Essay #3: Parasyte || Are we really that important as a species?
During my newfound anime obsession over quarantine, I found myself expanding from watching Shojo anime to stumbling upon Death Note to finally making my way into what is now one of my favorite anime genres: sci-fi anime. To this day, I still don’t really remember if Cowboy Bebop was my first sci-fi anime or if it was Parasyte. What I do remember, however, is that I completely binged all 24 episodes of Parasyte in about 3 days. The anime itself centered on a common theme in sci-fi: alien invasion. The complexity of the story-telling, however, and the way the […]
Sci Fi Essay #3: Place and Space- Scavengers as a Sensory Experience
Sci Fi Essay #3: Place and Space- Scavengers as a Sensory Experience
Scavengers is a short animation, by Joseph Bennett and Charles Huettner, that follows a pair of human explorers as they journey through an unknown planet (Vesta) full of unusual creatures. The title Scavengers– someone who feeds from the discards of something else- seems to allude to the impact they have while moving through a foreign terrain, as outsiders. While their true motivations, outside of trying to establish a Human settlement, are unknown throughout most of the animation, it is clear they are in search of something they don’t have but feel the Vesta can provide them, cutting and taking whatever they feel necessary to […]
Kindness in the Face of Violence: An Examination of “The Beast Below”
In “The Beast Below,” episode 2 of the 5th series of the new era of the long running British science fiction show Doctor Who, the Doctor and his new companion Amy Pond travel to the future and find themselves on board a starship that contains all of the English population, a moving diaspora necessitated by the earth becoming uninhabitable. The Doctor and Amy realize that something is amiss aboard the ship, and begin investigating what may be awry. They discover that the ship, rather than being powered by a traditional engine, is being carried on the back of an alien creature known as a star whale. In order to […]
Cyberpunk 2077: Blending ARPG and FPS for Creating an Incredible Cyberpunk World
Cyberpunk 2077: Blending ARPG and FPS for Creating an Incredible Cyberpunk World
Xinyu Luo
Fig. 1 Your Own Cyberpunk Journey
(https://www.cyberpunk.net/us/en/)
Cyberpunk 2077 is a video game developed and published by the Polish game company CD Projekt. Long before its official release date, December 10, 2020, countless video players have crazily high expectations for eight years since its first trailer in 2013. The primary reason behind this long-term enthusiasm should be players’ great anticipation of experiencing the 3D open-world cyberpunk-style future. Since its release, Cyberpunk 2077 has received controversial receptions by players and critics according to multiple criteria; however, in terms of […]
Essay 3: Ghost in the Shell and Post-humanism
Many works of science fiction repeatedly portray a “post-human” world where the concepts of “human” and “humanity” have undergone a radical transformation, so that “what is human” needs to be redefined. However, posthumanism is also more than a redefinition of the human; it is an “anti-anthropocentric” proposition that emphasizes non-human agents in the world. Writers, directors, critics, and theorists have tried hard to portray such a posthuman world, but it always ends up in humanism, or transhumanism and transhumanism, which refers to “human enhancement” through technology. The latter are merely a variant of the former, and they can still be ultimately subsumed under a kind of anthropo/superhuman centrism. As Nietzsche put it, “man is […]
The XCOM series, From George W. Bush to George Floyd
XCOM: UFO Defense, Mythos Games, MicroProse, 1994
XCOM: Enemy Unknown, Firaxis Games, 2K Games, 2012
XCOM 2, Firaxis Games, 2K Games, 2016
Reboot of the original series that began with the 1994 game for DOS and Amiga X-COM: UFO Defense, XCOM and XCOM 2 are two very similar yet radically different games. Despite a few significant tweaks, the game mechanics remain widely the same, and the plot of the latter follows that of the former. However, in the short four years that separates them, the designers chose a radically different approch and perspective on the turn-based tactics game.
But let’s rewind a bit. The first game came out in 1994, just a few years after the collapse of the […]
Robot as a Bridge to Connection
One short film that has always stuck out to me is “This Time Away,” which is directed by Magali Barbe, and turned out to be the best short film of the 2019 Manhattan Short film finalist. Unlike some sci-fi, this short film has a way of generating hope, and ultimately connection through its scenes, and story. Early on in the film it is evident that the main character is alone in the house, and that he might not have the desire to keep up the space in which he is living.
“This Time Away” short film, thirteen and twenty-three-second film, combines science fiction with real-world emotions of loss and love. Immediately Magali Barbe shows us the […]
Cyberpunk and Ghost in the Shell
In the 2040s Japan, after the Third and Fourth World War, human society is very different from before, high-tech has given birth to a new lifestyle, as machines have not only taken over human flesh, making prosthetic bodies replacing limbs the norm, but also human consciousness, turning brains from organic parts into electronic brains, which are connected to the boundless Internet. As a result, a new type of digital crime has emerged, in which hackers have direct access to the human brain and can steal or even alter people’s memories, thus changing their personalities for their use. The government set up Public Security Section 9 (Kouan Kyuu Ka) to stabilize internal affairs to solve this […]
Psycho-Pass: Algorithmic Tyranny
Psycho-Pass is a Japanese anime which is set in the future depicting a dystopian Japan governed by an advanced pre-crime supercomputer. Citizens’ mental state and personality can be measured in numbers for which the record of their emotion, desire, social deviation and mental inclination is surveillanced by the artificial intelligent system.
As both a hard science fiction and social science fiction, Psycho-Pass questioned the risk, security, surveillance and the nature and implications of technology based on numerous criminological parallels it has referred to. The overt references to surveillance, actuarial risk assessment and the scientification of social control resonate with many classic essays including Deleuze’s essay on the rise of societies of control, […]
Dystopian Nationalism
When we think SF, we think future, technology, speed, luxury––a pre-mediated look on SF from a western, Euro-centric perspective that has been imposed upon us since a long time. But we fail to think about how science-fiction plays part in places rampant with discriminatory practices, hierarchies, and traditions that have survived for centuries, and exist on their own, regardless of scientific and technological advances. How would a fascist country that segregates itself based on caste and religion make use of scientific achievements in ‘the future?’
Leila, a Netflix show based on Prayaag Akbar’s novel, answers this in its own interpretation. It is set 30 years in the future in a nation called Aryavarta, which feels like […]
When A Sci-Fi Short Is A Powerful Political Statement
As I think about media and science fiction, I find myself asking some basic questions. If science fiction is about the future, is there a genre requirement about how far ahead an author must look in order to be included in the canon?
I took a trip back in time and explored my long history of science fiction media, in search of a topic worthy of current consideration. Fahrenheit 451, Star Wars, 2001 a space odyssey, Silent Running, District 9, Children Of Men, A.I. Artificial Intelligence, Minority Report, Planet Of The Apes, RoboCop, Close Encounters Of The Third Kind, Terminator, E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial, The Matrix, Blade Runner. It’s a long list, and […]
What Makes a Science Fiction and SF Genre Products in China: From Liu Cixin’s Wandering Earth to Other Works and Chinese SF Writers
Two years ago, when Wandering Earth was firstly published on the screen in China, people gathered around and flowed to the cinema for watching it. It sounds nothing important, however, that was quite big news in China — no other films can earn such total prestige with so much praise in China, especially on the screen. Some media workers called that Wandering Earth made that year became the Year of Chinese SF on Screen, as Chinese film from its first time had tried such a gorgeous and magnificent scene and make a great success. On Donban, a Chinese version of Rotten Tomato or IMDB, it earned 7.9/10, which is better than […]
The stories we tell ourselves: Exploring the power of cultural conspiracy in Tarkovsky’s “Stalker”
When Andrei Tarkovsky’s last Russian-made film opens, viewers are transported to a haunting post-apocalyptic sepia-toned wasteland, sometime after a meteor crashes into Earth. In its wake: the mysterious creation of a vivid, colorful patch of wilderness everyone calls The Zone. With its perimeter heavily controlled by the military, The Zone is a seldom-visited place of myth, dangerous psychological traps and treacherous terrain. The only people who dare to traverse its metaphysical qualities are known as “Stalkers,” who illegally guide curious men with money to a storied place called The Room, which, as the legend goes, grants every human being their innermost desires.
In this imaginative, dystopian world, based on the 1972 novel Roadside Picnic, Tarkovsky uses […]
Exploring the Dark Reality of Online Sex Work Within ‘Cam’ (2018).
How does Sci-Fi approach sex work? Is there room for discourse around sex work within Sci-Fi? What does this discourse look like? The 2018 film ‘Cam,’ written by former camgirl Isa Mezzei and directed by Daniel Goldharber, offers a fascinating perspective on what sex work could look like in a not too distant future; and poignantly (and terrifyingly) addresses a lot of the concerns currently surrounding the sex industry.
This psychological thriller tells Alice’s story (portrayed by Madeline Brewer), an online sex worker who is hacked by an algorithm that steals her image, likeness, and personality from the site in which she performs her shows.
The film opens with what seems like a regular […]
The Immutable Data of Interactive Television
The televised anthology Black Mirror speculates how new technologies will affect the near future. While some of its episodes play with periods and genres, the series commonly projects dystopian societies and relationships caused by humans’ growing reliance on computers. Created by Charlie Booker, the show originated on Britain’s Channel 4, but in 2015, internet and content overlord Netflix purchased the program. Production sped, and the company produced fifteen new episodes and an interactive film, known as Bandersnatch. The latter venture allowed users to uncover alternative storylines and endings for the 2018 film, as their phones, remotes, and controllers enabled them to make choices within a branching narrative. Launched in 28 languages, Bandersnatch was a show […]
