Join us for the inaugural episode of our new live podcast Eff This Week tomorrow, Thursday August 25th. We kick off the show at 9:00 p.m. central time, streaming it live via UStream. We’ll interact with the audience as well, both via the UStream text chat and via Twitter. If you’re on a Flash-capable device or computer, you can listen to the stream and participate in the chat directly via our live page, and mobile users can listen to the stream via the UStream app, available for both iOS and Android. Even if you can’t make the ‘cast, you can still communicate directly with the hosts by tweeting with the hashtag #gwclive. We’ll be watching the stream.
Eff This Week will be a (mostly) weekly podcast about, well, nothing at all. We’re going to crack open the mics live and let you see a little bit of what goes on when we’re not recording. We might discuss some of the news from GWC, or we might just tear off on who knows what. Hell, suggest something via Twitter or chat during the ‘cast and we might just pick it up and run with it. Either way, we’re looking forward to it.
If you miss the live version (doh!) we’ll release the recorded ‘cast via the standard methods (our site and iTunes) a few days later.
Hope to see you there!
The blurry photo above is making the rounds today, proving that the promo photo (currently shown on the new movie’s IMDb page) isn’t a fluke: Superman is indeed losing his red briefs — or at least wearing them on the inside — just like he did a while back in the comics.
As you might imagine, this has created quite a buzz among aficionados. Change scares the hell out of fans, but it’s not all negative talk. Hell, it’s not even the first costume change for the Man of Steel in recent years. As RoboticJesus points out over on ComicVine, Supes wore jeans and boots once. And he’s a character that response well to change. What do you think?
(via @TheOperatorGWC)
This, folks, is just seriously awesome: OK GO takes on the Muppet Show theme. Yes, that’s every bit as cool as you’d imagine, complete with lots of Muppet references (“OK GO and the Muppets? That sounds pretty exciting. Let’s watch cat videos.”) and even a nice OK GO treadmill in-joke.
The vid promotes The Green Album, a set of twelve Muppet tunes performed by pop artists like Weezer, The Fray, and My Morning Jacket. Released yesterday, it’s available digitally and in CD form now. How cool is that?
The Green Album [Muppet Wiki]
Via Amazon
(via @TheOperatorGWC)
You need, physically need to check out NBC’s hit show Community. It’s awesome. Fans will recognize the Spanish motto as well as lots of other Greendale in-references. This shirt is full of win.
Greendale [TeeFury, link expires 8/23/2011]
Last year I wrote about this amazing SyFy show that debuted in July 2010 set in a quaint Northeastern coastal town called Haven. Based loosely on Stephen King’s The Colorado Kid, this show continues to amaze and captivate me. It’s a well put together story with great acting and, as Chuck often puts it, “a lot of heart.”
But Haven’s got troubles. No, not the kind that face Eureka (or any Fox show). Haven’s residents are somehow bestowed with special powers — powers that laid dormant but recently returned. Together these powers are called “the troubles.” But what are these troubles exactly? Who or what is causing them? And more importantly: what could ultimately quiet the troubles?
How was the universe created? What would an alien invasion be like? Why do people like sex? It almost sounds like any given GWC podcast. In fact, if you put GWC on TV with amazing special effects as well as international expert guest hosts like Stephen Hawking, NASA experts, and Hollywood stars like Michelle Rodriguez, you’d have the new Discovery Channel program called Curiosity: The Questions of Life.
Collider reported this week that MGM hired Noah Oppenheim to pen the forthcoming WarGames update, with Seth Gordon to direct. Oppenheim is a bit of a question mark as a screenwriter. His IMDb page lists producer credits (Losing It with Jillian, Today, Hardball with Chris Matthews), but no completed screenwriting gigs — though Collider reports he’s working with Spielberg and other big-name producers at present. Gordon recently directed Horrible Bosses, and offered Collider some insight into his WarGames take:
“I love the original. I’m a bit of a hacker fanatic, and know a fair bit about that industry and cyber crime and cyber warfare. I have a real point-of-view on the material and how things have changed. And also, I think the politics of the world have changed in really fascinating ways since 1983. There’s no longer a monolithic evil empire somewhere, spreading a different philosophy of life. That doesn’t exist. It’s a much more complicated, nuanced, political world we’re in, and I think that actually makes for a more interesting plot to tell. Frankly, cyber attack is a lot more real.”
If you’d asked me five years ago, I’d have wholeheartedly agreed with the idea that warfare has gone entirely unconventional: that we no longer live in a world of large empires battling as much as we do a world of large empires struggling to retain their stability among many smaller factions fighting to destroy it. And I’d say that’s still true when it comes to guns-and-bullets warfare. But cyber warfare seems like a different story.
The Oxford English Dictionary is, well, the single standard reference of the English language. Printed, it comprises a 20 volume set that pretty much demands its own bookcase. The one pictured above is Audra’s copy, the “compact edition,” which literally compresses nine pages of the big version onto each single 11-1/4″ by 17.5″ page, resulting in a single massive tome weighing in at around 12 pounds. The OED really shines online, though, where it receives updates every three months. And the last few updates have been quite geek friendly, including words like “woot,” “follower,” “retweet,” “auto-complete,” and even “sexting.”
It’s a science fiction staple: Earth’s first interstellar missions (assuming we’re not contacted by some advanced race) begin with “generation” ships — spacecraft that travel at low, sub-light speeds, traveling to the closest stars over two or three lifetimes. Those who initially crew the departing ship will never reach the destination, but their descendants will. Now sci-fi fantasy takes the first step toward reality: The the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (you know, the people who bring you the Grand Challenges and the 2005 Challenge winner, the famous Stanford U team’s Stanley autonomous vehicle) are hosting a symposium this fall to identify and quantify the issues behind a “100 year starship.”
Though the BluRays don’t release until September 16th, Twentieth Century Fox released an iPad app which they claim offers “a varied sampling of bonus materials featured in the collection including never-before-seen content sourced from the Lucasfilm archives.” Admittedly, it seems that all the cool stuff in the app will be available on the BluRays when they hit shelves. So if you’re planning to buy them maybe it makes sense to just wait. But if you’re not planning to spring for the new collection, this might give you a bit of fun — for a hell of a lot less cash. In fact, it’s free.
Fans at last week’s Las Vegas Star Trek convention got a bit of a shocker from Walter Koenig. His quote (via TrekMovie.com):
“[J. Michael Staczynski] told me that he is in negotiations to re-acquire the rights to Babylon 5 and it looks pretty good. Now what that portends I am not entirely sure. It could be a new series or it could be a feature film, but he was quite animated about it. He seemed very excited and Warner Brothers is dealing with him in good faith. So you might see another Babylon 5 in the not too distant future.”
So maybe there’s reason for B5 fans to get excited after all. Or maybe not. Straczynski is denying the rumors. “Walter misspoke,” he told Spinoff Online, “I am not in negotiations with WB to develop more Babylon 5.”
Earlier this year Warner Bros’ Alcon entertainment made entertainment news headlines by acquiring the “film, television and ancillary” rights to Blade Runner sequels, firing up the rumor mill with possibilities of new Blade Runner content — though not a remake/re-boot as “Alcon’s franchise rights would be all-inclusive, but exclude rights to remake the original.” Fans much lamented the possibility of a Scott-free ‘Runner future. Weep no more, though: Today Alcon announced that Ridley Scott will helm the next Blade Runner.
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