The Original Cyborg: Asian Women & The Machinations Of Power
Even alongside literal cyborgs, Asian women have been used as artistic shorthand for dehumanization and objectification by Kelly Pau In Alex Garland’s 2014 film Ex Machina, a computer programmer named Caleb Smith is tasked by CEO Nathan Bateman to evaluate whether
Archive and the Commodification of Death
The 2020 sci-fi film Archive explores the intersection of wealth, technology, and grief by Konstantina Buhalis Do you ever think about your death? Your biological decay is inevitable, but what are your plans? Cremation? A traditional casket burial? Maybe a Tibetan Sky Burial
The Architecture of Woe
We live amidst the dead temples of slumbering, industrial gods. What will we do if they wake once more? by Kurt Schiller // Illustration by Sam Hindman This novel dramatic paraphernalia consisted first of all of the Gothic castle, with
New Life and New Civilizations: Socialism, Progress, & The Final Frontier
We should not mistake Star Trek’s emphasis on decency with a radically different conception of civilization. Both the Federation and its more warlike are equally dependent on imperialism, on colonialism, on limitless resource extraction to survive. Both, in other words,
Point//Counterpoint: Godzilla vs. Kong
Later this month, the greatest rivalry in movie history is finally coming to a head. For the first time ever in an American film, Godzilla and King Kong are facing off in the ultimate battle of the behemoths, and the
Tamagotchi Girlfriend & The Future of Retrofuturism
The past has its own romance—but this, like all relationships, can only be fully understood in retrospect. by Colin Broadmoor “Hello, Dave! Thank you for joining me. Please, have a seat.” In the old days they would have shaken hands, but, instead, they
Body For Sale, Slightly Worn
In Masaaki Yuasa’s Kaiba, minds and bodies are just two more commodities on the market—revealing capitalism’s own dysfunctional relationship to bodily pleasure. by Will Riley In the first episode of 2008’s Kaiba, a sci-fi anime from Masaaki Yuasa, we find the male
Everyone Is Beautiful and No One Is Horny
Modern action and superhero films fetishize the body, even as they desexualize it. by RS Benedict When Paul Verhoeven adapted Starship Troopers in the late 1990s, did he know he was predicting the future? The endless desert war, the ubiquity of military
We’re More Than Our Aliens: Sex, Sexuality, & Aliens in Super Deluxe
The genre-bending Tamil sci-fi/sex-comedy challenges sexual norms, even as it falls back on sexual normativity. by Shinjini Dey The figure of the alien requires no introduction. It’s a category and a concept that is as common on immigration forms as it is
The Culture War: Iain M. Banks’s Billionaire Fans
Why Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos love Iain M. Banks’ anarcho-communist space opera. by Kurt Schiller Explicitly ideological fiction is as old as fiction itself. From ancient steles that boasted unconvincingly of the glorious defeat of the Sea Peoples to the biased