Science Fiction

News Simon Brew 19 May 2013 - 01:04 It's definite: the BBC has commissioned Doctor Who series 8, and Steven Moffat is plotting new adventures for the Doctor... As the internet recovers from the finale to Doctor Who series 7, The Name Of The Doctor, the BBC has moved quickly to confirm that more is in store. We already knew that we had a 50th anniversary special and a Christmas special planned. But there's now been formal confirmation of an eighth series of the revived show. The official Doctor Who website also seems to confirm Steven Moffat's involvement in series 8, too. It says that "the show’s lead writer and executive producer, Steven Moffat, has revealed he’s already plotting a brand new run of adventures for the Doctor". It doesn't confirm that Matt Smith is returning, although The Sun ran a piece last week suggesting that he would. We suspect that things are being kept up sleeves one way or another for the time being, though. More news as we get it... Doctor Who. Follow Den Of Geek on Twitter right here. And be our Facebook chum here. Doctor WhoDoctor Who series 8Doctor Who 50th anniversary

Earlier this evening, the official Doctor Who website confirmed that Series 8 of the show has been commissioned by the BBC. Current showrunner Steven Moffat is on board, reaffirming what he told reporters last weekend HERE. The BBC have not made any official casting announcements regarding Jenna-Louise Coleman and Matt Smith though both are definitely involved in the 2013 Doctor Who Christmas Special which starts shooting in "August or September". Jenna talks "big gap" before Series 8 Steven Moffat: Doctor Who is "knackering"

Okay, not comics per se, but John Welding is a favourite here, and whatever he does is always worth a look. This time he’s documenting his work on a piece for Unique Wakefield, an organisation promoting independent retail in Wakefield. “I am working with Unique Wakefield, drawing some of the independent shops in Wakefield. The line work for the chosen shops is done and I am now colouring them with Photoshop. The images were drawn with dip pen and ink at home from my dodgy reference photographs.”   And straight after that, it’s back to comics: As soon as I finished drawing independent shops for Unique Wakefield I set about drawing a set of pages forThe Ridings 30th Anniversary for this September. Although 85% there I haven’t settled on all the diary page elements yet and feel the above page is still a bit of a work in progress. With a lot of my work I want to see what comes from doing the drawings rather than just copying a process. The Ridings is different from my outside drawing projects in that everything is undercover away from the elements and man made from not that very long ago, it does sport some interesting architecture and the amount of land it sits (on according to Google Satellite Maps) is huge.

We’ve featured Katie Green’s Lighter Than My Shadow on here already, but there’s an awful lot of interesting pieces, very personal pieces from Katie Green over on the Lighter Than My Shadow blog. The book is released by Cape in October this year, but it’s already shaping up to be something rather special. Just from the little I’ve seen already there’s a natural, honest voice, gentle, familiar, and true to Green’s work. That it’s a very close subject for Green gives her words and images import and strength and I can already imagine the emotional impact the book’s going to deliver. In the meantime you can (and should) explore her comic zine The Green Bean, a celebration of the everyday stuff all around us, and available from Katie Green’s website. Here’s just a little sampling from the Lighter Than My Shadow blog… currently discussing the reasons why Green did the book: Why I – Eating disorders thrive in secrecy: My eating disorder made me a liar. Everyone knows how it goes: “Oh, you’re not having lunch?” “No, I ate earlier.” Clearly you didn’t. Or perhaps you did, but you didn’t want people to see what you ate, or how you ate it. The rules and rituals I needed to follow to allow myself to eat were elaborate and, quite frankly, embarrassing. I didn’t want people to watch me, worry about me, whisper about me. Why II – Stigma and misunderstanding I used to think that eating disorders were a choice. I used to think that anorexics were vain teenage girls not eating because they wanted to look like supermodels. I thought they should stop being stupid and just snap the heck out of it.  Until anorexia was the diagnosis given to me, and someone asked, “Why don’t you just eat?” Why III – General ham-fistedness When I first tried to explain anorexia to my family, I painted a picture (quite how it took me a further 6 years to realise I should make a graphic novel, I don’t know). My family and I used the painting to communicate, because usually I would clam up and find myself unable to speak at all in a hospital or doctor’s surgery. Why IV: Speaking the unspeakable The story of my recovery from eating disorders is impossible to tell without including the abuse (though I did briefly consider that as an option). They are inextricably tangled up together. It’s always felt important, if not vital, to communicate how my vulnerability in early recovery was preyed upon and taken advantage of. What else can I do to try and prevent the same happening to someone else?

"Jesus....MacArthur....Jay-Z....the great ones....always return." The four dots are meant to represent dramatic pauses. Work with me here, people. Paramount Pictures has unveiled the latest trailer for the highly anticipated comedy sequel Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues. You can check it out here below. When I saw that a new trailer for Anchorman 2 had hit today I tracked it down with the hope that we would finally get a first look at scenes from the sequel that has been in the works in one form or another for nearly a decade. No go friends. Instead we once again get the Channel 4 News Team - lead anchorman Ron Burgundy (Will Ferrell), field reporter Brian Fantana (Paul Rudd), sports anchor Champ Kind (David Koechner), and weatherman Brick Tamland (Steve Carrell) - giving direct-to-camera quips, showing us that the team chemistry is still there despite having been mothballed since Bush II ran for reelection [...]

You can now download Glen Cook's The Black Company: The First novel of "The Chronicles of the Black Company" for only 2.99$ here.Here's the blurb:Some feel the Lady, newly risen from centuries in thrall, stands between humankind and evil. Some feel she is evil itself. The hard-bitten men of the Black Company take their pay and do what they must, burying their doubts with their dead.Until the prophesy: The White Rose has been reborn, somewhere, to embody good once more. There must be a way for the Black Company to find her...So begins one of the greatest fantasy epics of our age—Glen Cook's Chronicles of the Black Company.

The BBC has released a video of David Tennant and Matt Smith chatting about Doctor Who - watch it in the player above. During it they talk about how their characters get on in the 50th Anniversary Special, due to air on November 23. Visit the episode section for more news on the Doctor Who 50th Anniversary Special HERE.

The BBC has released a behind~the~scenes video from tonight's Doctor Who Series 7 finale, The Name of the Doctor - watch it in the player above. Visit The Name of the Doctor section for more pics, news and clips HERE.

So, by now, we’ve all seen Star Trek Into Darkness. Some of us loved it, some of us hated it, some of us said, “meh.” But, forget about what you thought of the movie for a second. What did you think of the science? Let’s take a more in depth look at some of the most sciencey moments from STID. It goes without saying, but I’ll say it anyways, that this review contains SPOILERS!!! [WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD] Into the Volcano The Nibiru volcano scene was revealed in the IMAX preview of STID last December. We basically saw the entire scene back then, but there are a few points that I didn’t catch the first time around that I’ll touch on here. Spock takes a stroll in the Nibiru volcano The look and feel of the volcano is pretty spot on For the most part, they get this part right. Speaking as a volcanologist who loves to nitpick geology scenes in movies, there is not much for me to gripe about in Into Darkness. Of course, the visual artists did dramatize the scene a bit, but for everything they got wrong there’s another detail they got right. What was wrong visually? I can tell you from experience that the inside of an active volcano doesn’t look quite like what we saw in STID. The biggest flaw? Flames. Too much fire and brimstone. Yes, volcanoes produce hot steam, ash, and magma, but what’s depicted in STID looks more like a forest fire — embers and flames swirling around Spock. Again, this is a somewhat minor point, so it’s forgivable. The visual details that are spot on. The geologist in me was giggling with joy when she saw Spock standing atop real lava! The ropey, black rock beneath Spock’s feet is really something that came out of a volcano: a type of lava rock called Pahoehoe. And, if one was to flash freeze molten volcanic rock as Spock’s “cold fusion device” did, it’d look a lot like what we saw on screen: jet black volcanic glass. The best part of the volcano, though, was the bubble burst. A gigantic bubble of gas rose through the lava lake and formed a huge dome of lava that loomed far above Spock’s head. The pressure built up inside the bubble until it burst open, sending bits of molten rock flying in one large catastrophic explosion. That is EXACTLY what happens in real lava lakes. Spock in a seriously cool looking volcano BONUS: Fumaroles on a nearby planetoid! Recall the scene where Carol Marcus and Bones shuttle down to a nearby planetoid to have a go at diffusing of the mysterious photon torpedoes. What you probably didn’t realize was that this was a “volcanic” scene, too! My eyes immediately jumped to the flat plain of lava rock (scoria, a type of basaltic volcanic rock) where Carol and Bones were fiddling with the torpedo. In the background was a beautifully rendered fumarole – a crack in the ground where volcanic gasses escape into the atmosphere. The look and feel of the scene was completely scientifically realistic. What’s even better is that it felt like a barren, vast, wasteland. No vegetation, no animal life. This made it really feel like some small volcanic moon or “planetoid”. I’ll go out on a limb here and say this is in my opinion the most realistic looking planetary body I’ve ever seen in a movie. Props to the visual artists! Below is a couple of examples of real world locations reminiscent of the torpedo disarming scene in Into Darkness. Volcanic plains resembling the torpedo disarming scene in Into Darkness Verdict: The visuals were great. The volcano looked more realistic than any film I’ve seen, minus the swirling embers. What a real volcano looks like The science behind the volcano: Oh so close, but not quite right We cannot take the heat, cap’n! Here’s where the volcano scene took a turn for the less believable. Both Sulu and Scotty suggest that the heat from the volcano is too much for the shuttle or the Enterprise

The returns are starting to come in for Star Trek Into Darkness and it looks like it is going to come in under expectations with an domestic opening weekend around $70M (giving it an $83M total including Wednesday and Thursday). Overseas the film is performing stronger than its predecessor with an estimated $75M international take. More details and analysis below. Into Darkness underperforming Star Trek 2009 Domestically Star Trek Into Darkness brought in $11.5 on its opening day on Thursday making it the #1 domestic movie, but below expectations. Box office watchers feel that many movie-goers weren’t aware Paramount moved the release date up one day, which was only done a week ahead. Early estimates for Into Darkness had it headed for a $27M Friday and a $85M opening weekend (Fri/Sat/Sun), boosted by a "A" CinemaScore rating and strong reviews. However, by Saturday morning Friday’s results were revised to an estimated $22M. Paramount is now projecting $70M for the weekend. Analysts and rival studios think the number could be less, as low as $56M (according to Deadline). BoxOffice.com is estimating $68M. Bottom line is that it looks like despite inflation and increased revenue from 3D ticket sales, Into Darkness will underperform the 2009 Star Trek movie in its opening weekend (although it will likely end the weekend with a higher cumulative gross due to the earlier release). STAR TREK VS. INTO DARKNESS Domestic $M Star Trek 2009 Into Darkness (estimates*) Wednesday - $2.0** Thursday $4** $11.5 Friday $26.9 $22.0 Saturday $27.2 Sunday $21.0 Open Wkd Total. $75.2 $70.0 Cumulative $79.2 $83.5 *Estimates based on Paramount projection **limited release A $65-$70M opening weekend would make Into Darkness the third highest grossing opening weekend of 2013 so far (behind Iron Man 3 and Oz: The Great and Powerful) and would rank it in 7th or 8th place if it were a 2012 release. The 2009 Star Trek movie had the 6th best opening weekend of the year. Into Darkness overperforming 2009 Star Trek Overseas Paramount tells Variety, Into Darkness is "currently orbiting $75M for the weekend in 33 territories." We don’t have country by country details yet, but so far wherever there has been data, it has shown Into Darkness significantly overperforming the 2009 Star Trek film in each territory. Overall the film has been doing round 60-70% better than the previous film internationally, but it is still early to see if that trend continues. Right now most of the above is based on estimates and projections. In the next couple of days we will have more concrete details on how Into Darkness is performing both domestically and internationally.