viewers while delighting longtime fans. Like I said, the best of both worlds. But executives don’t always proceed along a logical path. All too often, the flashiness of a hot commodity (the YouTuber with 10 million followers! The writer who wrote that blockbuster!) is simply too hard to resist. Other times, it’s a desire to ensure a show’s tone and themes are attuned to the prevailing zeitgeist, thereby crafting a series that merely echoes the ideas of every other show rather than standing apart. It rarely ends well and I’m hoping Hollywood comes to that realization. Again, hopefully sooner than later. In the meantime…
I’m not privy to any of the internal decision-making, but I am disappointed its taken this long for Brad to hear word. Still, it could just be a matter of the studio’s go-slow approach. Maybe logical heads will ultimately prevail. Nothing is for certain. Except for one thing of course. Whatever form the new Stargate show takes, whoever is behind it, fandom will let their voices be heard LOUD and LONG.
Book News Bit #1: The Art of Love Death + Robots, which features the art of some immensely talented people, and also a foreword by me, is now on sale in the US (it’s been out in the UK for a couple of weeks). If you dig incredible art from amazing talents, you’ll want to check it out. Here’s the information on the publisher’s site.
Book News Bit #2: Tor/Macmillan have revealed the title of my upcoming book, and have included a little blurb on what it might be about. Click here to find out! And as always, for any question you might have at this early stage (very early indeed, as I am still writing it), there’s the New Book FAQ, your question will probably be answered there. If it’s not answered there, it’s very likely my answer at the moment is “dunno, we’ll see.”
In all, a pretty decent day for Scalzi-related book news!
House of the Dragon, following in the footsteps and long shadow of its predecessor, wasted no time in giving itself a meaty battle scene this week. But its first major skirmish marked a noted difference—beneath the blood and guts, a sort of grimly hilarious mythos plays out.
Will Sloan, a movie podcast host in Canada, first posted an old family photo online in 2016, asking if anyone knew what cartoon was playing on the TV in the background. Oddly, nobody on the internet could figure it out. But someone finally cracked the case on Monday after six long years.
