Horror is a good portion of my day job. As the host of PseudoPod, one of the first original genre fiction podcasts, every week my job is simple; get on stage, introduce a nightmare and then once its done talk about why and how it works. Its a little like Tony Stark’s amazing holographic work …
The Alien franchise has always been weird. The first three movies especially throw everything at the screen and see what gets woven into a nest using some kind of secretive resin. Space truckers in Hell, the best Starship Troopers movie before the Starship Troopers movie and an entire generation of Brit character actors shaving their …
This piece originally appeared as part of my weekly newsletter, The Full Lid. If you liked it, and want a weekly down of pop culture enthusiasm, occasional ketchup recipes and me enjoying things, then check out the archive and sign up here. So I’m massively excited by the new Discovery trailer. Not just because it’s full …
Having celebrated another circuit around the Sun last week, the traditional gift card frenzy has occurred. This time they turned into Deadpool 2, some silicon donut pans (Results coming soon!) and the complete Community on DVD. The show follows Jeff Winger, a disgraced lawyer forced to go to community college (‘I thought you had a law degree from …
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BODFwE-Tiz4] It has been my absolute joy to know both of these glorious nerds for my entire adult life. Andy and Arron are massively funny, endlessly enthusiastic and SmorgasPod is a lot like spending time inside their heads. Pop culture enthusiasm of every stripe mixed with razor-sharp and precisely absurd Yorkshire wit. Their youtube …
Working in comics and pop culture journalism is, at times, a lot like writing in sand. You’re trained to respond on a daily or weekly news cycle, too often you chase clicks rather than context and the attention economy means that the in-depth approach some material demands is the last thing it gets. Tripwire …
After the War, the tabletop RPG I’ve been developing for the last couple of years with the amazing Jason Pitre, is crowdfunding as we speak/read/type! As part of the project, I’ll be posting regular essays about the background and design over the next month. Starfleet’s Worst Day Let’s plot some cultural compass points and let’s …
Here are some things that have happened in the last six months: –Chelsea Cain, already harassed out of one book for daring to be a woman with both opinions and a pulse, has her comeback book at Marvel cancelled out from under her before it was even released. Or promoted. –Marv Wolfman and George Perez aren’t mentioned …
Stan Lee’s cameo in Runaway, courtesy of EW I am 12 years old and I’m ill. I’m sitting in the back of my mum’s car, waiting for her and my dad to finish shopping. I’ve got the same cold I will have for the next two years, I’m tired, I’m sore. I feel every inch …