Gabriel Mckee's Blog: SF Gospel, page 10

New "Spiritual Solicitations" at Holy Heroes!!

Over at our comics-and-religion-themed cousin blog Holy Heroes!!, I've just posted a big ol' roundup of ten recent and forthcoming comics about religion. Reverent? Irreverent? Irrelevant? We've got 'em all!

Featured: Oeming's Rapture, the Wolverton Bible, and butt-kicking Jesus!

Check out the full list here.

Battlestar Galactica finale: Mysteries solved; Mystery contemplated

Spoilers abound below. You have been warned.

Even I was a bit surprised at the degree to which Battlestar Galactica's mystical questions received mystical answers in last night's 2-hour finale, "Daybreak, Part 2." There's been a lot of God-talk (and gods-talk) throughout the show, and the resolution showed that there really was a divine hand behind the show's story. But, as one of the messengers says in the final scene, don't call him God—"You know he doesn't like that name."

As expected, Ga

The Last Frak Party: The 12 Pies of Kobol

There's much to say about the last episode of Battlestar Galactica, and I'll be posting my thoughts on it shortly you can read the serious stuff here. But first...

In honor of the finale, a group organized by Mark Hugo (star of the excellent short film "Silent Film Star vs. the Undead") gathered... to eat pie. Lots and lots of pie. It was perhaps the first, and very likely the last, 12-Pie Frak Party in history: one pie for each of the 12 colonies (or "signs of the zodiac," if you insist). Withou

Dollhouse, cults, and the abuse of power

The latest episode of Dollhouse ("True Believer") treads some tricky spiritual territory. The ATF, investigating a religious group it believes is storing illegal weapons, hires Echo to go undercover to find evidence that will justify a full-scale raid on the group's compound. Echo's handlers implant her with a personality named "Esther" who is blind—or rather, she thinks she's blind; the visual data her eyes take in bypasses her visual cortex and is beamed straight to the ATF's video monitors

Watchmen: A brief scriptural review.

"...for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life."

—2 Cor 3:6

You know what else kills, besides the letter? Casting bad actors to read badly-adapted dialogue. Just sayin'. 

Religion and SF in... City Journal?

The featured story on the website of city planning magazine City Journal is "How Science Fiction Found Religion" by Benjamin A. Plotinsky. (I'm not sure how it fits into the journal's scope, but nevertheless, there it is.) Plotinsky's thesis is that SF movies and TV, which have historically focused on political allegory, are increasingly rooting themselves in Christian symbolism. The article features a quote from yours truly (a bit from The Gospel According to Science Fiction on the inherent m

4 Alan Moore stories that are better than Watchmen

Watchmen is a good, and even a great, comic. But the best ever written? Hardly—and it's not even Alan Moore's best work, either. Here are my picks for Moore stories slightly more deserving of the praise that's heaped on Watchmen.

1. Miracleman*

Much of what Moore does in Watchmen he did first and better with this series. This reimagining of Marvelman, the UK's homegrown Captain Marvel knockoff, is the grandaddy of all "what-would-it-be-really-be-like" superhero stories. Few comics stories so fu

"Disguised as Clark Kent"? Superman, secret identities, and incarnational theology

In a guest post at Superman blog Say It Backwards, my thoughts on which ego is really alter:

Superman disguises himself as Clark Kent. Right? It says it right there in the opening of the George Reeves TV series. "Disguised as Clark Kent, mild-mannered reporter for a great Metropolitan newspaper." Kent is the mask, and Superman is the identity.

Or is he?

Read the full post, which delves a bit into Batman, Alan Moore, and Jesus, here.

On down the River...

SF author Philip José Farmer passed away in his sleep this morning, aged 91. Farmer has long been a favorite of mine, largely as a result of his Riverworld series, about an alien-designed afterlife wherein everyone who ever lived is resurrected along the banks of a river 10 million miles long. Religious themes cropped up frequently in his writing, perhaps most notably in the Father Carmody stories and the novel Jesus on Mars. His best stories were spirited blends of philosophical depth with o

Telekinetic toys at Toy Fair

Ersatz telekinesis toys are a trend at this year's Toy Fair. Babble reports on the Star Wars Force Trainer (from toy maker Uncle Milton), an EEG-based toy that enables you to lift a ball on a column of air with your mind. And it makes Star Wars noises at you. Watch the video here.

A similar toy, also unveiled at Toy Fair, is Mattel's Mind Flex. It doesn't make Star Wars noises, but the ball isn't enclosed. There's video of that one here.

If sincerely hope that extensive use of these toys can un