In the spirit of High Weirdness, this review will try to weave an impressionistic, magical spell exploring the commonalities Davis unveils between the respective life’s work and esoteric, drug-aided explorations of Terence McKenna, Robert Anton Wilson, and Philip K. Dick…
Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons (1967-1968), the sixth television series produced by AP Films/Century 21 to be filmed in “Supermarionation,” is a blitzkrieg of old school science fiction action that touches upon moral and psychological ambiguity within the explosive, action-driven framework that was second nature to the production team at this point…
In late 1984 I encountered a film that would become, with the benefit of hindsight, the sine qua non experience of my 1980s sci-fi movie-going childhood. No, it wasn’t Dune or The Terminator or Ghostbusters, but a now little-remembered sequel to Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke’s immortal cinematic classic 2001: A Space Odyssey…
By Evan Henry
When the “Marvel Age of comics” dawned in the early 1960s, the era of the Cuban Missile Crisis and Tsar Bomba, many of the new slew of superheroes embodied a politicized mutagenic anxiety surrounding the very real possibility of nuclear conflict. Throughout the decade, Lee, Kirby, Ditko, Heck, and others illustrated a bewildering array of physical monstrosities and curiosities…
By Louis Bayman
The five-part miniseries Chernobyl has become the popular television phenomenon of the year, and one of the most critically successful ever. Over thirty years since the explosion at the core of a nuclear reactor in 1986, the production has been praised for its fidelity both to the events around the disaster and to the look and feel of the Soviet 1980s. This has in turn prompted a backlash…
By Tom G. Wolf
Lurking within the mire of modern UFO lore are the Men in Black—black-suited, mysterious agents of uncertain origin who reportedly intimidate witnesses and abductees into silence. Their presence has been controversial within the UFO community, and there is no doubt that they have had a significant impact in wider pop culture…
By The Mutants
I’ve always been sort of morbidly fascinated by the music that toiled in the shadows of the big 1980s pop behemoths, which is why I love it when we do these “Six Songs” features. And as far as pop behemoths go, 1984 was The Year: Thriller was beginning its gradual slide out of supremacy, making way for other titans…
A little over thirty years ago, Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean’s Black Orchid limited series landed in comic shops. Gaiman, in the late 1980s probably known best for his history of Douglas Adams’s Hitchhiker’s Guide series (Don’t Panic), and his novelistic collaboration with Discworld creator Terry Pratchett…
By Leila Kozma
Just like the populist politicians of our time, Mr. Freedom becomes intoxicated with his own ego, weaponizing his boyish charm and rhetorical skills to persuade citizens to back all the wrong causes…
While religious iconography pervades the entire oeuvre of film director Andrzej Żuławski, three feature films that he made in Poland depict and indirectly explore the intersection of religious images and social institutions of the Eastern Bloc…
We Are the Mutants 