Books, movies, politics, and whatever I want

Monday Book Pick: Time’s Last Gift

Monday, March 18th, 2013

Time’s Last Gift by Philip Jose Farmer

This classic is back in print, so if you haven’t read it yet, go do so! In the not so far future from now, time travel is discovered. You can only travel backwards in time, and there is a limit of how far back you can go. So a team of scientist is sent back as far as possible, to the early days of Homo Sapiens. So far back, North Africa was lush plains and forests. Here is the plot twist, one of the team members is not quite what he presents himself as. He is in fact, much older than his other team members, since he been given the gift of immortality (or an extremely long life span) by a Witch Doctor he saved from a leopard in the African jungles he was born in. If you haven’t guessed who the tall gray eyed ringer is by now, you haven’t read enough Farmer.

Monday Book Pick Archive

Tags: , , , , , ,

Friday B-Movie Pick: Dredd

Friday, February 15th, 2013

Dredd

It’s back to Mega-City One and the world of Judge Dredd. This time it’s with SciFi fan Karl Urban in the lead role instead of Stalone. Urban played this role much truer to form. As in the Comics, you never see Dredd’s face. He always wears the helmet. It’s gritty, dark, nasty, and a lot of fun to watch. The bad guys are bad, the good guys are damn harsh, but fair. In all, a fun ride for fans of gritty SciFi action films.

Friday B-Movie Pick Archive

 

Tags: , , , , ,

Monday Book Pick: The Mad Goblin

Monday, February 4th, 2013

The Mad Goblin by Philip Jose Farmer

I’m seeing a lot of Philip Jose Farmer’s work come back into print, which is a good thing. The Mad Goblin is one of two parallel sequels to A Feast Unknown. This one focuses on James “Doc” Caliban (yes, based on Doc Savage), half brother of the fellow Tarzan was based on. Both are former agents of “The Nine.” A group that discovered the secret to extremely prolonged life thirty thousand years ago and has ruled the Earth from behind the scenes since then. This is adventure pulp at its finest, with Farmer paying tribute to one of his favorite fictional characters.

Monday Book Pick Archive

 

Tags: , , , , , , , ,

Friday B-Movie Pick: Looper

Friday, February 1st, 2013

Looper

A nice SciFi action flick starring Bruce Willis, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Emily Blunt (actually not in a RomCom!) and nicely played role by Jeff Daniels (“Kid, I’m from the future. Trust me, go to China.”) Some folks found the time looping a little hard to follow, but it wasn’t too difficult for those of us who have been watching Doctor Who for the better part of 30 years. For the most part, the acting really helped this flick shine. The story itself was interesting, and it was fun to watch the characters grow when presented with both their past and their future. Definitely worth a rental and popcorn.

Friday B-Movie Archive

Tags: , , , ,

Monday Book Pick: Area 51

Monday, January 21st, 2013

Area 51 by Bob Mayer

The first is a series of ten books (currently). I’ve just read this one, the series intro, and found it fast paced and fun. Now I enjoy a good conspiracy as much as the next person, perhaps more, and this book is based on the infamous Area 51, and throws in Pyramids, the Nazi obsession with the occult, and Ancient Astronauts! A good adventure pulp novel. Looking forward to the rest of the series.

Monday Book Pick Archive

Tags: , , , , ,

Quote of the Day

Tuesday, January 1st, 2013

I made it to 2013 and all I got from the SciFi books of my youth was the lousy dystopian government.

Tags: , , , ,

Friday B-Movie Pick: Total Recall

Friday, December 28th, 2012

Total Recall

Not the Schwarzenegger classic, but the remake that left out Mars entirely. An OK flick if you judge it on its own, but it pales to the original. Not that it didn’t try and it did have some real hat tips to the original. They also roped in the Bladerunner look and feel for the streets of “the colony”, as they were calling Austrilia in the film. There was even a Mr and Mrs Smith reference thrown in. Fun to watch for the fight and chase scenes, as well as the leading lady eye candy factor (Kate Becinsale and Jessica Biel for the double w00t!). Ok for a rental, but not worth the added cost for the less than useless Ultraviolet crap you are forced to pay for in order to get a DVD/BluRay version.

Friday B-Movie Pick Archive

Tags: , , , ,

Friday B-Movie Pick: Genesis of the Daleks

Friday, December 21st, 2012

Doctor Who: Genesis of the Daleks

Reaching back to 1975, we find this classic from the Tom Baker, the 4th Doctor, era. The Time Lords send the Doctor, Sarah and Harry back to the creation of the Doctor’s greatest enemy, the Daleks! It has that low budget mid 70s BBC look, but carries it off well. If you only know the new Doctor series (Numbers 9, 10 and 11), check this out.

Friday B-Movie Archive

Tags: , , , ,

Friday B-Movie Pick: Terminal Invasion

Friday, October 19th, 2012

Terminal Invasion

Bruce Campbell in all his B-Movie glory! Filmed in Canada back in 2002, this low budget beauty co-stars the former ST:DS9 Dabo girl, Chase masterson as the plucky pilot. All the action takes place in a small airport terminal, were a group of hostile aliens are trying to kill everyone.

Friday B-Movie Archive

Tags: , , , ,

Monday Book Pick: Armageddon 2419 A.D.

Monday, October 15th, 2012

Armageddon 2419 A.D. by Philip Francis Nowlan

From 1919 comes the original “Buck” Rogers novel. He wasn’t called “Buck” until later, after the comic strip picked up steam. Here he is just Anthony “Tony” Rogers, a WWI vet trapped in a cave mine and emerges centuries later to help lead the second American revolution as they take down the Han Overlords who took over the world centuries eariler. A good solid adventure story with a couple of decent and one really bad sequels written decades later.

Monday Book Pick Archive

Tags: , , ,