A complete version of the first epic science fiction film, Fritz Lang’s Metropolis has turned up 80 years after it was last seen - in a museum in Argentina!
(Who knows, maybe Hitler is still hanging out down there too… Is it safe?)
Apparently it contains explanations for the bits in the film that don’t make sense in current cuts.
Now we just have to wait for the release of the DVD.
Comments(0) Because, seriously, if anyone reading this is going and has the chance to buy a special edition, Comic Con attendee only…
(That’s right, Universal are doing a limited run BSG Toaster!!!)
…then please, for the love of god, get one for me too. I will pay whatever it costs, postage, the whole nine yards.
This might be the best piece of merchandising I’ve ever seen. And I love me my puns. Now help me frakking own one!
Comments(0) Of Cemetery Dance issue 58 - the magazine wasn’t quite what I was expecting.
I’m currently just scribbling some film reviews for Matrix - my article on steampunk movies is due up there soon.
Then I’ve got some Orbiter reviews to do.
Then some writing.
Then I promise I’ll blog something significant.
Comments(0) Haven’t been here for a while - insanely busy with union annual conference and ludcrously tight magazine deadline…
Anyway, I’m working on a couple of longer pieces which I hope will get up soon.
In the meantime, The Stage is posting this news about Stephen Moffat being appointed “lead writer and executive producer” of Dr Who - taking over from RT Davies. I’ve never been one of those people who were highly critical of Davies, but if he was going, this is surely the best possible replacement?
Comments(0) Illuminations got reviewed at The Fix - under the circumstances the reviewer did a pretty good technical job of completing the review of an assignment I’d have hated.
He’s pretty tough on our little project (but fair, and his criticisms are solidly supported) though he finds quite a lot to like. I’m not going to get into the game of arguing with a reviewer - I’ve had the boot on the other foot too often (obviously when he talked about the bits he liked about my contributions he was very perceptive, wise even, and when he talked about the bits he didn’t like he was an ignoramus who deserved to be boiled in oil) but I would point out in editor Paul Raven’s defence that one of the decisions we made early on was to publish the stories without too much extra polishing (hence quite a few grammar nits surviving into the printed version) as partly it is supposed to reflect the quick, almost disposable nature of the FFF experiment. Perhaps we should have made that clearer in the introductions.
You can buy copies of Illuminations from our website (www.oddtwoout.co.uk) or order it from any bookshop in the UK using the handy-dandy ISBN978-0955866203 - you can even see the cover (and hopefully soon some content) at Amazon (though despite several pokes they’re still showing it as available only for pre-order).
Still, proving that there’s no such thing as bad publicity, the review has brought in a little flurry of sales in the last 24 hours - for which I’m grateful to Alvaro (the reviewer), Eugie (The Fix’s inestimable editor) and, of course, to the folks who put their money down.
Comments(0) So the past week or so have been a bit of a write off - insanely busy at work last week before discovering that a friend had died suddenly. I hadn’t seen him for a while, but I still felt like we had a lot of stuff still to do together and I’d just been trying to organise a get-together when the news arrived.
I still don’t quite believe it. The weekend was a horrible daze.
And, while it’s a minor matter in comparison, I’m dosed with something truly horrible which is making me feel like shit all day and stopping me sleeping at night in case I drown in my own mucus.
Yes, I’m feeling sorry for myself.
Comments(2) Well, it’s taken a while (I first sold the story when The Hub was still a print magazine (in fact I think I sold the story before the first issue even appeared) but 50 issues on, “Home Protection” is finally out in this week’s issue of The Hub.
Read it.
Enjoy it (I hope).
Tell the editor you thought it was great.
Donate a little bit of cash to the magazine.
Comments(2) But how can you have even a cod (sorry) squidpunk anthology and not include Stephen Baxter? The man practically invented squid in space.
Comments(0) Ignore this, thanks, I’m just checking if my RSS feed is working again.
Comments(1) It started off as a quick test to see what was possible and ended up with a whole new blog… seven hours later, it’s 5:30am and frankly I’m not sure I’ve got a particularly firm grip on reality.
Still the old grey design was getting me down.
Perviously, although I’ve used wordpress to power this blog it was an installation done by my ISP. This was the first time I’ve done an installation from the ground up (well, with some help from Pragya’s Redie template, which I’ve tweaked.
Wordpress is a pretty remarkable piece of software - just fiddling about with this made me realise there’s a hell of a lot a more dedicated programmer could make this thing do.
Anyway, I hope you like the new look - do let me know if you come across broken things.
Bed now. Football later. Reviews to write.
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