What are the best new science fiction movies across the globe? The panel will make its recommendations, and you, the audience, can add more. This is a chance to contribute to watch lists for the 2022 Hugo Awards.
Cowboy Bebop and Dune are back on screens but it’s not 1965, 1984, or 1998. Is it that everything old is new again, or is space opera just a genre that keeps on giving? If E.E. “Doc” Smith’s The Skylark of Space is the root of the tree and Asimov’s Foundation series is the trunk,… Continue reading The Phylogenetic Tree of Space Opera
The pandemic has left many of us looking for even more streaming and network shows than before. We’ll discuss the biggest hits, our favorites, and shows we wish had gone differently. From adaptations of classics to the next new hotness, anything goes!
Superheroes can mean something very different to members of marginalized communities than they do to members of a dominant culture. How do the dynamics of a superpower fantasy change when the hero is a member of an oppressed group?
Why is Lt. Uhura’s costume at the National Museum of African-American History and Culture? How did the National Air and Space Museum come to display both the 11-foot studio model of Star Trek‘s Starship Enterprise and a full-size T-70 X-wing vehicle from Star Wars? Join Dr. Margaret Weitekamp, a curator and the chair of the… Continue reading Space Science Fiction at the Smithsonian
Jordan Peele’s Get Out brought psychological horror movies to the forefront again, pulling audiences back to the quieter side of horror. But it is not new. The 70s and 80s were a slasher movie fan’s dream period, but also had a fair amount of psychological horror: The Omen, The Exorcist, Angel Heart, and Jacob’s Ladder,… Continue reading The Resurrection of Psychological Horror
Why is it so difficult to come up with an ending for a long-running TV or film series that satisfies fans, creators, and critics? Do finales fall apart because writers try too hard to please everyone? Panelists will discuss endings that weren’t satisfying, why they didn’t work, and what could have been done differently.
Television and film make detectives and forensic scientists into superheroes. But how much can you really tell from a grainy video, fingerbone, or scrap of fabric? How accurate are the super-science labs portrayed in shows like Bones and CSI? Panelists separate the science from the fiction in film, TV, and video game crime procedurals.
Orphan Black, a show following the struggles of a group of clone sisters, was a great show with a small audience. This panel will celebrate its themes, science, and characterizations. Just don’t talk about Clone Club…
The good, the great, and the just plain weird. Writers, editors and filmmakers talk about works they love from Africa—novels, films, comics, and literary gossip mags.
