Tag: science fiction
-
Larry and Andy Wachowski’s The Matrix (1999) is a science fiction classic. The setting is a devastated Earth in the far future. The premise is that humanity has been enslaved by artificial intelligences. Human beings spend our lives in what are essentially coffins while mechanical vampires drain our energy. We don’t know it, because we are asleep, dreaming that we are in a radically different world. This is the Matrix. Today we would call it a multiplayer online game.
Like many dystopias, The Matrix is actually too optimistic. The Wachowski brothers thought the human race would have to be forced into the pods. (more…)
-
748 words
Before it was overshadowed by social media, click-bait, and online shopping, the internet provided the dawn of the twenty-first century with limitless potential. It’s worth noting that there was a dark side to it as well, and Mark Gullick’s Cherub Valley shows its readers the creepy underbelly of the “invisible world of information.”
The novel takes the genre of techno-dystopia to a whole new level and leads the reader down a rabbit hole they’d surely avoid in the real world. It’s descriptive without being dense with terminology, which is a common flub of science fiction and cyberpunk writers. (more…)
-
Denis Villeneuve’s Dune, Part I is now in theatres. I can’t recommend it. It isn’t terrible. It is merely mediocre. I found it dull to the eyes, grating to the ears, and a drag on my patience. Villeneuve spends 156 minutes and only gets halfway through the novel. David Lynch told the whole story in 137 minutes. Of course audiences are willing to sit through long movies if they are really good: Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy, for instance. But this film isn’t in that league. (more…)
-
“War is a bad thing, but peace can be a living horror.” — Ray Bradbury, “The Concrete Mixer”
I trust I am not alone among Counter-Currents readers in my appreciation for the late Ray Bradbury, my favorite author as a boy. Though Bradbury is often categorized as a science fiction author, his stories are just as suffused with magic and myth as they are with the futuristic technology that so repelled and terrified him. (more…)
-
2,759 words
Czech version here
Every musician that Shostakovich was at the Moscow Conservatory with in one particular year was shot. Every one, on Stalin’s orders. And when he asked . . . why he’d been spared, Stalin said, “Shostakovich can write film music. We need film music. Because we need film. (more…)
-
H. G. Wells is best known for being one of the founding fathers of science fiction, along with his French counterpart Jules Verne. While he was a wordsmith by trade, he had a strong influence on the medium of film almost from the beginning. (more…)
-
Take my love, take my land
Take me where I cannot stand
Burn the land, boil the sea
You cannot take the sky from meSo went the opening theme of Firefly, a boot camp/cowboy song with fiddles and guitars instead of electronic music. In 2002, Firefly was a sci-fi show that led a brief but exciting life, not even completing a full season. (more…)
-
May 18, 2021 Charles Krafft
Robert Stark Interviews Charles Krafft
Editor’s note: This is a transcript of Robert Stark’s July 4, 2016 interview with Charles Krafft. We would like to thank Hyacinth Bouquet for this transcript.
Robert Stark: This is Robert Stark. I am joined here with Charles Krafft. Charles, it is great having you on the show.
Charles Krafft: Well, thank you; and nice to talk to you again, Robert. (more…)
-
Galaxy Quest (1999)
Director: Dean Parisot
Writers: David Howard (story), Robert Gordon, and David Howard (screenplay)
Stars: Tim Allen, Sigourney Weaver, Alan Rickman, Tony Shalhoub, Sam Rockwell, Missi Pyle“It’s really a very sophisticated movie. . .” “. . . with eight-year-old audiences.” (more…)
-
Ray Bradbury’s classic dystopian novel Fahrenheit 451 was first published 68 years ago, and the first film adaptation was produced in 1966, but its messages remain surprisingly relevant today. Although many interpreted it as merely a story about government censorship, Bradbury himself characterized the work as a statement on the dumbing-down effect of television. (more…)
-
A. E. van Vogt
Slan
Sauk City, Wisconsin: Arkham House, 1946
Science fiction writer A. E. van Vogt’s first novel-length work, Slan, became a classic, notable for being a pioneer in the mutant protagonist genre that gave us the X-Men comic book series and its cinematic spinoffs. (more…)
-
4,241 words
Frank Herbert’s Dune (1965) is one of the masterpieces of science fiction, far eclipsing its five sequels in readership and reputation. But I wish to argue that the third and fourth Dune books, Children of Dune (1976) and God Emperor of Dune (1981), are equally audacious works of the imagination. [1] Both volumes tend to be underrated, partly due to the long shadow of Dune, partly because the sheer scope of Herbert’s vision boggles the mind, (more…)