Guests: Jason Aukerman and Carrie Cooper of the Center for Ray Bradbury Studies at IUPUI.
First broadcast May 13 2022.
Playlist at
The director and assistant director of the Center for Ray Bradbury Studies talk about the ins and outs of running a small research center.
Guest: Gideon Marcus of Galactic Journey.
First broadcast October 8 2021 and 1966.
Playlist at https://www.wrek.org/?p=36323
“Are you a traveler of both time and space?”
Guest: Kim Stanley Robinson
First broadcast March 5 2021.
Playlist at https://www.wrek.org/?p=35537
“They really want to talk. They want to tell you their story!”
Dan Simmon’s 1989 science-fiction novel is acclaimed for its unique structure, references, and style. We take a closer look at how it interrogates our expectations of genre to explore a complex host of themes. Thank you to Chris Marlton for coproducing this episode.
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This book attempts to redefine the novel by combining narrative with an imagined anthropological record. We discuss Le Guin’s background and mission, as well as larger questions about cultural misappropriation and utopianism.
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This comic about archaeologists uncovering the secret history of pop culture took Warren Ellis and John Cassaday 10 years to complete. We discuss its interrogation of genre, intellectual property and history, in light of the cyclical nature of the comics industry some 20 years after the project started.
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This first part in the Jerry Cornelius saga is literary science-fiction that challenges the politics of its time through transgression. But we find eerie parallels to our current zeitgeist and wonder if Cornelius is the perfect device to question our thoughts about subversion and morality.
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The first book in Jeff VanderMeer’s Southern Reach trilogy focuses on humanity’s weird relationship with nature and how we react to the unknown. We look at how VanderMeer wrote the book, the unique publishing strategy behind it and his choice to strip the characters of their identities, while still representing an all female cast.
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Michael Shea was a genre writer who combined fantasy, science fiction and horror into a unique blend of wonder and imagination. Together with our guest Robert Lamb (Stuff To Blow Your Mind), we discuss Shea’s writing style and legacy.
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Does this film change the way we look at the world the same way its 1982 predecessor and Phillip K. Dick’s original 1968 story did? We look at the aesthetics of this brutal dystopian vision and how it portrays women, fertility, power and agency… all while its financiers struggle with creative accounting to justify another sequel.
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