A science fiction blog featuring science fiction book reviews and with frequent ramblings on fantasy, computers and the web.
I have no idea what they are saying…but I love the look and the animation in this full trailer for Space Pirate Captain Harlock. The pop soundtrack near the end I could do without, though.
In this short animated film by by Iker Maidagan and Dana Terrace, a young Inuit boy reaches waters no one has ever reached before while trying to fish in the Arctic wilderness.
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A short retro-game-style animation tailored for the short attention span of the Twitter generation. Or, just a cool video. You decide!
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REVIEW SYNOPSIS: Overly long, sloppily scripted, needlessly violent, with changes that need not—and in some instances, should not—have been made, Zack Snyder’s telling of the classic superhero’s origins, despite some good touches, never coheres into a unified whole.
MY RATING: 
SYNOPSIS: Kryptonian scientist Jor-El sends his only son to Earth as his own world perishes. The boy grows to manhood and learns of his identity and extraordinary powers as a renegade general from his home planet demands his surrender.
MY REVIEW:
PROS: Good cast, with strong performances by Russell Crowe and Amy Adams; incredible rendering of Krypton; small, standout scenes.
CONS: Muddy, redundant script; too much action; too little character development, with the main characters underfinished; a major change in the title character that goes against his primary image.
How might some of your favorite films looked if the Dark Knight starred in them?
Watch this video to find out!
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I found the first Hobbit film to be enjoyable, if a bit too long. After watching the trailer for part 2, I’m left to wonder what extra stuff Jackson has added to pad this out to get to film three. Sure it looks good, but I bet we get to Smaug at the end, right before the credits roll. I may or may not go see this in theater, thought I think it will look best on the big screen.
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2013 is a hot year for science fiction films: Star Trek Into Darkness, Man of Steel, Iron Man 3, Pacific Rim, Oblivion, Ender’s Game, World War Z, and many more.
Here’s a simple 7-question meme, mostly about 2013 SciFi films.
Paste these questions in the comments and tell us your answers…
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Man of Steel is just around the corner. What better reason to remember exactly why the franchise needed a reboot!
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The Hollywood Reporter reports that Lauren Beukes’ new time-travel thriller The Shining Girls has been acquired by MRC and Leonardo DiCaprio’s Appian Way for the purposes of a television adaptation.
The Shining Girls releases today, but already it’s been generating buzz on Summertime reading lists. (I included it in my own list of June SF/F picks at Kirkus Reviews Blog). It tells the story of a serial killer who escapes the authorities using time travel, at least until one of his victims survives and begins to figure out the truth.
[via Giant Freakin Robot]
With apologies to Patrick Hester, who I know for a fact loves this film. Seriously. Total fanboy.
I love this series of videos…
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Although not re-enacted by bunnies, this 60-second, hand-drawn recap of Aliens is nonetheless fun.
The Congress is a film based on Stanislaw Lem’s novel The Futurological Congress. I say based, because the plot of the book, as given by Amazon, and the synopsis of the film share similar themes, but that’s about it:
Robin Wright, playing the role of herself, gets an offer from a major studio to sell her cinematic identity: she’ll be numerically scanned and sampled so that her alias can be used with no restrictions in all kinds of Hollywood films – even the most commercial ones that she previously refused. In exchange she receives loads of money, but more importantly, the studio agrees to keep her digitalized character forever young – for all eternity – in all of their films.
The contract is for 250 years and the movie is about what happens after the contract is over as Ms. Wright attempts to make her acting comeback. Apparently that involves a lot trippy, seemingly LSD-induced animated sequences that would do PKD and Richard Linklater proud. I have no idea what the #$^@$%&% is going on here, but it sure looks intriguing.
The Cosmonaut is a crowdsourced film that dramatizes the events surrounding the first Russian cosmonaut sent on a mission to the Moon, who winds up going missing.
You can watch the first scene of the fil right here…
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Man, the Empire simply does not like the Federation…
Some great imagery in this video set over the skies of San Francisco…
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REVIEW SYNOPSIS: Though it starts strongly, the sophomore journey of the fresh-faced crew of the starship Enterprise covers too little new ground.
MY REVIEW:
SYNOPSIS: When a rogue Starfleet agent attacks a secret archive, Captain James T. Kirk is tasked with hunting him down and terminating him.
MY REVIEW:
PROS: Good opening sequence; strong interaction between Kirk and Spock; good turns by Karl Urban and John Cho.
CONS: Anemic, especially in its revelations; far too derivative of the previous movie; laughable emotional sequences; action scenes that drag on far too long.
Star Trek Into Darkness, director J. J. Abrams’s follow-up to 2009’s Star Trek, is everything its predecessor was, only too much more so. This isn’t necessarily a good thing, though several good things work in its favor. Abrams’s gamble with making over Gene Roddenberry’s classic space opera with a new perspective on a much-beloved universe and fresh faces on seasoned characters reaped a handsome payoff, though astute audience members wondered if he could sustain what often seemed a one-picture trick. They had a right to question how a crop of young actors possibly could play roles so identified with elder thespians that they wove their dramatic tics into the fabric of their characters. Loyal fans, by contrast, knowing the full future history of the United Federation of Planets and the floor plans of the NCC-1701 U.S.S. Enterprise down to the last rivet, expressed honest trepidation at possible revisions to Roddenberry’s timeline, to say nothing of its philosophical underpinnings. The resulting Star Trek was an entertaining if occasionally brainless affair, balancing well the expectations of both a summer movie crowd and faithful Trekkers despite dangling plot lines and scientific rationales bent into configurations that would snap the most pliable rubber.
But it worked even after the novelty wore off, and proffered challenges for a sequel. Could Abrams and company make a follow-up that was less cluttered with the need to make the new timeline work and more focused on the things that made Roddenberry’s utopian vision compelling—namely, character and story?
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PleaseDontSuck, pleaseDontSuck, pleaseDontSuck…
Vin Diesel is back. And if that doesn’t scare you, maybe the new trailer for Riddick will. It seems like it has more in common with Pitch Black than it does with The Chronicles of Riddick.
Prepare for the latest chapter of the groundbreaking saga that began with 2000′s hit sci-fi film Pitch Black and 2004′s The Chronicles of Riddick.
The infamous Riddick has been left for dead on a sun-scorched planet that appears to be lifeless. Soon, however, he finds himself fighting for survival against alien predators more lethal than any human he’s encountered.
The only way off is for Riddick to activate an emergency beacon and alert mercenaries who rapidly descend to the planet in search of their bounty.
If IMDB is to be believed, Gravity is Alfonso Cuaron’s first film on the big screen since 2006′s excellent Children of Men. The teaser for Gravity, starring Sandra Bullock and George Clooney, came out a few days ago and I’ve watched it a couple of times since then. I’m not sure what to think. Here’s the synopsis:
Academy award winners Sandra Bullock and George Clooney star in “Gravity,” a heart-pounding thriller that pulls you into the infinite and unforgiving realm of deep space. The film was directed by Oscar nominee Alfonso Cuarón. Bullock plays Dr. Ryan Stone, a brilliant medical engineer on her first shuttle mission, with veteran astronaut Matt Kowalsky in command of his last flight before retiring. But on a seemingly routine spacewalk, disaster strikes. The shuttle is destroyed, leaving Stone and Kowalsky completely alone—tethered to nothing but each other and spiraling out into the blackness. The deafening silence tells them they have lost any link to earth…and any chance for rescue. As fear turns to panic, every gulp of air eats away at what little oxygen is left. But the only way home may be to go further out into the terrifying expanse of space.
Simon Pegg and Nick Frost are back again, this time to comedizice what appears to be an alien invasion in The World’s End. Will this film do for alien invasions what Shaun of the Dead did for the zombie apocalypse? Will the trailer reveal all the funny parts and leave the film with 2 hours of boringness? You decide!
Synopsis:
In The World’s End, 20 years after attempting an epic pub crawl, five childhood friends reunite when one of them becomes hellbent on trying the drinking marathon again. They are convinced to stage an encore by Gary King (Simon Pegg), a 40-year-old man trapped at the cigarette end of his teens, who drags his reluctant pals to their hometown and once again attempts to reach the fabled pub – The World’s End. As they attempt to reconcile the past and present, they realize the real struggle is for the future, not just theirs but humankind’s. Reaching The World’s End is the least of their worries.
