The best so far, yesterday the Star Wars: Rogue One Olympic Trailer aired and was posted on line, so for the 27 people world wide who have not seen it yet, here you go! Enjoy.
Terrestrial Human
NPR’s Science Friday is once more honoring Inventor Hedy Lamarr and has posted the segment of their show online for those who missed it. They are speaking with Pulitzer Prize winning author Richard Rhodes about his book, Hedy’s Folly: The Life And Breakthrough Inventions of Hedy Lamarr. And yes, she was also an actress, but one of her inventions helped hid Allied communications from the Nazi’s and is still used today in blue tooth and wifi networks: Spread Spectrum broadcasting with frequency hopping.
The Mars Rover recently hit its 4th anniversary of exploration (in Terrestrial years, not Martian) and to celebrate NASA has released the Mars Rover Game for mobile devices or the desktop. The game is both free and fun, and the game page also gives you some comparisons between the game rover and the real one on the red planet. Also on the page are links to information on the other rovers, Curiosity, Spirit, Opportunity, and the as yet unnamed rover mission of 2020. The robots are not the only ones planned to go there; NASA is working on the Journey to Mars project, shooting for a manned landing in the 2030s.
George R.R. Martin announced his shared superhero universe Wild Cards is coming to TV, and I cheered for a good 30 minutes. Melinda M. Snodgrass has been deeply involved with the project from the beginning as both a writer and an editor, and she will be an executive producer for the new TV show. UPC will be bringing it to the small screen, and since they have produced such shows as Mr. Robot, Killjoys, The Magicians, and 12 Monkeys, I have high hopes they will give Wild Cards the treatment it deserves. There are no guarantees, of course; back in 2011 I reported on their announcements about the Wild Card Movie that never got made. But perhaps if the show does as well as I expect it will we might get to see them on the big screen after all some day.
The live action remake of Pete’s Dragon could be quite amusing. It certainly benefits from the advances in CGI animation and compositing that have been made over the last several decades. If you are in the mood for something less family friendly, the animated film Sausage Party features a sausage trying to discover the truth about his existence, and what he learns is terrifying. I don’t know that I find either of them compelling enough to make me actually part with my money to see them in the theater.
While genre movies seem to be missing this week, TV has Stephan King’s 11.22.63, an eight episode mini series about people traveling back in time to alter the Kennedy Assassination so it never happened. Also available is Supergirl: Season 1, now migrated to the CW network, which is a great call all around. They are the de facto DC Comics TV network now; they have added Super Girl to the channel already carrying Arrow, The Flash, and Legends Of The Future. I can’t wait to see what interesting crossover story lines they all build together.
In Anime, Absolute Duo: The Complete Series is about Koryo Academy, a training center for the art of war, where the students forge their souls into weapons. But Tor’s first combat experience is simple compared to his social situation at his new school. Together in Garo The Animation: Season One Part Two, León and Alfonso find each other an team up to begin winning their country back, even though they have radically different ideas about what their country is. Finally, in Barakamon: The Complete Series, uptight young calligrapher Handa punches out a critic, gets shipped out to a prison/rest camp, and has his life turned upside down.