Solo: first trailer for Star Wars spin-off finally confirmed

News of a Star Wars spin-off film focusing on Han Solo's early life was first announced a long time ago (though not in a galaxy far away). But now fans will finally be able to see the young rapscallion in action, with the long-awaited first trailer for Solo.

Star Wars: Secrets of the Empire is a VR game you can feel and smell

A new VR attraction invites users to strap into a haptic vest, grab a VR gun, and embark on a real-world indoor adventure as an undercover stormtrooper from the Star Wars movies. Complete with props, smells, sound effects, and weather, the experience is called "hyper reality" and it looks awesome.

The fascinating ways Star Wars and Star Trek are challenging their own franchises

It's very rare to see contemporary versions of Star Wars and Star Trek make similar creative choices. After all, part of what's fueled the age-old Wars v. Trek debate are the series' wildly different approaches to scifi. But with The Last Jedi in theaters and Discovery airing online, both franchises seem to be tackling something fascinating, questioning institutions in each world that fans have held dear for decades.

A new anthology will honour Arthur C. Clarke with 2,001-word stories

Science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke would have turned 100 years old in 2017. Over the course of his long career, he left a legacy that science fiction authors still follow, by putting a premium on the scientific realism in his stories. A new anthology aims to honor the late author's legacy by collecting a series of stories. Each story will have exactly 2,001 words, a reference to his most famous work, 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Rian Johnson had some pretty insane ideas for Rey's parents in The Last Jedi

The latest Star Wars almost turned out really weird.

I's hard to imagine the pressure Rian Johnson was under to write the middle chapter in the final trilogy of the Skywalker Saga. And the guy had some tough choices to make-including how to reveal one of the biggest remaining mysteries in the Star Wars franchise: Who the hell are Rey's parents?

10 underrated science fiction movies you must see

It's not all about replicants, Terminators, and galaxies far, far away. Across the spectrum of literary and cinematic genres, science fiction has long since proved one of the most enduring and popular of them all. This is no doubt largely down to its tremendous malleability.

The postmodern Prometheus

'Frankenstein' might be the first science fiction novel, but its literary heritage has a vibrant afterlife in pulp fiction. Victor Frankenstein and his moping, depressed creation was conceived of by Mary Shelley a good century or more before the golden age of pulp fiction, but the monster and the genre had always seemed made for each other. Reanimated corpses, hubristic scientists, secret laboratories, rogue humanoid creations-each of these tropes scream "pulp"!

Man behind 'Sophia' AI robot plans to create 'super-intelligent genius machines' that win humans' trust

* David Hanson worked as a sculptor for Walt Disney and created animatronic robots for their theme park shows before starting his own firm
* He now aims to create machines that are life-like enough to win people's trust
* His 'masterpiece' is Sofia, a wise-cracking machine based on Audrey Hepburn
* Previous works include a robotic Albert Einstein which teaches children science

This is not the future sci-fi writer Charlie Stross predicted (Q&A)

By Seth Rosenblatt

Spreading computer viruses with human DNA. Stalking romantic partners with malware. Recording someone's every move with Internet-connected security cameras.

'Game of Thrones' creators developing new 'Star Wars' films

Lucasfilm has just announced that David Benioff and D.B. Weiss, who brought the epic world of George R. R. Martin's Game of Thrones to television, will write and produce a new series of Star Wars films.

These new movies will not be tied to either the ongoing Skywalker saga of the "Episodes" movies nor will they be connected to the trilogy being developed by The Last Jedi filmmaker Rian Johnson.

The problem with Disney trying to turn 'Star Wars' into the Marvel cinematic universe

In case you haven't figured it out yet, we're getting a whole bunch more Star Wars over the next decade. With three films down, two are already spinning up, Solo and Episode IX, and after that, a possible Obi-Wan movie, a new Rian Johnson trilogy and a series of films produced and written by Game of Thrones duo David Benioff and D.B. Weiss. Guessing "series" there is at least three.

On top of that, Disney is cooking up a few Star Wars shows for its coming streaming service, as well.

'Solo' trailer sells 'Star Wars story' like 'Star Trek' reboot

In what was an end to our national nightmare, we got our first look at Solo: A Star Wars Story on Sunday night with that Super Bowl commercial and then again on Monday with a 105-second trailer. The template for the initial pitch is actually pretty logical. Pop quiz (hotshot): What's another successful franchise picture from the last decade that successfully offered a younger/hipper version of an iconic pop culture character defined entirely by the original actor's performance?

Yes, I was struck by how much the first Solo trailer plays like the first two trailers to J.J. Abrams' Star Trek.

'Wonder Woman' sequel's working title may tease its big villain

The sequel to last year's blockbuster 'Wonder Woman' is due to hit theaters in November of next year. Production should begin within the next few months as these types of movies tend to require more time in post-production than it takes to shoot them. Of course, Gal Gadotwill return in the lead role, with director Patty Jenkins also coming back for more.

JJ Abrams on The Cloverfield Paradox, Star Wars 9, and going to the movies

There are few people who have worked on as many well-regarded franchises as JJ Abrams - producer and director of various Mission: Impossible, Star Wars, and Star Trek movies, along with co-creator of LOST.

How, then, did Abrams manage to release an entire movie directly onto Netflix without anyone seemingly knowing beforehand? Because that's exactly what happened with The Cloverfield Paradox - the third movie in the Cloverfield series - which was suddenly released onto the streaming service following the Super Bowl.

Best new science fiction and fantasy this month

Best-selling authors Paolo Bacigalupi and Tobias S. Buckell team up on The Tangled Lands (Saga), a rich and haunting novel that explores a world where magic is forbidden. Each of the book's four interconnected tales is devastating in its own way, because the authors don't let anyone get away clean.

Top 10 Sci-Fi movies of 2016

Every year, more than a few science fiction movies are released. Many of them are ambitious spectacles-and while that might not always pay off, at least the genre does seem to be willing to take risks or dazzle the audience. 2016 saw more than a few really great science fiction movies-along with more than a few busts.

Here are the best sci-fi movies of 2016.

The best recent science fiction - reviews roundup

Alastair Reynolds excels at world building - his impressive backlist attests to that - but he's also a master at constructing complex technological, far-future societies peopled by fully rounded characters. In Elysium Fire (Gollancz, £14.99), the Glitter Band is a vast ring of spatial habitats orbiting the planet of Yellowstone.

Cities in Flight: James Blish's overlooked classic

By Thomas Xavier Ferenczi

James Blish was a popular science fiction writer and critic who began his literary career while still in his mid-teens. Not yet out of high school, Blish created his own science fiction fanzine, and shortly thereafter became an early member of the Futurians, a society of science fiction fans, many of whom went on to become well-known writers and editors.

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New study finds thousands of alien asteroids could bring extraterrestrial life to Earth

When it comes to the potential that aliens might land on Earth, an invasion often comes to mind. Science fiction also has a place for the accidental infestation that might occur when an alien craft or asteroid crashes, though, and a new paper suggests the likelihood of this happening belongs firmly in the realm of reality.

Authors of this study estimated the capture rate of interstellar objects by means of three-body gravitational interactions to explore the implications of their model or the transfer of life by means of rocky material.

Altered Carbon may not be the cyberpunk show you're looking for

In the world of Altered Carbon, death is cheap. The human mind is digitized in a transferrable chip called a "stack," capable of being moved from body to body as necessary-or, if you've got the cash for it, as desired.

Bodies have become increasingly uncoupled from the consciousnesses that occupy them. Slang now just calls them "sleeves." The future of Altered Carbon, Netflix's new science fiction series, is one the flesh is just another kind of economy.

Disney wants you to buy a 'Star Wars' book to find out what didn't make it into 'The Last Jedi'

If you weren't satisfied with "Star Wars: The Last Jedi" or have been on the edge of your seat waiting for deleted scenes some of the wait is almost over.

YouTube's "The Star Wars Show" confirmed the tie-in novelization for "The Last Jedi" will contain expanded and deleted scenes from the "Star Wars" sequel. Director Rian Johnson said he met with Jason Fry, the author behind "The Last Jedi" novelization, to write new scenes for the book.

Women in science fiction: If Mary Shelley invented the genre why are so few female sci-fi writers household names?

Two hundred years ago, Mary Shelley sat down to write a ghost story and created science fiction. Women still pen the genre's finest, exemplified by Ursula K Le Guin, who died this week. Yet so often they are overlooked.

David Barnett asks: whither the brides of Frankenstein?

Two centuries. Two hundred years. That's how long we've had science fiction. From the birth of Frankenstein, to the death of Ursula K Le Guin. Two hundred years.

Ursula K Le Guin: The 'fearless' author who showed us a different world

By Ian YoungsArts & entertainment reporter

Ursula Le Guin was loved for her groundbreaking fantasy novels that tackled questions of gender, race and the environment. She influenced generations of authors from Margaret Atwood to Neil Gaiman - and wrote about a boy wizard 30 years before Harry Potter.

In her writing and in her life, Ursula Le Guin refused to blindly accept how the world is supposed to work. In life, if something was illogical or unjust, she simply decided that things would be different. "I am a man," she said in a 2015 BBC Radio 4 documentary, somewhat surprisingly. "When I was born, there were actually only men. People were men."

Final Frontier Friday: 'Threshold'

Hello and welcome as always to 'Final Frontier Friday.' This week I'll be continuing my quest to focus on things that aren't the original 'Star Trek' or 'The Next Generation' by tackling an episode of 'Voyager'. In fact, for some of you, 'Threshold' may very well be "that episode" of 'Voyager'. Suffice to say, last time I was to some extent taking up the defense of an unpopular (or at least divisive) character in Ezri Dax.

But I'd be shocked, if anything, if I had to say about 'Threshold' was terribly controversial.

Making magic with star wars: secrets of the empire

Starwars.com speaks with some of the key minds behind the groundbreaking hyper-reality experience. The odds aren't good. I'm a rebel, so already the cards are stacked against me. My squad and I have to infiltrate an Imperial base. There are four of us against what I'm sure will be many, many more than that.

'Aliens: Dust To Dust' will show us xenomorphs through the eyes of a terrified 12-year-old!

When Xenomorphs attack we see people die, though 'Aliens' has shown that children can survive these attacks and 'Aliens: Dust to Dust' will give us a story told through the eyes of a 12-year-old. The 4-issue miniseries is being penned and illustrated by Gabriel Hardman who was the storyboard artist for 'Logan', 'Dawn of Planet of the Apes', 'Batman: The Dark Knight Rises' and more!

'Star Wars Rebels' sets 90-minute series finale

(via CNN)"Star Wars" is officially closing one chapter in its universe, with the animated series "Star Wars Rebels" to conclude March 5 with a 90-minute series finale.

The program, which airs on Disney XD, will return February 19 with back-to-back episodes leading up to its conclusion.