The Companion Piece 00: Who?

If you're at all familiar with this blog, or with me as a person, then you'll know that I love me some Doctor Who. Or rather, you'll know that I love talking about Doctor Who. At horrifying length.

Well, good news for both of us, because me and the rest of the Hex Dimension crew are launching a new weekly Doctor Who feature to coincide with the start of the new series this coming Saturday. It's good news for me because it means I get to talk about Doctor Who every week; and it's good news for you because I won't be the only one talking, and because the others might be able to shut me up.

Tonight, in the run-up to Series 8, we ran the first instalment - an introduction to the team and a look back at the programme so far. We talk about our favourite Doctors, discuss what we are and aren't looking forward to this year, and discover that one of us is even grumpier about this stuff than me!

I really do hope you'll check it out, because a lot of effort, confusion and panic went into making this. No doubt there will be even more effort, confusion and panic as the weeks go on, and I fall back into my familiar pattern of alternately bitching and raving about the show. But, for now at least, I'm immensely proud of how this first one turned out.

So please, head over to Hex Dimension for our pre-series discussion, and don't forget to check back on Monday for the first real episode of...

Hex Picks: Romantic Films

Romance Month continues at Hex Dimension this week, as we choose a selection of our favourite romantic films. Unlike last time, a few of us even managed to play the theme straight, and didn't pick sci-fi or fantasy romances! Of course, some of us still cheated, and (naturally) I was one of them.

Click here to find out which sci-fi romance never fails to make me cry, and to witness the continuing streak of my brother and I thinking the exact same way...

Hex Dimension: A Case of the Ghiblis

Yesterday the news broke that Studio Ghibli, the loved and lauded Japanese animation studio, might be closing its doors. I've written about anime and Ghibli before, of course (spoiler: not a fan), so Emily over at Hex asked me to write a few words.

I didn't want to, at first, but as the day went on I slowly realised that I needed to. Because this news was huge - world-changing, even. It just took me a while to realise that.

Please do check out my article, and see why Studio Ghibli matters so damn much.

Hex Picks: Romantic Novels

This month is romance month on Hex Dimension! It was a joke at first, but the theme stuck and we're doing our best to run with it. Unfortunately, because we're a bunch of massive nerds, every book we picked turned out to be our usual selection of fantasy and sci-fi - but with added mushiness.

So, if you want to read our thoughts on what makes a good romance - which in my case turns out to involve quite a lot of snot - check out our picks here, and remember to check back every week for even more unashamed slush!

x x x

Edge of Tomorrow Review

Way way back in early June, when the Earth was still young, you may remember that I promised to review the then-current movie Edge of Tomorrow. Well, let it never be said that I don't keep my promises, because here, barely a month-and-a-half late, is that fabled review!

Normally I would act coy about what I thought, to try and get you to click the link below, but this time I'm just going to say it: Edge of Tomorrow is the best film of the summer so far. Chances are it's not playing anywhere near you, because late review is late, but if you do somehow manage to find a showing then this thing is shockingly good and well worth your time. If you want to know why it's so good... you'll have to click the link below. Because I'm coy like that.

Read the review here!

Hex Picks: Sci-Fi Month

It's recommendation time again! This month, Hex Dimension tried something new and had a constant theme running through all our picks. The theme for July was science-fiction (we are a geek website, after all) and it resulted in a bunch of great suggestions, ranging from hardcore cyberpunk to whacky space-fantasy.

As always, we started with books, moved on to films, then games, and wrapped up this week with comics. Hopefully you'll check them all out and discover some hidden sci-fi gems! Unfortunately, I missed the deadline for that final post (by a mere half-hour, I swear) and my recommended comic didn't make the cut. I do still want to share it with you, though, so I've decided to post it here on NerdTech instead:


Girl Genius - Phil and Kaja Foglio

All this month, for our sci-fi recommendations, I've been trying to pick examples of real, hard sci-fi rather than that namby-pamby soft stuff. But I've been racking my brains for a similarly hardcore comic and, shamefully, I don't think I've read any! So today I'm going completely the other way.

Kaja and Phil Foglio's ongoing webcomic Girl Genius is about as soft and unrealistic as it's possible for sci-fi to be. Because this is not a comic about science; it's a comic about MAD science. Girl Genius takes the age-old idea of the mad scientist and spins it in a unique direction: what if all scientists were mad? What if the use and understanding of science required (and also caused) a certain level of insanity? What would that world be like?

The answer, of course, is "very very silly". This is a world of giant clockwork men, steampunk spider-tanks, airship cities, unstable time-machines, frankinsteinian abominations, and an alarming number of death-rays. But that's all just texture - this sci-fi nonsense is fun, but the substance lies in some great characters and relationships, and there's some pretty complex political intrigue too.

The art can be a little messy and confusing at times, and the story often throws things rapidly and haphazardly together, possibly just to see what works - but the chaos actually suits Girl Genius perfectly. It's a mad experiment performed by crazy people, and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. But hey, that's SCIENCE!

How to Train Your Dragon 2 Review

How to Train Your Dragon is a film that basically came out of nowhere, to very little fanfare, and unexpectedly turned out to be one of my favourite movies ever. It's just one of the most beautiful, emotional films out there - and it probably doesn't hurt that it's about actual dragons. I love it to bits.

And now there's a sequel! It's a DreamWorks property so of course there's a sequel. The only question is whether that sequel is any good. To find out, why not check out my latest review at Hex Dimension - where I'm stealthily taking over as the go-to animation guy...

Read the review here!