Table of contents for October 2018 in SFX

There are few things in sci-fi as exciting as the arrival of a new Doctor. You know roughly what you’re getting, of course – time travel, monsters, a lot of running – but a new face on the Time Lord means a new twist on an old formula. The latest regeneration is arguably the most eagerly anticipated since the show returned in 2005, as Jodie Whittaker becomes the first woman to take on TV’s most iconic role. And let’s face it, it’s about time, because now that Time Lords changing gender is enshrined in Doctor Who canon, it was becoming increasingly implausible every time the Doctor morphed into another white man. As befits the biggest sci-fi event of the year, we bagged an exclusive interview (p36) with showrunner Chris Chibnall…

IS THE POWER OF THREE GIFT ASSIGNED TO YOU BY THE SCRIPT ONE YOU WOULD HAVE CHOSEN FOR YOURSELF? Madeleine Mantock (Macy Vaughn) I really like my power [telekinesis]. It’s kind of difficult to film, though, because, obviously, it’s not happening in real life. So, you have to trust that they’re going to make it look cool. Melonie Diaz (Mel Vera) I usually want Macy’s power, but I’m slowly learning to love my power because Mel is a control freak. She stops time and has conversations with people and is able to say things to them in real time. So I was like, “Wow, what a great way to express yourself.” I’m starting to really love it again. Sarah Jeffery (Maggie Vera) At first, I was, like, “Mind reading, hmm.…

Nigel Planer and Adrian Edmondson have co-written a new play together: Vulcan 7 sees two actors who were at RADA together reunited on a film featuring the Roman god of fire. “Adrian is Gary Savage, who’s playing a ‘Thermidon’ – Vulcan has a bunch of them in attendance,” Planer tells Red Alert. “Gary was the young star who went off and starred in Scorsese movies. Now he’s back in England, washed-up and alcoholic. I’m Hugh Delavois, who plays Vulcan’s butler. He’s been in all the Vulcan films, and is more of a boring actor. They’re both pretty sad characters, and still bickering 40 years later. It’s about what happens to actors when you get a bit older.” The play’s set entirely inside a Winnebago on the side of an Icelandic…

After admitting that she “felt overwhelmed and honoured in equal measure” after her third novel Dreams Before The Start of Time won this year’s Arthur C Clarke Award, Anne Charnock says she first discovered the late science fiction author through movie classic 2001: A Space Odyssey. “Although my fiction is earthbound and set in the near future, 2001 conveyed the sense of awe and estrangement I’ve come to love and admire about science fiction in its many forms,” says Charnock, whose novel shares themes with 1987’s first Clarke Award winner, Margaret Atwood’s A Handmaid’s Tale – making it very timely with the TV show becoming a huge cultural phenomenon. Opening 15 years from now when infertility has been eliminated and children are grown in artificial wombs, Charnock believes that Dreams…

PLANE SAILING “I read the Manifest pilot script. This plane goes missing then, after five-and-a-half years, it lands again and no time has passed for the people on the plane. I was immediately hooked; I wanted to know how that worked, what happened to the people’s families and all these interrupted lives.” MADE OF STONE “Ben Stone [my character] has a son who’s dying of a terminal illness. When he got on the plane there was no cure for this cancer. When they land again, there is – and it was developed by another passenger that was on the plane. So what does that mean? I think that all of the passengers that were on this plane are going to have interconnected lives, which is going to be really interesting…

FRACTURED VISIONS 29-30 September Things get scary in Cardiff as the inaugural Fractured Visions Film Festival comes to the Tramshed, bringing an eclectic selection of horror from around the world. www.fracvis.co.uk FANTASYCON 19-21 October Chester’s The Queen Hotel hosts all things fantasy, horror and sci-fi. The line-up’s yet to be announced but tickets are available now. bit.ly/SFXFantCon DESTINATION STAR TREK 19-21 October Celebrating the 25th anniversary of Deep Space Nine, the Birmingham Trek convention has assembled the likes of Alexander Siddig and Terry Farrell, as well as William Shatner. destinationstartrek.com MCM LONDON 26-28 October All the usual A-grade awesomeness descends on the Excel London, with guests this year including Dave Bautista, Frank Miller and the cast of Shadowhunters. mcmcomiccon.com/london BRAM STOKER FESTIVAL 26-29 October An entire weekend of “deadly adventures”…

Alex Garland’s tech drama Devs gets greenlight from FX. TV show based on videogame Vampyr in development. He said he’d never score another superhero movie and came back for X-Men: Dark Phoenix. Now Hans Zimmer is doing Wonder Woman 1984. ALF reboot reportedly in development. After the CW declines Supernatural spin-off Wayward Sisters, network president Mark Pedowitz admits “there may not be a franchise” beyond the original show. NK Jemisen’s The Stone Sky wins Best Novel at the Hugo Awards. Wonder Woman bags Best Dramatic Presentation (Long Form), while The Good Place episode “The Trolley Problem” nabs its Short Form cousin. Big Finish announces The Legacy Of Time, a Doctor Who crossover event to celebrate its 20th anniversary in 2019. Matt Smith joins Star Wars IX.…

#THE NEW BUFFY TV SHOW Paul David Degen, Facebook They should reboot the show as The Slayer, so every few seasons you get a new Slayer, Watcher, town, era and friends, in a kinda Doctor Who style, so it has more longevity. Gary Pyke, email I want the new show to fit into the official continuity of the comics. I don’t care how, but everything that happened in those comics happened. Plus it would instantly differentiate itself from the original by the fact that the Slayers are considered to be a terrorist organisation and everyone knows about vampires (although admittedly that feels a little like True Blood). Paul Eatherton, Facebook How about a massive academy of Slayers, with Scoobies running it? Now that I would watch. Gary Mancini, Facebook I…

Ask five people which of Guy Gavriel Kay’s books is his finest and you’re likely to get five different answers. Many consider his novel The Fionavar Tapestry (an epic homage to JRR Tolkien’s The Lord Of The Rings) their favourite, while others prefer his later works, which forsake conventional fantasy tropes in favour of something that skirts the borders of historical fiction, albeit with “a quarter-turn to the fantastic,” as Kay himself puts it. Tigana serves as a bridge between these two different styles. While Kay drew inspiration from Renaissance Italy and tales from Slavic mythology, it is unique because it features magic as a major plot device. The Peninsula of the Palm is invaded by a sorcerous tyrant named Brandin of Ygrath, who sends his son to conquer the…

1963–1989 Created by Peter Brachaki, the original TARDIS set is the show’s design classic. Its blinding white futurism is pure 1960s but also perfectly timeless and otherworldly. Most of the first seven Doctors’ control rooms are variants of this: roundels, hexagonal console and all. 1972 The classic design of the control room gets a fleeting, unloved tweak in Jon Pertwee tale “The Time Monster”. Gone are the roundels, replaced by plastic bowls for some ’70s Tupperware party chic. “Oh, just a spot of redecoration, that’s all,” the Doctor shrugs, but this version is never seen again. 1976 “The Masque Of Mandragora” introduces a secondary control room to the TARDIS. It’s a compact, proto-steampunk alternative whose Victorian trimmings – wood panels, stained glass panels – conjure the spirit of Jules Verne…

WATCHING GHOST STORIES, Jeremy Dyson and Andy Nyman’s film of their long-running horror stage play, it’s immediately obvious that these are two writers/filmmakers who are hugely passionate and knowledgeable about the genre. Not only does its anthology structure recall the output of British studio Amicus, but it’s littered with little homages: an Evil Dead point-of-view shot here; a crib from John Carpenter’s The Fog there; a sly nod to Nigel Kneale 1976 TV series Beasts. This should come as no surprise to anyone familiar with Dyson’s career. His work as the non-performing member of The League Of Gentlemen is equally steeped in the horror tradition. He’s also written a history of the supernatural horror film, adapted the chilling tales of writer Robert Aickman, and penned two volumes of creepy short stories of…

VAMPIRE’S KISS (1988) ✶ Eating a live cockroach was one of the less batty things Cage does in this tale of a publishing executive who begins to believe he’s one of the undead after a woman bites him in the neck. “I’m a vampire! I’m a vampire! I’m a vampire!” he screams through the streets. DEADFALL (1993) ✶ Directed by Cage’s brother Christopher Coppola, this film noir sees Cage off the chain as a cokehead criminal with a penchant for shades, loud clothes and OTT behaviour. He rants, he raves, he gibbers, he swears, and even has a complete toddler tizzy on the bed. THE WICKER MAN (2006) ✶ Neil LaBute’s terrible remake of the Christopher Lee classic has been long-since elevated to cult status due to Cage’s turn in…

IT BEGAN WITH A REQUEST. “Can’t you two fellows think up a good idea to improve Anglo-American relations?” The year was 1944 and the man asking was Jack Beddington, the head of film at the Ministry of Information, a mercifully impermanent department set up by the British government in the early days of WWII to disseminate uplifting propaganda for the war-weary masses. And those “two fellows”? That’d be Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, a writing-directing partnership who had, since 1939, been the authors of some of British cinema’s most idiosyncratic treasures. “What’s wrong?” asked Powell, “are we not winning the war?” “Oh, that’s just the trouble,” Beddington replied. “When we were losing, everyone loved each other, but now we’re actually winning…” Beddington knew the pair’s work well enough not to…

▶ RELEASED 21 SEPTEMBER 12A | 111 minutes ▶ Director Lenny Abrahamson ▶ Cast Domhnall Gleeson, Ruth Wilson, Charlotte Rampling, Will Poulter From one room to a whole house, as Lenny Abrahamson follows up his acclaimed Oscar-nominated drama with this tightly wound adaptation of Sarah Waters’ 2009 gothic novel. Room (2015) dealt with a mother and a daughter in captivity; this latest effort is similarly a tale of a family pushed to extremes. Set in 1948, in rural England, the story is narrated by one Dr Faraday (Domhnall Gleeson), a respected medic who’s lived in the local village since he was a boy. It begins as Faraday is called to Hundreds Hall, owned by the Ayres family, to attend to their sick maid Betty (Liv Hill). Shocked by its run-down…

▶ RELEASED OUT NOW! 12A | 113 minutes ▶ Director Jon Turteltaub ▶ Cast Jason Statham, Bingbing Li, Rainn Wilson, Ruby Rose Jason Statham versus a huge prehistoric shark. The concept alone inspires visions of utter madness, with the Stath walloping a massive, toothy creature while growling one-liners. Sadly, The Meg doesn’t live up to the movie you’re probably already unspooling in your head. “Shoehorns in darker elements that don’t work” Sure, there’s fun to be found, as director Jon Turteltaub ratchets up the insanity and feeds cast members further down the list to the titular hungry megalodon, with Rainn Wilson’s billionaire a quippy blast in places. But the movie struggles to find a tone. Is it aiming for the sheer silliness of the sort of megashark movie found lurking…

▶ RELEASED OUT NOW! 2018 | 12 | Blu-ray (4K/3D/standard)/DVD/download ▶ Directors Joe Russo, Anthony Russo ▶ Cast Josh Brolin, Robert Downey Jr, Chris Evans, Chris Hemsworth, Scarlett Johansson, Mark Ruffalo Like their fierce rivals at DC, Marvel’s comics division has long been obsessed with creating high profile entry points to woo readers who might be intimidated by many years of continuity. Infinity War suggests that the cinematic branch of the operation shares few of those concerns. Because 10 years and 19 movies into a saga that began when Robert Downey Jr told the world he was Iron Man, the third Avengers outing makes zero concessions to anyone who isn’t entirely up to speed with recent MCU predecessors Black Panther, Thor: Ragnarok and Guardians Of The Galaxy: Vol 2. Even…

▶ RELEASED 17 SEPTEMBER 1969 | 18 | Blu-ray ▶ Director Teruo Ishii ▶ Cast Teruo Yoshida, Yukie Kagawa, Teruko Yumi, Mitsuko Aoi “You’re dreaming a warped dream!” Watching this deranged Japanese exploitation flick, which recalls The Island Of Dr Moreau and The Human Centipede, that line of dialogue rings true. Based on Edogawa Ranpo’s 1926 novella The Strange Tale Of Panorama Island, with elements of a couple of his other stories, it sees an amnesiac in an asylum go in search of his identity. The clues lead to an island ruled by a webbed-fingered loon with a scheme to overrun the world with “malformed men”. Cue artificially conjoined twins, women sprayed silver, and others grafted to goats to create centaur-like beasts. Brace yourself for outlandish twists, a casual scattering…

▶ RELEASED 24 SEPTEMBER 2018 | 12 | Blu-ray (4K/3D/standard)/DVD/download/VOD ▶ Directors Ron Howard ▶ Cast Alden Ehrenreich, Emilia Clarke, Donald Glover, Woody Harrelson The Jedi may be absent from Solo, but it’s a movie haunted by its own Force ghosts. There’s the spectre of the film Phil Lord and Chris Miller almost made before Lucasfilm executed Order 66; the swaggering shade of Harrison Ford; and one hard fact: this was that inconceivable proposition, a Star Wars film that underachieved at the box office. Solo’s arrival on disc gives it a second chance, and this pulpy, unpretentious space Western deserves a fairer crack. A film that operates outside the Force-heavy mythologising of the Episodes, replacement director Ron Howard is free to revive some of the saga’s original spirit, tapping into old-time…

▶ RELEASED OUT NOW! 1972 | 18 | Blu-ray BLU-RAY DEBUT Micro-budget auteur Jesús Franco always cared more about titillation than terror. This tale of the undead adds a black-gloved touch of the giallo genre to the crypts and fangs – the Count looks like an embalmed Riviera roué – but Franco’s not especially interested in scares, only the chance to roam over his underclad cast. The pace drags but the ’70s Eurochic atmosphere is as heady as a Campari-soaked fever dream. + Extras Trailers.…

▶ RELEASED 24 SEPTEMBER 1982 | 15 | Blu-ray & DVD (dual format) ▶ Director Wes Craven ▶ Cast Ray Wise, Adrienne Barbeau, Dick Durock, Louis Jourdan BLU-RAY DEBUT Released a couple of years before Alan Moore’s groundbreaking run on the Swamp Thing comic, this cheap and cheerful monster movie does the DC character few favours. Alec Holland (Ray Wise) is working on a bioengineering project in the deep South when his team, including Adrienne Barbeau’s Alice Cable, is attacked by the criminal Arcane (Louis Jourdan) and his henchmen. Holland is contaminated by the formula he’s been developing and mutates into the half-man, half-plant Swamp Thing. Cue running, punching and shooting. Like its protagonist, Wes Craven’s film struggles with its identity. It gestures towards horror, but is neither scary nor…

▶ RELEASED 4 OCTOBER 352 pages | Hardback/ebook/audiobook ▶ Author Peter McLean ▶ Publisher Jo Fletcher Books More Gangs Of New Yorkthan Game Of Thrones, this is a tale of mobsters with swords. Priest Of Bones has a conspiratorial tone that suggests the narrator, Thomas Piety, is recording his memoirs. It’s set in Ellinburg, a city like Ankh-Morpork without the laughs. The landscape is post-medieval but not wholly industrial, and crews such as the Gutcutters and the governor’s own corrupt guardsmen dominate tanneries and waterwheel districts. Piety’s returning from a war we never see but which inspires the shell-shocked reverence evoked by Ypres. We follow Piety’s world-weary attempts to re-establish his former territory while dealing with the grander politicking of the Queen’s spies. The conflict is well paced, but parts…

▶ RELEASED 20 SEPTEMBER 832 pages | Hardback/ebook/audiobook ▶ Author Chris Wooding ▶ Publisher Gollancz On the whole, Chris Wooding’s latest is pretty much what you’d expect from a fantasy novel: pre-industrial setting, warring countries, improbably youthful hero… What sets it apart is the sense of uncertainty. You’re clearly supposed to sympathise with the Ossians: the Krodans have invaded their country, replaced their religion, remodelled their social structure and so on, and as the story progresses you discover they appear to be doing some things that can only be evil. Yet individual Krodans aren’t all bad. Even the main antagonist, Overwatchman Klyssen, is concerned about his career, his family, and his cat. Likewise, the individual Ossians aren’t all good. The older ones, in particular, are aware of bad decisions they’ve made…

HARRYHAUSEN: THE MOVIE POSTERS ▶ RELEASED OUT NOW! 192 pages | Hardback ▶ Author Richard Holliss ▶ Publisher Titan Books ● Has over 150 full-colour posters for movies with effects by stop-motion legend Ray Harryhausen, drawn from private collections and the archive of the Ray & Diana Harryhausen Foundation. ● The artwork’s glorious: tentacles trashing the Golden Gate Bridge! Huge crowds fleeing as flying saucers zap buildings! Raquel Welch in a fur bikini! ● Each of the major films gets a couple of pages of introductory text. ● The number of variations is impressive, with posters from as far afield as Thailand, and Australia plus rare versions produced for double-bills and reissues. ● We love the luridly tinted photomontages used in Japan. ● Includes bits and pieces of other “advertising…

▶ RELEASED OUT NOW! 437 pages | Paperback/ebook ▶ Author Miles Cameron ▶ Publisher Gollancz Cold Iron is immersive, with likeable characters, but it plods like a cart horse. Set in a Renaissance-style fantasy land where both gunpowder and magic are commonplace, this first book in the Masters & Mages trilogy is the tale of young Aranthur’s progress in his studies at the Academy. There’s a little of Harry Potter in the adventure of a boy wizard establishing his place in a world amid feuds, secrets and politics; a brutal Harry Potter adventure with plenty of sex and slaughter, mind you. Author Miles Cameron predominantly writes historical fiction under his real name, Christian Cameron, and that background reveals itself in the authenticity of Cold Iron’s world-building. You can visualise every…

As ever, there are stacks of releases we couldn’t fit in. Brandon Sanderson has a new novella starring Stephen Leeds, the intelligence agent who can become an expert on any subject in hours. LEGION: LIES OF THE BEHOLDER (20 September, Gollancz) centres on a sinister high-tech firm specialising in advanced methods of human incarceration; there’s also an omnibus containing this story and previous novellas Legion and Legion: Skin Deep. Peter V Brett has a new novella too. Set in the world of the Demon Cycle series, BARREN (20 September, Harper Voyager) centres on Selia, a town elder who must contend with not only demon attacks, but small-town politics and prejudice regarding her sexuality. Off on your hols soon and looking for something to give you the heebie-jeebies on the plane?…

▶ RELEASED 20 SEPTEMBER ▶ Publisher Self Made Hero ▶ Writers/artists Krent Able, Box Brown, Julian Hanshaw, Erik Svetoft, Shaun Tan, Tillie Walden ANTHOLOGY The perils of tech underpin the six stories in this well-curated collection, which feels a little like an indie comics Black Mirror. Box Brown’s “Uploading” imagines a world where people are uploaded to an archive when they die. It’s a simple idea, executed well and with a touch of dark ambiguity. Less subtle, but rather more freaky, is Krent Able’s “Bloody Kids”, a grim horror story with a cheeky sense of humour. A taste for the surreal is present in both Erik Svetoft’s “#STHLM#TRANSFER” and Julian Hanshaw’s “Be Little With Me”. The latter is an amusingly weird tale of doppelgangers, chickens and a projector that opens portals…

▶ RELEASED OUT NOW! ▶ Publisher DC Comics ▶ Writer Robert Venditti ▶ Artist Bryan Hitch ISSUES 1-3 While the character was reintroduced in Metal, you don’t have to understand DC’s recent, confusing crossover to enjoy this rollicking new Hawkman series. With shades of Indiana Jones, Robert Venditti’s smart script cleverly highlights the contradiction in someone at home soaring the skies who then spends so much time underground in the guise of their alter-ego, archaeologist Carter Hall. More crucially, Venditti reveals that the reincarnated warrior’s numerous past lives have taken place not just throughout history but on alien planets. From giant-sized gorillas to huge tyrannosauruses and flocks of feral, feathered men, Venditti provides plenty of opportunities for artist Bryan Hitch to cut loose. Alternating single and double-page splashes with more…

RICHARD EDWARDS EDITOR RAVES There’s an art to making a great blockbuster, so I reckon the Best Popular Film Oscar is positive. Patrick Stewart is a legend and I’m intrigued to see what happens after the TNG era, so I’m on board for the new Jean-Luc Picard show. RANTS Is there any point continuing Trek movies if Chris Pine doesn’t re-sign? IAN BERRIMAN REVIEWS EDITOR RAVES Been revisiting Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting Of Hill House and am loving it. Listening to Silva Screen’s soundtracks for Doctor Who’s “The Invasion” and “The Five Doctors” (out 14 September). RANTS I finally got round to American Gods. Incredibly stylish and provocative, but there wasn’t much story. JONATHAN COATES ART EDITOR RAVES Maniac’s hospital badges and the Nostromo crew patches are pleasingly similar. RANTS…

When DC Comics tapped Tom King to helm their next event book, the Batman scribe didn’t just want to write another multiverse-altering crossover. Instead, in Heroes In Crisis he is telling a more heartfelt but no less impactful tale, which is literally ripped from today’s headlines. “I was pushing my three-year-old on a swing, and was thinking about what scared me the most,” King tells Red Alert. “It was around the time of one of those school shootings, which happen all the time in the US. The fear of a mass shooting just crept into my head, and what would it lead to, and how would the heroes deal with it.” Taking the form of a murder mystery, the seven-parter explores what happens when several heroes are apparently brutally slain…

“What’s great about doing something like this is there aren’t any rules,” says James Buckley, star of Dave’s fantasy comedy Zapped. “Doing things like The Inbetweeners, it was always very important to find what we thought was real. With this, if we think of a joke then it’s probably going to get in. That’s the only rule here: if it’s funny we can do it. That’s great, to have that freedom.” Zapped sees Buckley’s hapless office drone Brian Weaver transported across time and space to the town of Munty in a world of magic and fairies. Series two ended on a cliffhanger as an attempt to return Brian home resulted in the wizard Howell (Paul Kaye) being transported to Earth in his stead, while Brian was captured by a circus.…

DATE 10-21 October LOCATION Various, London “Genre storytelling is a hugely important part of the LFF programme,” BFI London Film Festival Film Programmer Michael Blyth tells Red Alert. “Particularly in the Cult Strand, our main home for all things strange and unusual.” Those are two words you’ll definitely associate with a lot of the genre stuff showing at this year’s festival, which includes the premiere of Terry Gilliam’s long-in-gestation The Man Who Killed Don Quixote and Peter Strickland’s In Fabric. In fact, this year’s LFF is packed with some of 2018’s most exciting sci-fi delicacies. “Bill Oliver’s futuristic think-piece Duplicate stars Ansel Elgort as two identical young men linked in a very unexpected manner,” reveals Blyth. “While techno-horror Cam tells the story of an erotic web performer who finds herself…

LICENCE REVOKED! BOND 25 The name’s differences. Creative differences. Yes, Danny Boyle has hit the big red button marked ejector seat, only months before the next James Bond movie was due to enter production. Producers Michael G Wilson and Barbara Broccoli and star/producer/pouting killing machine Daniel Craig announced Boyle’s exit in a joint tweet. Some say a source of conflict was Boyle’s choice of Polish actor Tomasz Kot for the role of the film’s Russian villain, part of a provocative storyline rumoured to play on current East-West tensions. Screenwriter John Hodge – Boyle’s frequent collaborator – has also left, prompting speculation Eon will revert to an earlier script by franchise warhorses Neal Purvis and Robert Wade. The film was targeting a November 2019 release, but unless a new director arrives…

PRAISE B FrightFest is upon us – or it’s upon me, at least. As I write these words, five days of horror heaven are about to begin. Luckily, I’ve seen a few corkers in advance. One of the best this year is bound to be Upgrade, Leigh Whannell’s sci-fi actioner that sees a paralysed man (Logan Marshall-Green) implanted with a chip that takes over his body and messes with his mind. A high-concept techno-terror cautionary tale with some awesome choreographed fight scenes and a good dollop of gore, this is unashamed B-movie territory, and none the worse for it. A bit like last month’s The Meg, in fact. What with the weather and the World Cup, it’s been a bit of a weird summer for movies, and after the sophisticated…

With the idea of a black Spider-Man costume first being proposed in a reader’s letter to then-Marvel editor Jim Shooter in 1982, several writers and artists contributed to Venom’s development. Shooter first introduced the symbiotic Spidey suit in classic crossover Secret Wars in May 1984, the very same month that Roger Stern, Tom De Falco and Ron Frenz revealed in Amazing Spider-Man #252 that it was actually a sentient alien. But it was David Michelinie and Todd McFarlane who were mostly responsible for the creation of the Black Barrel of Slime that we know and love to hate today, debuting his inaugural alter ego Eddie Brock in 1988’s landmark comic Amazing Spider-Man #300. “It was David Michelinie who originated the idea of bonding that leftover suit to somebody to make…

When it came to designing the look and feel of the show, all three EPs were agreed on the direction they should take. “We talked a lot about anime,” says Auman. “When I first flew up to Lucasfilm to meet Dave [Filoni], we immediately hit it off and just starting nerding out about Robotech – that was a huge influence on the show.” Ridge agrees. “Robotech and Macross especially were the touchstones. On Rebels, Dave looked to things like Lord Of The Rings, which he’s a huge fan of. Here it was a few live-action movies, but mostly classic anime. It was a huge influence on us.” Another influence came from the real world – the aerial combat that characterised World War II. George Lucas was inspired by dogfighting movies…

You read the book as a child. What drew you to it? ● It was so full of true genuine danger and challenge and as a mother of four kids, I go to the movies and see these so-called children’s films that are so message-heavy or so denuded of any real Hans Christian Anderson danger, so there’s no true obstacle for the child to overcome and this was full of that. Your character has lost her magic. What’s caused that? ● They’ve all lost someone. Jack’s character has lost his sister. Owen’s character has lost his mother. And my character has lost her family. They never overtly talk about it, but they’re all carrying little wounds that they’re trying to deal with themselves. Mrs Zimmerman, she’s been siloing that and…

Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger made their first film together in 1939 and their last in 1972. Despite their lofty status in the 1940s, Powell’s reputation in particular took a bashing with his controversial (but now revered) 1960 picture, Peeping Tom. So, it’s somewhat staggering to note that the final film of that great cinema partnership was a low-budget fantasy made for the Children’s Film Foundation. The Boy Who Turned Yellow was directed by Powell from a script by Pressburger and told the story of a boy who, after losing his pet mouse, encounters a yellow man who can travel through electricity. A little of the old magic shines through in its dreamy view of ’70s London, but it’s a fairly sorry end to a career that, three decades previously,…

THE INNOCENTS This 1961 take on The Turn Of The Screw – the tale of a governess who fears her young charges are being possessed – makes atmospheric use of Sheffield Park, an 18th century mansion near Haywards Heath. THE LEGEND OF HELL HOUSE Richard Matheson’s novel Hell House is set in Maine, but the 1973 film relocates its haunted mansion – previously owned by a perverted millionaire – to England. Wykehurst Park in West Sussex was used for exteriors. THE LEGACY In this 1978 shocker, an American interior designer hired by a dying man discovers that (spoilers!) he’s a Satanist and she’s the heir to his mansion (actually Loseley Park, a Tudor manor house near Guildford), after five other guests all meet a horrific end. THE OTHERS A mother…

RASSILON’S GAUNTLET → Pro tip: don’t provoke the version of Time Lord President Rassilon played by Timothy Dalton in Doctor Who’s “The End Of Time” by offering some unwanted advice. If you do, he might zap you to atoms with this fearsome weapon. FREDDY KRUEGER’S GLOVE → A Nightmare On Elm Street’s dream-invading bogeyman made his signature weapon himself, welding together fishing knives and bits of old pipe and attaching them to an old leather workglove. Hey, he might be a child killer, but at least he’s recycling. THE TIME GAUNTLET → Red Dwarf episode “The Inquisitor” features a Simulant of the same name, who travels through time visiting every soul in history. Those who’ve “lived without merit” are erased with his time-manipulating gauntlet. Bad news for the TOWIE cast.…

▶ RELEASED OUT NOW! 1973 | 15 | Blu-ray/DVD ▶ Director Joseph G Prieto ▶ Cast Salvador Ugarte, Terri Juston, Marcelle Bichette, Kitty Lewis “Problematic” is the go-to term du jour for this shameless piece of Grindhouse trash, which comes across like The Texas Chain Saw Massacre mashed together with House Of Wax, Glen Or Glenda and Scooby-Doo. After a car carrying three free-loving students and an uptight teacher stalls in a cemetery during a storm, they take refuge in the home of an eccentric spinster, soon discovering her peculiar collection of life-size (and uncannily lifelike) “dolls”. There’s a big twist concerning Miss Leslie’s identity, but given that this hulking six-footer’s voice is very obviously dubbed, it’s unlikely modern viewers will be doing double-takes when her wig’s pulled off in…

▶ RELEASED OUT NOW! 1986 | 18 | Blu-ray In this anthology horror, a guy tells his nephew three unsuitably adult stories: so Red Riding Hood becomes a horny cheerleader; the “three Baers” a trio of escaped lunatics. The soft rock theme is witty, and a resurrection showcases icky Hellraiser-ish effects, but the links to the original tales are too tenuous to feel ingenious, and the humour’s awfully broad. + Extras Commentary; interview; deleted scenes; alternate cut; trailers; gallery; booklet.…

▶ RELEASED 17 SEPTEMBER (Download out now) 2018 | 15 | Blu-ray (4K/standard)/DVD/download ▶ Director David Leitch ▶ Cast Ryan Reynolds, Josh Brolin, Zazie Beetz, Julian Dennison Deadpool 2 opens with a shot of a Wolverine music box and a reference to the closing scenes of Logan. It sums up this bloated sequel. Although sporadically funny, too often it feels neutered and smug. It’s anarchic, but in a corporately sanctioned, franchise-friendly way. It’s become the very thing that the first film lampooned. When tragedy strikes, Wade Wilson (Ryan Reynolds) sets out to find a new path in life. He determines to focus his efforts on protecting a fiery young mutant named Russell (Julian Dennison), a decision that puts him at odds with surly cyborg from the future Cable (Josh Brolin).…

▶ RELEASED 17 SEPTEMBER 2018 | 15 | DVD ▶ Creators Sam Vincent, Jonathan Brackley ▶ Cast Gemma Chan, Katherine Parkinson, Emily Berrington, Colin Morgan Considering that it’s been the most consistently high-quality British sci-fi show of the last half decade, Channel 4’s AI drama should be shouted about more than it is. What it lacks in elaborate set-pieces and otherworldly locations – London suburbia remains Humans’ natural habitat – is more than compensated for by its blend of real-world allegory, exploration of big themes and impressively character-driven drama. Throughout its lifetime, Humans has shown a constant desire to evolve, expanding beyond series one’s examination of our relationship with technology (the android “Synths” were effectively just a sophisticated, humanised extension of iPhones) to tackle more complex human rights issues. This…

Available to download since May but only now arriving on shiny disc, FAHRENHEIT 451 (1 October, DVD) – an HBO movie of Ray Bradbury’s dystopian classic – stars Black Panther’s Michael B Jordan as fireman Guy Montag, who in this social media-satirising update, torches servers as well as books. We said: “Slick and stylish, but can be a little corny… and it’s a struggle to buy into the notion that Guy is a man of heightened sensitivity.” The title of INCIDENT IN A GHOSTLAND (out now, Blu-ray/DVD) suggests supernatural goings-on, but Martyrs director Pascal Laugier’s latest is actually a home-invasion horror, albeit one which plays with what’s reality and what’s fantasy to disorientating effect. Centring on two teenage sisters who are brutally tortured, it’s one for those who derive satisfaction…

▶ RELEASED 18 SEPTEMBER 336 pages | Hardback/ebook/audiobook ▶ Author Grady Hendrix ▶ Publisher Quirk Books Satanism and heavy metal go together like cheese and crackers, so a horror story where a metal band appears to be a front for some devilish dealings is both a no-brainer and also not very original. Fortunately Grady Hendrix is one of the most interesting horror writers around and has imbued a generic premise with heart, thrills and squirmy terror. We Sold Our Souls’ lead character, forty-something musician burn-out Kris Pulaski, was once guitarist in metal band Dürt Würk, until a half-remembered night which split the group irreparably. Now former frontman Terry is an inexplicably huge star and planning an enormous tour for his new band Koffin. Kris knows she has to confront him about…

▶ RELEASED OUT NOW! 304 pages | Hardback/ebook ▶ Author Catherynne M Valente ▶ Publisher Corsair Imagine if Douglas Adams had tackled the glittery, sequin-filled extravaganza that is the Eurovision Song Contest in the style of The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy, with the contest spanning all the far-out and froody denizens of the galaxy. It’s an idea that seems so right that you can’t help feeling a little sad that he never created it, but Space Opera is undeniably the next best thing. Catherynne M Valente – who acknowledges the influence of Hitchhiker’s – has cleverly recreated just the kind of surreal alien anarchy Adams would be proud of, all of it topped off with a Ziggy Stardust swagger. The intergalactic chaos kicks off when an alien race that…

Our pick of the paperbacks: 84K (13 September, Orbit) by Claire North (real name Catherine Webb; aka Kate Griffin). Set in a future UK where a sprawling Company has the country in a stranglehold, this bleak dystopia follows a civil servant who, after a former girlfriend is murdered, goes in search of the daughter he never knew he had. We said: “The truly scary thing about 84K is how convincing this dark, brutal, class-divided Britain is. Perhaps this book should be mandatory reading for anybody in British politics.” Also well worth a look: Louise Erdrich’s FUTURE HOME OF THE LIVING GOD (out now, Corsair). After evolution goes haywire, with primitive species of humans being born, society begins to disintegrate and expectant women are rounded up. Events unfold through the diary…

▶ RELEASED OUT NOW! 270 pages | Hardback/ebook ▶ Author Marcus Sedgwick ▶ Publisher Zephyr Mary Shelley’s Frankensteinis one of the most influential novels ever written, and the story of its conception – thought up by the 18-year-old author as part of a competition with her lover Percy Shelley and their pal Lord Byron – has become the stuff of legend. MS, the narrator of The Monsters We Deserve (who may or may not be a fictional avatar of Marcus Sedgwick himself), loathes it. Holed up in a remote house, trying to write his next book, he becomes fixated on Frankenstein and everything he dislikes about it – its apparent racism and classism, and the clumsy conveniences of its plotting. Then, as the discovery of a secret room begins to fray…

▶ RELEASED OUT NOW! ▶ Publisher Vertigo ▶ Writers Various ▶ Artists Various ONE-SHOT DC’s adult comics imprint Vertigo has had its fair share of problems in the last decade, but their latest attempt at getting back on track is their most attention-grabbing manoeuvre yet. Thirty years after the first issue of The Sandman was published, Vertigo are celebrating the anniversary (and their own 25th birthday) by launching four new ongoing series set in the limitless worlds of Neil Gaiman’s creation. Three of the upcoming comics are relaunches of previous Gaiman-related Vertigo titles: The Dreaming, which follows the massive supporting cast of The Sandman: Lucifer, once again tracking the dark misadventures of the ex-ruler of Hell; and Books Of Magic, charting the life of bespectacled teenage magician Timothy Hunter. Alongside…

Patrick Stewart to return as Jean-Luc Picard in post-Next Generation Star Trek spin-off. Star Trek: Discovery has found its Spock in the form of Ethan Peck, grandson of legendary screen star Gregory. HBO gives greenlight to Damon Lindelof-helmed Watchmen TV series. Hugh Laurie to play Captain Ryan Clark in Armando Iannucci’s spaceset HBO show Avenue 5. Ruby Rose to take lead role in CW’s Batwoman. Mark Gatiss has written and directed new one-off ghost story The Dead Room for BBC Four. Second series of Timewasters to visit the 1950s and the dawn of rock ’n’ roll. Black-ish creator Kenya Barris rebooting Bewitched for ABC. Brendan Fraser to play Robotman/Cliff Steele in DC Universe’s Doom Patrol series. Steven Moffat is set to get timey-wimey again with a HBO adaptation of The…

As intrepid highlander Jamie McCrimmon in Doctor Who, Frazer Hines kept Patrick Troughton’s Time Lord company across time and space, and remains a much-loved touchstone of classic Who. We caught up with him at Bournemouth Film & Comic-Con. Would you like to appear in the TV show again if you had the chance? Oh I’d love to. The last Peter Capaldi story, I’d love to have gone in there. I met him in Cardiff, I watched him shoot a scene, and at the end he said, “If it wasn’t for this guy here and his Doctor, we wouldn’t be here working today,” and they all gave me a round of applause. That’s the kind of guy Peter is, lovely man. Was there anything unfinished about Jamie’s story? People say, “Ah,…

Tell us about your protagonist. Harry Hendrick was a promising young journalism student, but his confidence was shattered by a near-miss with a defamation lawsuit. He’s been stuck at a local paper for over a decade – bored stupid but taking comfort from the familiarity. After a night out on the town he wakes up with a bizarre tattoo on his neck… What sort of research did you do? All the military/crime research was via books (The Amazing SAS by Ian McPhedran, The Brotherhoods by Arthur Veno and SAS Sniper by Rob Maylor are worth a read) or the internet. I got a bit obsessive – for every twist and turn I wanted to see if something like that’d ever happened. How long did the book take to write? I…

Bringing to mind a fantastical Peaky Blinders, Peter McLean’s new novel Priest Of Bones is informed just as much by his favourite TV shows as by his love of “swords and horses” fantasy fiction. “I actually pitched it as ‘Godfather with swords’, but there are definitely elements of Peaky Blinders in there as well, along with shades of Gangs Of New York and even Sons Of Anarchy,” he tells Red Alert, admitting that lead character Tomas Piety has much in common with Peaky Blinders’ head honcho Thomas Shelby, although he doubts “that they would get on if they ever were to meet.” In the first in the War Of The Rose Throne series, McLean says that gangster-turned soldier/priest Tomas Piety doesn’t take naturally to the cloth – although he is a…

DATE 10 November LOCATION Foyles, Charing Cross Road, London SFX Book Con is back at Foyles’ Charing Cross Road this November for a bigger, even more epic sequel. We’re delighted to reveal that Richard Morgan (Altered Carbon) and Peter F Hamilton (Salvation, pictured) join us after their popular appearances at our first Con. The guest list has also added 2018’s Arthur C Clarke Award winner Anne Charnock (Dreams Before The Start Of Time), Jen Williams (The Copper Cat), Pat Cadigan (Synners), Lavie Tidhar (A Man Lies Dreaming), Rebecca Kuang (The Poppy War) and Kate Mascarenhas (The Psychology Of Time Travel). They join a line-up boasting MR Carey, Chris Wooding, Sarah Lotz, Tade Thompson, Rebecca Levene, James Smythe, John Gwynne and Tasha Suri, at a day of panels, signings and all-round…

Rebecca Ferguson joining Men In Black… Peter Dinklage to produce and star in Rumpelstiltskin for Sony Pictures, with a script by Patrick Ness… Gal Gadot is joining the voice cast of Ralph Breaks The Internet… Samuel L Jackson and Cobie Smulders confirmed to play Nick Fury and Maria Hill in Spider-Man: Far From Home… Joachim Rønning in line to direct a sixth Pirates Of The Caribbean movie… Ben Schwartz voicing Sonic in Sonic The Hedgehog… Alec Baldwin joins clown prince spinoff Joker… Warner Bros developing new Supergirl movie… Paramount bagging the screen rights to David Koepp’s killer virus tale Cold Storage… Paramount making a big-screen version of mobile puzzle game Monument Valley, produced by Akiva Goldsman… Jesse Williams to star in road trip horror Random Acts Of Violence… Scott Cooper…

“TROPES CAN BE MADE FRESH IN HOW THEY’RE TWISTED OR SUBVERTED” It’s often listed scornfully as a lazy staple of the genre. Start an online discussion and dozens will chime in with how much they loathe it. But if we hate it so much, why does the Chosen One persist in modern SFF? In a “Chosen” story, a single person is, by virtue of some external force (be it deity, prophecy, fate/destiny, magic, or genetics), the only one who can achieve some important task or role. From King Arthur to Neo, Buffy to Aang, Bilbo to Harry Potter, they’re a staple of SFF, but the enduring popularity of the Chosen trope carries with it vehement criticism: it’s overdone, lacking suspense and strips characters of agency. If the outcome is pre-determined,…

WITH JODIE WHITTAKER AND FRIENDS’ ARRIVAL IMMINENT, there are also some fresh faces aboard the TARDIS at Titan Comics as Jody Houser and Rachael Stott are joining forces on a new The Thirteenth Doctor title. Based in Los Angeles, Houser has written the likes of Valiant’s Faith and Mother Panic for DC, while Stott previously illustrated Titan’s Twelfth Doctor series. “Rachael’s an old hand at Who, and it’s always good to have collaborators you know have experience on a property that you yourself are new to,” says Houser, who also appreciates colourist Enrica Angolini’s efforts. “Her colours work so well with Rachael’s art, and I’m glad she likes doing patterns and crazy lighting!” Houser and Stott have already teamed up on the back-ups in Titan’s The Road To The Thirteenth…

NICHOLAS PARSONS Who fans howled in 1989 when, in an example of producer John Nathan-Turner’s “stunt casting”, the Sale Of The Century host was cast as a wartime vicar in Seventh Doctor tale “The Curse Of Fenric” – but his performance won over most of the cynics. ANNE ROBINSON Christopher Eccleston’s penultimate episode saw Rose play a deadly game of The Weakest Link hosted by a robotic Anne Robinson who turned not just a withering look but a disintegrator ray on hapless contestants; Robinson herself provided the voice of the “Anne Droid”. Future Million Pound Drop host Davina McCall leant her vocals to the same story, for a futuristic riff on Big Brother. JOHN BARROWMAN A decade before bringing Captain Jack Harkness to life, Barrowman hosted two seasons of Children’s…

MORBIUS Jared Leto’s signed on to play the “living vampire” Dr Michael Morbius. Life helmer Daniel Espinosa is planning to bring this macabre Marvel icon to the screen. KRAVEN THE HUNTER The world’s greatest big game hunter – and one of the classic Spider-foes. The Equalizer’s Richard Wenk is writing this film. BLACK CAT Originally planned as a double-header with Silver Sable, this is now a solo showcase for Marvel’s Catwoman proxy. NIGHTWATCH A nanotech-enhanced vigilante with invisibility and shape-shifting powers. Spike Lee’s been in talks to direct this one. SILK Korean-American heroine Cindy Moon was bitten by the same radioactive spider that gave Peter Parker his powers. JACKPOT Alana Jobson uses Mutant Growth Hormone to give herself super-strength and invulnerability. Surely that’s cheating……

There’s no mistaking Emma Dumont when she walks into the suitably named green room at Kensington Olympia to talk to SFX: namely because she’s wearing the green wig she sports on The Gifted in her role as Lorna Dane, aka Polaris. “It’s all about my hair, guys!” she laughs. It’s certainly one expensive barnet – she reveals that it costs $50k per episode to digitally cover up the wig line on her forehead in post-production – but of course it’s only a small facet of her character. Polaris is the mutant who kicked the hornets’ nest in the first season of the show, ending the year pregnant, angry and determined to fight for mutant rights. Which isn’t surprising, given that she’s Magneto’s daughter: a fact not fully acknowledged on the…

How do you create an alpha-male character without glamorising thuggery? “Easy, have your protagonist do something utterly unacceptable early on in the narrative,” says Richard Morgan. “Create some distance for yourself and the reader, make it clear that this is not a wank fantasy insert.” The latest instance of Morgan’s approach is contained within Thin Air, a novel set on a future Mars where we meet Hakan Veil, an enforcer for hire whose body just happens to be augmented with military-grade tech. In the book’s opening set-piece, we watch Veil carrying out what’s essentially a gangland hit. Granted, Veil takes out a bad guy, but it’s still uncomfortable to witness. “We all dream of being competent against violence – and, tacitly, therefore violently competent ourselves – but I’m very much…

In order to get the science of the movie right, Powell immersed himself in medical literature when rewriting Pressburger’s first draft. A key text was Frigyes Karinthy’s Journey Round My Skull, in which the Hungarian writer described the optical hallucinations he experienced after suffering a brain tumour. Powell also consulted his own brother-in-law, surgeon Joe Reidy, who shared information about neurological damage. In fact, Powell’s research for the film even inspired a 2008 science book, A Matter Of Life and Death: The Brain Revealed By The Mind Of Michael Powell.…

▶ RELEASED OUT NOW! 15 | 93 minutes ▶ Director Sylvain White ▶ Cast Joey King, Julia Goldani Telles, Jaz Sinclair, Annalise Basso Both cinema and urban legends are crammed with creepy creatures summoned either knowingly or unwittingly by foolish mortals: Candyman, Bloody Mary, the girl from The Ring. Slender Man was born online, the creation of Eric Knudsen (aka Victor Surge), and after a couple of previous outings in small independent films (and videogames), here he – one assumes, because of the name, since the entity has no face – gets his big studio chance. Sadly, it’s pretty thin gruel. Featuring a host of ideas stolen from other, better horror movies, Slender Man forgets to take the scares too. It boils down to a bunch of annoying teens bringing…

▶ RELEASED OUT NOW! 15 | 91 minutes ▶ Director Brian Henson ▶ Cast Melissa McCarthy, Bill Barretta, Elizabeth Banks, Maya Rudolph Sharing some conceptual DNA with Peter Jackson’s infamous gross-out puppet comedy Meet The Feebles, The Happytime Murders takes the idea a step further and imagines a world in which humans and fluff-filled folk share the streets, but the latter are treated as second-class citizens. With movies such as Feebles and Team America already out there, this one needed something extra to give it a reason to exist. Sadly, it only partially delivers that. The racial commentary’s a little first-base, and the temptation to push the boundaries of puppet sex and violence rather than tweak them means the film ends up looking like a toddler that has just discovered…

▶ RELEASED OUT NOW! 1987 | 18 | Blu-ray ▶ Director Peter George ▶ Cast Barry Brenner, Gail Neely, Dawn Wildsmith, Michael Sonye BLU-RAY DEBUT A genius title and a lurid poster (machinegun-blazing Nazi, board skewered by a chainsaw; screaming bikini babe) have ensured this is one of the best-remembered films from low-rent trash hawkers Troma. The high concept – inspired by the director’s encounter with some overly territorial surfer dudes – has promise. After a California-wrecking quake, the beaches have been taken over by vicious gangs, chief among them a bunch with names like Adolf, Eva and Mengele; no mean feat, considering there’s only six of them. After the Surf Nazis kill an African-American who stands up to them, his elderly mother vows revenge. Gail Neely is a hoot…

▶ RELEASED OUT NOW! 1988 | 15 | Blu-ray Don’t Look Now star Donald Sutherland and co-writer Allan Scott converged again for this “based on a true story” tale. Set in 1927 Pennsylvania, it centres on a boy who, influenced by a preacher, believes a hermit has evil powers. Expending as much time on young Billy’s romance with a free-spirited girl, it feels lacking in focus and – barring a few moments where we see the hermit as they do – frustratingly low-key. + Extras Commentary; three interviews; booklet.…

▶ RELEASED 14 SEPTEMBER 2018 | SVOD ▶ Director Bertrand Mandico ▶ Cast Vimala Pons, Anaël Snoek, Diane Rouxel, Elina Lowensohn MUBI Some films feel like they’ve been unearthed rather than made. Bertrand Mandico’s feature debut combines black-and-white and colour footage, practical effects and a strikingly eerie soundtrack to create something that somehow feels both thrillingly modern, and like it could be a newly discovered art movie from the ’60s. A group of young boys, seemingly in thrall to a spirit called Trevor, rape and murder their drama teacher. As punishment, they’re transported to an island via a long and arduous sea journey, where one by one they succumb to its mysterious properties. The Wild Boys starts with an act of horrifying brutality and explicit imagery, but it’s not the…

▶ RELEASED 24 SEPTEMBER 1990 | 18 | Blu-ray & DVD (dual format) ▶ Directors George Romero, Dario Argento ▶ Cast Adrienne Barbeau, Harvey Keitel, Ramy Zada, Madeleine Potter BLU-RAY DEBUT Nearly 170 years after his death, Edgar Allan Poe’s work continues to provoke shudders. This collaboration by two 20th century masters of horror adapts two of his best-known stories. George Romero uses the kernel of “The Facts In The Case Of M Valdemar” – the hypnotising of a dying man – for a very ’80s tale of a scheming gold-digger (Adrienne Barbeau). Then Dario Argento tackles “The Black Cat”: Harvey Keitel plays the murderer undone after he accidentally walls up a moggy with his wife’s corpse; by making him a crime-scene photographer, Argento also adds a tableau from “The…

▶ RELEASED 4 OCTOBER 339 pages | Paperback/ebook ▶ Author April Genevieve Tucholke ▶ Publisher Simon & Schuster In any world – even one of medical marvels and high technology – there comes a time when death is a blessing. And in a rural, pre-industrial land of legends and witches, religions and monsters, villagers understand the need for someone who can release people from their pain. These are the Boneless Mercies, small groups of women trained in death, helping those who need it, and often escaping from something themselves – brothels, abuse, tragedy. Frey is one such Mercy, leading a small group of friends, surviving but all of them hoping for something more – a life not immersed in death. When they hear of a monster, the Blue Vee Beast,…

▶ RELEASED 27 SEPTEMBER 464 pages | Hardback/ebook ▶ Author Rena Rossner ▶ Publisher Orbit It’s not uncommon, especially when you’re young, to feel like your annoying little sibling must belong to another species. It’s less common, however, to find out that they genuinely do. Liba and Laya are sisters, and opposites: Liba is dark-haired, solidly built and bookish; Laya is graceful, fair and intuitive. One day, their parents go to visit distant family, leaving the sisters in a cottage in the woods. (You may think this ill-advised, but that’s fairy tales for you.) No sooner have mum and dad gone – with a parting revelation that the family is more uncanny than realised – than trouble brews in the nearby town. A group of strangers are selling weird fruit,…

▶ RELEASED OUT NOW! 378 pages | Paperback/ebook ▶ Author Sean Grigsby ▶ Publisher Angry Robot If you’re a reader who finds tunes playing in your head as you inhale a story, then Daughters Of Forgotten Light will have John Carpenter’s theme for Escape From New York on constant repeat. The book’s lethal city is a space-drifting snowglobe called Oubliette, to which luckless young women are dispatched from a resource-starved, war-torn Earth. (Unwanted men are sent to war, but this isn’t their story.) A new batch of deportees arrive on Oubliette, to be devoured by an “Amazon” cannibal gang who might have named themselves better after Sawney Bean. One newcomer, Susan, comes under the protection of the titular Daughters, who ride their super-motorbikes after their harsh but not inhuman leader Lena.…

▶ RELEASED OUT NOW! 240 pages | Hardback ▶ Artists Dane Hallett, Matt Hatto ▶ Publisher Titan Books Even those who hurled brickbats at Alien: Covenant should be impressed by this compendium of artwork. Its two volumes come packaged in a slipcase. Developing The Art Of An Android is essentially a 45-page interview with Dane Hallett and Matt Hatton, the pair charged with creating the ink/charcoal sketches scattered about the home of Michael Fassbender’s David. This provides some interesting insights into the duo’s process. Then there’s a “sketchbook” featuring hundreds of examples. Starting with flora and fauna rendered à la Rembrandt or Da Vinci, it gradually becomes more attuned with HR Giger, 19th century medical illustrations and Goya’s The Disasters Of War. The imagery grows more morbid and sexualised, progressing via decapitated…

▶ RELEASED OUT NOW! ▶ Publisher Titan Comics ▶ Writer Andrew Cartmel ▶ Artist Christopher Jones ISSUES 1-3 The final two seasons of classic Doctor Who have a distinct flavour that marked a gear change from Sylvester McCoy’s first year in the role. Inspired by the likes of Watchmen, as well as the politics of the late ’80s, script editor Andrew Cartmel nudged the show in darker, stranger directions. He returns to pen this sprightly three-issue comic arc, “Operation Volcano”, with help from “Remembrance Of The Daleks” writer (and bestselling novelist) Ben Aaronovitch, here credited as Executive Producer. It immediately captures the tone and preoccupations of the era. Nuclear paranoia, race issues and the Doctor pushing Ace into an uncomfortable situation to force her to grow are all season 26…

RELEASED OUT NOW! Publisher Image Comics Writer Mark Millar Artist Olivier Coipel ISSUES 1-3 The first issue of The Magic Order opens with a child being enchanted to kill his father; the second with an aborted foetus escaping from its mother’s womb; the third with someone using magic to perv on a couple having sex – clearly Mark Millar has lost none of his desire to push buttons. Still, the first post-Netflix-buyout title from the Millarworld imprint is a fun family drama with a supernatural twist. “Effectively a superhero family book in goth clothing” The Order has been around for a long time. A group of wizard families, they protect the world from magical threats, but now someone is bumping them off in spectacular fashion. The surviving members of the Order…

▶ RELEASED OUT NOW! ▶ Reviewed on PC ▶ Also on PS4, Xbox One ▶ Publisher Gearbox Publishing VIDEOGAME At its best, We Happy Few offers a bizarre series of unlikely events. Unfortunately, what happens between those events is inescapably boring. It’s set on a collection of British islands in an alternate history ’60s. The Allies lost WW2, but the residents of Wellington Wells avoided occupation by doing something bad that they don’t want to remember. This left them so traumatised that they started taking a mind-altering drug, Joy. Twenty years later, everyone’s still addicted. It’s a depressing set-up, but this is a pretty place to be. When you take Joy, the streets burst into colour, with rainbows appearing in the sky and butterflies circling your feet. Even when you’re off…