Earlier this week, horror legend Wes Craven died at age 76. I know I wasn’t alone in really feeling this one; horror movies are a big part of who I am, and there aren’t many horror filmmakers of his caliber. For that reason, it was obvious from the moment I…
School is back in session – sorry, students; congratulations, parents – and before we know it, fall will be here, ushering in cooler weather and pumpkin spice everything. Whether you consider that good news or bad, we do still have a few precious weeks of summer to enjoy -and being…
Space. The final frontier, and perhaps my very favorite setting for any and every kind of media. Big adventures in an almost limitless universe. Exploration, contact and conflict with aliens, rebel alliances versus evil empires — I love it all. Give me a spaceship, a crew — ragtag or highly…
Kids today have it too damn easy. I’m not talking about the prevalence of iPads and Xboxes, or the fact it takes fewer than ten seconds to look up any fact known to humanity. I’m talking about the fact that kids today aren’t traumatized by pop culture. Consider The Dark Crystal:…
It’s difficult, maybe impossible, for small, local bookstores to compete with the Amazons of the world. It’s just as hard for local authors with a smaller audience to compete in those marketplaces against the Stephen Kings and Dale Carnegies. Faced with those realities, Longmont based author and financial professional Ron…
If you know of the CW show Supernatural at all, you probably have a pretty low opinion of it: “What, that trashy CW monster show with the two pretty boys? Do I look like a teenage girl to you?” (No disrespect to any teenage girls who might be reading.) But I’m here…
Sharks are awesome. They’re the scariest real-world monsters out there — even for people like us, who live in a landlocked state. Thanks to their charming personalities and dashing good looks —all teeth and soulless eyes and hunger — sharks make for great movie and TV stars, a truth apparent…
In the beginning, George Romero said, “Let there be ambulatory corpses hungry for the flesh of the living!” And there were, and it was good. No, forget that. It was fucking great. When Romero dropped Night of the Living Dead on audiences back in 1968, he didn’t know he was…
Denver’s geeky convention scene is busy, averaging a little more than one con a month. As full as the con calendar is, there’s always room for one more, especially when it sports the pedigree of DINK, or the Denver Independent Comic and Art Expo. Helmed by the same duo that…
Geek culture is big, but even in the vast, loosely defined ocean of “geek” there are a few universal touchstones. That’s not to say that everyone agrees on them — hell, if you can get five geeks together in a room who agree on more than two separate geek-related things,…
The heat is getting unbearable (finally) – all the more reason to go inside and have some good, geeky fun. August is full of great options to beat the heat while celebrating the geek, from fantasy legends visiting Denver to a whirlwind of sharks. Here are the month’s ten best…
In his debut novel Carnality: Dancing on Red Lake, local author and Westword contributor Josiah Hesse delves into the weird world of the evangelical movement. The first in a planned series of six books that trace the history of the movement in America, Carnality lays the groundwork for this ambitious task…
If the lack of a Pot Pavilion at this year’s Denver County Fair, which starts July 31 and runs through August 2 at the National Western Complex is harshing your mellow, don’t blame the cats, the lawsuit over last year’s edibles mess or even the fair’s organizers losing their love…
Plenty has been said about the mainstreaming of geek culture — I reference it all the time, myself — and it’s easy to see why. Superhero movies everywhere. Grown men and women in business-casual reading Harry Potter on the bus. Ads for video games during everything from football games to…
If science fiction and economic trends can agree on anything, it’s that robots are destined to become our merciless overlords. You can prepare yourself for this horrific inevitability, or even study how you might fight it, with a trip to the Longmont Museum for its new robocentric film series, launching…
Harry Potter has been gone long enough for a bit of reflection. The final book hit shelves eight years ago, almost to the day. The final film, four years ago. Since then, the world has been largely free of new Harry Potter material, apart from the reams of fan fiction…
I want you to consider something stupid. I want you to consider a trip down the deepest, nerdiest rabbit hole you will ever find. I am here to convince you to turn pieces of cardboard sideways while pretending to be a wizard, and I can all but promise that if…
Childhood is terrifying and awesome, and few films capture that dichotomy as well as Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. The candy-colored fantasy of the film grabbed my imagination as a child in a way that few other films did, and my fascination with it didn’t wane as I became…
July is here, a time for blowing things up in celebration of America’s birthday! Woo, freedom! We can also celebrate our freedom to watch horror movies, play games and generally be total geeks — and the coming month offers plenty of opportunity to do all of that, too. Here are…
Well, it’s finally happened — long after I’m spry enough to take advantage of it. The hoverboard is here! Or nearly here. Supposedly there’s more info coming on October 21 (in honor of the day Marty McFly visited the future, natch) and there’s every reason to think it’s all some…
Dreams are weird. The shifting settings, ineffable imagery and bizarre happenings all seem to make sense at the time, only to leave you bewildered and often a little disturbed upon awaking. Nightmares are all that, plus a nice helping of mortal terror thrown in for good measure. Many horror filmmakers…
There weren’t many nerdy kids in the ’80s who didn’t love The Last Starfighter. How could we resist its charms? It was about a poor kid growing up in the middle of nowhere whose love and mastery of video games turned out to be his ticket to the stars! That’s…
