Comic-Con Episode IV: A Fan's Hope poster and all film stills ©2012 Wreckin Hill Entertainment, all rights reserved.

Every July, hundreds of thousands of fans descend upon the city of San Diego for a four-day celebration of comics, sci-fi, popular arts fandom and (growingly) previews of mainstream television and film blockbusters. What is this spectacular nexus of nerds? Comic-Con International, of course! From ScriptPhD’s comprehensive past coverage, one can easily glean the diversity of events, guests and panels, with enormous throngs patiently queueing to see their favorites. But who are these fans? Where do they come from? What kinds of passions drive their journeys to Comic-Con from all over the world? And what microcosms are categorized under the general umbrella of fandom? Award-winning filmmaker Morgan Spurlock attempts to answer these questions by crafting the sweet, intimate, honest documentary-as-ethnography Comic-Con Episode IV: A Fan’s Hope. Through the archetypes of five 2009 Comic-Con attendees, Spurlock guides us through the history of the Con, its growth (and the subsequent conflicts that this has engendered), and most importantly, the conclusion that underneath all of those Spider-Man and Klingon costumes, geeks really do come in all shapes, colors and sizes. For full ScriptPhD review, click “continue reading.”

In 1970, comics fan Shel Dorf organized a three-day gathering in San Diego at the US Grant hotel as a fringe gathering for the most enthusiastic amateur comics fans, aspiring artists and writers to interact with comics pros. It drew 300 fans. This was the backdrop against which young Morgan Spurlock grew up in West Virginia, passionately consuming comics and horror films, transported to a different world where everyone was a little bit askew and “weird.” “I wasn’t just a fan,” Spurlock remarks. “I was addicted.” It wasn’t until 2009 that he was able to make his first amateur journey to Comic-Con International San Diego, by now a cultural juggernaut regularly drawing over 150,000 fans, amid a vastly changed (and comics-cultural) landscape. Nevertheless, Spurlock was thrilled. He ran into boyhood idol Marvel animator Stan Lee, and thanked him for all the confidence and creativity he helped to inspire. Stan’s response? “Let’s make a documentary about Comic-Con!” And so, gathering forces with Lee, sci-fi cult icon Joss Whedon, among others, Spurlock embarked on a two-year journey that captured the 2010 Con (the 40th Anniversary edition) in all its glory—including panels, parades, photos, costumes and interviews with notable celebrities that have turned passions into professions. Most of all, however, Spurlock captured the fans.

Costume designer Holly Conrad with her team on the convention floor exhibits at the 2010 San Diego Comic-Con.

To winnow down the most compelling stories for the documentary, Spurlock held a casting call online that drew thousands of submissions. Among them was Holly Conrad, a talented, award-winning costume designer from a small town hoping to win the grand prize at the annual Comic-Con costume show. Knowing her slim odds, especially because of where she comes from, and the importance of making a splash for her career to take off, Holly called Comic-Con a “suicide mission for her future.” Also in a pressure cooker was Chuck Rozanski, proprietor of Mile High Comics, Americas largest inventory and dealer of comic books. Chuck uses the hectic, chaotic, crowded Comic-Con exhibit area to sell rare and collectible comics, comprising a substantial portion of his company’s income for the year, but faces a more fractured Con, with a smaller focus on comics every year. If he doesn’t make a killing at this year’s Com, Chuck knows the future of his whole business might be at risk. Sharing the convention floor with Chuck are comics-obsessed bartender Skip Harvey and US Airforce pilot and family man Eric Henson, two amateur graphic artists also putting their destiny on the line in San Diego. Armed with only a portfolio and a dream, Eric and Skip are hoping to get noticed at the portfolio critique sessions and land a professional design contract with one of the comics representatives. One succeeds (to the preview audience’s delight) and one learns he is a very big fish in a very small bowl, and must cultivate his talent for the greater stage. Intermingled for comic relief is the adorable story of James Darling and Se Young Kang, a couple who met and started dating at the previous year’s Con. James is planning to ask Se Young to marry him at this year’s Con, but must overcome a slew of hilarious obstacles to pull of his nerdy romantic feat.

Chuck Rozanski hangs rare collectibles that he is hoping to sell on the convention floor in a scene from Comic-Con Episode IV.

Comic-Con Episode IV: A Fan’s Hope is a terrific purview into the conflicts and dissent of the modern Con. Hidden beneath the popularity of the yearly event is a schism between older fans who have been coming for years (and feel somewhat lost in the shuffle) and the new fans, such as lovebirds James and Se Young, who may not even necessarily be there for comics events. Longtime attendees such as Kevin Smith admitted that the event has become a “beancounter” with tremendous power to preview movies and television, something Hollywood has noticed and latched onto. One can legitimately forget the presence of comics and the graphic arts at Comic-Con altogether without trying very hard. This presents a huge problem for the poignant storyline of Chuck Rozanski, with whom we empathize as he struggles to sell comics through 4-day event. When ScriptPhD.com asked Spurlock at a recent Los Angeles junket about what surprised him the most, he pointed to the sheer volume of what goes on at Comic-Con, especially the job-hunting aspect of the Comic-Con exhibition floor. His favorite moment in the movie is the comparison of Comic-Con to a Russian nesting doll, with events hidden beneath other events. “I showed the movie to people and they responded that they didn’t even know that went on at Comic-Con! There is something for everyone, no matter what your passion.” Spurlock remarked.

The documentary is at its strongest and most successful when the focus turns to what the essence of what Comic-Con is defined by—the fans. “We all weighed in with what we thought were the most important pieces of the story,” Spurlock says. “But in the end it all came back to the fans.” It is the fans whose enthusiasm drives the growth of events like Comic-Con, however much nostalgia for the past may feel threatened. It is the fans whose passion continues to motivate and drive geniuses like Stan Lee to this very day. That very same passion also launches new careers, as Holly Conrad found. Since the filming of this documentary, she has moved to Hollywood and found successful work as a costume designer on several productions. Lastly, and most importantly, it is the fans who create that magical atmosphere where no matter who you are, where you come from, what you look like, how “out there” you behave, you find total acceptance and camaraderie amongst a group of treasured friends just as passionate and devoted as you are. To Spurlock, the Con “reminds us all of the importance of dreams and of wonder. It’s not just an event… it’s a state of mind.”

Trailer for Comic-Con Episode IV: A Fan’s Hope:

“Making of” featurette:

Comic-Con Episode IV: A Fan’s Hope was released in select cities on April 5, and theaters and video on demand on April 6th.

~*ScriptPhD*~

*****************
ScriptPhD.com covers science and technology in entertainment, media and advertising. Hire our consulting company for creative content development.

Subscribe to free email notifications of new posts on our home page.

                          

Lab Coats in Hollywood: Science, Scientists and Cinema book cover ©2011 MIT Press, all rights reserved

Read through any archive of science fiction movies, and you quickly realize that the merger of pop culture and science dates as far back as the dawn of cinema in the early 1920s. Even more surprising than the enduring prevalence of science in film is that the relationship between film directors, scribes and the science advisors that have influenced their works is equally as rich and timeless. Lab Coats in Hollywood: Science, Scientists, and Cinema (2011, MIT Press), one of the most in-depth books on the intersection of science and Hollywood to date, serves as the backdrop for recounting the history of science and technology in film, how it influenced real-world research and the scientists that contributed their ideas to improve the cinematic realism of science and scientists. For a full ScriptPhD.com review and in-depth extended discussion of science advising in the film industry, please click the “continue reading” cut.

Written by David A. Kirby, Lecturer in Science Communication Studies at the Centre for History of Science, Technology and Medicine at the University of Manchester, England, Lab Coats offers a surprising, detailed analysis of the symbiotic—if sometimes contentious—partnership between filmmakers and scientists. This includes the wide-ranging services science advisors can be asked to provide to members of a film’s production staff, how these ideas are subsequently incorporated into the film, and why the depiction of scientists in film carries such enormous real-world consequences. Thorough, detailed, and honest, Lab Coats in Hollywood is an exhaustive tome of the history of scientists’ impact on cinema and storytelling. It’s also an essential and realistic road map of the challenges that scientists, engineers and other technical advisors might face as they seriously pursue science advising to the film industry as a career.

The essential questions that Lab Coats in Hollywood addresses are these—is it worth it to hire a science advisor for a movie production? Is it worth it for the scientist to be an advisor? The book’s purposefully vague conclusion is that it depends solely on how the scientist can film’s storyline and visual effects. Kirby wisely writes with an objective tone here because the topic is open to a considerable amount of debate among the scientists and filmmakers profiled in the book. Sometimes a scientist is so key to a film’s development, he or she becomes an indispensible part of the day-to-day production. A good example of this is Jack Horner, paleontologist at the Museum of the Rockies in Bozeman, MT, and technical science advisor to Steven Spielberg in Jurassic Park and both of its sequels. Horner, who drew from his own research on the link between dinosaurs and birds for a more realistic depiction of the film’s contentious science, helped filmmakers construct visuals, write dialogue, character reactions, animal behaviors, and map out entire scenes. J. Marvin Herndon, a geophysicist at the Transdyne Corporation, approached the director of the disaster film The Core when he learned the plot was going to be based on his controversial hypothesis about a giant uranium ball in the center of the Earth. Herndon’s ideas were fully incorporated into the film’s plot, while Herndon rode the wave of publicity from the film to publish his research in a PNAS paper. The gold standard of science input, however, were Stanley Kubrik’s multiple science and engineering advisors for 2001: A Space Odyssey, discussed in much further detail below.

Armageddon did phenomenally well at the box office despite not relying on the advice of their science advisor. Pictured here is a meteorite falling on New York City in the film, largely panned as not very realistic, scientifically.

Kirby hypothesizes that sometimes, a film’s poor reception might have been avoided with a science advisor. He provides the example of the Arnold Schwarzenegger futuristic sci-fi bomb The Sixth Day, which contained a ludicrously implausible use of human cloning in its main plot. While the film may have been destined for failure, Kirby posits that it only could have benefited from proper script vetting by a scientist. By contrast, the 1998 action adventure thriller Armageddon came under heavy expert criticism for its basic assertion that an asteroid “the size of Texas” could go undetected until eighteen days before impact. Director Michael Bay patently refused to take the advice of his advisor, NASA researcher Ivan Bakey, and admitted he was sacrificing science for plot, but Armageddon went on to be a huge box office hit regardless. Quite often, the presence of a science advisor is helpful, albeit unnecessary. One of the book’s more amusing anecdotes is about Dustin Hoffman’s hyper-obsessive shadowing of a scientist for the making of the pandemic thriller Outbreak (great guide to the movie’s science can be found here). Hoffman was preparing to play a virologist and wanted to infuse realism in all of his character’s reactions. Hoffman kept asking the scientist to document reactions in mundane situations that we all encounter—a traffic jam, for example—only to come to the shocking conclusion that the scientist was a real person just like everyone else.

Most of the time, including scientists in the filmmaking process is at the discretion of the studios because of the one immutable decree reiterated throughout the book: the story is king. When a writer, producer or director hires a science consultant, their expertise is utilized solely to facilitate, improve or augment story elements for the purposes of entertaining the audience. Because of this, one of the most difficult adjustments a science consultant may face is a secondary status on-set even though they may be a superstar in their own field. Some of the other less glamorous aspects of film consulting include heavy negotiations with unionized writers for script or storyline changes, long working hours, a delicate balance between side consulting work and a day job, and most importantly, an inconsistent (sometimes nonexistent) payment structure per project. I was notably thrilled to see Kirby mention the pros and cons of programs such as the National Science Foundation’s Creative Science Studio (a collaboration with USC’s school of the Cinematic Arts) and the National Academy of Science’s Science and Entertainment Exchange, which both provide on-demand scientific expertise to the Hollywood filmmaking community in the hope of increasing and promoting the realism of scientific portrayal in film. While valuable commodities to science communication, both programs have had the unfortunate effect of acclimating Hollywood studios to expect high-level scientific consulting for free.

A still from a scene in the spacecraft of 2001: A Space Odyssey. Stanley Kubrik painstakingly designed each element of the technology and aeronautical science in the movie, and depended on a slew of science advisors to do so.

1968’s 2001: A Space Odyssey is widely considered by popular consensus to be the greatest sci-fi movie ever made, and certainly the most influential. As such, Kirby devotes an entire chapter to detailing the film’s production and integration of science. Director Stanley Kubrik took painstaking detail in scientific accuracy to explore complex ideas about the relationship between humanity and technology, hiring a range of advisors from anthropologists, aeronautical engineers, statisticians, and nuclear physicists for various stages of production. Statistician I. J. Good provided advice on supercomputers, aerospace Harry Lange provided production design, while NASA space scientist Frederick Ordway lent over three years of his time to develop the space technology used in the film. In doing so, Kubrik’s staff consulted with over sixty-five different private companies, government agencies, university groups and research institutions. So real was the space technology in 2001 that moon landing hoax supporters have claimed the real moon landing by United States astronauts, taking place in 1969, was taped on the same sets. Not every science-based film has used science input as meticulously or thoroughly since, but Kubrik’s influence on the film industry’s fascination with science and technology has been an undeniable legacy.

One of the real treats of Lab Coats in Hollywood is the exploration of the two-way relationship between scientists and filmmakers, and how film in turn influences the course of science, as we discuss in more detail below. Between film case studies, critiques and interviews with past science advisors are interstitial vignettes of ways scientists have shaped films we know and love. Even the animated feature Finding Nemo had an oceanography advisor to get the marine biology correct. The seminal moment of the most recent Star Trek installation was due to a piece of off-handed scientific advice from an astronomer. The cloning science of Jurassic Park, so thoroughly researched and pieced together by director Steven Spielberg and science advisor Jack Horner, was actually published in a top-notch journal days ahead of the movie’s premiere. Even in rare spots where the book drags a bit with highly technical analysis are cinematic backstories with details that readers will salivate over. (For example, there’s a very good reason all the kelp went missing from Finding Nemo between its cinematic and DVD releases.)

As the director of a creative scientific consulting company based in Los Angeles, one of the biggest questions I get asked on a regular basis is “What does a science advisor do, exactly?” Lab Coats in Hollywood does an excellent job of recounting stories and case studies of high-profile scientist consultants, all of whom contributed their creative talents to their respective films in different ways, what might be expected (and not expected) of scientists on set, and of giving different areas of expertise that are currently in demand in Hollywood. Kirby breaks down cinematic fact checking, the most frequent task scientists are hired to perform, into three areas within textbook science (known, proven facts that cannot be disputed, such as gravity): public science, something we all know and would think was ridiculous if filmmakers got wrong, expert science, facts that are known to specialists and scientific experts outside of the lay audience, and (most problematic) folk science, incorrect science that has nevertheless been accepted as true by the public. Filmmakers are most likely to alter or modify facts that they perceive as expert science to minimize repercussions at the box office.

A lot of the math seen in the film A Beautiful Mind was drawn by actual mathematicians to preserve authenticity.

A science advisor is constantly navigating cinematic storytelling constraints and a filmmaker’s desire to utilize only the most visually appealing and interesting aspects of science (regardless of whether the context is always academically appropriate). Another broad area of high demand is in helping actors look and act like a real scientist on screen. Scientists have been hired to do everything from doctoring dialogue to add realism into an actor’s portrayal (the movie Contact and Jodie Foster’s depiction of Dr. Ellie Arroway is a good example of this), training actors in using equipment and pronouncing foreign-sounding jargon, replicating laboratory notebooks or chalkboard scribbles with the symbols and shorthand of science (such as in the mathematics film A Beautiful Mind), and to recreate the physical space of an authentic laboratory. Finally, the scientist’s expertise of the known is used to help construct plausible scenarios and storylines for the speculative, an area that requires the greatest degree of flexibility and compromise from the science advisor. Uncertainty, unexplored research and “what if” scenarios, the bane of every scientist’s existence, happen to be Hollywood’s favorite scenarios, because they allow the greatest creative freedom in storytelling and speculative conceptualization without being negated by a proven scientific impossibility. An entire chapter—the book’s finest—is devoted to two case studies, Deep Impact and The Hulk, where real science concepts (near-Earth asteroid impacts and genetic engineering, respectively) were researched and integrated into the stories that unfolded in the films. (Side note: if you are ever planning on being a science advisor read this section of the book very carefully).

In years past, consulting in films didn’t necessarily bring acclaim to scientists within their own research communities; indeed, Lab Coats recounts many instances where scientists were viewed as betraying science or undermining its seriousness with Hollywood frivolity, including many popular media figures such as Carl Sagan and Paul Ehrlich. Recently, however, consultants have come to be viewed as publicity investments both by studios that hire high-profile researchers for recognition value of their film’s science content and by institutes that benefit from branding and exposure. Science films from the last 10-15 years such as GATTACA, Outbreak, Armageddon, Contact, The Day After Tomorrow and a panoply of space-related flicks have attached big-name scientists as consultants (gene therapy pioneer French Anderson, epidemiologist David Morens, NASA director Ivan Bekey, SETI institute astronomers Seth Shostak and Jill Tartar and climatologist Michael Molitor, respectively). They also happened to revolve around the research salient to our modern era: genetic bioengineering, global infectious diseases, near-earth objects, global warming and (as always) exploring deep space. As such, a mutually beneficial marketing relationship has emerged between science advisors and studios that transcends the film itself resulting in funding and visibility to individual scientists, their research, and even institutes and research centers. The National Severe Storms Laboratory (NSSL) promoted themselves in two recent films, Twister and Dante’s Peak, using the films as a vehicle to promote their scientific work, to brand themselves as heroes underfunded by the government, and to temper public expectations about storm predictions. No institute has had a deeper relationship with Hollywood than NASA, extending back to the Star Trek television series, with intricate involvement and prominent logo display in the films Apollo 13, Armageddon, Mission to Mars, and Space Cowboys. Some critics have argued that this relationship played an integral role in helping NASA maintain a positive public profile after the devastating 1986 Challenger space shuttle disaster. The end result of the aforementioned promotion via cinematic integration can only benefit scientific innovation and public support.

Futuristic touch screens shown in 2002's Minority Report have become standard in technology such as phones, tablet computers and other security devices.

Accurate and favorable portrayal of science content in modern cinema has an even bigger beneficiary than specific research institutes, and that is society itself. Fictional technology portrayed in film – termed a “diegetic prototype” – has often inspired or led directly to real-world application and development. Kirby offers the most impactful case of diegetic prototyping as the 1981 film Threshold, which portrayed the first successful implantation of a permanent artificial heart, a medical marvel that became reality only a year later. Robert Jarvik, inventor of the Jarvik-7 artificial heart used in the transplant, was also a key medical advisor for Threshold, and felt that his participation in the film could both facilitate technological realism and by doing so, help ease public fears about what was then considered a freak surgery, even engendering a ban in Great Britain. Of the many obstacles that expensive, ambitious, large-scale research faces, Kirby argues that skepticism or lack of enthusiasm from the public can be the most difficult to overcome, precisely because it feeds directly into essential political support that makes funding possible. A later example of film as an avenue for promotion of futuristic technology is Minority Report, set in the year 2054, and featuring realistic gestural interfacing technology and visual analytics software used to predict crime before it actually happens. Less than a decade later, technology and gadgets featured in the film have come to fruition in the form of multi-touch interfaces like the iPad and retina scanners, with others in development including insect robots (mimics of the film’s spider robots), facial recognition advertising billboards, crime prediction software and electronic paper. A much more recent example not featured in the book is the 2011 film Limitless, featuring a writer that is able to stimulate and access 100% of his brain at will by taking a nootropic drug. While the fictitious drug portrayed in the film is not yet a neurochemical reality, brain enhancement is a rising field of biomedical research, and may one day indeed yield a brain-boosting pill.

No other scientific feat has been a bigger beneficiary of diegetic prototyping than space travel, starting with 1929’s prophetic masterpiece Frau im Mond [Woman in the Moon], sponsored by the German Rocket Society and advised masterfully by Hermann Oberth, a pioneering German rocket research scientist. The first film to ever present the basics of rocket travel in cinema, and credited with the now-standard countdown to zero before launch in real life, Frau im Mond also featured a prototype of the liquid-fuel rocket and inspired a generation of physicists to contribute to the eventual realization of space travel. Destination Moon, a 1950 American sci-fi film about a privately financed trip to the Moon, was the first film produced in the United States to deal realistically with the prospect of space travel by utilizing the technical and screenplay input of notable science fiction author Robert A. Heinlein. Released seven years before the start of the USSR Sputnik program, Destination Moon set off a wave of iconic space films and television shows such as When Worlds Collide, Red Planet Mars, Conquest of Space and Star Trek in the midst of the 1950s and 1960s Cold War “space race” between the United States and Russia. What theoretical scientific feat will propel the next diegetic prototype? A mission to Mars? Space colonization? Anti-aging research? Advanced stem cell research? Time will only tell.

Ultimately, readers will enjoy Lab Coats in Hollywood for its engaging writing style, detailed exploration of the history of science in film and most of all, valuable advice from fellow scientists who transitioned from the lab to consulting on a movie set. Whether you are a sci-fi film buff or a research scientist aspiring to be a Hollywood consultant, you will find some aspect of this book fascinating. Especially given the rapid proliferation of science and technology content in movies (even those outside of the traditional sci-fi genre), and the input from the scientific community that it will surely necessitate, knowing the benefits and pitfalls of this increasingly in-demand career choice is as important as its significance in ensuring accurate portrayal of scientists to the general public.

~*ScriptPhD*~

***************
ScriptPhD.com covers science and technology in entertainment, media and advertising. Hire our consulting company for creative content development.

Subscribe to free email notifications of new posts on our home page.

                          

"The Science of Battlestar Galactica" ©Wiley Books and NBC Universal, all rights reserved.

Battlestar Galactica is one of the defining, genre-changing science fiction shows of its, or perhaps any, time. The remake of the 1970s cult classic was sexy, sophisticated, and set a new standard for the science fiction shows and movies that will follow in its path. In addition to exploring staple concepts such as life, survival, politics and war, BSG reawakened its audience to science and its role in moral, ethical, and daily impact in our lives, especially given the technologically-driven era that we live in. “Writers were not allowed to jettison science for the sake of the story,” declares co-executive producer Jane Espenson in her foreword to the book. “Other than in specific instances of intentionally inexplicable phenomena, science was respected.” In an artful afterword, Richard Hatch (the original Apollo and Tom Zarek in the new series) concurs. “BSG used science not as a veneer, but as a key thematic component for driving many of the character stories… which is the art of science fiction.” The sustained use of complex, correct science as a plot element to the degree that was done in Battlestar Galactica is also a hallmark first. This is the topic of the new book The Science of Battlestar Galactica, newly released from Wiley Books, and written by Kevin R. Grazier, the very science advisor who consulted with the BSG writing staff on all things science, with a contribution from Wired writer Patrick DiJusto. Now, for the first time, everyone from casual fans to astrophysicists can gain insight into the research used to construct major stories and technology of the show—and learn some very cool science along the way. Our review of The Science of Battlestar Galactica (and our 100th blog post!) under the “continue reading” cut.

Humanoid Cylon #1, John Cavil: 'I don't want to be human. I want to see gamma rays, I want to hear X-rays, and I want to smell dark matter. Do you see the absurdity of what I am? I can't even express these things properly, because I have to conceptualize complex ideas in this stupid, limiting spoken language, but I know I want to reach out with something other than these prehensile paws, and feel the solar wind of a supernova flowing over me. I'm a machine, and I can know much more.'

What is life? Seriously. I’m not asking one of those hypothetical existential questions that end up discussed ad nauseum in a dorm room at 3 AM. I’m asking the central question that Battlestar Galactica, and much of science fiction, is based around. The shortest section of The Science of Battlestar Galactica, “Life Began Out Here,” is its most poignant. No matter the conflict, subplot or theme explored on BSG, they ultimately reverted back to the idea of what constituted a living being, and what rights, if any, those beings possessed. It all boils down to cylons. What are they made of? How do their brains (potentially) work? How much information can they contain, and how is it processed from one dead cylon to its next incarnation? How could a cylon and a human mate successfully, and is their offspring (Hera Agathon) the Mitochondrial Eve of that society? How did they evolve? What is the biological difference between raiders, centurions, and humanoid cylons? Who can forget the ew gross factor of Boomer plugging her arm into the cylon computer system, but how could she do that, especially when she was made to act, feel and think as a human being? A brief, smart discussion on spontaneous evolution and basic biology gives way to a thoughtful evocation of our own efforts with artificial intelligence, and the responsibilities that it engenders. Take a look at the website of the MIT iGem Program, an annual competition to design biological systems that will operate in living cells from standard toolkits. Do some of their creations, including bacteria that eat industrial pollutants and treat lactose intolerance, constitute life, and are our own Cybernetic Life Nodes not too far away? The section ends in a fascinating debate over who we are more akin to—the humans of the Battlestar universe (as is widely assumed) or cylons. The answer would surprise you.

The middle of The Science of Battlestar Galactica, composed of “The Physics of Battlestar Galactica” and “The Twelve Colonies and The Rest of Space” reads largely like my college physics textbook, only with far cooler sample problems. If Apollo and Starbuck both launch their vipers at the same time and Starbuck coasts past Apollo, according to special relativity, who is moving? In perhaps the greatest implementation of Einstein’s famous theory in science fiction, special relativity explains how Starbuck could explain that she wasn’t a Cylon when she returned unharmed from the dead, and why her viper looked brand new. A special look at radiation particularly interested me, with a chemistry background, as it thoroughly delved into the chemistry and physics of radiation, heat-seeking missile weapons, DNA damage, and the power of nuclear weapons, both with fictional examples (the destruction of Caprica) and real (Japan and Chernobyl). The chapters on relativity (E=mc²) and the Lorentz Contraction reminded me of a seminar on dark energy that we covered at the Hollywood Laserium presented a year ago by Dr. Charles Baltay (NOT Baltar!), the man who was responsible for Pluto losing its planetary status. At the time, a lot of the concepts seemed a bit esoteric, but having read this book, are now elementary. Did you know, for example, that a supernova explosion is so powerful, it can briefly cause iron and other atoms remaining in the star to fuse into every naturally occurring element in the periodic table? Nifty, eh? Astronomy buffs, amateur and experienced, will enjoy the section on space, with a preamble on the formation of our galaxy and star systems to the 12 different planets of the Colonies, and how that many habitable planets could all be packed into such a dense area (see companion map below).

A detailed space map of the 12 colonies of Battlestar Galactica. We strongly recommend exploring this map while reading the chapters on physics and space.

With perfect timing for the publication of The Science of BSG, Kevin R. Grazier and co-executive producer Jane Espenson have teamed up to create a plausible astronomy map of the 12 colonies of Battlestar Galactica. Find a larger, interactive version here.

A viper fighter jet from Battlestar Galactica. All images/content ©NBC Universal, all rights reserved.

One of the more fun aspects to watching BSG was the cornucopia of weapons, toys, and other electronics used by both humans and Cylons, a subject explored in the most meaty section of the whole book, “Battlestar Tech.” This includes a discussion of propulsion and how the Galactica’s jump drive might work, artificial gravity, a great chapter on the vipers and raptors as effective weapons, and positing how it is that Six was able to infiltrate the colonial computer infrastructure… besides the obvious, that is. I really enjoyed learning about Faraday cages, tachyon particles, brane cosmology, and what a back door is in computer programming, terms you can bet I will be throwing out casually at my next hoity-toity dinner party. The next time you rewatch an episode, and hear Mr. Gaeta utter a directive such as “We have a Cylon raider, CBDR, bearing 123 carom 45,” not only will you know exactly what he’s saying relative to the cartesian coordinates of the BSG space universe, but how this information is used to operate the complicated three-dimensional space system that the pilots have to operate in. Finally, critics such as myself of the dilapidated corded phones used aboard the Galactica will be interested to find out why they may have actually been a good idea in protecting the fleet from Cylon detection.

How was Dr. Baltar able to detect Cylons from humans? It has to do with silica, silica, and more silica. All images ©NBC Universal, all rights reserved.

The ultimate selling point of this book is its ability to present material that will appeal to all fractions of a very diverse audience. The writing style is fluid, clever, informative and appropriately humorous in the way one would expect of a geeky sci-fi book (highlighted by a chapter on Cylon composition and detection thereof by Dr. Baltar written in dialogue format between an omniscient scientist and a smart-aleck fanboy). In fact, the co-authors merge their styles well enough so as to imagine that only one person wrote the book. Part textbook, part entertainment, part series companion, The Science of Battlestar Galactica is concomitantly smart, complicated, approachable and difficult—it does not surprise us one bit that in the couple of short months since its wide release, talk of numerous literary awards has already been circling. In between lessons on basic biology, astrophysics, energy and basic engineering are sprinkled delightful vignettes of actual on-set problem solving involving science. My favorites included plausible ways Cylons could download their information as they’re reborn (get ready for some serious computer-speak here!), an excellent explanation of Dr. Baltar’s mysterious Cylon detector, radiation and the difference between uninhabitable ‘dead Earth’ and barely habitable New Caprica, and the revelation by Dr. Grazier of how he had to—in a frantic period of 24 sleepless hours—construct a theory as to how the FTL drive works for an episode-specific reason. Much like the show it is based on, this book asks as many questions as it answers, most notably on social parables within our own world. Are we on our way to building Cylon artificial intelligence? Could our computer infrastructure ever get compromised like the ones on Caprica? Would we ever be able to travel to parallel universes, and what would be the implications of life forms besides our own? How might they even detect our presence?

Read our in-depth interview with Kevin R. Grazier here

Join our our Facebook fan page for a special giveaway commemorating the release of The Science of Battlestar Galactica and our 100th blog post. Now if you’ll excuse me, having read and absorbed this illuminating volume, I have been inspired to go and watch the entire series from start to finish all over again!

~*ScriptPhD*~

*****************
ScriptPhD.com covers science and technology in entertainment, media and advertising. Hire our consulting company for creative content development.

Subscribe to free email notifications of new posts on our home page.

                          

The Naked Lady Who Stood On Her Head ©2010 William Morrow Publishing, all rights reserved.

One of the most captivating books of 2010 was not a gory science-fiction thriller or a gripping end-of-the world page-turner, though its subject matter is equally engrossing and out of the ordinary. It is about somewhat crazy people doing crazy things as seen through the lenses of the man that has been treating them for decades. The Naked Lady Who Stood On Her Head is the first psych ward memoir, a tale of a curious doctor/scientist and his most extreme, bizarre, and sometimes touching cases from the nation’s most prestigious neurology centers and universities. Included in ScriptPhD.com’s review is a podcast interview with Dr. Small, as well as the opportunity to win a free autographed copy of his book. Our end-of-the year science library pick is under the “continue reading” cut.

Dr. Gary Small, Professor of Psychiatry at UCLA's renowned Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior

Gary Small is a very unlikely candidate for the chaos that many of us confuse with a psych ward. Whether it was the frantic psych consults on ER or fond remembrance of Jack Nicholson and his cohorts in One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, most of us have a natural association of psychiatry with insanity or pandemonium. Meeting Dr. Small in real life is the antithesis of these scenarios. Warm, welcoming, serene and genuinely affable, his voice translates directly from the pages of his latest book. Told in chronological order—starting with a young, curious, inexperienced intern at Harvard’s Massachussetts General Hospital to his tenure as a world-renowned neuroscientist at UCLA—The Naked Lady Who Stood On Her Head feels like an enormous learning and growing experience for Dr. Small, his patients, and the reader.

The scene plays out like a standard medical drama or movie. In the beginning, the young, bright-eyed, bushy-tailed, trepidatious doctor is exploring while learning the ropes on duty. There is, in the self-titled chapter, literally a naked lady standing on her head in the middle of a Boston psych ward. Dr. Small is the only doctor that can cure her baffling ailment, but in doing so, only begins to peel away at what is really troubling her. There is a bevvy of inexplicable fainting schoolgirls afflicting the Boston suburbs. Only through a fresh pair of eager eyes is the root cause attained, a cause that to this day sets the standard for mass hysteria treatment nationwide. And there is a mute hip painter from Venice beach, immobile for weeks until Small, fighting the rigid senior attendings, gets to the unlikely diagnosis. As the book, and Dr. Small’s career, flourishes, we meet a WebMD mom, a young man literally blinded by his family’s pressure, a man whose fiancé’s obsession with Disney characters resurfaces a painful childhood secret, and Dr. Small’s touching story of having to watch as the mentor he introduced at the book’s beginning hires him as a therapist so that he can diagnose his teacher’s dementia. Ultimately, all of the characters of The Naked Lady Who Stood on Her Head, and Dr. Small’s dedication and respect, have a common thread. They are real, they are diverse, and they are us. Psych patients are not one-dimensional figments of a screenwriter’s imagination. They are the brother who has childhood trauma, the friend with a dysfunctional or abusive family, the husband or wife with a rare genetic predisposition, and all of us are but one degree away from the abnormal behavior that these conditions can ignite. In his book, Dr. Small has pulled back the curtain of a notoriously secretive and mysterious field. It’s a riveting reveal, and absolutely worth an appointment. The Naked Lady Who Stood On Her Head has been optioned by 20th Century Fox, and may be coming to your televisions soon!

Podcast Interview

In addition to his latest novel, Gary Small is the author of the best-selling global phenomenon The Memory Bible: An Innovative Strategy For Keeping Your Brain Young and a regular contributor to The Huffington Post (several excellent recent articles can be found here and here). His seminal research on Alzheimer’s disease, aging and brain training has appeared in recent articles in NPR and Newsweek. A seminal brain imaging study recently completed in his laboratory garnered worldwide media attention for suggesting that Google searching can stimulate the brain and literally keep aging brains agile. Dr. Small regularly updates his research and musings on his personal blog.

ScriptPhD.com Editor Jovana Grbić sat down for a one-on-one podcast with Dr. Small and discussed inspiration for the book, current and future aspects of psychiatry, and the role that media and entertainment have played and continue to play in shaping our perception of this important field. Click the “play” button to listen:

In addition to our review and podcast, ScriptPhD.com will be giving away a free signed copy of The Naked Lady Who Stood On Her Head via our Facebook fan page as a little holiday gift for our Facebook fans. Join us and drop a comment on the giveaway announcement for eligibility. Happy Holidays from ScriptPhD.com!

~*ScriptPhD*~

*****************
ScriptPhD.com covers science and technology in entertainment, media and advertising. Hire our consulting company for creative content development.

Subscribe to free email notifications of new posts on our home page.

                          

The brain's neuron, a remarkably plastic, trainable cell.

Each of the brain’s 100 billion neurons has somewhere in the realm of 7,000 connections to other neurons, creating a tangled roadmap of about 700 trillion possible turns. But thinking of the brain as roads makes it sound very fixed—you know, pavement, and rebar, and steel girders and all. But the opposite is true: at work in our brains are never-sleeping teams of Fraggles and Doozers who rip apart the roads, build new ones, and are constantly at work retooling the brain’s intersections. This study of Fraggles and Doozers is the booming field of neuroplasticity: how the basic architecture of the brain changes over time. Scientist, neuro math geek, Science Channel personality and accomplished author Garth Sundem writes for ScriptPhD.com about the phenomenon of brain training and memory.

Certainly the brain is plastic—the gray matter you wake up with is not the stuff you take to sleep at night. But what changes the brain? How do the Fraggles know what to rip apart and how do the Doozers know what to build? Part of the answer lies in a simple idea: neurons that fire together, wire together. This is an integral part of the process we call learning. When you have a thought or perform a task, a car leaves point A in your brain and travels to point B. The first time you do something, the route from point A to B might be circuitous and the car might take wrong turns, but the more the car travels this same route, the more efficient the pathway becomes. Your brain learns to more efficiently pass this information through its neural net.

A simple example of this “firing together is wiring together” is seen in the infant hippocampus. The hippocampus packages memories for storage deeper in the brain: an experience goes in and a bundle comes out. I think of it like the pegboard at the Seattle Science Center: you drop a bouncy ball in the top and it ricochets down through the matrix of pegs until exiting a slot at the bottom. In the hippocampus, it’s a defined path: you drop an experience in slot number 5,678,284 and it comes out exit number 1,274,986. How does the hippocampus possibly know which entrance leads to which exit? It wires itself by trial and error (oversimplification alert…but you get the point). Infants constantly fire test balls through the matrix and ones that reach a worthwhile endpoint reinforce worthwhile pathways. These neurons fire together, wire together, and eventually the hippocampus becomes efficient. It’s just that easy. (And because it’s so easy, researchers aren’t far away from creating an artificial hippocampus.)

A crossword puzzle a day keeps the neurons firing away!

Now let’s think about Sudoku. The first time you discover which missing numbers go in which empty boxes, you do so inefficiently. But over time, you get better at it. You learn tricks. You start to see patterns. You develop a workflow. And practice creates efficiency in your brain as neurons create the connections necessary for the quick processing of Sudoku. This is true of any puzzle: your plastic brain changes its basic architecture to allow you to complete subsequent puzzles more efficiently. Okay, that’s great and all, but studies are finding that the vast majority of brain-training attempts don’t generalize to overall intelligence. In other words, by doing Sudoku, you only get better at Sudoku. This might gain you street cred in certain circles, but it doesn’t necessarily make you smarter. Unfortunately, the same is true of puzzle regiments: you get better at the puzzles, but you don’t necessarily get smarter in a general way.

That said, one type of puzzle offers some hope: the crossword. In fact, researchers at Wake Forest University suggest that crossword puzzles strengthen the brain (even in later years) the same way that lifting weights can increase muscle strength. Still, it remains true that doing the crossword only reinforces the mechanism needed to do the crossword. But the crossword uses a very specific mechanism: it forces you to pull a range of facts from deep within your brain into your working memory. This is a nice thing to get better at. Think about it: there are few tasks that don’t require some sort of recall, be it of facts or experiences. And so training a nimble working memory through crosswords seems a more promising regiment than other single type of brain training exercise.

This is borne out by research. A Columbia University study published in 2008 found that training working memory increased overall fluid intelligence. So the answer to this article’s title question is yes, brain training is very real. (Only, there’s lot of schlock out there.) But hidden in this article lies the new key that many researchers hope will point the way to brain training of the future. Any ONE brain training regiment only makes you better at the one thing being trained. But NEW EXPERIENCES in general, promise a varied and continual rewiring of the brain for a fluid and ever-changing development of intelligence. In other words, if you stay in your comfort zone, the comfort zone decays around you. In order to build intelligence or even to keep what you have, you need to be building new rooms, outside your comfort zone. If you consume a new media source in the morning, experiment with a new route to work, eat a new food for lunch, talk to a new person, or…try a NEW puzzle, you’re forcing your brain to rewire itself to be able to deal with these new experiences—you’re growing new neurons and forcing your old ones to scramble to create new connections.

Brain imaging shows growth in cortical thickness for a group of subjects that played Tetris for three months (red and yellow areas). Yes, even playing video games can sharpen your mind!

Here’s what that means for your brain-training regimen: doing a puzzle is little more than busywork; it’s the act of figuring out how to do it that makes you smarter. Sit down and read the directions. If you understand them immediately and know how you should go about solving a puzzle, put it down and look for something else…something new. It’s not just use it or lose it. It’s use it in a novel way or lose it. Try it. Your brain will thank you for it.

Garth Sundem works at the intersection of math, science, and humor with a growing list of bestselling books including the recently released Brain Candy: Science, Puzzles, Paradoxes, Logic and Illogic to Nourish Your Neurons, which he packed with tasty tidbits of fun, new experiences in hopes of making readers just a little bit smarter without boring them into stupidity. He is a frequent on-screen contributor to The Science Channel and has written for magazines including Wired, Seed, Sand Esquire. You can visit him online or follow his Twitter feed.

*****************
ScriptPhD.com covers science and technology in entertainment, media and advertising. Hire our consulting company for creative content development.

Subscribe to free email notifications of new posts on our home page.

                          

As Comic-Con winds down on the shortened Day 4, we conclude our coverage with two panels that exemplify what Comic-Con is all about. As promised, we dissect the “Comics Design” panel of the world’s top logo designers deconstructing their work, coupled with images of their work. We also bring you an interesting panel of ethnographers, consisting of undergraduate and graduate student, studying the culture and the varying forces that shape Comic-Con. Seriously, they’re studying nerds! Finally, we are delighted to shine our ScriptPhD.com spotlight on new sci-fi author Charles Yu, who presented his new novel at his first (of what we are sure are many) Comic-Con appearance. We sat down and chatted with Charles, and are pleased to publish the interview. And of course, our Day 4 Costume of the Day. Comic-Con 2010 (through the eyes of ScriptPhD.com) ends under the “continue reading” cut!

Comics Design

The visionaries of graphics design for comics (from left to right): Mark Siegel, Chip Kidd, Adam Grano, Mark Chiarello, Keith Wood, and Fawn Lau.

We are not ashamed to admit that here at ScriptPhD.com, we are secret design nerds. We love it, particularly since good design so often elevates the content of films, television, and books, but is a relatively mysterious process. One of THE most fascinating panels that we attended at Comic-Con 2010 was on the design secrets behind some of your favorite comics and book covers. A panel of the world’s leading designers revealed their methodologies (and sometimes failures) in the design process behind their hit pieces, lifting the shroud of secrecy that designers often envelop themselves in. An unparalleled purview into the mind of the designer, and the visual appeal that so often subliminally contributes to the success of a graphic novel, comic, or even regular book. We do, as it turns out, judge books by their covers.

As promised, we revisit this illuminating panel, and thank Christopher Butcher, co-founder of The Toronto Comic Arts Festival and co-owner of The Beguiling, Canada’s finest comics bookstore. Chris was kind enough to provide us with high-quality images of the Comics Design panel’s work, for which we at ScriptPhD.com are grateful. Chris had each of the graphic artists discuss their work with an example of design that worked, and design that didn’t (if available or so inclined). The artist was asked to deconstruct the logo or design and talk about the thought process behind it.

Mark Ciarello – (art + design director at DC Comics)

SOLO, a new release from DC Comics.

Mark chose to design the cover of this book with an overall emphasis on the individual artist. Hence the white space on the book, and a focus on the logo above the “solo” artist.

Adam Grano – (designer at Fantagraphics)

The book cover of A Drunken Dream by Moto Hagio

Adam took the title of this book quite literally, and let loose with his design to truly emphasize the title. He called it “method design.” He wanted the cover to look like a drunken dream.

The Humbug collection.

For the Humbug collection, Grano tried hard not to impress too much of himself (and his tastes) in the design of the cover. He wanted to inject simplicity in a project that would stand the test of time, because it was a collector’s series.

Book cover for The World of Steve Ditko by Blake Bell.

Grano considered this design project his “failure.” It contrasts greatly with the simplicity and elegance of Humbug. He mentioned that everyone on the page is scripted and gridded, something that designers try to avoid in comics.

Chip Kidd – (designer at Random House)

The first Peanuts collection release after Charles M. Schultz's death.

Chip Kidd had the honor of working on the first posthumous Peanuts release after Charles M. Schultz’s death, and took to the project quite seriously. In the cover, he wanted to deconstruct a Peanuts strip. All of the human element is taken out of the strip, with the characters on the cover up to their necks in suburban anxiety.

Grant Morrison's Superman.

Kidd likes this cover because he considers it an updated spin on Superman. It’s not a classic Superman panel, so he designed a logo that deviated from the classic “Superman” logo to match.

Final Crisis, volume 1, by Grant Morrison and J.G. Jones.

Kidd chose this as his design “failure”, but not the design itself. The cover represents one of seven volumes, in which the logo pictured disintegrates by the seventh issue, to match the crisis in the title. Kidd’s only regret here is that he was too subtle. He wishes he’d chosen to start the logo disintegration progression sooner, as there’s very little difference between the first few volumes.

Fawn Lau – (designer at VIZ)

GenKaku Picasso by Usamaru Furuya

Fawn was commissioned to redesign this book cover for an American audience. Keeping this in mind, and wanting the Japanese animation to be more legible for the American audience, she didn’t want too heavy-handed of a logo. In an utterly genius stroke of creativity, Lau went to an art store, bought $70 worth of art supplies, and played around with them until she constructed the “Picasso” logo. Clever, clever girl!

Mark Siegel – (First Second Books)

The new biography "Feynman" by Ottaviani Myrick.

Mark Siegel was hired to create the cover of the new biography Feynman, an eponymous title about one of the most famous physicists of all time. Feynman was an amazing man who lived an amazing life, including a Nobel Prize in physics in 1965. His biographer, Ottaviani Myrick, a nuclear physicist and speed skating champion, is an equally accomplished individual. The design of the cover was therefore chosen to reflect their dynamic personalities. The colors were chosen to represent the atomic bomb and Los Alamos, New Mexico, where Feynman assisted in the development of The Manhattan Project. Incidentally, the quote on the cover – “If that’s the world’s smartest man, God help us!” – is from Feynman’s own mother.

Keith Wood – (Oni Press)

The Queen and Country collection.

Wood remarked that this was the first time he was able to do design on a large scale, which really worked for this project. He chose a very basic color scheme, again to emphasize a collection standing the test of time, and designed all the covers simultaneously, including color schemes and graphics. He felt this gave the project a sense of connectedness.

Local by Bryan Wood and Ryan Kelly.

Wood chose a pantone silver as the base of this design with a stenciled typeface meant to look very modern. The back of the cover and the front of the cover were initially going to be reversed when the artists first brought him the renderings. However, Wood felt that since the book’s content is about the idea of a girl’s traveling across the United States, it would be more compelling and evocative to use feet/baggage as the front of the book. He was also the only graphic artist to show a progression of 10-12 renderings, playing with colors, panels and typeface, that led to the final design. He believes in a very traditional approach to design, which includes hand sketches and multiple renderings.

The Culture of Popular Things: Ethnographic Examinations of Comic-Con 2010

Undergraduate and graduate students present their sociology and economics analyses of Comic-Con 2010.

Each year, for the past four years, Comic-Con ends on an academic note. Matthew J. Smith, a professor at Wittenberg University in Ohio, takes along a cadre of students, graduate and undergraduate, to study Comic-Con; the nerds, the geeks, the entertainment component, the comics component, to ultimately understand the culture of what goes on in this fascinating microcosm of consumerism and fandom. By culture, the students embrace the accepted definition by famous anthropologist Raymond J. DeMallie: “what is understood by members of a group.” The students ultimately wanted to ask why people come to Comic-Con in general. They are united by the general forces of being fans; this is what is understood in their group. After milling around the various locales that constituted the Con, the students deduced that two ultimate forces were simultaneously at play. The fan culture drives and energizes the Con as a whole, while strong marketing forces were on display in the exhibit halls and panels.

Maxwell Wassmann, a political economy student at Wayne State University, pointed out that “secretly, what we’re talking about is the culture of buying things.” He compared Comic-Con as a giant shopping mall, a microcosm of our economic system in one place. “If you’ve spent at least 10 minutes at Comic-Con,” he pointed out, “you probably bought something or had something tried to be sold to you. Everything is about marketing.” As a whole, Comic-Con is subliminally designed to reinforce the idea that this piece of pop culture, which ultimately advertises an even greater subset of pop culture, is worth your money. Wassmann pointed out an advertising meme present throughout the weekend that we took notice of as well—garment-challenged ladies advertising the new Green Hornet movie. The movie itself is not terribly sexy, but by using garment-challenged ladies to espouse the very picture of the movie, when you leave Comic-Con and see a poster for Green Hornet, you will subconsciously link it to the sexy images you were exposed to in San Diego, greatly increasing your chances of wanting to see the film. By contrast, Wassmann also pointed out that there is a concomitant old-town economy happening; small comics. In the fringes of the exhibition center and the artists’ space, a totally different microcosm of consumerism and content exchange.

Kane Anderson dressed up in a costume as he immerses himself in the culture of comics fans in San Diego.

Kane Anderson, a PhD student at UC Santa Barbara getting his doctorate in “Superheroology” (seriously, why didn’t I think of that back in graduate school??), came to San Diego to observe how costumes relate to the superhero experience. To fully absorb himself in the experience, and to gain the trust of Con attendees that he’d be interviewing, Anderson came in full costume (see above picture). Overall, he deduced that the costume-goers, who we will openly admit to enjoying and photographing during our stay in San Diego, act as goodwill ambassadors for the characters and superheroes they represent. They also add to the fantasy and adventure of Comic-Con goers, creating the “experience.” The negative side to this is that it evokes a certain “looky-loo” effect, where people are actively seeking out, and singling out, costume-wearers, even though they only constitute 5% of all attendees.

Tanya Zuk, a media masters student from the University of Arizona, and Jacob Sigafoos, an undergraduate communications major at Wittenberg University, both took on the mighty Hollywood forces invading the Con, primarily the distribution of independent content, an enormous portion of the programming at Comic-Con (and a growing presence on the web). Zuk spoke about original video content, more distinctive of new media, is distributed primarily online. It allows for more exchange between creators and their audience than traditional content (such as film and cable television), and builds a community fanbase through organic interaction. Sigafoos expanded on this by talking about how to properly market such material to gain viral popularity—none at all! Lack of marketing, at least traditional forms, is the most successful way to promote a product. Producing a high-quality product, handing it off to friends, and promoting through social media is still the best way to grow a devoted following.

And speaking of Hollywood, their presence at Comic-Con is undeniable. Emily Saidel, a Master’s student at NYU, and Sam Kinney, a business/marketing student at Wittenberg University, both took on the behemoth forces of major studios hawking their products in what originally started out as a quite independent gathering. Saidel tackled Hollywood’s presence at Comic-Con, people’s acceptance/rejection thereof, and how comics are accepted by traditional academic disciplines as didactic tools in and of themselves. The common thread is a clash between the culture and the community. Being a member of a group is a relatively simple idea, but because Comic-Con is so large, it incorporates multiple communities, leading to tensions between those feeling on the outside (i.e. fringe comics or anime fans) versus those feeling on the inside (i.e. the more common mainstream fans). Comics fans would like to be part of that mainstream group and do show interest in those adaptations and changes (we’re all movie buffs, after all), noted Kinney, but feel that Comic-Con is bigger than what it should be.

But how much tension is there between the different subgroups and forces? The most salient example from last year’s Con was the invasion of the uber-mainstream Twilight fans, who not only created a ruckus on the streets of San Diego, but also usurped all the seats of the largest pavilion, Hall H, to wait for their panel, locking out other fans from seeing their panels. (No one was stabbed.) In reality, the supposed clash of cultures is blown out of proportion, with most fans not really feeling the tension. To boot, Seidel pointed out that tension isn’t necessarily a bad thing, either. She gave a metaphor of a rubber band, which only fulfills its purpose with tension. The different forces of Comic-Con work in different ways, if sometimes imperfectly. And that’s a good thing.

Incidentally, if you are reading this and interested in participating in the week-long program in San Diego next year, visit the official website of the Comic-Con field study for more information. Some of the benefits include: attending the Comic-Con programs of your choice, learning the tools of ethnographic investigation, and presenting the findings as part of a presentation to the Comics Arts Conference. Dr. Matthew Smith, who leads the field study every year, is not just a veteran attendee of Comic-Con, but also the author of The Power of Comics.

COMIC-CON SPOTLIGHT ON: Charles Yu, author of How To Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe.

How To Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe, out in release September 7, 2010.

Here at ScriptPhD.com, we love hobnobbing with the scientific and entertainment elite and talking to writers and filmmakers at the top of their craft as much as the next website. But what we love even more is seeking out new talent, the makers of the books, movies and ideas that you’ll be talking about tomorrow, and being proud to be the first to showcase their work. This year, in our preparation for Comic-Con 2010, we ran across such an individual in Charles Yu, whose first novel, How To Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe premieres this fall, and who spoke about it at a panel over the weekend. We had an opportunity to have lunch with Charles in Los Angeles just prior Comic-Con, and spoke in-depth about his new book, along with the state of sci-fi in current literature. We’re pretty sure Charles Yu is a name science fiction fans are going to be hearing for some time to come. ScriptPhD.com is proud to shine our 2010 Comic-Con spotlight on Charles and his debut novel, which is available September 7, 2010.

How To Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe is the story of a son searching for his father… through quantum-space time. The story takes place on Minor Universe 31, a vast story-space on the outskirts of fiction, where paradox fluctuates like the stock market, lonely sexbots beckon failed protagonists, and time travel is serious business. Every day, people get into time machines and try to do the one thing they should never do: try to change the past. That’s where the main character, Charles Yu, time travel technician, steps in. Accompanied by TAMMY (who we consider the new Hal), an operating system with low self-esteem, and a nonexistent but ontologically valid dog named Ed, Charles helps save people from themselves. When he’s not on the job, Charles visits his mother (stuck in a one-hour cycle, she makes dinner over and over and over) and searches for his father, who invented time travel and then vanished.

Questions for Charles Yu

Sci-fi author Charles Yu.

ScriptPhD.com: Charles, the story has tremendous traditional sci-fi roots. Can you discuss where the inspiration for this came from?

Charles Yu: Well the sci-fi angle definitely comes from being a kid in the 80s, when there were blockbuster sci-fi things all over the place. I’ve always loved [that time], as a casual fan, but also wanted to write it. I didn’t even start doing that until after I’d graduated from law school. I did write, growing up, but I never wrote fiction—I didn’t think I’d be any good at it! I wrote poetry in college, minored in it, actually. Fiction and poetry are both incredibly hard, and poetry takes more discipline, but at least when I failed in my early writing, it was a 100 words of failure, instead of 5,000 words of it.

SPhD: What were some of your biggest inspirations growing up (television or books) that contributed to your later work?

CY: Definitely The Foundation Trilogy. I remember reading that in the 8th grade, and I remember spending every waking moment reading, because it was the greatest thing I’d ever read. First of all, I was in the 8th grade, so I hadn’t read that many things, but the idea that Asimov created this entire self-contained universe, it was the first time that I’d been exposed to that idea. And then to have this psychohistory on top, it was kind of trippy. Psychohistory is the idea that social sciences can be just as rigorously captured with equations as any physical science. I think that series of books is the main thing that got me into sci-fi.

SPhD: Any regrets about having named the main character after yourself?

CY: Yes. For a very specific reason. People in my life are going to think it’s biographical, which it’s very much not. And it’s very natural for people to do that. And in my first book of short stories, none of the main characters was named after anyone, and still I had family members that asked if that was about our family, or people that gave me great feedback but then said, “How could you do that to your family?” And it was fiction! I don’t think the book could have gotten written had I not left that placeholder in, because the one thing that drove any sort of emotional connection for the story for me was the idea of having less things to worry about. The other thing is that because the main character is named after you, as you’re writing the book, it acts as a fuel or vector to help drive the emotional completion.

SPhD: In the world of your novel, people live in a lachrymose, technologically-driven society. Any commentary therein whatsoever on the technological numbing of our own current culture?

CY: Yes. But I didn’t mean it as a condemnation, in a sense. I wouldn’t make an overt statement about technology and society, but I am more interested in the way that technology can sometimes not connect people, but enable people’s tendency to isolate themselves. Certainly, technology has amazing connective possibilities, but that would have been a much different story, obviously. The emotional plot-level core of this book is a box. And that sort of drove everything from there. The technology is almost an emotional technology that [Charles, the main character] has invented with his dad. It’s a larger reflection of his inability to move past certain limitations that he’s put on himself.

SPhD: What drives Charles, the main character of this book?

CY: What’s really driving Charles emotionally is looking for his dad. But more than that, is trying to move through time, to navigate the past without getting stuck in it.

SPhD: Both of his companions are non-human. Any significance to that?

CY: It probably speaks more to my limitations as a writer [laughs]. That was all part of the lonely guy type that Charles is being portrayed as. If he had a human with him, he’d be a much different person.

SPhD: The book abounds in scientific jargon and technological terminology, which is par for the course in science fiction, but was still very ambitious. Do you have high expectations of the audience that will read this book?

CY: Yeah. I was just reading an interview where the writer essentially said “You can never go wrong by expecting too much [of your audience].” You can definitely go wrong the other way, because that would come off as terrible, or assuming that you know more. But actually, my concerns were more in the other direction, because I knew I was playing fast and loose with concepts that I know I don’t have a great grasp of. I’m writing from the level of amateur who likes reading science books, and studied science in college—an entertainment layreader. My worry was whether I was BSing too much [of the science]. There are parts where it’s clearly fictional science, but there are other parts that I cite things that are real, and is anyone who reads this who actually knows something about science going to say “What the heck is this guy saying?”

SPhD: How To Live… is written in a very atavistic, retro 80s style of science fiction, and really reminded me of the best of Isaac Asimov. How do you feel about the current state of sci-fi literature as relates to your book?

CY: Two really big keys for me, and things I was thinking about while writing [this book], were one, there is kind of a kitchiness to sci-fi, and I think that’s kind of intentional. It has a kind of do-it-yourself aesthetic to it. In my book, you basically have a guy in the garage with his dad, and yes the dad is an engineer, but it’s in a garage without great equipment, so it’s not going to look sleek, you can imagine what it’s going to look like—it’s going to look like something you’d build with things you have lying around in the garage. On the other hand, it is supposed to be this fully realized time machine, and you’re not supposed to be able to imagine it. Even now, when I’m in the library in the science-fiction section, I’ll often look for anthologies that are from the 80s, or the greatest time travel stories from the 20th Century that cover a much greater range of time than what’s being published now. It’s almost like the advancement of real-world technology is edging closer to what used to be the realm of science fiction. The way that I would think about that is that it’s not exploting what the real possibility of science fiction is, which is to explore a current world or any other completely strange world, but not a world totally envisionable ten years from now. You end up speculating on what’s possible or what’s easily extrapollatable from here; that’s not necessarily going to make for super emotional stories.

Charles Yu is a writer and attorney living in Los Angeles, CA.

Last, but certainly not least, is our final Costume of the Day. We chose this young ninja not only because of the coolness of his costume, but because of his quick wit. As we were taking the snapshot he said, “I’m smiling, you just can’t see it.” And a check mate to you, young sir.

Day 4 Costume of the Day.

Incidentally, you can find much more photographic coverage of Comic-Con on our Facebook fan page. Become a fan, because this week, we will be announcing Comic-Con swag giveaways that only Facebook fans are eligible for.

~*ScriptPhD*~

*****************
ScriptPhD.com covers science and technology in entertainment, media and advertising. Hire our consulting company for creative content development.

Subscribe to free email notifications of new posts on our home page.

                          

Street signs adorning the City of San Diego for Comic-Con 2010

Day 3 was Star Wars Day at San Diego Comic-Con International and we have something shocking to report, ladies and gentlemen. We did not see a single light saber, not one! Since we almost incurred an unfortunate eye injury last year due to an overenthusiastic Jedi, this was most welcome relief. For ScriptPhD.com, today was all about science and technology. In a day that could not have been more tailor-made for our website, we enjoyed panels with the eminent sci-fi television writers of today discussing writing for genre TV (a must-read for any aspiring TV writers out there!), a visit from the greatest science fiction writer in the history of science fiction, Ray Bradbury, a preview of next season’s sci-fi show The Event, and a panel on how exactly shows like CSI “tech” out with gadgets galore. Oh, yes, did we mention we got to hang out privately with the MythBusters?? With the help of our intrepid reporter Bryy Miller, we bring you the most complete Comic-Con coverage on the web. Plus, our Costume of the Day, after the “continue reading” cut!

The Write Stuff: Creating Genre Television

LOST. CSI. V. Battlestar Galactica. It seems that sci-fi, tech, and geek-chic television is everywhere. Not only is it a staple of prime time (across basic and extended cable), it’s an increasingly popular genre for which good writers are constantly in demand. Since we are SCRIPTPhD.com, an opportunity to listen in as a panel of some of today’s hottest genre television writers gave away secrets of their craft and advice for aspiring writers was irresistible.

Writing for Genre TV panel Part 1 (from left to right): Moderator Jeff Goldsmith, Javier Grillo-Marxuach, Sarah Watson, Robert Hewitt Wolfe, Ashley E. Miller

Writing for Genre TV Part 2 (from left to right): Steve Melching, Gabrielle Stanton, Jesse Alexander, Steve Kriozere, Charles Murray, and Mark Altman.

Since this panel consisted of so many writers, albeit a dream team thereof, there was only an allotted amount of time for three questions, each of which the panelists answered one by one down the line, and quite enthusiastically. The moderator, Jeff Goldsmith, who runs the industry rag Creative Screenwriting correctly pointed out that not only are they all working in TV, but if they weren’t on this panel, they’d be at Comic-Con anyway. He called them the “Algonquin geek table.” The first question was to ask each screenwriter what brilliant idea they had that would revolutionize a show they were working on at the time, but that couldn’t get past the network censors.

Mark Altman (Castle, Elvis Van Helsing) recalled creating a pilot called Elvis Van Helsing, but ABC went with The Middle Man instead. So he turned it into a graphic novel, and the rest was history. Charles Murray (V, Criminal Minds) actually recalled a terrific idea for an episode of Criminal Minds, where a serial killer would put a milk carton in someone’s fridge and the “Have You Seen This Person?” picture would be of the dead person. Clever, we thought! Steve Kriozere (NCIS, VIP) had the clever idea on VIP of casting Bruce Campbell to play Pamela Anderson’s uncle. The amazing and talented Jesse Alexander (Alias, LOST, Heroes) recalled a victory for geeks in the form of Heroes Season 1 in an episode entitled Days of Future Past where all the characters went into alternate future. He mentioned that it was so hard to approve and get on air, but the episode went on to win multiple awards. What didn’t make it? “Season 5.”
Steve Melching (Clone Wars, Transformers, The Batman) recalled writing for the animated series The Batman taking place in his first few years in Gotham City, and wanted (but failed) to approve a B story about a frat boy group dressing up in D-List costumes, committing fake crimes and then videotaping their subsequent ass kicking by Batman. We wonder why that didn’t get approved. Ashley E. Miller (Fringe, Terminator) wanted a Fringe follow up to the episode “Bishop Revival,” which had an immortal Nazi. He wanted a flashback episode to 1942, where we find out that Agent Phillip Broyles is 100 years old, and whacking Nazis. Jose Molina (Castle, Firefly) wanted a Firefly payoff episode with a 9-months-pregnant woman being evil, where the team kills her but they save the baby, and the episode would consist of three acts of “Three Men and a Baby.” Right. Sarah Watson (Middleman, Parenthood) recalled being hired to do a SyFy Channel movie of the week about an untapped volcano under Manhattan (seriously!), and she had grand plans for lava engulfing Statue of Liberty, taking over all of Manhattan island, but when the movie got produced the visual ended up being lava trickling out from under a garage. Robert Hewitt Wolfe (The Gates, Deep Space Nine) was writing for 4400 in its final season, and was obsessed with the idea of creating an aerosol promycin bomb over Seattle (hmmm, as a Seattleite, I booed this from the audience). The showrunners created a promycin bomb at the end. So the next time you think all TV writers are geniuses, just remember that for every great episode of your favorite show, there were many bad ideas tossed around in the writers’ room.

Next, Goldsmith asked the panel to recount (as diplomatically as possible) the stupidest network notes they’d ever encountered for a show script they worked on.

Mark Altman recalled working on a SyFy Channel movie where executives asked him to recap the whole plot at the beginning of the hour because of people tuning in from HBO. Charles Murray, while working on V, was told he couldn’t use the word lizard in an episode. How do you get past something like that, he was asked. “I left the show. That’s how you get past it.” Steve Kriozere revealed the #1 SyFy Channel rule of movies: don’t speak to the monster. Jesse Alexander, having worked on some of the greatest sci-fi hits ever, waxed more philosophical. Everyone has an opinion on these shows, but executives want the rules of the show’s world, they want everything spelled out clearly, a lot of exposition. They’re generally happier if the shows are procedurals, but sci-fi shows don’t have room for that—if all the secrets and exposition are revealed it drives people away from the content. Steve Melching pointed out that a lot of animated shows have hyper-sensors because they’re aimed at children. The dumbest note he ever received was that you can’t say “killer satellites.” Ashley E. Miller was reminded (we are shocked!) that you cannot have an 11 year old boy say douchenozzle on prime time TV. Jose Molina recalled an episode of Castle where a body is found in the teaser, the guys go through case, and find out that the victim was killed by a stiletto. Said the executives: “Does the killer have to kill with a shoe?” Sarah Watson revealed that the most annoying thing to writers on shows now is that they’re paid by sponsors, so writers have to put products into scenes strategically. Her worst example was an episode of a show with a surf competition…sponsored by Tampax. To make this work, they had to cover a poor actress’s entire surf bodysuit with Tampax logos. Robert Hewitt Wolfe was taken out to dinner by the main executives of a show he was working on and flat out asked to dumb down the series. Ahhh, the things you learn when the iron curtain goes down.

Finally, Goldsmith asked the panel to give advice to young TV writers (or aspiring writers) on how to best write for a budget, which is unfortunately what most young writers will face on television these days.

Without question, the panel answered unanimously that the secret in the writing is all. about. character. The best and cheapest special effects are two actors in a room with terrific conflict and terrific dialogue—that’s what’s compelling, that’s what’s intimate. Most physical action, they reminded us, is actually superfluous—only revert to it after all possible dialogue is tapped out. Ultimately, you must look at how what you cut (if you are forced to cut things) affects the character. If you put six people in a scene, make sure that all of them need to be in the scene, because it is extremely expensive to shoot. The writers lamented that networks sometimes have too much money, and a subsequent desire to compete with Transformers or Iron Man, which television can’t do. Writers must remember that character works for television, and you can have high-concept ideas for sci-fi. That’s why shows on cable, which are often budget-restricted, are so great. Sarah Watson reminded the audience that you can always make a show cheaper, and fantastic, with great writing and great dialogue. This is how Friday Night Lights, which shoots on a shoestring budget down in Texas, was able to survive for five seasons.

Mostly, in advice relevant to any writer reading this, they said not to repeat past mistakes.

The Event

The Event panel (from left to right): Ian Anthony Dale, Zeljko Ivanek, Laura Innes, Sarah Roemer, Jason Ritter, Blair Underwood, and producers Evan Katz, Steve Stark, Jeffrey Reiner, Nick Wauters and Jim Wong.

This television show, premiering in the fall of 2010, might be the new LOST, or it might be the new FlashForward. I’m not sure yet. The Event, a show that is so steeped in mystery that even its title is nothing more than Something Happens, was a show—and will be a show—with as many problems as it has concepts. Fortunately, all of its flaws are structural.

The pilot is laid out as three separate stories (well, actually, four, but one is extremely short in comparison) over the course of three separate acts. We actually start the show in the middle of the story when our hero, Sean Walker (Jason Ritter), hijacks a plane in order to save it, and then flash back to eight days earlier, and then forward to seven days earlier, and then once more to the present. It gets even more confusing when President Eli Martinez (the incredibly suave Blair Underwood) gets his go at the story, and then his segment goes back an entire year. The other two stories comprise of the father of Sean’s girlfriend, whose house and family are assaulted by unknown forces, and Simon Lee (Ian Anthony Dale), the supposed second-in-command of a secret government base/prison that lies at the center of The Event. It’s a shame that Lee’s section is so short, as Dale is a fantastic actor even within the confines of such little material. But perhaps the best acting comes from ER/West Wing (and Northwestern University!) alumna, Laura Innes, who absolutely nails her cryptic sayings as Sofia, the leader of the base/prison/thing-to-be-revealed-later.

The show will need to cut out some of the flashes in order to survive past its initial thirteen episodes, but it is definitely a unique format that works for this type of story. The writing was high-quality and so was the dialogue; there were no qualms there. It also revealed quite a bit about the world that had been set up if you looked closely enough. Co-Producer Evan Katz made the promise that answers would actually come a lot faster than with other mystery longforms. This is welcome, especially since I am of the belief that mystery shows can maintain the mystery if they answer questions in the right or clever way. Sometimes, it is even essential to answer them if you want the show to progress to its next level of weirdness. Blair Underwood was then asked what it is like to be the first Cuban president, to which he replied that there would be no Salsa dancing.

Katz then ended the panel the only way it could have possibly ended:

“The Salsa is not The Event.”

Spotlight On: Ray Bradbury

He is brilliant. He is one of the foremost technology predictors since Leonardo DaVinci. He is irreverent, utterly aware of his importance, and quite simply, the greatest science fiction writer in the history of the genre. He none other than Ray Bradbury. Ray has been coming to Comic-Con since the very first year of its inception. A devoted comics and graphic novel buff, he loves interacting yearly with fans, and gracing them with his musings, knowledge and appreciation. We were honored and somewhat overwhelmed to be there in person for Ray’s 41st Comic-Con panel, on the heels of his 90th birthday. Because Bradbury’s words speak for themselves, we bring you the panel through his eyes.

Ray Bradbury being wheeled in for his Comic-Con panel.

Bradbury, not shy about quips and bold statements, starts out his panel with a bang: “I want to make an announcement. Sam Weller and I are working on a new book together: Let’s Let The Cat out of the Bag.” In actuality, Weller and Bradbury released a brand new book of interviews (out June 29th) entitled Listen to the Echoes: The Ray Bradbury Interviews. Weller has spent over a decade with Bradbury, getting to know him, studying his works, and acted as his guide during the panel (Mr. Bradbury has become a bit hard of hearing). Bradbury is currently working on a new book of 20 short stories entitled “Juggernaut” to be published next Christmas.

Sam Weller, middle, Ray Bradbury's biographer, led the panel and discussion at Comic-Con

On how it feels to be Ray Bradbury and if he ever marvels at himself, after a long, thoughtful pause, a hearty laugh and: “It feels mighty damn good.”

Fahrenheit 451 was among the most prescient sci-fi works of all time, predicting technology such as earbuds, flat screen televisions, school violence, and the rise of graphic novels. How did Bradbury predict all this stuff?

“The secret of life is being in love. By being in love, you predict yourself. Whatever you want is what you get. You don’t think about things; just do them. Don’t predict them—just make them.”

Of the technologies Bradbury predicted, he also warned about many, including rise of mass media. What tech would he like to see next?

Again, a thoughtful pause. “I’d like certain technologies to disappear. The internet is a great, big, stupid goddamn bore.” Keep in mind that when Bradbury was approached by an internet magnate to publish his works as e-books for the internet, he responded with: “Prick up your ears and go to hell!” The internet magnate? None other than the CEO of Yahoo.

Another strong, recurring theme of Bradbury’s panel was his love (adoration, really) of space exploration, most notably colonization of Mars and the Moon. Why? “Because we’re going to live forever. We should go back and build a base on the Moon, put a civilization on Mars. 500 years from now, we’ll go out into the Universe, and when we do that, we have a chance to live forever.”

Weller tried to get Bradbury to discuss the new book, once again evoking his crotchety sense of humour: “You can’t afford it. So get out of here and forget it.” In an extremely revealing, intimate moment, Weller pointed out that many Mars stories and works are inspired by and cut from Bradbury’s Martian Chronicles, none more similar than the Twilight Zone. Bradbury then revealed something that many of his fans probably don’t know. “Rod Sterling came to my house many years ago. He didn’t know anything about writing sci-fi. So I took him down to my basement and gave him copies of books written by Roald Dahl, John Collier, a number of other great sci-fi authors, and myself. Rod Sterling forgot that he read all these books, and when he wrote his programs, he copied some of his ideas from me, and we got into a big argument.” The two never reconciled.

As we’ve mentioned, Bradbury came to Comic-Con in its first year, where he said only 300 people came to first meeting, quite different from today, where 1,000 people were gathered in his room alone. Why does he come so often? “Because I’ve been collecting comic strips all my life. I have 30 years’ of Prince Valiant Sunday illustrations put away, all of Buck Rogers. My background in becoming a writer was falling in love with comic strips.” How did they influence his prose and narrative? “Comic strips are full of imagination and glorious adventures. My all-time favorite is Mutts. A year from now, there will be a graphic novel of “The Martian Chronicles” and “Something Wicked This Way Comes.”” Bradbury is, in fact, the world’s greatest (and possibly oldest) fanboy. He is famous for writing fan letters to writers and other figures that he admires. He sent books to John Huston, the famous screenwriter and filmmaker. He sent a hand-written letter to Edgar Rice Burroughs begging him to come to a meeting of Bradbury’s science fiction society club.

Another thing fans may not know is that Bradbury is considered the patron saint of the American library system. He has been very active in rescuing libraries that are under fire because of budgetary crises. He recounted the story of his love affair with the library. “When I left high school, I had no money to go to college. I decided to not worry about going to college. I thought: “I will educate myself.” So I walked down the street, I walked into a library for 3 days a week for 10 years. Most of you in the audience can’t afford to go to college. But if you want to educate yourself, you can afford to go to the library. When I was 28 years old, I graduated from the library.”

The concept of time travel is explored in the short story “A Sound of Thunder.” If Bradbury could time travel, he was asked to what moment it would be? “Every. Single. Moment. Every single moment of my life has been incredible. I’ve savored it. It’s beautiful, because I’ve remained a boy. The man you see here tonight is a 12 year old boy, and he’s having fun!” How does he stay connected to his inner child? “Don’t worry about the future, or the past, you just explode every day. If you’re dynamic, you don’t have to worry about what age you are.”

Indeed, childhood is a theme of many of his short stories. Why is this so important to Bradbury? “Because I grew up loving carnivals and circuses. That’s why I wrote those stories.”

When asked if he had any regrets in life, Bradbury evoked the biggest laugh of the day: “I regret that I didn’t have more time with Bo Derek.” What’s the Bo Derek story? She came up to him in Paris train station, and exclaimed “Mr. Bradbury, I love you!” To which he responded, “Who are you?” She replied, “My name is Bo Derek. Mr. Bradbury, will you travel on the train with me?” With a stoic face he recalled replying: “Yep, I will!” The rest was censored.

Other than Be Derek, what was his greatest love? Bradbury turned philosophical. “I am the world’s greatest lover. I love to write short stories. I write them. I love to write novels. I write them. I love to write poetry. I write it. I love to paint pictures. I paint them. I loved directing a film. So I directed it. Those are my greatest lovers. I have loved all these things I have told you about.”

What authors inspired Bradbury growing up? “Edgar Rice Burrows. And Edgar Allan Poe—scared the hell out of me.”

Another fact about Bradbury that many people may not know is his rather illuminating and successful career as a designer and architect. He was asked how he got involved with designing the San Diego city center Horton Plaza. ”I designed a lot of other places all over LA. 50 years ago, the people who were building the New World’s Fair asked me to redesign the United States Pavilion. I helped build Epcot down in Florida. Because of those works, the people of San Diego came and asked for input in building The Horton Plaza at the center of San Diego.”

Aldous Huxley famously said of Bradbury, “You know what you are sir? You are a poet.” When asked who the poets are that have influenced his writing, Bradbury immediately responded: “Shakespeare and Alexander Pope.”

What are the things that keep Bradbury motivated now? “I have more work to do.”

On how his writing has changed over time: “It’s gotten more brilliant.”

As such a fan of Mars, Bradbury was asked how he feels about the ongoing Martian probes, and the real science evidence they have brought back to Earth. “I’m glad we are doing that [research], but we should be doing more. We should be going there in person. Not with a lander, but with a real rocket ship and landing on Mars.” In a rather endearing moment, Weller revealed that Bradbury has never driven an automobile. But he was invited to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, where scientists asked him if he’d like to drive the Mars Rover over Mars. So he hasn’t driven on the 405 freeway, but he has driven across Mars! The scientists even gave him a Martian drivers license.

Any futuristic technologies for cities that Bradbury would like to see? “Monorails all over LA and California. Get rid of the goddamn freeways!” As a Los Angeles resident, hear, hear, Mr. Bradbury!

What was the intended audience of Fahrenheit 451 and how does he feel about its rise to prominence as a true modern American classic? “I am not a science fiction writer. All my books are fantasy. But the one book that is pure science fiction is Fahrenheit 451. So I’m glad that I wrote it. I’m glad that you all feel that way about it too.”

Does Bradbury have a favorite work? “All of my books are my favorites. All of my books are my children. I love all my children.”

How does Bradbury feel about digital books? With a cranky grunt: “I’ve already told you that. I don’t like them. I think of iPads and Kindles as books with a computer screen. Real books smell, real books have memories.” We here at ScriptPhD.com would like to give that statement a heartfelt “AMEN!”

Finally, Bradbury, on turning 90 in a few weeks. How does it feel? “It’s been 90 goddamned incredible years!” To which the audience responded by singing him “Happy Birthday.” A surreal, incredible and special moment.

Teching Out on TV

The Teching Out on TV panel (from left to right): Pauley Perrette, Kristen Vangsness, Barrett Foa, and Rich Catalani.

This panel started out with an inundating montage of clips from tech-chic procedurals CSI and NCIS that involved technology of all sorts. It was part awesome and part utterly corny, as words to the song that was spliced in occasionally would find themselves on to the screen. I was afraid that this foreshadowed the panel being just a huge PR stroke for both shows, but I was later proven wrong. Despite the moderator speaking in a loud, fast, incoherent style of mumbling, the rest of the speakers (Anthony Zuicker, creator of CSI; Pauley Perette, CSI; Barrett Foa, NCIS: Los Angeles; Kirsten Vangsness, Criminal Minds; and Rich Catalani, producer of CSI) were very articulate about all aspects of technology on their shows. They strove to make it less a panel about technology on CSI and NCIS and more about technology and how it relates to CSI and NCIS.

The presentation started out with questions about how everyone got involved in their work, and more specifically, how they got involved in technology, or if they even were. Perette studied forensics in college, talking about how, back in her early years, nobody knew a thing about it. She related a story that the first time that her computer was hacked into, she tried to tell the police, but ended up having to explain to them what an IP Address was. Then, after shows such as CSI and Law & Order made technology and forensics mainstream, everyone was a part of a club that they felt they cultivated. “We all became semi-experts,” she said. “It’s been an incredible decade of change. What we’re showing on our show is the grand upmovement”. Vangsness was a tad in the opposite direction: she took teaching jobs in order to support herself, and one of those jobs was teaching PowerPoint to third graders. She now has images of third graders hacking into government installations to post spam of kittens.

Foa stopped the discussion at one point to explain to the audience that his show, unlike the original CSI, does not stare at a green screen when looking at his computer tomfoolery. It is all real. Which complicated matters greatly when Perette’s character met Foa’s in a crossover between their two shows. She had to literally teach him on set how to react to a green screen as oppose to a real image. Foa also related how the super-tech that we often think of as fictional and made up is actually real. The CSI writers have access to China Lake, a military outpost where they test experimental technology. Scary, huh?

But sometimes technology cannot save you, and honest-to-God legwork must be put into use. For one CSI episode involving a stampede of ants, they actually had to hire an Ant Wrangler and clean up all the creepy crawlies using a vacuum. CGI was expected to just look too ridiculous. Then, in a devilish sort of irony, the projector broke, so the panel was cut short and went straight to questions. Perette was met with a young woman who was going to major in Cellular Biology in college because of Perette’s performance on CSI.

Thus, the cycle continues.

MythBusters: Panel + Press Room Coverage

How popular are Discovery Channel’s MythBusters? Very. Each year, the group of geeky demolition rock stars, who prove and disprove popular science myths through the scientific method, represent one of the fan favorite panels at Comic-Con. This year was no different. Press pass notwithstanding, we barely squeezed into a sardine-tight hall full of science fans awaiting their heroes’ arrival. Take a look at the picture below:

A packed-to-the-brim house of 2,000 people awaits the entrance of the MythBusters.

As if the presence of television’s most explosive group wasn’t enough, the audience was tantalized two-fold before the panel. First, a montage video introducing the Busters had us cracking up with its over-the-top… what else?… explosions!

Their entrance was preceded by what else, but a montage of some of their greatest hits!

Then, a special guest, Geoff The Robot from The Late Show with Craig Ferguson, stepped out to proclaim his nerdy love of all things MythBusters.

Geoff, the robot from the Late Show with Craig Ferguson.

Finally, to ear-deafening applause, Chris Hardwick of one of our favorite blogs The Nerdist (follow him on Twitter) introduced the MythBusters, who announced that they’ve signed up for 7 more years of glorious science. This is a very special Comic-Con for them. It’s the first time all five have come as a group, and it is gorgeous geek diva Kari Byron’s first Con.

The MythBusters all together at Comic-Con--a first for them! From left to right: Grant Imahara, Tory Belleci, Kari Byron, Adam Savage, Jamie Hyneman, and host Chris Hardwick of The Nerdist.

The first thing the MythBusters wanted their fans to know is just how very real they are. Although they feel like royalty at the Con, when they go back home to San Francisco, MythBusters is far from glamorous. Inside their workshop, which is a workshop and not a studio, they are doing all of the stunts and building themselves. They get dirty, they get bruised, and they do all of the experimenting. Says Adam Savage: “If you see it, we built it.” Although Savage has started getting more involved behind-the-scenes, he explained that the team is so knowledgeable about how to build things, that it’s faster and more efficient for them to do the building than to leave it to someone else. Tory Bellici mused that it would be nice to have stunt doubles sometimes, to which Kari Byron quipped: “They’re not stunts when you fall off.” Did we mention that we love Kari? Jamie Hyneman, who initially signed up for MythBusters because of the allure of getting to try new things, is still having a hard time acknowledging being on TV. When asked what famous people he’d met because of MythBusters, he couldn’t recall one. “President Obama?” nudged Byron. “Oh. Yeah,” replied Hyneman hysterically. Not so for Grant Imahara, possibly the most famous robotics guy in the world. “Craig Ferguson called me the Keith Richards of robotics,” said Grant. “I’m not sure how to take that.”

The audience was treated to a highlight reel of the upcoming season, which promises to have the best, and most extreme, experiments yet. The team revealed some of the secrets. Adam Savage revealed that a scene of a Porsche flipping backwards violently was done to bust an old 1980s myth that classic sports cars are more aerodynamic going backwards than forwards. In an utterly bad-ass bit of reconstruction, the body of a Porsche chassis was cut off, flipped backwards on the car, then raced at 100 miles per hour. Any more questions, kids? A scene showing Kari puking violently (she joked that it was in her contract to have to throw up every year) was explained as an episode testing whether people really do get cold feet when they have to do something scary. For the team, scary meant picking, then eating, two of the most disgusting selections from a table of delicacies consisting of spiders, cockroaches, chicken feet and more. And where does the team get their constant supply of ideas? “Surfing the internet really works!” joked Grant Imahara.

As to whether the team is cognizant of how much they advance science and critical thinking, and actively try to build experiments around didactic aims, the answer is… NO! Jamie remarked that as a whole, the MythBusters are a remarkably curious group. They are curious about stuff, they try to figure it out, and do so in a methodical and logical way. But they never set out to do science. Which, honestly, in the opinion of this website, is why their science is so great.

At this point, the team shared fun and hilarious inside stories from their Comic-Con experience and tidbits from back home in San Francisco. Adam recalls being shocked at two geeks that came up to him at an autograph table with their baby, wearing a onesie that said “Proof that nerds have sex.” Despite his uncomfortable laughter, the duo then asked him to sign their baby! Another fan went up to Jamie and remarked: “I’ve been watching your shows since I was a little girl and now I’m a PhD!” We’re pretty sure Jamie was kidding, but Adam still poked fun back at him. “You’re old!”

Just in time for next week’s Discovery Channel Shark Week, Adam recalled a fan coming up to him a few months back with what the fan was convinced was a brilliant suggestion: “Dude, you know what you should totally do? You should totally prove that, like, punching sharks will make them go away! Seriously, dude, it would be awesome! You’d just punch them.” A brief pause from Adam. “8 months later, there we were, knee deep in sharks, punching them in the face…”

Kari revealed that she filmed the show up to her 10th month of pregnancy. She pointed out that it’s a myth that pregnancy only lasts 9 months. (BUSTED!) She was worried that her baby would never come out. Replied Grant: “With all those explosions and gunshots outside, I wouldn’t come out either!”

Finally, to a fan that asked whether the team is ever scared of an experiment as too dangerous, Jamie reminded him that danger is a relative term. Nothing the MythBusters do is any less dangerous than driving down a freeway at 70 miles an hour. The trick is to good engineering and survive by doing a good job.

The new season of MythBusters premieres in the fall. Find coverage of their Comic-Con panel and clips from the new season on the MythBusters website.

The MythBusters (and Geoff) chilling with us back in the press room after the panel. Aren't they all beyond adorable??

We got to spend even more time hanging out with the MythBusters (and Geoff) backstage in the press area to get even more scoop about the show. We all wondered about the research process that the team undergoes. First and foremost, Adam proclaimed that they “don’t ever get things tested because they’re too dangerous.” There’s nothing the team is afraid of, and no length of time is too long to wait for a payoff. The research can take anywhere from 2 weeks to 2 years. The team searched 19 months for a lead layer thin enough to do an experiment properly. By contrast, the poppy seed drug testing experiment took two hours. They ate poppy seed muffins at 9 AM, and tested positive for heroin at 11 AM (well into the next day).

When asked about their terrific rapport, the team reiterated that they very much enjoy each other’s company and socialize quite well. All of the process, from picking to carrying out experiments, is totally collaborative. Secondly, the team shares a bond because they know each other quite well. “It’s not like we’re a science show boy band,” joked Adam. Most of them have known each other and worked together well before MythBusters began. Unlike other shows, MythBusters goes on for most of the year (46-47 weeks) because the building portions of the segments are so time-consuming. The most important thing to Jamie is a strong sense of respect that trickles down all the way to the show’s loyal crew of 23 people.

For the future of the show, Jamie revealed an interest in looking at the dichotomy of destructive things that do good work as well, steam being high on his list. The team never gets inspiration from movie trailers or clips if there’s no story there and they’re not worthy of a myth.

Adam revealed the interesting fact that somebody actually bought the Corvette which had been fouled by a decomposing pig to prove that a decomposing body can destroy the inside of the car. Adam now associates the smell of cleaner with that episode, which makes him sick to this day. Was that the team’s least favorite experiment, wondered ScriptPhD.com? Grant picked the ear wax candle experiment, jokingly calling it the “seasickness experiment.” Tory picked the chili pepper cure experiment. (“Burns on the way in, burns on the way out!”), while Kari picked the water torture episode. The most destructive experiment to this day, much to the chagrin of OSHA and safety regulation organizations of San Francisco, was the Civil War rocket, tested with a wax core. The team thought they had a proper bunker in the shop, but unfortunately ended up setting fire to their ceiling!

On any potential Discovery Channel crossover shows, Adam revealed that he’d like to go out into the wild with Bear Grylls (and so would I!) while Kari revealed that she would not like to do a dirty job.

And for the highlight of my personal day…

The Nerdist and The ScriptPhD giving a thumbs up to geekdom!

Last, but not least, is our official Day 3 Costume of the Day. We chose this warrior for a simple reason. He braved the chilly convention center without a shirt, yet with a completely covered head. Now if that isn’t upside-down thinking, we don’t know what is!

Our Day 3 Costume of the Day

Incidentally, you can find much more photographic coverage of Comic-Con on our Facebook fan page. Become a fan, because this week, we will be announcing Comic-Con swag giveaways that only Facebook fans are eligible for.

~*ScriptPhD*~

*****************
ScriptPhD.com covers science and technology in entertainment, media and advertising. Hire our consulting company for creative content development.

Subscribe to free email notifications of new posts on our home page.

                          

Day 2 of Comic-Con is over and now, the Convention is really underway! Today’s ScriptPhD.com coverage has a heavy focus on television, and sci-fi television to be specific. Really, is there any other kind? We spent time in the press room with the stars and producers of SyFy Channel hits Caprica and Stargate Universe, our favorite geeky physics show Big Bang Theory and the exciting (first-time ever!) Comic-Con Discovery Channel unveiling of their new scripted series Reign of the Dinosaurs. As always we try to pay hommage to the roots of Comic-Con with coverage of the design tricks behind comics and graphic novels. Additionally, we provide pictorial documentation of the costumes and happenings of the Con, and our Day 2 Costume of the Day. Complete coverage under the “continue reading” cut.

From the Press Room: Stargate Universe

We were delighted to start our day with the cast of one of our favorite sci-fi shows on the air, Stargate Universe, to get a little peek into the cast’s geeky sides and what they think of their characters and show.

David Blue (Eli) of Stargate Universe being adorable.

For star David Blue, playing the ship’s resident math geek Eli Wallace, this year is a completely different experience. Last year, there was so much uncertainty about the show’s acceptance and success, while this year, the cast walks into Comic-Con confident of where they are headed. He spoke of liking the idea of Eli as a hero, the show’s surrogate for the audience. Though he admits to being a geek, he was very hesitant to play the role when he heard about it, because of his previous computer nerd role on Moonlight for fear of typecasting. But Eli is not a stereotypical nerd, and experiences a lot more emotional and character growth over the course of Season 2. “I am proud to be a geek/nerd,” Blue says. “Everything from computer programming to comic books to video games.”

We were so thrilled to hear that David was a certified Grade A USDA organic geek, that we got him to proclaim so on camera for you guys:

Ming-Na (Camile) of Stargate Universe was so fascinated with all of our recording devices, she taped US for CNN.com!

Ming-Na, whose character Camile Wray is far more controversial and decisive on the show, was asked right off the bat what she’d do differently in real life as opposed to her character. “Well, I wouldn’t be a lesbian,” the married actress quipped. Turning more serious, she said that she wouldn’t be as level-headed and calm as her character, who is often asked to make difficult, morally ambiguous decisions based on emotional issues. The fan’s response to Camile is largely a love-hate relationship. She’s gotten great response from the gay community, something that Na appreciates, but Camile’s escape from cliches or stereotypes is something that has resonated. The morally wrenching decisions are a staple of the show (and sci-fi television in general), and will only continue into Season 2. “You may not like her decisions,” says Na, “But I like her.”

From the Press Room: Caprica

Alessandra Torresani (the Cylon Zoey) of Caprica in the press room at Comic-Con.

One of the most pivotal roles in the history of sci-fi television (the first Cylon) went to a girl that didn’t even really know the significance of the part. “I didn’t know what Battlestar was before I got the role,” admits Torresani, who was not a real sci-fi geek growing up. “I actually turned it down because I didn’t want to do [Caprica]. I wanted to do [Gossip Girl-type fluff]. It’s exciting now to [realize how important the role is], but it wasn’t nerve-wracking at the beginning. When I read the pilot, she was a spoiled brat, and then she gets in a robot. We didn’t know that I was going to be a Cylon. We just thought they’d use my voice and the robot’s body.” Filming the scenes as the Cylon, Torresani revealed, involves acting next to a giant green 7′ tall stick that everyone communicates with as the Cylon. She finds that the hardest part for her as an actress are scenes as the Cylon where she can’t communicate vocally, such as being lit on fire and not being able to utter a single word. “It’s really challenging. That’s something I never thought I’d have to do.”

Battlestar Galactica and Caprica producer David Eick (and moi) in the press room at Comic-Con.

We started our time with executive producer David Eick with a humdinger—the question we know fans would want to ask. What has been the producers’ reaction to mixed reviews and fan division of the show, most notably from the Battlestar Galactica fanbase? “We knew to expect a much greater mix [of opinions] because we knew going in that we were not going to craft it or market it as a spin-off of Battlestar,” replied Eick. Rather than containing cheeky references to BSG or inside jokes only the audience knows, Caprica is very much its own beast. He hopes fervently that as the show finds itself and its own focus, that the audience, too, would find its own way in the show. He reminded us that the early days of Battlestar were equally contentious in terms of critical and fan opinions. “The very first Comic-Con we came to for Battlestar was like George W. Bush showing up at an ACLU rally.”

In many ways, he feels more challenged by Caprica, which lacks the ticking time-clock feel of BSG. It’s a more sophisticated style of storytelling, which is based in defining the characters and the world around then, Rome before the fall. The mythology of that world is deepened as the show progresses, and how it’s harnessed by Zoey to express herself. Eick spoke of how much more graceful and elegant Caprica is visually and content-wise, with Blade Runner being a huge influence on the producers and writers. By contrast, BSG had much more of a Black Hawk Down, action feel to it.

By the way, Ron and David have a longstanding tradition of taking a drink of tequila together before either a major show launch or major seminar/Convention. In fact, David brought the bottle and we all had a little fun. Kidding. But seriously, folks, next time you think the storylines on Caprica are getting a liiiiiiiittle wacky, just remember this picture:

TEQUILA! David Eick livens the Caprica press tables.

One of the happiest moments of my life, no joke. In the press room with sci-fi visionary, genius, and very gracious man, Battlestar Galactica/Caprica creator Ronald D. Moore.

Ronald D. Moore, who made a rare media appearance at Comic-Con this year, largely echoed Eick’s comments. Caprica, he maintained is a serial, and (purposefully) as different from Battlestar Galactica as possible. In an even rarer move, Moore openly self-criticized himself for some of the early hiccups of the show. He admitted that it was hard to follow, that the story was indeed confusing, but that the show gained confidence as it went on. He predicted as strong of a build-up for Caprica as the eventual success of Battlestar Galactica. Another fun tidbit that Moore revealed was that the group marriage concept was tossed around for Battlestar Galactica, but just never found the story or the characters to make it happen.

We asked Ron about his thoughts on the current state of sci-fi and what he enjoys. “I’m probably not up to speed on a lot of other science fiction,” Moore said. “I almost avoid it now because I spend so much of my time in a science fiction world that I tend not to go there. It becomes almost like more work to watch other science fiction shows. In my brain, I’m inevitably thinking ‘How does that compare to us? And that’s their structure. How many characters do they have? I wonder what their CGI budget was.’ I haven’t watched a lot of other science fiction television for that reason.” Nevertheless, he maintains that it’s a thriving genre that will always be with us, despite the rise and fall of popularity. The one holy grail Moore hopes for is a broadcast network (read mainstream) sci-fi hit. He isn’t sure what the reason is that this popularity has remained so elusive, LOST notwithstanding. “Maybe it’s just us,” he mused. “Maybe it’s just us [the collective sci-fi geekdom], and there’s not this gigantic mass market for it in television in the way that there is a gigantic mass market for movies. Maybe that will never happen.”

We here at ScriptPhD.com hope otherwise.

From the Press Room: Big Bang Theory

If Ronald D. Moore is concerned about the viability of a basic network science fiction hit, at least he can take solace in Big Bang Theory, arguably the smartest, most successful, streamlined show about science and scientists in the history of television. We had such a fun time hanging out with the actors last year, that this year, with access to the full production team, we decided to get as much scoop from the show as possible.

Big Bang Theory producers Lee Aaronson and Steve Molaro

Big Bang Theory creators Bill Prady and Cuck Lorre

One thing fans would be surprised to learn, and the first question we asked right off the bat, is just how geeky the team behind Big Bang Theory is. Producer/writer Lee Aaronson, a self-certified comics and graphic novel geek, used to own his own comic book store. This is where a lot of the inspiration for Sheldon (and the rest of the team’s) love of geek culture comes from. They also have a close relationship to UCLA physics professor and the show’s science advisor David Salzberg. Often, they will write a line like “Hey guys, I was just working on [insert science here]” and let him fill in the blanks. We were wondering about that, too!

Geeky enough? Not even close. Showrunner and co-creator Bill Prady is a former computer programmer. He’s far more excited about Apple founder Steve Wozniak guest starring on the show than any fame or fortune that has incurred because of it. He and co-creator Chuck Lorre maintained that the geek culture was their most important singular focus in writing the show. As one might glean from walking the halls of Comic-Con, they maintained that all geeks/nerds/scientists are not the same. There is a lot of heterogeneity amongst them, and differing, personal passions—be they Star Trek or the mathematical concepts behind string theory. And where do they get all their geeky throwaway lines? “Oh, those are all available on the internet!” And THAT is why we love Big Bang Theory.

A little something for the Penny/Sheldon fans. Johnny Galecki and Kaley Cuoco in the press room at Comic-Con.

Jim Parsons (and Simon Helberg looking on) of The Big Bang Theory in the press room at Comic-Con.

The actors themselves get right in the thick of the fun. Kaley Cuoco, playing perhaps the non-geekiest of the bunch in Penny, has nevertheless embraced geekdom. Her latest love? Her iPad! She and Johnny Galecki would both like to see a romance blossom between Penny and Sheldon (“Peldon,” joked Cuoco), but acknowledge that the road from platonic friendship to romantic involvement is filled with bumps and individual growth. Jim Parsons, who I shamelessly adore, started his time with us by telling me to shove it. He was, of course, talking about my tape recorder, but when I joked that I couldn’t believe Sheldon told me to shove it, his reply was: “And he’d tell you to shove it again and again!” Before telling Simon Helberg to bite him. Nice to know he stays in character so well!

We couldn’t leave a Big Bang Theory press room without getting our favorite superior elitist nerd to do something only for ScriptPhD.com fans. So here you have it, kids. From Jim Parsons, to you… a personal “Bazinga!”

Comics Design

The visionaries of grapics design for comics (from left to right): Mark Siegel, Chip Kidd, Adam Grano, Mark Chiarello, Keith Wood, and Fawn Lau.

One of THE most fascinating panels that we attended at Comic-Con so far was on the design secrets behind some of your favorite comics and book covers. A panel of some of the world’s leading designers revealed their methodologies (and sometimes failures) in the design process behind their hit pieces. An unparalleled purview into the mind of the designer, and the visual appeal that so often subliminally contributes to the success of a graphic novel, comic, or even regular book. We do, as it turns out, judge books by their covers.

We will be revealing each designer’s comments on their thought and art process, but are waiting for images from the panel to be emailed to us. So consider this a placeholder until we can finish this writeup and include it in Saturday or Sunday’s coverage. Stay tuned . . .

Graphic Novels: The Personal Touch

(From our correspondent Bryy Miller)

Graphic Novels: Personal Touch panel (from left to right): Shaenon Garity, Gabrielle Bell, Howard Cruse, Vanessa Davis, Larry Marder, Jillian Tamaki and C. Tyler.

Some panels have mysterious names, some not so much. This one belongs in the latter category. There was no hidden meaning behind the phrase “personal touch.” This was all about the writers (Gabrielle Bell of Cecil & Jordan in New York, Howard Cruse of Stuck Rubber Baby, Vanessa Davis of Make Me A Woman, Larry Marder of Beanworld, Jilliam Tamaki of Skim, C. Tyler of You’ll Never Know, and moderator Shaenon Garrity of Skin Horse). More importantly and interestingly, it was about who they were. Some didn’t know who they were, others did, but they all knew one thing: that something inside of them needed to write.

Tamaki started off the discussion by stating perhaps the simplest answer of why she writes what she does, “I think that’s the only kind of book I wanna make.” Davis continued by adding that “anytime… it’s going to have a personal touch. Comics can soak up the people’s idiosyncrasies and sensibilities.” Marder, perhaps the odd man in the group, stated that even though his autobiography is a FANTASY, it still is an autobiography in the sense that it tells stories about his own feelings. Before anyone else could chime in, C. Tyler (arguably the oldest member of the panel) shot to life with an amazing amount of energy and playfulness. “I’ve taken autobiographies for granted.” she started “I know we’re at Comic-Con, but I hate superhero comics. When I read the first autobiographical comic, I was floored… it was disturbing and in a comic.” She went on to describe how she is fascinated with the idea of putting yourself out there, grabbing pieces of scraps from the table and showing us as if they were her life story – or even her creative process – in visual form. She would get extremely animated, and it really helped to humanize the element of the mysterious writer’s block and constant internal struggle to find how to portray your story. She ended her opening remarks with this, “the personal touch for me is I do it all by hand.”

Bell was the most reluctant to speak, but also, besides Tyler, the most visual. Not in the sense that she was very gesticulative or alive, but that she obviously was thinking very hard but having trouble in how to phrase her thoughts. “I try to cut my personal touch out,” she started, displaying the classic writer’s twitch of not looking directly at her audience “[I try to] make it universal. Professional.”

This instigated a very visceral response from Tyler, who on the spot tried to get into an earnest conversation with her fellow comic artist about what it means to be professional. Sadly, it didn’t last that long as Bell migrated back into thought. Cruse then brought up the point that, if your content is good, then mistakes in your craft are easily overlooked by a reader. The discussion (because calling it a panel at the end would just feel weird) had reached its time limit. Cruse gave some parting advice to young writers, “It will literally paralyze you to think of how many people have an idea similar to yours.” Marder stated that you have to fail in public. Garrity reminded everyone to heed that advice, as “Carol, Larry, and Howard have been in the comics since the seventies.”

Tyler let out a self-taunting gag.

Reign of the Dinosaurs

The Reign of the Dinosaurs creative team (from left to right): Pete Von Sholly, Mishi McCaig,Tom DeRosier, David Krentz, Ricardo Delgado and Iain McCaig. (Executive producer Erik Nelson speaks on the jumbotron.)

In November of 2008, the hoi polloi at Discovery Channel approached producer Erik Nelson (Grizzly Man) with a simple request: “the ultimate kick-ass dinosaur show.” They poured enormous resources, creative and fiduciary, to create a television series that will truly break ground, both for Discovery Channel and its own medium. Scripted, yet unnarrated, scientifically stunning, yet bereft of the omniscient “talking head” paleontologist, Reign of the Dinosaurs is the ultimate exercise in “show don’t tell.” Premiering in the Spring of 2011, Reign will consist of 36 self-contained episodes erected from the art up. The stories will be chronological, detailing the rise, reign, and ultimate extinction (with a twist!) of the dinosaur species. But unlike the plethora of educational shows that cover the same topic, these will be rooted in storytelling, in treating the dinosaurs not as dinosaurs, but characters with whom we share an emotional connection. Trust me, having seen the first few world-premiere clips, you will care for these creatures, and the show will both exhilarate you and break your heart.

The true key to the success of Reign of the Dinosaurs was a dedication to amassing cream of the crop talent, formerly of Disney and Pixar, which allowed them to channel superlative animation and design talents towards an ambitious format. Along with Nelson, the team (and Comic-Con panel) consisted of renowned artists Ricardo Delgado (Dark Horse’s Age of Reptiles), Tom DeRosier (Lilo and Stitch, Mulan), self-proclaimed dinosaur nerd David Krentz (Disney’s Dinosaur, John Carter of Mars), Iain McCaig (Star Wars 1, 2, and 3), Mishi McCaig (Iron Man), Pete Von Sholly (The Mask, Darkman). Along with showing the audience their two (so-far) completed “cold open” teasers that will open episodes of the show, several of the animators simulated storyboard pitches (see picture below), just like the ones they would exchange in a writers’ room for several forthcoming episodes.

A sample of storyboard animatics previewing storylines from the future series "Reign of the Dinosaurs."

Several things impressed me upon the early viewing of Reign of the Dinosaurs, aside from the stunning art direction and well thought-out design. First of all, this show is really cheeky and funny. When the writers say that they’ll give the creatures personalities, they mean it, and it’s all done through expository action rather than showy narration. An early cold open has a dinosaur, trying to soothe her babies to sleep in the wee hours of the dawn, annoyed at the incessant chirping of a smaller dinosaur deep in the forest. Finally, she marches over and does what a dinosaur would do: bites the head off of her more annoying, diminutive co-habiting pest. Literally. Secondly, the stories pack an emotional wallop. A cinema-quality sequence shown at the end, taking place post-impact of the asteroid that ultimately killed off the dinosaurs, has the post-apocalyptic feel of Cormack McCarthy’s The Road (which the illustrator said influenced him) and visual appeal of Blade Runner. The ending, a hopeful coda on the extinction of the dinosaurs as an evolutionary stepping stone for our modern birds, had me sobbing. And then giving the panel a standing ovation.

Spring of 2011 is far away in television terms, but close enough for me to say this. Be excited, folks. Be very, very excited.

From the Press Room: Reign of the Dinosaurs

The creative team behind "Reign of the Dinosaurs" poses for ScriptPhD.com during their press room after their Comic-Con panel.

Not only did we get treated to a front-row preview of Reign of the Dinosaurs, ScriptPhD.com was extraordinarily fortunate to join the Discovery creative team for an intimate roundtable discussion panel after their panel. We were able to get enormous insight into the team’s collaborative process, storytelling aims, and dedication to balancing scientific accuracy with emotional connection, all while reinventing an entire medium. Ambitious? Just slightly.

One of the first things that impressed me upon talking to the Reign of the Dinosaurs team after their panel was their sheer dedication to, almost obsession with, “getting the science right.” Mishi McCaig and Iain McCaig spoke at length about the team’s dedication to nearing the line between science and entertainment. Hugely important to the project was the involvement of renowned University of Maryland paleontologist Thomas Holz, Jr., who cross-checks and gets pitched all the storyboard ideas. The behavior depicted in the show is speculative, but based on facts. This includes the animal’s muscle movements, how they would hunt prey, how they would interact—all aided by the paleontology knowledge of illustrator Dave Krentz. Ultimately, the team wants interest in the show to launch a more widespread educational initiative, which will include a Discovery multi-media website, and other supplementary materials to the show itself. Even when stories delve into the outrageous or fun, they’re rooted in research. A clip depicting high dinosaurs hallucinating was rooted in the marula tree, whose hallucinogenic fruit animals will eat and get high off of.

Producer Erik Nelson and illustrators Tom DeRosier and Ricardo Delgado spoke at length about the collaborative process of making the show, which they described like a TV writing room, only with animators. “Everyone’s sensibilities came together in a ‘hive mind’,” said Nelson. This visionary approach was important to the team, which is essentially trying to reinvent a TV genre. The last non-narrated, no-dialogue animated show was Walt Disney’s “Silly Symphonies” back in 1938. Needless to say, we’ve come a long way since then. The team was amazed at how constructing the dinosaurs’ stories moved them, comparing their effort to “March of the Penguins,” another simple vehicle showcasing animals that was rooted in an emotional audience response. This empathy for the dinosaurs peaks with the show’s conclusion, in which the dinosaurs die out (spoiler alert!), but which is still painted in an upbeat, survivalist way, as most geologists and paleontologists agree that modern birds are the direct evolutionary ancestors of dinosaurs.

“We’re not trying to hook you as a dinosaur person,” concluded Delgado. “We’re trying to hook you as a human being.”

Two last fun tidbits from today. Last year, on Day 3 of Comic-Con, we got geeky in the press room with our friend Barry of The Ugly Couch Show. When we saw each other again this year, we thought we’d start an annual tradition. So here it is, ladies and gentlemen. Two very tired, cranky, overworked press corps members getting silly in the press room:

With our good friend Barry of The Ugly Couch Show. Next year, we might take our act on the road!

And last, but definitely not least, is a very worthy Day 2 Costume of the Day. These ladies hit it out of the park. Bonus points if you can tell us which comics they’re representing:

ScriptPhD.com Day 2 Comic-Con costume(s) of the day.

Come back tomorrow for more geeky sci-fi fun! And don’t forget to become a fan of our Facebook fan page for extra Comic-Con photos and a chance to win amazing surprise swag when we get back from San Diego.

~*ScriptPhD*~

*****************
ScriptPhD.com covers science and technology in entertainment, media and advertising. Hire our consulting company for creative content development.

Subscribe to free email notifications of new posts on our home page.

                          

Greetings from sunny San Diego, everyone! ScriptPhD.com is in the absolute epicenter of sci-fi, comics and the illustrative arts: Comic-Con 2010. Armed with a press pass, our wonderful correspondent Brian Stempien of Lefty Films, and an industrial-sized vat of Purell, we are proud to bring you four-day coverage that spans the nexus of sci-fi, graphic arts, design, technology, film, television, and of course, the forum that started it all, comics. Day 1 coverage includes an array of panels covering the origins that drive an artist’s imagination, the future of cultural arts in a digital age, the future of space exploration with Iron Man’s Stark Industries as a model, good sci-fi, bad sci-fi, sci-fi that will change your life, and a conversation with two leading visionaries of the sci-fi genre, J.J. Abrams and Joss Whedon. ScriptPhD.com also got to chat with the stars and producers of our favorite forensics show, Dexter. Plus, we have a little secret teaser interview with a certain MythBusters star that we’ve been teasing for a good while now! As we always do at Comic-Con, we pick our Costume of the Day as part of our compete Day 1 coverage, under the “continue reading” cut.

The Spark of Imagination

The Spark of Imagination panel: (from left to right) Tony DiTerlizzi, Travis Knight, Mike Mignola, John Stevenson, Doug TenNapel, and moderator Geoff Boucher

What better way to begin a four-day celebration of visual imagination than a panel of distinguished artists and designers discussing the “spark” that originates imagination, how to harness concepts and ideas, and how they feel imagination informs the creative process. The panel consisted of Tony DiTerlizzi (illustrator of The Spiderwick Chronicles), Travis Knight (lead animator of Disney’s Coraline), Hellboy creator/writer Mike Mignola, Kung Fu Panda director John Stevenson, Doug TenNapel (illustrator/writer of Earthworm Jim), and moderator Geoff Boucher of the LA Times blog The Hero Complex.

Let’s be honest, creative types are weird, weird people, me being one of them. Unequivocal unanimity was reached that this very oddness, which might alienate a person from the mainstay of society, was the very fuel that drove creativity and imagination. Tony DiTerlizzi recalled being a daydreaming doodler from elementary school onward, never listening to anything his teachers or figures of authority said to him, almost inhabiting his own world. (Sound familiar, creative readers?) Travis Knight concurred, adding that spontaneity, a side benefit of idiosyncrasy, is absolutely essential to the core of imagination. Artists never really grow up; they start out as hermits hiding in basements, grow into high school kids that get shoved into lockers, and end up playing with dolls as adults. But in a way, he added, it’s wonderful and liberating to live on the fringes of society, to see things in a way that adults have forgotten how to. Hellboy creator Mike Mignola expressed amazement and awe at people wiling to be brave enough to create things for the sake of creation, even if it will never see the light of day. “Let’s face it,” Knight sighed. “There’s something wrong with us.”

Doug TenNapel shows Geoff Boucher prototypes for illustrations.

Recognizing and managing productive imagination when it happens were also a popular consensus among the group. It’s really easy to come up with stuff, maintains Doug TenNapel; it’s not really a special gift or ability and we all have it to some degree. The hard part is the execution in all forms of art. There are millions of ideas that will cross through our minds that will never see the light of day not because they’re not good, but because they aren’t viable. To develop those skills of managing and presenting ideas and putting them to use so one can make a living off of them, an artist has to become an “imagination editor” that parses out the ones that matter. Thank goodness Mignola refined that skill, or Hellboy never would have seen the light of day. He’d been drawing for years at conventions and other comics gatherings, usually on-demand for fans. After endless renditions of popular figures such as Batman, the fans wanted something more original, and Mignola sketched an early, rough inception of what would become Hellboy. Later, when asked to contribute a monster to a convention comic book, he recycled the character, drawing “Hellboy” on his belt to fill a blank spot on the page. Only later, when Mignola wanted to do his own comics, would the stories and three-dimensional world grow around that original central character.

DiTerlizzi also utilizes a character as a focal point for his stories. In order to care about a world, he reminded the audience, you must first care about the character that will inhabit it. How to come up with these characters and worlds? Research, imagination, and life experience! In researching a new character for Coraline, a model, Travis Knight watched YouTube videos of runway models. His biggest regret as he walked the halls of Comic-Con was seeing so many sequels, rehashes and remakes of 1980s TV shows and recycled concepts, and such a paucity of new thinking and bold ideas. This, Knight maintained, is the driving force for the future group of designers and illustrators.

Ultimately, making movies, TV shows, and even designing is inherently a collaborative process, one that the artist must accept if they want to derive the pinnacle of their imagination. John Stevenson ended the panel by emphasizing the three key concepts of successfully harnessing imagination: collaboration and sharing (all too lacking in the modern, fearful world of design and illustration), inspiring the people you’re working with as a leader, and thanking people and showing appreciation for those that have contributed to the betterment of a project.

Be inspired. Create. Let your imaginations soar!

Iron Man and Rocket Men: Is Stark Industries an Appropriate Model for Private-Industry Space Exploration?

The Iron Man versus Rocket Man panel (from left to right): moderator Jeff Berkwits, Mark Street, John Hunter, Chris Radcliff, Dave Rankin and Molly McCormick.

Iron Man was easily one of our favorite sci-fi movies from the past couple of years… and really, what was not to love? Geeky gadgets, innovative applications, and a true purview into the scientific discovery process (more on this later). More than a few mainstream publications have noted the strong ties the movie has to innovation (a couple of good ones can be found here and here). But a bigger tie-in can be argued between Tony Stark himself and the government contractors that constitute the vast majority of the space infrastructure, most notably NASA. So when we saw a Comic-Con panel devoted to exploring this very topic, we jumped at the chance to catch some of the action. Leading New Space entrepreneurs Mark Street (XCOR Aerospace) and John Hunter (Quicklaunch) joined Chris Radcliff (SD Space) and Dave Rankin (The Mars Society—San Diego chapter), with moderator Jeff Berkwits (former Amazing Stories editor) gathered to discuss what is right and wrong with NASA, and how the presence of small businesses can only help quicken the ‘space race.’

First and foremost, let’s define New Space. When we talk about Stark Industries, for example, we are talking about the most extreme example of the tech-based industry, representing the Lockheed Martins and Boeings (and to some degree NASAs) of the world—funded by the government, developing missiles, rockets, and even top-secret projects. New Space, and the small, innovative companies that are leading the forefront of its revolution, represent realistic opportunities for outer space exploration. They are Tony Stark working in his basement, on the cheap, on experiments that no one is seemingly interested in. In this case, it’s the idea of making space exploration available to ordinary people, not just military or astronauts.

The first half of the seminar consisted of a very heated argument about why more companies have not been able to take the lead in space exploration and where, exactly, NASA has stagnated so much. Mark Street pointed out the dichotomy between the entrenched business models of industry versus small companies, some of whom are already launching innovative space solutions and making a profit off of them. The established market, on the other hand, has a steady source of defined income, and no real incentive to decrease costs associated with space travel, which will take lots of investment and trial and error. Boeing isn’t building the next rocket, per se, but they are building airplanes thanks to already established rules and comfort zones. Smaller companies are ultimately able to address these problems thanks to risk-taking, failure, learning lessons, and innovating. John Hunter likened NASA to a modern March of Dimes, a philanthropic organization that was relevant back in the 60s, when it helped cure polio, but has since usurped 90% of donations for cost overhead and only 10% for actual causes that it supports. NASA’s budget of $18 billion consists of 70% “legacy” projects and 30% new innovation. What they need, he claimed, is new thinking, new risk taking. During the space war with Russia, “some of the dumbest guys I knew were looking for jobs at NASA,” Hunter maintains. “Because they knew they could study vortexes coming off of golf balls for the next twenty years.” Ouch.

To Dave Rankin, this was somewhat unfair. He invoked the sign at the X-Prize launch of Spaceship 1: “Spaceship 1: 1, NASA: 0”. To be sure, the X-Prize accomplishment was a worthy one, but NASA has been launching human beings to space stations for years, and they are still the only ones with a proven track record in the United States. Part of the problem is that because NASA is subject to political whim, it has no clear-cut focus with its identity (does it launch rockets, do basic research, innovate new technology, etc?). That lack of risk-taking at NASA is where you wind up with stagnation; it’s so big, with so many stake holders, that the sheer size lends itself to bureaucracy. The panel also brought up NASA’s two shining stars: the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, CA, and the Hubble Space Telescope. While JPL provides some of the world’s best robotics, such as the Mars Rover, the photography coming from outer space is simply amazing. “You can’t put a dollar value on some of what NASA does. It’s who we are as human beings, but you can’t make a profit off of it. As humans, we have to keep looking into what are the places of the universe and how did we come to be here,” said Chris Radcliffe. Quipped Rankin: “Let it not be said that government does not fund the arts.”

Take a look at a video of the first commercial launch into space:

Is Tony Stark a model for our current space industry?

The inspiration for New Space exploration—for sticking Tony Stark into a basement—is that we need some more inspiration from space exploration than we are getting from traditional launches, and that will involve sending more people into space. Chris Radcliffe gave an example of a young engineer working at Hewlett-Packard in its early days who had the brilliant idea that computers could be more than technical devices; they could be personalized, streamlined, and made accessible to everyone. Hewlett-Packard didn’t agree, so he formed his own company and made that computer. The man? Steve Wozniak. The company? Apple. The computer? The Apple I. Like many of the companies comprising the New Space revolution, the design process in Iron Man is from top down, but the fun part is in the testing—you never quite get the process right the first time around.

Overall, the panel was very optimistic about the future of space travel and exploration, but emphasized the importance of spin-offs and small companies as a means to accomplish that. The biggest hurdles they will face is lowering prices of going to space, and overcoming the bad publicity of any first deaths that may come from the danger factor. Foreign competitors will have an even bigger role in driving our exploration. China will keep us on our toes, as they are very good at taking an idea, copying it and productionizing it. What will be the role of these companies in space exploration? Chris Radcliffe is pretty sure that space tourism will succeed, but that it will only comprise about 5% of the market. But it will be enough to drive producing vehicles and rockets and spacesuits and supplemental research off of things that will make money. The NASA CRuSR project, for example, takes existing suborbital platforms and doing science (in this case access to space for a reasonable cost) that they otherwise could not do on their own.

One of the more lighthearted moments, amidst a lot of PhD degree flaunting both from the panel and several people who asked questions, was a gentleman who prefaced his question by saying “I work in a coffee shop.” The reply from the panel: “You’re my hero!” While he respected space exploration as an ideal, he wondered whether the enormous cost of availing space to the average man might be better spent on pragmatic problems that can be solved right here and right now. Unanimously, the panel agreed that expanding human presence in space can only improve standards of living for everyone. If we wait until all our earthly problems are solved, they maintained, we’ll never do anything else.

Dave Rankin gave perhaps the best reason why New Space could be the future of exploration. “Space exploration is a forum for humanity: when we find a new space, we try to fill it.” We think Tony Stark would agree.

State of the Geek Report

State of the Geek panel (from left to right): Moderator Jeff Bond, Steve Melching, Ashley E. Miller, Steve Kriozere, and Bill Hung and Todd Doogan.

From the more substantial programming of earlier in the day, we decided to devote the rest of Day 1 of Comic-Con to exploring our inner geek, with two panels looking at the best (and worst) of sci-fi in current entertainment. We started off with the “State of the Geek Report” panel, an exploration of the state of science fiction, fantasy, and horror in television and film today, and what the success of Avatar means for the future of movies. Steve Melching (The Clone Wars), Ashley E. Miller (Thor, X-Men: First Class), Steve Kriozere (Elvis Van Helsing), and Bill Hung and Todd Doogan of Digital Bits joined Geek Monthly editor and moderator Jeff Bond in discussing all things geeky in modern sci-fi.

Overall, the panel agreed that 2010 (largely carrying over from 2009) was one of the strongest years on record for sci-fi content. In some ways, we are at a peak of great sci-fi presence in pop culture and visual mediums, echoing 1982, considered by some to be the greatest year for sci-fi movies ever (Android, Blade Runner, ET, Forbidden World, The Wrath of Khan, Tron, etc). However, Bill Hunt maintained that Hollywood continues to try too hard to make every sci-fi film an “event,” and is getting excited for releases, but for all the wrong reasons. Not every film can be a blockbuster. In the past year, of the sci-fi films that got high marks from Jeff Bond, many were produced on extremely low budgets, including Moon, District 9, and the indie sci-fi film Yesterday Was a Lie. He also gave high marks to Star Trek and Avatar, which is where the panel took a big of a detour.

While Bond felt that the traditional, universal storytelling and high craft of Avatar made it a great success, Ashley Miller felt otherwise. Every dollar spent on the film was for aesthetics, and indeed, frame by frame, it is a beautiful film, including changing our expectations of what a 3D film should look like. However, as a complete work of art, it was shockingly lacking. To that, the panel brought up the point that what Cameron did with Avatar was harness 3D technology effectively, but the idea that every film now needs to be in 3D is ridiculous. Of recent releases, the brilliant Inception manages to be a challenging, engaging movie without the use of 3D technology.

Visionaries such as Christopher Nolan and James Cameron are given a lot of autonomy in their filmmaking—they are auteurists whose vision leads to the ultimate conclusion. Does sci-fi filmmaking lack for more Nolans and Camerons of the world? Autonomy, the panel decided, is earned. And not every director walking around is a Chris Nolan or James Cameron. Cameron made the original Terminator, which many feel is one of the greatest sci-fi movies of all time, on a shoestring budget. And Nolan used every penny of Inception’s mega-budget wisely. District 9 (which ScriptPhD.com loved) was shot in South Africa, with a native cast, on a very small budget. Moon, which we also liked, did all their special effects on model scale, with digital enhancements.

Ultimately, sci-fi is hurting most from studios turning everything into a “brand”: they are minimizing risk with constant remakes, but will ultimately have to swallow their tails and go towards original content at the risk of running out of material to remake. Sci-fi on television, which does not wallow in such an ignominious fate, is suffering from an embarrassment of riches. Highlights included Caprica, which invented an original, immersive futuristic world, and Stargate, which indulges in the essence of science fiction; to get the scope of wonder about other planets and life forms in the universe. (We will be joining cast and crew from both of these shows on Day 2 of Comic-Con!)

Abusing the Sci of Sci-Fi

The Abusing the Sci of Sci-Fi panel (from left to right): Moderator Phil Plait, Jaime Paglia, Kevin Grazier, Zack Stentz, and Sean Carroll.

From a discussion of the best of sci-fi, we went to what always ends up being one of our favorite Comic-Con panels, Discovery Magazine and Science and Entertainment Exchange’s “Science of Science Fiction.” Hosted by the hilarious, delightful and brilliant physicist Phil Plait (of the Bad Astronomoy blog), the panel was an equal mix of writers and scientists: Eureka creator/head writer Jaime Paglia, Battlestar Galactica and Eureka science advisor/physicist Kevin Grazier, Fringe writer Zack Stentz, and physicist/author Sean M. Carroll.

In perhaps one of the smartest ways we’ve seen yet at Comic-Con, the panel collectively provided examples of “good” and “bad” science on television and in film through clips. We’ll provide you with some of the highlights. Plait started the procession by admitting that he himself became interested in astronomy by watching Star Trek and Space:1999, and maintains that there is a lot of inspiring science in television and film, despite the bad. That said, his “worst” clip was from Armageddon, a scene Plait maintains is possibly the worst science film clip ever—Bruce Willis is supposedly on an asteroid and yet it’s raining! “Jerry Bruckheimer, you’re not in the audience are you?” He asked. “Armageddon. Worrrrrrrrrrst movie ever made!”

Paglia, bravely, picked scenes from Eureka as both his “good” and “bad” clips. The bad was a terrible attempt at an episode where nanoids have started to replicate biological organisms, while the good was an episode where Eureka made its own version of the Hadron supercollider. Quipped Stentz: “I have lived in Eureka in Northern California. Let me telll you…not filled with geniuses!”

Phil Plait REALLY dislikes the science in Armageddon.

Grazier, agreeing with Plait that Armageddon is the worst science film ever made, maintains that it has lessons of both good and bad science. In a scene showing the hypothetical impact of the impending asteroid (complete with overdramatic voiceover: “It has happened before, it will happen again!”), the shock wave of the impact is shown traveling around the Earth, which would not happen, while secondary impacts, which would happen, are omitted. The film was overly dramatic where it didn’t need to be, and yet missed out on an opportunity to show really scary science that was accurate. “It’s the only film that ever lost me in the first 30 seconds,” said Grazier. That said, the scenes showing post-asteroid tsunamis and other ramifications are so perfect, they could be a computer simulation for an asteroid impact on Earth.

Stentz, in a bit of writer’s defense, pointed out a bad scene from Fringe where the science was purposely abused in the service of an otherwise good episode. He wanted to illustrate that sometimes, you have to break the rules in order to tell the story you want to tell. Here, the writers wrote a story line where Walter’s hippocampus was “stolen” to remove his memory. To retrieve it, the team suggests implanting the memories (via the brain pieces) in the brain of someone who could interpret them. “I’m not a neurologist, but I know enough about memory to know that it doesn’t work that way. We knew that when we wrote it. We wanted the drama of a theft from someone’s brain, and how do you use them. That’s why you heard the line, ‘In theory, you shouldn’t be able to do that.’”

Carroll, ever the ambitious physicist, provided a theory, as opposed to just clips, against the philosophical backdrop of issues raised by the demands of narrative versus scientific accuracy. Take a look at the following Big Bang Theory clip of Sheldon explaining Superman and gravity:

This is the right way to think about science versus storytelling. A lot of writers are afraid of scientists because, frankly, we’re ANNOYING. We act as copy editors: “You can’t do this. You can’t do that.” But scientists are also good at telling you the consequences of existing laws, even if it ruins the romance of Superman. Science can make a story better by following this formula for conflict. On the opposite side of the spectrum, you have the mysterious “Red Matter” from this past year’s Star Trek remake. No one knew what the stuff was, how it worked, just that it was a ball, it was bad, and you had to use a hypodermic needle to handle it. It’s far more interesting if you know the rules, can explain the science, and integrate that smartly into the storyline.

A lot of times, people think science fiction means anything can happen at any time, and that’s actually science magic. The rules don’t have to be scientific rules, but good drama comes out of limitations (scientific or otherwise), characters not being able to do something and coming up with another solution for it. As a working writer in TV/film, you want people wanting clarity on one side, but on the other had, you don’t want people to feel stupid and you can’t bore them. You can introduce science and technology in a way that heightens the excitement rather than taking them back to science class. ER used a writing trick to make this happen: one line of exposition, another line of exposition (medical jargon), then an emotional line telling you what happens. Ellen Page of the recent move Inception served this purpose as the audience member—what questions would they ask of the characters in the movie. To this degree, Carroll awarded Iron Man the award for best “science” movie of recent times, not for any specific science content, but because building the suit shows the true scientific method, and that’s how it’s really done in the lab!

Our intrepid correspondent Bryy Miller also went to two very exciting panels that covered a bit more mainstream pop culture. Here is what he had to report:

Tripwire Magazine

The Tripwire Magazine panel (from left to right): Joel Meadows, Andy Grossberg, Jeff Carlisle, and Rich Johnston

I had a theater class in high school, and we used to say that it was the most “un-schooly” class ever. It existed within the confines of the high school, but did not feel as constricting or regulated. Sitting in with the guys from Tripwire Magazine, a joint UK-American geek culture print, evoked the same feeling. It understood that the Con existed, but the speakers (Editor-in-Chief Joel Meadows, U.S. Editor Andy Grossberg, and Staff Writer Jeff Carlisle, and guest speaker Rich Johnston [editor of Bleeding Cool News]) were so aloof and full of intelligent confidence that everything seemed to fade away. They made the audience feel like they were a part of Tripwire – Joel even mocked the obscurity of their little magazine being at Comic-Con by proclaiming “welcome to the Tron panel, everyone!”

Their little magazine, starting as nothing more than fan scribblings in 1992, slowly gained notoriety over the years until they halted for a bit in 2003 due to their current publisher financially screwing them over. They got back on the horse in 2007, and since then, have gone on to catch things in geek culture such as the coveted first set visit for the superhero film, Kick-Ass. This proved to come back to teach them a further lesson in industry magazine politics, as the article was released a full year before it was assumed that it would. Tripwire covers everything in geek culture except music and gaming, and now they have set their eyes on new media such as webcomics and webserials.

“Anyone can get in, but how do you get people’s attention?” Grossberg mused, before giving Felicia Day’s The Guild as an example. A highly successful webseries about gaming, The Guild has a frothing following that has attained such levels due to catering to an audience that already surfs the web daily, and that would most likely consist of gamers. But Grossberg has another theory, and it is much more pernicious in nature as well as much harder to digest. “You know what they expect [newspaper] editors to do?” Grossberg asks Meadows, talking about the changing roles of businessmen in the digital age. The Editor-in-Chief simply replies: “Everything”. Turning to us, Andy Grossgberg comes to the summary of the thought that he started with The Guild, and that is that old media is dying because nobody has an attention span. He then goes on to lay out all of the various people involved in the making of a print comic versus the one or ones involved in making a webcomic. Carlisle then speaks up with his input on if you want to make money as a comic creator in the age of new media, “do a webcomic … everything will be the same thing [as far as everything being digital].”

This all went over fairly well until they asked to see a show of hands concerning who knew what they were talking about. Apparently, I was the only hand that shot up. It seems that the digital divide is still there, which scared me, considering we just spent an hour talking about how fast the winds of change are blowing. The panel ended with a heated discussion over which comic adaptation is the most “meta” because after all, this is Comic-Con.

EW Visionaries: J.J. Abrams and Joss Whedon

EW Magazine's Jeff "Doc" Jensen chats with J.J. Abrams (left) and Joss Whedon (right).

Both J.J. Abrams (Alias, co-creator of Lost, What About Brian?, Cloverfield) and Joss Whedon (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Firefly) are rock stars in the world of television genre writing. So it would go without saying that their combined might upon one singular panel would cause another big bang, or the birth of a unicorn, or at least get a boatload of fans churned up to Twilight-levels of excitement. That was the feeling in the enormous venue Hall H: that the world would halt for a brief hour while these two decided how to continue shaping it. Well, unfortunately, no unicorns were birthed. Fortunately, it was still a good time. Instead of the melding of ideas and thoughts, it was more of a dinner between two famous film people that enjoyed answering questions specifically asked of or about them. They would occasionally reference that the other dinner guest was eating at the sane table, but other than that, it could have been a Joss Whedon panel followed by a J.J. Abrams panel.

The moderator opened it up with a hum-dinger, asking Whedon if he was indeed officially announcing that he would be directing Marvel’s superhero team flick, The Avengers. At first, Whedon said that there was no official word yet, but then he followed that by saying the official word. This, needless to say, got a gigantic response from the unfathomably-huge, wide, and deep crowd. Abrams had nothing new, but gave a movie story none-the-less: when he was a small child, one of the crew members from The Exorcist mailed him an actual tongue from the movie. It was in no way related to what Whedon had just announced, nor was it a movie announcement, but it somehow felt like it was contributing to the larger narration of the panel. Abrams was then asked about his infamous draft of Superman Returns, in which Krypton does not explode and Lex Luthor is an alien. “It was not well received” Abrams sheepishly said, referencing the fan-storm that had swept the internet mere hours after it was put online. Abrams followed that up with talking about how he managed to team up with Steven Spielberg for Super 8, his mysterious monster move that, even though a teaser has been released, is not yet filming. “I was told that Steven Spielberg made movies when he was my age,” Abrams began “so they asked me and my friend to clean up some of his old movies…. They have in-house studios for that sort of thing, and they paid us $300, and I knew why they did not do that”. He added that the film would not be in 3D.

Whedon stated that he was fine with 3D, as long as it was done well. He was also fine with 3D as long as it was not in his upcoming horror movie, Cabin in the Woods – which it is. “I love it, it puts you in the space… [but] the movie has to work in 2D” he said. Abrams revealed that he was still on the fence regarding the issue, “everything gets dim… it seems less.”

Before a rather banal question and answer session filled with every Whedon and Abrams fanboy imaginable, Whedon took the time to talk about Dr. Horrible 2, the much talked about sequel to Dr. Horrible’s Sing Along Blog. When discussing the project, which would continue the story set forth in his webseries created during the Writer’s Strike (and has since become the second Whedon-written musical to become a staple of Comic-Con). “I missed my window,” Whedon said, on the topic of digital media “I was waiting for people to show up to the party.”

Even though the Q&A session was quite lame, and I do not like Abrams, something spectacular happened at the very end of the panel. A young lady asked if criticism is ever okay for writers, since her brother recently asked for some and then shut himself off from her when he received it. This clearly made Abrams livid, as he asked for the man’s phone number. His intentions were clear. That’s when I finally found something I liked about Abrams. I connected with him as a writer and as a human being. In the big picture, that’s what these panels are for. Not to showcase new projects or to grandstand, but to connect.

From the Press Room: DEXTER

ScriptPhD.com was extremely fortunate to join producers and stars of SHOWTIME hit Dexter on their way to their Comic-Con panel. Here’s some dirt that we picked up! (We promise to catch up with Michael C. Hall, who was literally rushed out before our very eyes, back in Los Angeles in a separate post devoted entirely to Dexter.)

Dexter star James Remar and producer Many Coto dish about Season 5.

The production staff at Dexter is getting a shake-up. This year, they’ve added several new producers, including Tony Goldwin (pictured), who visited Comic-Con along with the old guard to give us some insight into things we can expect from the show this season. Part of the strategy of the “new energy” is a shake-up of the show itself. The producers wanted to avoid the “one season, one adversary” formula and recalibrate the show’s content while delivering the same pleasing product to the audience. So expect a lot of differences this year with what Dexter deals with and whom he battles with (if at all).

Unlike a lot of other shows adopting the popular meme of “skipping time” for resolution, Dexter will pick up right where we left off to get all the blowback over Rita’s death. And what a lot of blowback there is! The newest change, producers tell us, is that Dexter is feeling a new emotion for the first time… guilt. It’s something he’s never felt before and quite new for him. Much of this is because he was so hopeful as the season ended that things might actually be heading towards a positive change, that he might get rid of the dark passenger, he was looking forward to a honeymoon with Rita, only to come home and find her dead and his son in a pool of blood. Dealing with that will be very difficult for him, but the producers couldn’t tease us with more. On top of all of this, people are starting to figure his tendencies out, which adds yet another layer of complexity.

ScriptPhD.com asked about the forensics of the show and how they’re keeping it fresh. Said Producer Sara Colleton: “Well, we have an expert who works with us, and they’re the tech person. You just keep up to date with what is used by police. What we don’t do is CSI-style, flashy, make-believe forensics. I don’t know how to go in your nose and down your throat and find a bullet and say “Here it is!” We really try to play by the rules in terms of how long a DNA test takes, what the limitations of top forensics are. We want those things to be real, because the conceit of the show is so unreal, that we want everything else to feel real.”

Dexter star Jennifer Carpenter dishes about Season 5.

Jennifer Carpenter (Deb Morgan) was very excited about Season 5′s changes, though she admitted that for the first time, she really didn’t know what was going to happen. In the beginning of the season, Deb hopes that she and Dexter have a certain kinship, because they’ve both experienced loss, but that isn’t quite what happens. She correctly noted something I’ve noticed a lot about Deb, which is that she does a lot of talking at Dexter, and not with Dexter, which leads to his typical one-word answers. Jennifer noted that a lot of times, women in particular are guilty of “filling in the blanks” with the stories we want to hear (guilty as charged!), which affects Deb’s relationship with Dexter. She felt a little pressure of Comic-Con, with such a concentration of die-hard fans that you have to please, but pointed out that this is also the great thing about Dexter; they hate you one week and love you the next. Jennifer also hinted at growing suspicion on Deb’s part about Dexter, who experiences his grief a lot differently than her, but that the sister part of her refuses to piece it together. We asked Jennifer about the growing stripping away of Deb’s vulnerability, and how much more of that we’ll see in the upcoming season, and frankly, what she thought of it as character growth. Here’s what she had to say:

“I have to say that last year, Keith Carradine (Lundy), his line “You’re confused, and now you’re not. We’ll figure it out together.” was the first time on the show that I’ve heard someone say (to Deb) I’m going to help you. And then immediately he’s dead. That one line helped me play [the character] for seven episodes. I think about it now and I could cry my eyes out. This year, I feel like it’s about standing up straight, choosing your words, how you enter a room, she’s not editing herself, but she’s calculating. She’s working like a cop. And a little less of a potty mouth.” But not too much, she promised us!

Finally, we are thrilled to publish an interview that we have teased you about long enough. As we await the yearly MythBusters panel, always a hit here in San Diego, we had the opportunity to get some pre-Comic-Con scoop from one of our favorite MythBusters about her new hosting adventure on the Science Channel. Check it out:

Interview with MythBusters’s Kari Byron

ScriptPhD.com: Head Rush will primarily be aimed at kid-enthusiastic presentations of science. How did your interest in hosting and putting this show come together?

Kari Byron: This has been a passion project that Debbie Myers [general manager of The Science Channel], The Science Channel and I have been talking about for a while. There is a disconnect at about the age of 12 where girls stop being interested in science. And we just wanted to figure out a way to get them, and obviously all kids around that age, interested in science in a way that they could be passionate about it as well. We figured if we could create a show that was cool, not talking down to them, we could keep that interest alive.

SPhD: You have a very non-traditional science background as a sculptor and painter. How important is it to you to convey that a layperson can have a healthy curiosity and passion about science?

KB: Well I obviously came to science a little later in life, and I think that’s why I have the same excitement that you’d have when you were a kid for it. I think having no science background makes it more accessible in the way that you don’t have to be a scientist to enjoy the science.

SPhD: This programs is affiliated with President Obama’s STEM initiative. You and I chatted a bit about girl power at the Discovery Channel 25th Anniversary party. What kind of responses do you get from girls that are fans of your work on MythBusters?

KB: It’s really cool! I talk to a lot of moms and teachers as well, and I get excited [that they use], I hate to use the word role model because I feel like I don’t deserve it, but it’s nice that they have a really positive response. They like seeing someone that’s more like them.

SPhD: What small sneak peek can you give us to tease fans during Comic-Con to get them super excited about watching the show?

KB: I’m actually so interested in the material that we’re doing, that I’m just amazed at the stories. We do a bunch of experiments that give a hands-on approach to science. [Head Rush] is so different from MythBusters that I can’t even compare it. We will be using clips from all the Discovery brand shows, and a lot of MythBusters, of course, but the Head Rush segment of it is its own beast. I don’t know who or what I can reveal!

There you have it folks! Kari is so excited about her new show, she is hard pressed to reveal any secrets to spoil it. We thank her and Discovery Channel for granting ScriptPhD.com a sneak preview. Head Rush will air on The Science Channel beginning August 23, Monday-Friday 4-5 ET/PT, and Saturdays, 7-9 AM ET/PT.

Comic-Con 2010 Costume of the Day: ….and the unanimous winner is…. Calendar Man! We gave points for creativity.

Calendar Man from the front.....

....and from the back!

For a complete album of pictures from Comic-Con (and many of the costumes that didn’t quite make the running for Costume of the Day, take a look at our our Facebook fan page (and become a fan!).

~*ScriptPhD*~

*****************
ScriptPhD.com covers science and technology in entertainment, media and advertising. Hire our consulting company for creative content development.

Subscribe to free email notifications of new posts on our home page.

                          

The Vision Revolution by Mark Changizi. ©2010 BenBella Books, all rights reserved

Dr. Mark Changizi, a cognitive science researcher, and professor at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, is one of the most exciting rising stars of science writing and the neurobiology of popular culture phenomena. His latest book, The Vision Revolution, expounds on the evolution and nuances of the human eye—a meticulously designed, highly precise technological marvel that allows us to have superhuman powers. You heard me right; superhuman! X-ray vision, color telepathy, spirit reading, and even seeing into the future. Dr. Changizi spoke about these ideas, and how they might be applied to everything from sports stars with great hand-eye coordination to modern reading and typeface design with us in ScriptPhD.com’s inaugural audio podcast. He also provides an exclusive teaser for his next book with a guest post on the surprising mindset that makes for creative people. Read Dr. Changizi’s guest post and listen to the podcast under the “continue reading” cut.

You are an idea-monger. Science, art, technology—it doesn’t matter which. What matters is that you’re all about the idea. You live for it. You’re the one who wakes your spouse at 3am to describe your new inspiration. You’re the person who suddenly veers the car to the shoulder to scribble some thoughts on the back of an unpaid parking ticket. You’re the one who, during your wedding speech, interrupts yourself to say, “Hey, I just thought of something neat.” You’re not merely interested in science, art or technology, you want to be part of the story of these broad communities. You don’t just want to read the book, you want to be in the book—not for the sake of celebrity, but for the sake of getting your idea out there. You enjoy these creative disciplines in the way pigs enjoy mud: so up close and personal that you are dripping with it, having become part of the mud itself.

Enthusiasm for ideas is what makes an idea-monger, but enthusiasm is not enough for success. What is the secret behind people who are proficient idea-mongers? What is behind the people who have a knack for putting forward ideas that become part of the story of science, art and technology? Here’s the answer many will give: genius. There are a select few who are born with a gift for generating brilliant ideas beyond the ken of the rest of us. The idea-monger might well check to see that he or she has the “genius” gene, and if not, set off to go monger something else.

Luckily, there’s more to having a successful creative life than hoping for the right DNA. In fact, DNA has nothing to do with it. “Genius” is a fiction. It is a throw-back to antiquity, where scientists of the day had the bad habit of “explaining” some phenomenon by labeling it as having some special essence. The idea of “the genius” is imbued with a special, almost magical quality. Great ideas just pop into the heads of geniuses in sudden eureka moments; geniuses make leaps that are unfathomable to us, and sometimes even to them; geniuses are qualitatively different; geniuses are special. While most people labeled as a genius are probably somewhat smart, most smart people don’t get labeled as geniuses.

I believe that it is because there are no geniuses, not, at least, in the qualitatively-special sense. Instead, what makes some people better at idea-mongering is their style, their philosophy, their manner of hunting ideas. Whereas good hunters of big game are simply called good hunters, good hunters of big ideas are called geniuses, but they only deserve the moniker “good idea-hunter.” If genius is not a prerequisite for good idea-hunting, then perhaps we can take courses in idea-hunting. And there would appear to be lots of skilled idea-hunters from whom we may learn.

There are, however, fewer skilled idea-hunters than there might at first seem. One must distinguish between the successful hunter, and the proficient hunter – between the one-time fisherman who accidentally bags a 200 lb fish, and the experienced fisherman who regularly comes home with a big one (even if not 200 lbs). Communities can be creative even when no individual member is a skilled idea-hunter. This is because communities are dynamic evolving environments, and with enough individuals, there will always be people who do generate fantastically successful ideas. There will always be successful idea-hunters within creative communities, even if these individuals are not skilled idea-hunters, i.e., even if they are unlikely to ever achieve the same caliber of idea again. One wants to learn to fish from the fisherman who repeatedly comes home with a big one; these multiple successful hunts are evidence that the fisherman is a skilled fish-hunter, not just a lucky tourist with a record catch.

And what is the key behind proficient idea-hunters? In a word: aloofness. Being aloof—from people, from money, from tools, and from oneself—endows one’s brain with amplified creativity. Being aloof turns an obsessive, conservative, social, scheming status-seeking brain into a bubbly, dynamic brain that resembles in many respects a creative community of individuals. Being a successful idea-hunter requires understanding the field (whether science, art or technology), but acquiring the skill of idea-hunting itself requires taking active measures to “break out” from the ape brains evolution gave us, by being aloof.

I’ll have more to say about this concept over the next year, as I have begun writing my fourth book, tentatively titled Aloof: How Not Giving a Damn Maximizes Your Creativity. (See here and here for other pieces of mine on this general topic.) In the meantime, given the wealth of creative ScriptPhD.com readers and contributors, I would be grateful for your ideas in the comment section about what makes a skilled idea-hunter. If a student asked you how to be creative, how would you respond?

Mark Changizi is an Assistant Professor of Cognitive Science at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in New York and the author of The Vision Revolution and The Brain From 25,000 Feet. More of Dr. Changizi’s writing can be found on his blog, Facebook Fan Page, and Twitter.

ScriptPhD.com was privileged to sit down with Dr. Changizi for a half-hour interview about the concepts behind his current book, The Vision Revolution, out in paperback June 10, the magic that is human ocular perception, and their applications in our modern world. Listen to the podcast below:

X-Ray Eyes: In the face of clutter (i.e. a fence), our left and right eyes take partial images (top two figures), transpose them (bottom left figure) to construct a complete image (bottom right figure).

~*ScriptPhD*~
*****************
ScriptPhD.com covers science and technology in entertainment, media and advertising. Hire our consulting company for creative content development.

Follow us on Twitter and our Facebook fan page. Subscribe to free email notifications of new posts on our home page.