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Picture of the Day: May 15, 2012 [Picture Of The Day]

Tue, 15 May 2012 17:30:00 PDT

THE ARTIFICIAL FIREFLIES OF SUMMER | In Tokyo, the traditional Sumida River fireworks displays were supplemented with this gorgeous display of 100,000 LED "fireflies," all solar-powered, drifting on the river. Photo courtesy of Tokyo Hotaru Festival.

Leonard Nimoy wanted to play the villain in Star Trek V [Star Trek]

Charlie Jane Anders — Tue, 15 May 2012 16:30:00 PDT

What would Star Trek V have been like if Leonard Nimoy had played both Spock and his misguided brother Sybok? Answer: Probably still pretty terrible, all other things being equal. More »

New Magic the Gathering Art Is Sumptuous Eye Candy [Concept Art]

Annalee Newitz — Tue, 15 May 2012 16:05:51 PDT

Artist Winona Nelson took our breath away with the designs for some new Magic the Gathering cards. More »

Eureka goes all in with the body-swapping craziness [Tv Recap]

Alasdair Wilkins — Tue, 15 May 2012 15:51:03 PDT

Yesterday's Eureka was the most fun (non-animated) episode of the show in ages, as weird spikes in Sheriff Carter's brain made him swap bodies with the rest of the cast. The results were equal parts funny, disturbing, and weirdly poignant. More »

Wild trailers for ABC's new TV shows include evil Nazi babies and green aliens! [Video]

Meredith Woerner — Tue, 15 May 2012 15:20:18 PDT

Earlier today ABC announced that it would be adding three new genre shows: 666 Park Avenue, Zero Hour, and The Neighbors to their line-up next year. And now we've got the sizzle reels for each show. We're completely blown away by the evil Nazi baby, and the look of the aliens in The Neighbors! Watch them all, right here. More »

Doctor Who corsets and Lolita skirts set our double hearts aflutter [Sci Fashion]

Annalee Newitz — Tue, 15 May 2012 15:20:00 PDT

Over on Etsy, London fashion designer Rae has created the ultimate Doctor Who fetish outfits. Using her own designs, she's whipped up Lolita skirts, bow ties, and a corset from cute Who-themed fabrics. These are just three of the confections she has on offer — check out Rae's store Corset Wonderland to see the whole collection. And if you want to order one, now's the time. Rae's about to head back to school for a master's degree, so send her your measurements now and you'll have the ultimate outfit in time for Comic-Con. More »

Chronicle's Josh Trank: Being able to tell a compelling story is the rarest special effect [Chronicle]

Charlie Jane Anders — Tue, 15 May 2012 15:15:26 PDT

Chronicle was one of the freshest movies we've seen this year so far, with its telekinetic teens going off the rails. This superpowered "found footage" movie comes out on DVD today, so we were excited to talk to director Josh Trank. More »

A 73-Year-Old Man Tried to Assassinate JFK with a Buick Full of Dynamite [Secret History]

Keith Veronese — Tue, 15 May 2012 14:54:05 PDT

Weeks after John Fitzgerald Kennedy beat Richard Nixon in the 1960 United States presidential election, an elderly man nearly killed the President-Elect. More »

Incredible videos recreate Isaac Newton's experiments with alchemy [Video]

Annalee Newitz — Tue, 15 May 2012 14:30:00 PDT

You may be familiar with Isaac Newton from such inventions as calculus and the law of universal gravitation. What you may not know is that he was also an avid "chymist," or alchemist. In fact, Newton actually wrote roughly a million words about alchemy and his experiments with it — as University of Indiana science historian William Newman has noted, Newton probably spent more time doing alchemy than he did on any of his other scientific pursuits. More »

Meet a few of the 100-trillion lifeforms that call your body "home" [Biology]

Robert T. Gonzalez — Tue, 15 May 2012 13:42:06 PDT

Scientific American is hosting a great interactive web applet that introduces you to the microorganisms that treat the various nooks, crannies, tissues and organs of our bodies like so many different ecosystems. More »

Time-lapse video shows a trailer-sized asteroid coming between Earth and the Moon [Video]

Charlie Jane Anders — Tue, 15 May 2012 13:33:00 PDT

NASA released this amazing video that shows just how close the 43-foot asteroid 2012 JU came to Earth the other day — within 118,000 miles, or about half the distance to our own Moon. It's amazing to think that an object can come from near Mars in February and come so close to us, just a few months later. Video: NASA/JPL. More »

New Prometheus TV spot shows the many ways this crew is doomed! [Prometheus]

Meredith Woerner — Tue, 15 May 2012 13:22:27 PDT

This is by far the most gruesome — and spoiler-filled — trailer for Ridley Scott's Prometheus yet. We're talking full-on carnage, and some glimpses of crazy easter eggs to go with that big Easter Island head. Feast your eyes on the dark horror that awaits this crew — including a couple animated GIFs! More »

Why does the world's oldest cave art show a vagina? [Archaeology]

Robert T. Gonzalez — Tue, 15 May 2012 12:52:01 PDT

By now you've probably heard: a team of archaeologists has discovered what appear to be engravings of "vulvar representations" on the walls of a cave in southern France. More »

Battleship: An Important Document in the Future Field of Peter David Novelization Studies [Book Review]

Charlie Jane Anders — Tue, 15 May 2012 12:45:36 PDT

Peter David isn't just a prolific contributor to comics, novels, television and various other media, he's also a huge player in the field of movie novelizations. (As opposed to media tie-in novels, which he also casts a massive shadow in.) One day, future scholars will study the novelizations of Peter David, with elective courses in "The Embedded Ironies in David's Novelization of Ang Lee's Hulk.") And when scholars pore over David's novelizations for signs of Peter David's distinctive voice seamlessly integrating with whatever Hollywood archetypes he's dealing with this time around, they'll find his novelization of Battleship an important cornerstone. More »

The lost art of sculpting cathedrals out of lard [Retro Future]

Cyriaque Lamar — Tue, 15 May 2012 12:25:00 PDT

From bacon suits to flying buttresses made of dead hog. Here are some panels from Otto F. Fleiss' floridly titled pamphlet (deep breath) White Art in the Meat Food Business. A Practical Handbook for Butcher, Pork Stores, Restaurants, Hotels and Delicatessens on How to Make Lasting and Transferable White Art Decorations out of Bacon Fat Back for Window Displays, Ornaments on Meat Food Cold Buffets and for Exhibits and Advertising Purposes. Enrich yourself with Personal Knowledge. More »

The physics of wine bottle opening [Video]

Esther Inglis-Arkell — Tue, 15 May 2012 12:21:55 PDT

Did you know that you can open a bottle of wine by whacking it against a wall? If you've read Lifehacker, you know it's possible. But what about the physics behind this phenomenon? Let's talk about why gas in the bottle pops the cork, even if the alcohol isn't champagne. More »

ABC's Fall Schedule: Wacky Aliens and a Magical Apartment Building [The Neighbors]

Meredith Woerner — Tue, 15 May 2012 12:20:43 PDT

We'd been keeping our fingers crossed that ABC would pick up Jessica Jones, the noirish superhero show based on Brian Bendis' amazing comic. But ABC passed on Jessica, and instead we're getting Terry O' Quinn in 666 Park Avenue, a conspiracy theory drama, and a disconcerting comedy about alien neighbors. More »

A brilliant, satirical indie flick about the future of dead-end jobs [Video]

Annalee Newitz — Tue, 15 May 2012 11:16:53 PDT

Last week marked the debut of Jim Munroe's latest indie flick, Ghosts with Shit Jobs, at the Sci-Fi London Film Festival. It played to a rapturous, sold-out crowd, and for good reason: As one of the festival organizers said, it's rare to see really smart, biting science fiction satire these days. Made for a budget of $5,000 by a group of filmmakers in Canada, written by Munroe (Infest Wisely), this movie is a weird, sad look at digital drudgery in Toronto after the economy collapses. More »

How a newborn baby saved Toy Story 2 from being lost forever [Video]

Robert T. Gonzalez — Tue, 15 May 2012 10:40:00 PDT

When an accidental computer command starting wiping animation data from the drive where Toy Story 2's files were kept, a year's worth of work was erased in a matter of seconds. More »

In this week's comics, it's the BPRD and Ed Brubaker writing the post-apocalypse [Comics We Crave]

Cyriaque Lamar — Tue, 15 May 2012 10:25:00 PDT

What's on the stands this week? First off, there's Dark Horse's new miniseries BPRD: Hell On Earth - Devil's Engine... More »

10 Best Time Travel Movies of All Timelines [Daily 10]

Charlie Jane Anders — Tue, 15 May 2012 10:00:00 PDT

Some day, people from the distant future will travel back to our era and inform us that science has conclusively identified the best movies about time travel. Until then, though, we're forced to make our own judgements. Luckily, there are a few time-travel movies that have rocked our space/time continuums more than any others. More »

How do we measure the vast distances of the Universe? [Video]

Robert T. Gonzalez — Tue, 15 May 2012 09:55:00 PDT

Space, as we all know, is big. In fact, it's more than big; it's vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big. More »

The first footage from Do No Harm, NBC's Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde show [Video]

Meredith Woerner — Tue, 15 May 2012 09:50:00 PDT

Oh man, Do No Harm looks ridiculous in an awesomely cheeseball way. NBC has revamped the classic horror tale of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde with kind, good-looking Dr. Jason Cole, who hides a sex maniac named Ian Price inside of him. More »

The curious case of the vulgar C-3PO trading card [Video]

Cyriaque Lamar — Tue, 15 May 2012 08:45:00 PDT

The Star Wars films have become such cultural touchstones that even the most arcane background minutiae are subjected to intense fan scrutiny. More »

Help the New York Times find a better superpower metaphor [Internet]

Julian Whitcrosse — Tue, 15 May 2012 08:20:00 PDT

Over the weekend, New York Times tech reporter Nick Bilton posted an article about how Facebook can use its deep integration with other sites and apps (through Facebook Connect, the Open Graph developer platform, and Like buttons) to detect what's happening on the Internet before anyone else. "Facebook is more tapped into the pulse of people online than any company on the planet," he wrote. More »

This photograph of a truck isn't what it seems [Concept Art]

Annalee Newitz — Tue, 15 May 2012 07:40:00 PDT

This is not a truck. Adam Makarenko creates slightly paranormal stories using photographs of meticulously-crafted miniatures. Here you're peeking at part of a tale that dreamily evokes a beehive's life. First, the bees are stacked in their boxes on the back of a truck — transported to a new home. Later, they join the ecosystem in a place that's full of bears. You can see a lot more of Makarenko's work on his website. More »

4 minutes from The Amazing Spider-Man show off Peter Parker's new attitude [Video]

Meredith Woerner — Tue, 15 May 2012 07:15:00 PDT

One thing that has us excited about Marc Webb's new Spider-Man flick is the promise of a smart-ass Peter Parker, and this new four-minute clip displays that humor. Plus, here's another clip that shows the actual transformation of Dr. Curt Connors. Fingers and reptile tails crossed! More »

Your body's internal clock is at war with society [Video]

Robert T. Gonzalez — Tue, 15 May 2012 07:05:00 PDT

Just because you sleep later than your early rising friends doesn't mean you sleep longer than they do; nor does it make you lazier. And yet, the association between the time of day that a person wakes up and how proactive or driven they are is just one example of the many preconceptions that society upholds regarding sleep and productivity. More »

Feast your eyes on the greatest bacon costume of 1894 [Secret History]

Cyriaque Lamar — Tue, 15 May 2012 06:40:00 PDT

In the introduction of his seminal 1917 pork products treatise Bacon and Hams, author and smoked swine maven George J. Nicholls included this photo of himself "in fancy dress as a side of bacon." The costume was so smashing that it won him no less than forty guineas. More »

Jon Favreau explains how Iron Man 3 is different. Plus Leonard Nimoy and Peter Weller talk Star Trek 2! [Video]

Alasdair Wilkins — Tue, 15 May 2012 06:00:00 PDT

Idris Elba confirms he will be back for Thor 2. Does the Prometheus soundtrack listing reveal major plot points? Alfonso Cuaron's Gravity gets delayed. A Robert Heinlein classic is getting adapted. Plus what's ahead on the next season of The Vampire Diaries! More »

Printed books existed nearly 600 years before Gutenberg's Bible [Secret History]

Annalee Newitz — Mon, 14 May 2012 20:45:37 PDT

It is a little-known but undisputed historical fact that Johannes Gutenberg did not invent the printing press. Though the Gutenberg Bible was certainly the first mass produced printed work, it was hardly the first printed book — nor was it even the first made using movable type. Chinese and Korean inventors had been producing printed books for centuries before Gutenberg was born. More »

Once Upon A Time's Season Finale: This Changes Everything [Video]

Meredith Woerner — Mon, 14 May 2012 18:11:26 PDT

After a few slow weeks, last night Once Upon A Time finally let all its cats out of the bag and then chased them around town with a vacuum. So let's break this mother down, because we have a lot of convenient ground to cover. More »

Picture of the Day: May 14, 2012 [Picture Of The Day]

Mon, 14 May 2012 18:03:34 PDT

SPEND A DAY IN ORBIT AROUND JUPITER | "Sunrise on Io," concept art by Ron Miller. This is just the first image in a gallery tracking what an entire day would look like from Jupiter's moon Io.

Neal Adams to draw The First X-Men, a miniseries starring Wolverine and a Nazi-hunting Magneto [X-men]

Cyriaque Lamar — Mon, 14 May 2012 16:10:00 PDT

Forty-odd years ago, Neal Adams was having the time of his life illustrating Roy Thomas' scripts for The Uncanny X-Men, only to see the comic almost immediately canceled. More »

Experience one (spectacular) day in orbit around Jupiter [Space Porn]

Ron Miller — Mon, 14 May 2012 15:29:26 PDT

Io keeps the same face toward Jupiter as it orbits the planet. For this reason, Jupiter appears to hang motionless in Io's sky. Just as the Earth's Moon does, Jupiter goes through phases as Io orbits it. Here's a gallery showing the view from a location in the northern hemisphere during the course of a single day. It's the kind of view future colonists might take for granted, but it's still pretty incredible for those of us who've only ever experienced days on Earth. More »

This movie looks like it might freak you right out of your skin [Video]

Charlie Jane Anders — Mon, 14 May 2012 14:43:43 PDT

Beyond The Black Rainbow, in select theaters this Friday, looks like the weirdest frigging movie in ages. Just check out these two exclusive stills, plus the bizarre, loopy trailer. It's a huge tribute to 1970s and early 1980s pop culture, set in a distorted version of 1983. More »

You won't have to complain about Fox cancelling your favorite science fiction shows any more [Television]

Charlie Jane Anders — Mon, 14 May 2012 14:24:54 PDT

People always complain about Fox pulling the plug on their most beloved science fiction TV shows, from Firefly to Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. The thing they always forget is that Fox also took a chance on some risky genre projects, which is why it had those favorite shows to cancel in the first place. More »

Predictions for the future that will inspire you [Futurism]

Robert T. Gonzalez — Mon, 14 May 2012 14:16:05 PDT

The folks over at Steelcase have been asking everyone from school children to journalists to technological innovators to discuss their predictions for the next hundred years. The responses have been excellent. More »