Lovecraft 101: Get To Know The Master of Scifi-Horror. For more detailed insights into each of Lovecraft's tales in publication order you might want to follow the H.P.Lovecraft Literary Podcast. For another story-by-story guide to Lovecraft you might want to check out Kenneth Hite's Tour De Lovecraft (also available in expanded form as a book). China Mieville on Lovecraft and racism and a lecture at Treadwells by Archaeologist James Holloway which delves deep into Lovecraft and identity. The making of the Call of Cthulhu RPG. The making of Cthulhu (Hipsters! Ego! Madness!). Happy Halloween with H.P. Lovecraft!
posted by Artw on Oct 31, 2009 - 54 comments

Is mysticism overtaking science in sci-fi? Does Every SF Show Need Jesus Now?
posted by Artw on Oct 1, 2009 - 121 comments

Who Goes There - the John W. Campbell short story which inspired the movies The Thing from Another World and, closer to the original, The Thing (which, apparently, was horribly critically mauled upon release but has since become as much as a classic as the 50s film). The story is now being reprinted alongside a treatment by Logan's Run author William F. Nolan for an unmade 1978 screen version.
posted by Artw on Sep 1, 2009 - 18 comments

Concept Art World - For example: Michael Kutsche, Marek Okoń, 25 Inspiring Examples of Spaceships and Aircraft, Star Trek XI Concept Art by Ryan Church plus lots more.
posted by fearfulsymmetry on Aug 19, 2009 - 9 comments

Tony Scott has confirmed that a prequel to Alien is in the works, with commercial director Carl Rinsch at the helm. Of course, his brother Ridley was no stranger to advertising. Meanwhile Dark Horse is celebrating 30 years of the franchise by releasing a new series of Aliens comics.
posted by Artw on May 30, 2009 - 188 comments

“Until the recent Great Rebellion, the Jedi Bendu were the most feared warriors in the universe. For one hundred thousand years, generations of Jedi perfected their art as the personal bodyguards of the emperor. They were the chief architects of the invincible Imperial Space Force which expanded the Empire across the galaxy, from the celestial equator to the farthest reaches of the Great Rift. Now these legendary warriors are all but extinct. One by one they have been hunted down and destroyed as enemies of the New Empire by a ferocious and sinister rival warrior sect, the Knights of Sith.” - The first draft of Star Wars... was awful.
posted by Artw on May 25, 2009 - 149 comments

Dreams With Sharp Teeth – clips from a Sundance Channel documentary on science fiction writer (and somewhat litigious colourful character) Harlan Ellison. Harlan says pay the writer. (via)
posted by Artw on May 19, 2009 - 101 comments

The SF Signal Mind Meld feature poses science fiction related questions to a number of SF luminaries and the scientist, science writer or blogger. Subjects have included the best women writers in SF, taboo topics in SF, underated authors and the most controversial SF novels of the past and present. The also cover lighter topics, such the role of media tie-ins, how Battlestar Galactica could have ended better (bonus Geoff Ryman) and the realistic (or otherwise) use of science on TV SF shows.
posted by Artw on May 6, 2009 - 17 comments

Some articles about Blade Runner
posted by nthdegx on Jan 29, 2009 - 59 comments

Top 10 Science Fiction Flicks For The Thinking Man (beerandscifi version) - The Portland based blog (with a very admirable focus) takes on the Rotten Tomatoes list with a less dull alternative. (via)
posted by Artw on Jan 15, 2009 - 102 comments

The Sea of Perdition - Children of the Kingdom - Black Tulips - Three short films by South African-born film director Richard Stanley. Stanley's career took off with Hardware (an unacknowledged adaptation the 2000ad story Shok!) and the apocalyptic African western/Horror movie Dust Devil, then hit the rocks with the doomed 1996 version of the Island of Doctor Moreau, from which he was fired and replaced by John Frankenheimer. Stanley hasn't directed a feature film since... though he now has two films in preproduction, Vacation and Bones of the Earth. The original script for Moreau can be read on his unofficial site, as well as the script for a sequel to Hardware. Richard Stanley's MySpace Blog is also very strange.
posted by Artw on Dec 26, 2008 - 18 comments

The Best Youtube Videos of Spanish Filmmaker Nacho Vigalondo (previously). [more inside]
posted by Staggering Jack on Dec 13, 2008 - 5 comments

Aliens vs Predator: Whoever wins, you lose - MeFi's own jscalzi talks about the worst Sci-Fi film of the year. Meanwhile Sigourney Weaver and Ridley Scott suggest making another alien movie - with Ripley but without any aliens. It's may not be all bad news for xenomorphs though - 2009 will see the release of Aliens: Colonial Marines is still just around the corner, hopefully.
posted by Artw on Dec 11, 2008 - 412 comments

Wrong side of the art. This blog was originally made as an easy access page to view/manage my collection of movie posters specializing in cult/horror/exploitation/B/sci-fi and basically any other genre to which one may refer as 'shit'. Don't forget the blaxploitation, naziploitation, nunsploitation, and bruceleeploitation, and watch out out if you're at work: some B-movies aren't for kids.
posted by gerryblog on Jul 26, 2008 - 24 comments

High-Tech Noon. What makes a classic Western even more classic? Blasters and force-fields, that's what. (SLYT)
posted by fearfulsymmetry on Apr 21, 2008 - 25 comments

Trailers From Hell. Cult directors (and other industry types) introduce and comment on trailers for cult films. For instance, Allison Anders on Peeping Tom, Rick Baker on The Man Of A Thousand Faces, Joe Dante on Attack Of The 50 Foot Woman, Jack Hill on White Heat, Dan Ireland on The Haunting, Mary Lambert on The Masque Of The Red Death and Edgar Wright on Carnage. (Flash menu and intro unfortunately)
posted by fearfulsymmetry on Jan 28, 2008 - 11 comments

Art Binninger was a sci-fi buff in the 1970s with the resources of the audiovisual squad at Vandenberg Air Force Base at his disposal. The result was Star Trix, a claymation Star Trek parody, that spawned three short films and Star Trix: The Flick (parts 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5). Art Binninger himself explains the whole saga on his web site.
posted by jonp72 on Dec 15, 2007 - 3 comments

Geoff Ryman on mundane science fiction. [previously, via]
posted by brundlefly on Sep 22, 2007 - 82 comments

Kerwin Mathews, 1926-2007. The genre actor may be best remembered as the title character in one of my favorite movies, the classic The 7th Voyage of Sinbad.
posted by Chinese Jet Pilot on Jul 18, 2007 - 8 comments

The 10 Best Sci-Fi Films That Never Existed
posted by Tlogmer on Feb 13, 2006 - 157 comments

A scene by scene comparison between the Matrix and Ghost in the Shell, a critically acclaimed japanese anime that was released four years before the Matrix.
posted by disgruntled on Jan 5, 2005 - 47 comments

Mother of the Matrix? What if everything we experience is actually being delivered to our catatonic bodies by superintelligent robots? On a more practical note, what if the Wachowski brothers ripped off the ideas for their high-grossing trilogy from an unknown screenwriter who claims to have submitted it in response to a 1981 ad the brothers placed "requesting new sci-fi works?" (registration required, but it will deliver the goods while saving you the pain of parsing intentional spelling errors in "Da Ghetto Tymz"). Does the fact that the author claiming infringement is a black woman change the character of this story? It does seem like, considering where the case has gone, that it would be considered news. Just how long is the arm of Time/Warner/AOL/Skynet? In other stories, how many times will The Terminator be sued? (via PennyArcade)
posted by nanojath on Dec 6, 2004 - 70 comments

Geek Nirvana: Star Trek's Federation vs Star Wars' Empire By the Numbers

Because we know the debate rages on......

Now if we could only resolve Kirk vs. Picard for once and all.
via Linux Notes
posted by fenriq on Sep 17, 2004 - 45 comments

50 Reasons to Boycott the Matrix. Lowbrow. Violent. Rascist. And with that Reloaded budget, they could have made millionaires out of every starving child in America. Shameful.
posted by scarabic on May 11, 2003 - 54 comments

Is there no spoon? The Warner Bros Matrix site is home to a series of scholarly essays inspired by the film (last updated 3/20/03). I mean, sure, the film offers some "whoa dude" moments regarding technology, perception, and vinyl pants, but I was surprised to find it an interesting launching point for discussions about freedom, heaven, and Plato's Cave as well. Being a philosophy layman, I can't vouch for their quality with any authority, but if you know the movies inside and out, as I apparently do (god help me) you might find the essays interesting.*
_{*for the next 15 agonizing days, anyway}
posted by scarabic on Apr 30, 2003 - 36 comments

What is the AniMatrix? A direct-to-video release of 9 animated shorts (comic book style, pure CGI, etc) by 7 directors looks at possible visions of the world pre-Matrix. Looks like it could be an interesting collection.
posted by mathowie on Sep 5, 2002 - 27 comments

"This is a war, and we are soldiers."
The first teaser for "The Matrix Reloaded" and "The Matrix Revolutions" has hit the web (QT only). Is this the movie that is going to break the Spider-Man/Star Wars Episode 2 records? Do the fans want/need a sequel? Can they possibly top the "cool fight scene" quotient of the last movie?
posted by Grum on May 15, 2002 - 23 comments

THE Pope will host the European premiere of 2001: A Space Odyssey. I'm guessing my thoughts on 2001 aren't all that different from the pope's, but I'm mostly an atheist. How do you view the monolith? And also, here's a list of pope's favorite films. Andrei Rublev is my overall 4th favorite film, the Sacrifice and Decalogue are in my 20's.
posted by tiaka on Mar 2, 2001 - 8 comments

http://www.otnemem.com is the first movie Web site that ever made me eager to see a movie I haven't heard a thing about. It won't open in the US till March, but it looks awfully clever, and I'm always up for a good short-term-memory-loss revenge thriller. And it's a site whose all-Flash version is better than the HTML version - another rarity. Also, the domain name is pretty clever - the movie's name spelled backwards, which turns out to be thematically and structurally appropriate to the movie.
posted by nicwolff on Dec 21, 2000 - 10 comments

Frank Herbert's Dune is premiering Sunday December 3 on the Sci Fi channel. Should be a trip.
posted by SilentSalamander on Dec 2, 2000 - 20 comments

Dark Angel is a rip-off of Heinlein's Friday, which I completely agree with. Cameron has been successfully sued by Harlon Ellison before for blatantly ripping off his ideas. Then again the sci-fi word is a static world of either super-humans/machines/aliens/time-trave/alternate dimensions.
posted by skallas on Oct 19, 2000 - 13 comments

Okay, now he's not a replicant. Contrary to what Ridley Scott said, Harrison Ford claims Deckard was not a replicant. Where's Phillip K. Dick when you need him? Oh, right...
posted by Aaaugh! on Sep 28, 2000 - 16 comments

Thank God.
posted by Mark on Mar 21, 2000 - 3 comments