There have been only a few notable Thanksgiving episodes of science-fiction TV shows — after all, not all SF stories even take place inside the United States. But science fiction and fantasy are always happy to remind us that gathering a bunch of characters together at a table is a recipe for stress and disaster.

Cuddly sitcom alien Alf was a huge fan of Thanksgiving, as this bizarre moment from the 1989 Macy's Thanksgiving Parade shows. But Alf went further — his show devoted a whole two-part episode, "Turkey In The Straw," to the holiday.

In that episode, everybody's favorite lovable alien puppet causes a stir when he eats the family turkey, raw. And it all goes downhill from there, when no replacement can be found the Tanners end up at dinner with the crazy neighbors. Then you add in the homeless person that Alf has been leaving clothes and food, and it's a "very special episode" to remember. You can watch it on Youtube

Buffy the Vampire Slayer featured a slayer Thanksgiving in the episode "Pangs." After her mother announces she's leaving town for the holiday, Buffy decides to take over Thanksgiving duties herself. She ends up so obsessed with the idea of the perfect meal that she starts neglecting her slayer duties, as the vengeful spirit of the Chumash tribe starts murdering people. Maybe we don't all have Native American spirits infecting our best friend's penis with horrible diseases, but most people can relate to craziness and stress that our expectations of "the perfect Thanksgiving" can create. Not to mention the final moment when someone lets a secret slip and creates an awkward silence.

Plus, now all geeks everywhere can call the holiday a "ritual sacrifice with pie" and complain about yam shams.

And then of course, there was the Heroes episode the other day, which proves we're still working through our emotions with respect to this particular holiday. Once again, one of our protagonists wants to create the perfect family Thanksgiving, and as always their plans are entirely thwarted by drama.

But even apart from those three examples of Thanksgiving in media SF, there are plenty of other warnings that a table spread with food is a dangerous thing. In Star Wars, our heroes almost become part of the celebratory meal. In Alien, as soon as everybody tucks into their food, somebody's chest bursts open.

But two recent fantasy films prove that the most dangerous combination in film is children and food.

In Pan's Labyrinth, Ofelia has been denied food, when the faun appears to her and tells her to perform another task for him. She's sent into the lair of The Pale Man, who sits motionless in front of a sumptuous and tempting feast. The faun has told Ofelia not to eat anything from the table, and at first she listens and completes her task. But the temptation is too great, and when she samples the food The Pale Man comes to life and pursues her in what is one of the most frightening scenes in recent cinema history.

In another film about a little girl with a huge imagination, Coraline is drawn into a world populated by her Other Mother and Other Father, who have buttons for eyes. In her real world, the food her mother makes is unappetizing and sparse. But in this other world, there is more than enough home-cooked food to go around. The animators worked hard to sculpt food that looks completely delicious, no matter what it may have been made of. The Other Mother's table includes a gravy train, and cakes that with magic icing. All Coraline has to do to stay there and eat her fill is agree to have buttons sewn over her eyes.

But let's not leave things on a downer note — it's not always true that every fantastical feast has to end miserably. In the Lost episode "Everybody Hates Hugo," the survivors have found a cache of food in the hatch. Hurley is given the task of cataloging it and rationing it. This makes him remember the things he went through when he won the lottery, and after briefly considering blowing up the pantry, he instead decides to give all the food away all at once. The survivors enjoy the food together, in a moment of good will and companionship.

So before you sit down to your meal with your family, friends, or fellow superheroes, tell us in the comments what your favorite science-fictional feast scene is. And please pass the plate of mashed potatoes shaped like Devil's Tower.

Granted, not all of these foods will actually devour you; some will simply kill you or turn you into their zombie slave. But all are best approached with caution, and should only be handled by chefs with combat training.

Killer Tomatoes (Attack of the Killer Tomatoes): After years of being made into ketchup and mistaken for vegetables, the tomatoes get their revenge, and a killer theme song.

The Stuff (The Stuff): It's not clear what would possess a man to taste a slimy substance he found out in the woods, but it turns out the Stuff is delicious, addictive, and contains no calories. It also turns out that the Stuff is alive, and it chews on your brain until you've transformed into a nice, pliable zombie.

Bubble Shock! (The Sarah Jane Adventures "Invasion of the Bane"): Another zombifying substance is Bubble Shock!, a fizzy organic beverage. But it's actually an alien life form, one that turns drinkers into slaves of Mother Bane. While it doesn't have quite the brain-mushing powers of the Stuff, Bubble Shock! has a viral quality, with Bane zombies offering the beverage to anyone who hasn't tried it.

Popplers (Futurama "The Problem with Popplers"): Another mysterious foodstuff found lying on the ground, popplers are incredibly delicious nuggets of meaty goodness. There are just two problems: first, popplers are intelligent; second, they're the juvenile form of the ornery Omicronians, and Lrrr, the Omicronian ruler, thinks it's only fair that he should get to eat a human to set things right.

The Blue Plate Special (Spaceballs): Poor John Hurt. When he tried to enjoy a meal in Alien, he had a chestburster pop right out of him. Then he sits down for the blue plate special at a diner in Spaceballs and meets with the same fate.

Curry Monster (Red Dwarf "DNA"): In a typically boneheaded move, the crew of the Red Dwarf test a DNA modifier on a container of vindaloo, creating a monster that's half man, half Indian takeaway.

Killer Pizzas (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles "Case of the Killer Pizzas"): The pizza-loving foursome find that sometimes their favorite food can get a case of the munchies. An alien species from Dimension X lays eggs that happen to look like meatballs, and they manage to land on a handful of pizzas. Pop your pizza in the microwave, and those little critters hatch mean and hungry.

TMNT - Case of the killer pizzas

Wolfbullet | MySpace Video

Pizza the Hut (Spaceballs): He's delicious enough that he ate himself to death, but woe unto those who cross this cheesy gangster. They'll learn what it's like to have Pizza send out for you.

Bezoar Eggs (Buffy the Vampire Slayer "Bad Eggs"): When Buffy and the crew are given eggs to babysit as a class assignment, it seems like a minor nuisance. But it turns out those aren't chicken eggs they're faux parenting; they actually hatch bezoars, little parasites that attach to your brain stem (and, like all good parasites, render you their zombie slave). And Xander gets a nasty surprise when he hardboils his egg son and decides to enjoy a mid-afternoon snack.

Evil Gingerbread Men (The Tick, The Gingerdead Man): Be they the product of an eager baker or possessed by the spirit of a serial killer, these confections can be downright deadly. You'd imagine, though, that milk would be a major weakness.

Werewolf (Angel "Unleashed"): Werewolf is considered a delicacy among certain sadistic members of the Los Angeles elite. Unfortunately, werewolves tend to revert to their human form once they're killed, so they have to be served alive while the meat is carved off. But if the werewolf isn't properly restrained, you could end up on the menu.

Wub ("Beyond Lies the Wub" by Philip K. Dick): Again, it's rarely a smart idea to eat a species you happen to find just hanging out on another planet, especially if it's capable of literary discussions. The pig-like wub will let you eat it, but there's a hefty price; the wub will completely take over your body, essentially booting out your soul through your stomach.

Martian Water (Doctor Who "The Waters of Mars"): Actually, you don't even need to drink water containing the Flood to contract its zombifying contagion — just touching it will do the trick. Still, drinking the water is ill-advised.

Kandy Man (Doctor Who "The Happiness Patrol"): The good news is that this licorice-based robot won't actually devour you. The bad news is that, if you aren't visibly happy at all times, it will kill you — likely by drowning you in super sugary fondant.

Stay Puft Marshmallow Man (Ghostbusters): Sure, Stay Puft nearly demolished the entire island of Manhattan in the service of Gozer. But that toasted marshmallow glop that dropped on the Ghostbusters at the end of the move looked mighty tasty.

Ebola Cola (Transmetropolitan): As the slogan goes, "You Drink It, It Eats You."

Aqua Teen Hunger Force (Aqua Teen Hunger Force): A mutated meatball, milkshake, and carton of french fries, the Aqua Teens get into all sorts of mayhem, which often gets various creatures (and occasionally Maser Shake) killed. I probably wouldn't put eating the remains past them either, given the right situation.

Triffids (Day of the Triffids): Triffids have a lot going for them. They're a great source of vegetable oil (making them valuable crops), and they can fight off any potential predators with their venomous whips. Plus, they love to feed on rotting meat, which is easy to obtain once most of humanity has been struck blind.

Tom Turkey (The Simpsons "Treehouse of Horror XIX"): Since it's Thanksgiving week, this musket-wielding bird will cap off our list. After rescuing the children of Springfield from the murderous Grand Pumpkin, Tom Turkey gets invited to Thanksgiving dinner. But once he learns what people eat on Thanksgiving, he starts gobble-gobbling up the children himself.

According to the site, the series will be a motion comic adaptation of the current "official" sequel to the television series, and the casting sides they have make it look like an adaptation of the Faith-centric second arc, "No Future For You" (written by Brian K. Vaughan), with actors needed for parts including Faith, Lady Genevieve and the dream-sequenced Daniel Craig. The sides name "Maxx Initiative" as the people behind the motion comics, but aside from the mention of Jeff Shuter as casting director, no other creative personnel are named as being involved. Recording dates, according to the casting sides, are still to be decided, so don't hold your breath waiting for the end result, either - Although we are waiting to find out whether or not Whedon is involved in this any more than he was the Marvel motion comic version of his Astonishing X-Men comic.

We've got the scoop on a new Buffy series! [Sci-Fi Wire]

THR broke the news of Noxon's involvement, and also revealed that...

The new version will keep the comedy-horror tone while modernizing the effects.

Keeping the tone sounds good, but it would be a shame to lose the campy horror of the original movie's long-fingered prosthetics.

Noxon wrote 22 episodes on Buffy episode including "Villains," where Willow goes bezerk and rips off Warren's skin — a very special episode indeed. She was also the producer on Buffy for the end seasons and worked on Mad Men, writing ""The Inheritance" and serving as a consulting producer. So perhaps there's hope for this film yet — especially since the entire project was almost dumped a few months ago because they didn't think they could get the script to work. That shows some kind of dedication to getting it right, which in itself gives us a tiny cause for optimism.

I have to confess, it's very hard for me to watch horror movies. It's not that I don't enjoy the occasional scare, and it's not that I'm worried about ghosts and monsters following home (although I will confess to a mild fear of zombies). No, it's just that when the body count starts rising, I start feeling, well, sad. I don't come out of the theater pumping with adrenaline; I'm too distracted thinking about the people who died and the loved ones they've left behind.

The plots of several pieces of horror are discussed below, so be warned there may be spoilers.

The movie that really hit this home for me is not a science fiction movie, but Wes Craven's Scream. In the movie's opening sequence, Drew Barrymore is terrorized by a knife-wielding serial killer one night while she's home alone. As the killer is chasing her down, her parents pull up in the driveway. For a brief moment, it looks like she's saved, but in the next shot, we see the parents, happy from a pleasant evening out, and their daughter pulled down by the killer before she has the chance to cry out for help.

How horrible. It's a suspenseful moment to be sure, but one that evokes horror more than terror. Horrifying that she was so close to salvation only to meet a brutal end, and horrifying that her parents will find their daughter mutilated on their lawn and spend the rest of their lives wondering what would have happened if they have come home just a little sooner. It's a scene tinged with more tragedy than terror.

Horror is a genre that picks and pokes at our deepest anxieties. It's a reminder that we live in an unstable world, and that no matter how careful or good we are, we could at any time be struck with death, disfigurement, or madness. A lot of horror movies appeal to our limbic systems, to that part of our brain that wonders what lurks in the shadows and triggers a happy release of hormone every time someone shouts "Boo!" And there is undeniably an artistry to that, to the sort of jumps and thrills so frightening that, weeks later, you're still checking under the bed for demons from Hell. But often the horror that still lingers for years afterwards are the ones that play on the less primal — but still very human — fears of losing the ones you love and being left alone in the world.

When Heartbreak Drives the Horror

Horror protagonists don't always make the best choices. They insult powerful witches, run up the stairs when they should run out the door, and try to capture the man-eating alien instead of killing it. And when Louis Creed buries his son Gage in the Micmac burial ground in Stephen King's Pet Sematary, we know it's a bad idea. He knows it's a bad idea. But he so desperately hopes that he can repair his wounded family that he is willing to make a terrible and utterly wrong decision. And when Gage comes back only to murder his mother, Louis too easily manages to talk himself into burying his wife in the same graveyard.

It should be a forehead-slapping moment, but it's depressingly relatable. That Gage comes back as an undead monster is pretty horrifying (he did make our list of scariest characters in film), but what's more horrifying is what grief can drive Louis to do. His grief is so potent, so unbearable that he's willing to make monsters out of his loved ones in the hope that seeing them again will mend his heart.

It's an idea that harkens back to WW Jacobs' "The Monkey's Paw," that famed exercise in truly depressing horror. After the Whites receive a wish-granting monkey paw, they wish for money, only to lose their son in an accident and receive compensation for his death. In that moment, they understand the nature of the monkey paw: it grants wishes, but in a perverse way. Still, the husband defers to his wife's terrible, maddening grief and wishes their son back to life. But, like Louis Creed, Mr. White must make his son dead again — knowing what comes back couldn't possibly be right — doubling his guilt and grief.

There are reasons why stories like "The Monkey's Paw" endure, and why its ideas find its way into so many other works of horror. They force us to access our fears of losing those closest to us, asking us how far we would go to keep them with us. Perhaps the most frightening thing about these stories that many of us will face terrible grief in our lives — and perhaps even guilt at the deaths of our loved ones — and we could be capable of making the same terrible decisions as the people in these stories, even if we don't get the opportunity to act on them.

When Losing Someone Makes Things That Much Worse

Even when grief and loss aren't the focus of a horror story, a moment of terrible loss can have more impact than even the most terrifying monster. 28 Days Later adds a frightening bit of realism to the zombie apocalypse, but it never forgets that the fear of losing your life is little match for the sadness that comes in a world suffused with death. When Jim discovers that his parents committed suicide in the face of violent death (leaving a note begging him not to wake from his coma), it's a bright spot of pain in a movie already filled with terror. But when our merry band of survivors becomes something of a family, with Frank playing the wise and protective father, the apocalypse seems survivable, almost manageable. Then Frank becomes infected with the Rage virus, and it's not just another zombie movie death. It puts a lump in your throat and reminds you that the zombie outbreak isn't all fun and killing the Infected — it's actually horribly sad.

This threat of loss adds dimension to other horror movies as well. Take The Ring, a film already terrifying in its J-horror weirdness. That The Ring turns a VHS cassette into an object of terror is incredibly impressive, but it's when Rachel's son Aidan watches the tape that the clock really starts ticking. Faced with the death of her son, Rachel must not only save herself, but survive long enough to keep Samara from killing her son as well. It adds a deeper, driving motivation to an already scary movie.

Joss Whedon is perhaps the master of this particular brand of horror. Though the series was filled with man-eating monsters, death in Buffy the Vampire Slayer is often random, senseless, and poignant. Few moments in the show stand out as clearly as Joyce's death from an aneurysm, or Tara's from a stray bullet. The central theme in Buffy is that family and friends make life grand, even when your life is filled with mayhem and violence. In such a world, few things are as horrifying as losing part of your family, and such deaths always left the characters unbalanced, even psychotic with grief. Even the show's most calculated death, Angelus' slaying of Jenny Calendar, is designed to maximize heartbreak. It's not enough that Angelus kills her; he also has to place her in Giles' bed with a trail of roses leading up to it, in a mockery of romantic seduction. And that heartache, far more than fear, drives Giles to hate and try to destroy Angelus.

When Your Loved One Turns Monstrous

This is a staple of vampire and zombie movies, when you find you must destroy the creature wearing your loved one's face. Buffy tried this in the very first episode, turning Willow and Xander's friend Jesse bloodsucker and forcing Xander to kill him an episode later. It's not the strongest instance of this particular trope (I'm not sure if Jesse is even mentioned later in the series), but it's a solid introduction to the horrible nature of vampires. Zombie movies are stronger in this regard. Even Shaun of the Dead, a movie mostly devoted to the funny side of the undead, goes suddenly tearjerker when we learn Shaun's mother has been bitten by a zombie. This bit of sadness is then compounded by the ensuing debate over shooting Shaun's dead mother in the head. Even though everyone knows it has to happen, Shaun can't bring himself to let it happen, and even the normally logical Liz argues against it. And when his mother inevitably rises from the dead, Shaun is the one who must shoot her body, a shockingly tearful moment from the zombie romantic comedy.

It's another work from Stephen King, The Shining, that offers a more realistic view on why this concept is so horrifying. Jack Torrance is a man so driven to drink that he gives his soul over to the hotel for alcohol. In the movie, it's played more as slasher horror, with Jack Nicholson gleefully hunting down his wife and child, but it's a grim reminder that the people we love could become the people we fear, or that we ourselves might be capable of inflicting terrible harms on our loved ones.

When Hope Is Your Worst Enemy

Few genres are as relentlessly obsessed with death as post-apocalyptic fiction. In Cormac McCarthy's The Road, death abounds; most of the world is dead, bands of rapists and murderers prowl the road, and the protagonist's wife has killed herself. The protagonist is not concerned for his own survival — he's already dying — but for his son's. He's confronted with the wrenching knowledge that he might have to kill his son to save him from an even worse fate. But he hopes for something better, hopes that he will find good people with whom his son could make a future. The whole book is a dirge for civilization, but the father's hope might only leave his son open to future horrors — and tragically, the father dies without knowing his son will fall in with good people after all.

In The Walking Dead, zombies are less agents of fear than they are death incarnate, and the comic often plays on themes of hope and how we cope with loss. Hope is tragic as much as it is necessary for survival. A farmer keeps his undead family in a barn by his house, hoping there will someday be a cure. The survivors hope to rebuild some semblance of civilization, but lose some of their number every time they think they've found peace. And as brutal and horrible as death is for the ones who die, the grief of the survivors is far more powerful and frightening.

The Fear of Dying Alone

It's telling that the very first episode of The Twilight Zone , "Where Is Everybody?" deals with loneliness, and the human need for companionship. It's a theme that inspired one of the more unnerving episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation. In "Remember Me," Dr. Crusher sees the her son and everyone else aboard the Enterprise disappear, until she's the only one left (of course, it turns out that she's the one who has actually disappeared, in this case into a static warp bubble). The episode has a Twilight Zone quality to it, but it's especially bleak that Crusher is at the center of it. Here is a woman who has already lost a husband to the hazards of Starfleet, whose closest friends routinely put their own lives in danger, and whose son is joining the very military organization that took her husband. "Remember Me" is, more than anything, a metaphor for the very real possibility that she could end up alone. Even Garfield, of all things, played with this idea in its surprisingly depressing 1989 Halloween run, where the orange fat cat wakes to a future where his house is abandoned and he never exists.

Even the episode of The Twilight Zone that was most optimistic about the apocalypse, "Time Enough at Last," deals with loneliness. After a nuclear attack wipes out everyone around him, Burgess Meredith is about to commit suicide until he realizes there's a library full of books to keep him company. It's only when he breaks his glasses that he feels truly alone, and that loneliness is more frightening than anything that goes bump in the night.

(Thanks to Graeme for suggesting "Remember Me").

Note: This is not intended to be an exhaustive list, just a rundown of the eras in horror comedy. Feel free to suggest titles, or whole epochs, that we may have missed out.

The 1920s stage plays

In the 1920s, playwrights decided to spice up their stage plays by adding more horror elements, creating silly haunted-house and monster stories like The Bat, The Cat & The Canary and The Gorilla. Some of these, like Canary, got adapted to silent movies. The 1925 Lon Chaney film The Monster also features a comic-relief character, but isn't really a full-fledged comedy.

Abbott And Costello And Laurel And Hardy And So On

In many ways, the 1930s and 1940s were the heyday of the "clean" horror comedy, which featured monsters without any real gore or violence. Laurel And Hardy did A Live Ghost in 1934, the haunted-house movie The Laurel-Hardy Murder Case in 1930 and A-Haunting We Will Go in 1942. The Three Stooges also dabbled in horror-comedy with short films like 1943's Spooks!. And then going into the 1940s, Abbott and Costello, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis, and Bob Hope, among others, brought the genre to new prominence. There's also the hilariously titled Zombies On Broadway. Let's put on a show!

1960s Anarchy

The 1960s saw a slew of trippy novels, movies and TV shows in which horror elements often jostled with comedic ones — several of Peter Sellers' 1960s comedies often veer into horror at odd moments. At the same time, monster sitcoms like The Munsters and The Addams Family ruled television with their zany portrayals of monsters who were just like us — almost. This was also the era that gave the start of the long-running Scooby Doo cartoons, and a slew of cute/funny images of monsters, from the Frankenberry cereal to the Count on Sesame Street.

Self-Aware Campiness

Susan Sontag published her famous essay on "camp" in 1964, but the 1970s really backed up the camp truck to our door, and dumped a load of glitter on our front steps. Horror comedy was no exception, with Vincent Price starring in two mega-campy Dr. Phibes movies, and other over-the-top horror films like Please Don't Eat My Mother and Attack Of The Killer Tomatoes taking over cinemas. Most of all, Rocky Horror Picture Show became a defining movie for a whole ripped-fishnets-sporting generation.

The self-aware horror spoof genre took off way more in the early 1980s, with movies like Creepshow mocking the genre's cliches. And in general, the horror-comedy movie genre really came into its own in the 1980s, diversifying into a bunch of thriving sub-genres.

Ghostbusters, Gremlins and more

1984 saw the release of both Ghostbusters and Gremlins, sparking a new onslaught of cute/scary monsters and ghosts, including four (!) Critters movies. I'd also put 1986's Little Shop Of Horrors and Haunted Honeymoon into this category: wide-eyed protagonists coming face-to-tentacle with weird, slimy or fluffy-but-nasty creatures. According to Box Office Mojo, both Ghostbusters films and the first Gremlins occupy three out of the top four best-selling horror comedy slots of all time.

Troma comedies in the 1980s and beyond

Troma deserves its own category, for its sheer volume of output if for no other reason. Although it's best known for the Toxic Avenger films and Surf Nazis Must Die, there are just so many weird, over-the-top and just plain wrong Troma films out there, you could fill a bookshelf with the DVDs. And really, Troma is just the tip of the iceberg of a slew of direct-to-VHS and direct-to-DVD movies that we've seen in the past 20 years ago, with a ton of cult auteurs pushing the boundary between scary and funny.

1980s Werewolf/Vampire Humor

Teen Wolf (1985), An American Werewolf In London (1981), Fright Night (1985), Mr. Vampire (1985), Once Bitten (1985), Vamp (1986) and Love At First Bite (1979) were just some of the cocaine-fueled laughs at Universal monsters. Here's a photo of Grace Jones at a vampire strip club, from Vamp.

Body Horror/Comedy

The Reanimator films and Brian Yuzna's Society, among others, take the David Cronenberg trope of the human body being transformed into something gooey, icky or disturbingly awful, and they find the silliness and subversive humor that lurks just behind that, with gore, decapitated limbs still moving and lots of oozing goop all providing opportunities for slapstick and discomfort. The 1980s were also the heydey of Frank Hennenlotter's over-the-top violence and bodily destruction, in films like Basket Case. I'd also stick Peter Jackson's Dead/Alive into this category. In many ways, this genre has been the gift that keeps on giving, as evidenced by the awesomeness of 2006's Slither.

The Rise Of Sam Raimi

Classic Sam Raimi films deserve their own category, especially the Evil Dead films and Army Of Darkness. Bruce Campbell in his prime, rocking the chainsaw hand, against the legions of dead. Good times.

Christopher Moore

No discussion of horror-comedy would be complete without mentioning the 1990s and 2000s novels of Christopher Moore, especially his vampire classics Bloodsucking Fiends: A Love Story, You Suck: A Love Story, and Bite Me: A Love Story, plus his zombie Christmas tale The Stupidest Angel: A Heartwarming Tale Of Christmas Horror.

Creature Features

Tremors (1990), Arachnophobia (1990), Lake Placid (1999) and Eight-Legged Freaks (2002) were just some of the slew of tongue-in-cheek monster-rampage films that came out in the 1990s and early 2000s. My fave is probably Lake Placid, just for the amazingly deadpan performances by Bill Paxton and Betty White, among others.

Buffy Etc.

Joss Whedon's Buffy empire, including a movie and two television series, pretty much deserves its own category, and it came along with a slew of other TV shows and books featuring (frequently female) heroines facing tongue-in-cheek magical/horrific threats, including Charmed and Xena: Warrior Princess.

The Chucky and Leprechaun Films

I have no idea where those fit in, so I'm putting them here. These are like the silly counterparts to the already quite silly Jason Voorhees and Freddie Krueger films. Chucky is a weird doll that comes to life and attacks people (I guess — I've only read a comic-book adaptation) and there have been a million films about a silly leprechaun going around disemboweling people and controlling their minds. And rapping. And dancing.

Horror Spoofs

The Scream films in the late 1990s jumpstarted the slasher-movie genre with their knowing humor and sly horror-movie references. And then with the release of Scary Movie in 2000, the floodgates opened. There have been a ton of horror spoofs, many of them with the word "Movie" at the end of their titles. Plus the upcoming Transylmania, which exactly one person is excited about. (And we know where you live.)

Zombie Rom-Coms

Shaun Of The Dead, Planet Terror, Jennifer's Body and Zombieland all, to some extent, use the reanimated dead as a backdrop for character-focused comedies. (Okay, so the rom-com thing in the subhed is stretching it slightly — they don't all feature love stories, exactly. But some of them do.) Zombie comedies that are less character-focused include the Nazi epic Dead Snow, the zombie slave masterpiece Fido, the zombie sheep masterpiece Black Sheep and the incredibly nasty Zombie Strippers. Plus Bruce La Bruce's Otto, Or Up With The Dead People. Oh, and there's also last year's Poultrygeist: Night Of The Chicken Dead. No, really. There's also Jon Heder's webseries Woke Up Dead.

Meanwhile, in the world of books, many people see Max Brooks' Zombie Survival Guide as humorous, rather than as the indispensible handbook it is. There have also been a decent number of funny zombie books, including Breathers: A Zombie Lament by S.G. Browne, the mash-up Pride And Prejudice And Zombies, and several others.

Not entirely sure how it fits in, but horror spoof John Dies At The End, by Cracked.com editor Jason Pargin (under a pseudonym) is selling like hotcakes on Amazon.

Sources include Wikipedia, BoxOfficeMojo, IMDB, Scared Silly and the book Laughing Screaming: Modern Hollywood Horror & Comedy by William Paul.

Additional reporting by Mary Ratliff.

[via Whedonesque]

After compiling 43 clips of science-fiction dream sequences, we started to wonder exactly why we invade people's dreams so often in SF stories. What purpose does this unreality serve?

We all want to venture past our own limited little reality fields and pop our limiting bubbles of experience — and sometimes aliens, spaceships, time-machines and weird mutations just aren't enough to make that possible. Sometimes we have to get all the way liminal. Stand in the doorway for a bit.

But more specifically, here are some reasons why science fiction gets so dream-happy:

1) The cheap foreshadowing

So we haven't thought about the Borg in months, and they haven't flashed so much as a single implant around these parts. But they're never far from our thoughts — or our dreams, for that matter. And it's just a nifty coincidence — and by "nifty," we mean "ominous and horrifying" — that our hero has a terrible dream about the Borg right before they pop up again. Such a dream does double duty: it reminds us of exactly what the Borg are about and why they're so fearsome. And it sets the mood for another round of Borgian devilry.

2) The prophetic dream

This is similar to the use of dreams as foreshadowing, but usually the foreshadowing dream also includes some actual useful information that our heroes can decipher and use against the monster/villain later. The prophetic dream is a plot device as well as (or sometimes instead of) a grace note. It's not just thrown in for effect, it's actually providing useful info, or at least clues to future developments. The frequent dream sequences in Buffy The Vampire Slayer often set up developments years down the road, like the coming of Dawn. A cruder version is the Doctor's dream at the start of the Doctor Who story "The Time Monster," which gives him tons 'o' clues.

3) Escaping the straitjacket of realism

Science fiction often works really hard to establish a mood of complete realism, paradoxically because it features so many elements that don't, and maybe couldn't, exist in our world. And sometimes, the only excuse for letting go of that need for realism is to stick in a dream sequence, where everything goes loopy.

4) Heightened realism

On the other hand, if people really did meet aliens or their own grandparents, or whatever, people would probably have severe, bizarre mental reactions as a result. Reactions that, honestly, would seem over the top or crazy if you tried to depict them normally. So sometimes the only way to convey a realistic sense of humans coming face-to-face with the unreal is by representing their terror and confusion in the form of an alarming dream. It's actually a form of added realism.

5) Thematic gracenotes

This is something that seemed to leap out from many of the dream sequences we looked over. Like Fahrenheit 451, for example — the hero is facing a conflict, or a mind-blowing decision, and we see that mental anguish amplified in a dream sequence. Preferably full of whirling shapes, and faces going around in a circle. Whoosh.

6) The easy scare that doesn't break any toys

Oh no, Ripley has an alien in her stomach, and it just burst out! Oh, except she doesn't, and it didn't. False alarm, folks.

7) Padding the running length.

What do you mean, we still have another ten minutes left? Do we have any explosives we haven't set off? No? Can we afford another monster costume or some extra CG? No? Okay, how about a long, trippy dream sequence where people stand around and recite e.e. cummings. It's puddlewonderful — in space! The fans will be debating what it means for decades...

8) Up the surrealism ante.

Imagine you're David Lynch. Okay, that may be asking too much. But pretend for a moment that you're impersonating a guy (or Laura Dern) and who has weird hair. And the person you're impersonating has done a lot of drugs, and it's making him or her have loopy visions of worm babies. What can you possibly do to make this guy (or Laura) have more weirdness on top of that? How about a totally batfreak dreamsequence, preferably featuring David Bowie? Or maybe a tiny radiator lady with facial hair?

9) Meeting the alien

Sometimes alien creatures (and gods, and demons) are so alien that no real-life encounter will work. The only way we can talk to them, or have any kind of meaningful communication, is in a dream, or a dreamlike world, where everything is semi-nonsensical and there's a bit of vaseline on the lens... because we're meeting a consciousness that's totally unlike our own.

10) Extra sexiness without consequences

And most importantly, we want to see Mulder shirtless and handcuffed. We want to see Sookie and Eric doing the wild thing. We crave random titillation, and we don't care if it makes sense in the context of the story. In fact, the less sense it makes, or the more it hints at undercurrents of sexitude under the surface, the more exciting it is. So it's almost mandatory for dream sequences to include "I can't believe they went there" friskiness.

The truth is, we want to be smacked in the face with strangeness. Our desire for the bizarre and ridiculous is so much greater than our pitiful suspension of disbelief that you need to short-circuit the whole "is this really happening" question.

[Via Sci Fi Wire]

Actually, my absolute favorite of all time has to be this weird sequence from Futureworld, with the red ninjas, and the bondage, and the sexy, sexy gunslinger action:

If you can explain to me exactly what that dream about Yul Brynner symbolizes, I'll buy you your own lifesize Yul Brynner gunslinger robot.

Even though science fiction often strives to portray bizarre or other-worldly things happening in our "real" world, it often reaches for the most jagged tool in a film-maker's kit: the dream sequence, in which things are practically required to get loopy and unreal. Some creators — like, say, David Lynch and Joss Whedon — love the dream sequence more than others. But it pops up surprisingly often. With the melty faces, and the people falling in space, and the weird animal costumes, among other things...

Here are 40 or so dream sequences that we love, divided up by era...

1920s through 1970s (Or if you want to view it in a non-gallery format, click here.)

1980s. (Or if you prefer a non-gallery format, click here.)

1990s. (Or, for non-gallery format, click here.)

2000s. (And it's available as a non-gallery page, here.)

I wouldn't dream of claiming that we included every amazing SF dream sequence, ever. So what are your favorites? What did we miss?

Sources: UGO, Wikipedia, FinestFive and IMDB, among others.

Complicated is probably underselling it, though. In every one of Joss Whedon's projects, the central romantic relationship is really deeply messed up. His romantic leads use each other, delude themselves, and often end up in tragedy. But through all of the complexity, these twisted relationships end up feeling more real than any simple rom-com example ever would.

Of course, that extends to sexuality in the context of these relationships. Whedon likes to put his characters into weird sexual situations as well. Sex tends to have unexpected consequences in reality as well as fiction, but in Joss Whedon's world, those unintended consequences are often unimaginable or even disturbing.

Here are a few of the best examples of Joss Whedon's propensity for weird, convoluted romances. (Spoilers for Dollhouse, Buffy, Dr. Horrible, and Firefly!)

Buffy and Angel

In a lot of ways, the Buffy-Angel relationship is Joss Whedon's prototype for messed up relationships. For starters, their story is essentially a supernatural Romeo and Juliet. In a dangerous and deadly way, Buffy and Angel are very much star-crossed lovers. Buffy's sole task is to kill vampires, and Angel is... well, a vampire.

Of course, things are more complex than that; Angel is not just a vampire, but a vampire with a soul. This is what draws Buffy to him. He's got a troubled past and a dark edge, but deep inside, he's essentially as human as her.

And then we get our first very Whedonesque sexual experience with a twist. When Angel and Buffy finally go at it, it is precisely this act of love that causes Angel to lose his soul and revert to the demon he once was. Buffy's feelings for him go from complex to downright wrong (and very dangerous) in a matter of moments.

It's a sophisticated metaphor for the terrible versions of themselves people sometimes become after sex. But it's also a quintessentially Joss Whedon touch: when the couple is at their happiest, things take a turn for the darkest.

Buffy and Spike

And let's not forget Buffy's even more mixed up relationship with Spike. She is repulsed by him for a very long time, seeing him as a symbol of the destructive nature and blood lust inside of herself.

But in Joss Whedon's mind, this man as symbol of self-loathing may as well be a symbol of self-loving; Buffy embarks on a twisted, self-destructive romantic fascination with Spike. The sex scenes between these two always feel a little dirty and more than a little self-destructive on both ends.

And that's not even counting the feather in the demented cap that is Spike and Buffy's relationship: Spike tries to rape Buffy in an attempt to prove to her that she really does love him. It's a strange, dark, twisted scene, but what makes it even more twisted is that this attempted rape really is the first step on the road that eventually leads to Spike's transformation into someone Buffy does love.

This arc is also steeped in metaphor. The two of them, at their darkest moments, turn to each other, and they even help each other become the people they want to be, but not before they help tear each other down to the saddest, most broken people they can be.

Captain Malcolm and Inara

Interestingly, the relationship between Malcolm Reynolds and Inara Serra is probably the most normal of Whedon's leading romantic stories, despite the fact that the two never get beyond meaningful glances and playful flirtation.

From the get-go, Malcolm disapproves of Inara's profession. She's a "companion," which, in the world of Firefly, is a specially trained, deeply spiritual individual who creates meaningful sexual and emotional bonds with their clients. Captain Mal disdainfully refers to this as "whoring."

In fact, the Captain makes it clear over and over that he doesn't respect her profession. But he makes clear, after famously punching out another man who calls her a whore, that he does respect her. In fact, his disapproval of Inara probably stems mostly from jealousy.

I imagine that if "Firefly" had continued, Joss Whedon would have leveraged this hot-and-cold romance into a much more destructive story-line. Whedon and crew have indicated that Inara was on the path to dying if the show had continued, which shouldn't surprise anyone... anything remotely romantically stable isn't destined to last in the Whedonverse.

Dr. Horrible and Penny

While Dr. Horrible remains pretty light throughout its three parts, it does offer us a pretty twisted little romantic storyline.

Billy is a meek man, but his alter ego, Dr. Horrible, seems to count impressing the cute laundry buddy Penny as one of his main goals as a world-dominator. Billy seems to think that he, as Billy, will never impress her, but Dr. Horrible certainly will.

In the end, though, when Dr. Horrible makes his big debut, he accidentally contributes pretty directly to Penny's death. With her last breaths, Penny reaches out to Billy, not Dr. Horrible, and calls instead for the Doctor's nemesis.

It is at this moment that Dr. Horrible realizes that he never had a chance with Penny, that the only way he could connect with her was as Billy. But Billy is gone now, replaced by the villain he thought he needed to become.

In Joss Whedon's hands, a sci-fi musical blog with rom-com elements still ends up a pretty dark romantic tragedy.

Pretty Much Everyone On Dollhouse

Finally, in Whedon's most recent creation, pretty much every romantic relationship has it's twisted, destructive side. For starters, the first real romantic relationship we get is the one between FBI agent Paul Ballard and his neighbor Mellie.

Just when we see Ballard getting comfortable with this woman, Whedon hits us with the revelation that she was only there to spy on him, that the personality that loves him was concocted to do just that and nothing more. The woman he loved is just a shadow in an empty room.

Needless to say, this distorts Ballard's relationship with her. Soon after the revelation, Ballard, frustrated by the fabricated nature of Mellie's love, has some angry sex with her, then runs out on her. She's devastated, yet Ballard knows it's only because she's programmed to be devastated. His relationship with her is a symbol of the depravity he's fighting in trying to shut down the Dollhouse.

But Dollhouse doesn't stop its experimental romantic stories there. The show asks what would happen when the shadows start to linger in the empty room. Could the unimprinted dolls start to develop romantic interests, despite their supposed lack of personality or libido?

The poster-children for this concept are Victor and Sierra. These two gravitate towards each other in their unimprinted state, and they also seem to feel a residual pull towards each other in some of their imprinted states.

By far the most dark and twisted relationship on Dollhouse, though, is that between Sierra and her original handler. Her handler, on multiple occasions, took advantage of the preternatural trust programmed into the otherwise blank Sierra to take advantage of her innocence and rape her.

It's one of the most twisted sexual events Whedon has yet crafted, and it further proves his fascination with strange, unconventional, or even downright disturbingly messed up romantic relationships.

What Does It All Mean?

It's clear that Joss Whedon loves complicated romantic and sexual relationships. Both love and lust are unabashedly large motivating factors for his characters, and this provides a springboard for the most interesting story-lines on his shows.

But it also makes what can sometimes be fanciful and unbelievable circumstances seem much more real. When we see a "happily ever after" story, we sometimes think, ok, but for how long can someone be so uncomplicatedly happy? Joss Whedon's stories provide us with some answers to that question.

More to the point, Whedon uses supernatural and science fictional elements to take complex, realistic romantic and sexual tension and inflate them to near mythic proportion. At the risk of going too far with the Whedon love, it's the kind of thing that Shakespeare so excelled at. In his works, gods and ghosts often became the engines for deeply affecting tragedy, helping his stories bridge the gap between intimate realism and giant mythology.

Whedon's stories do the same thing for his fans. We know life isn't simple, that there's something disingenuous about a television show that portrays all romantic stories as cut from the same simple cloth. Whedon offers us all the intricacies of our own romantic and sexual development writ large. It's the kind of thing that appeals very strongly to a select audience and will hopefully someday get the wider appreciation it deserves.

They Come Back, But Not Quite Alive

Torchwood: When Jack Harkness is understandably upset when Owen Harper is shot and killed. But at least he's got the Resurrection Gauntlet to bring him back to life, right? Well, sort of. Owen still walks and talks, but he's not precisely alive. His heart doesn't beat, his flesh doesn't heal, and his reflexes are gone. And, if that wasn't bad enough, he can't even enjoy food or sex anymore, and Weevils follow him everywhere.

Caprica: Granted, the consequences of bringing Zoe Graystone back from the dead are pretty far-reaching. After all, it results in the creation of the Cylons and the eventual decimation of humanity. But when Joseph Adama encounters a computerized copy of his dead daughter, her concerns with being back from the dead are more immediate. Without a living body, she has no pulse and just generally feels wrong, to the extent that she can't stand being semi-alive this way.

"Playback" Arthur C. Clarke: Caprica's borrowed a page from Clarke here, who wrote a tale of aliens who try to bring a pilot back to life after his ship explodes. They manage to restore all of his memories, but have no idea what kind of body he had, and he's a bit depressed to find that he's just a non-corporeal simulation.

"The River Styx Runs Upstream" by Dan Simmons: When a young boy's mother dies, his father has her body resurrected. Although her body has returned, her mind simply isn't there, and she wanders through life as an automaton. The boy's distraught father and older brother eventually kill themselves in their grief, horror, and shame, but the boy doesn't think resurrection's so terrible. He himself goes to work for the Resurrectionists, spending his free time with his resurrected family.

You Bring Them Back Wrong

Doctor Who "The Empty Child:" Well-meaning nanobots attempt to reconstruct a child killed during the London Blitz. But not knowing what a human child looks like, they bring him back as a mindless abomination, with a gas mask for a face and ever searching for his mother. Even worse, the bots decide that this is what all humans must look like, and proceed to transmute healthy children as well.

"The Monkey's Paw" by WW Jacobs: The mystical monkey's paw grants wishes, but never in the way you hoped. After the first wish Mr. White makes results in the death of his son Herbert, his second wish is for Herbert to return. Mr. White never sees his son, but he knows after a horrible accident and a week on the slab, Herbert probably isn't the same. His third wish takes Herbert away.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer "Forever:" Following the same vein as "The Monkey's Paw," Dawn tries to resurrect her dead mother via magic. She also never sees her mother, realizing that what comes back won't quite be her, and breaks the spell before her mother reaches their front door.

They'll Try to Kill You Afterward

30 Days of Night: Dark Days: After Eben Olemaun becomes a vampire to save the remaining citizens of Barrow, he turns to ash when the polar sun finally rises. This sets Stella Olemaun on a quest to bring her husband back to life. But when she succeeds, Eben is still a vampire — and a hungry one at that.

"Herbert West — Reanimator" by HP Lovecraft: Medical student Herbert West is fascinated by life and death, and develops a serum he believes will restart the machinery of the human body. The serum works, but turns the corpses into cannibalistic zombies. West is unrepentant , focused on new ways to find dead subjects for his experiments. Of course, eventually his zombie experiments turn on him.

Practical Magic: After Sally Owens' boyfriend Jimmy turns out to be abusive, she drugs him and accidentally kills him. Fearing prison, Sally and her sister Gillian cast a spell to revive him, but Jimmy's immediate reaction isn't exactly gratitude. He tries to kill Gillian, forcing Sally to murder him once again.

Pet Sematary: Any dead creature buried in the ancient Micmac burial ground comes back to life, just not quite the way you put it in. After losing his young son Gage, Louis buries his son in the graveyard. Sure enough, Gage comes back — and promptly murders his mother.

Lexx: You would think that, given the prophecy that the last of the Brunnen-G would kill His Divine Shadow, the last thing His Divine Shadow would do is resurrect a Brunnen-G corpse. But he did exactly that to Kai, making him one of the living dead as a Divine Assassin. It takes over 2000 years, but eventually Kai does get around to killing him.

Supernatural "Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things:" College students and necromancy are always a recipe for trouble. When a broken-hearted boy tries to bring his dead crush back, she's of course got to go zombie and start chomping down on her loved ones.

God Emperor of Dune by Frank Herbert: For thousands of years, Leto Atreides has ruled over humanity, and always has a ghola — a copy — of his father's faithful friend Duncan Idaho to serve him. But the Duncan ghola's almost inevitably rebel against Leto and try to kill him, forcing Leto to kill all but 19 gholas. Still, Leto keeps bringing in a fresh Duncan ghola after each attempt on his life.

They Bring Death With Them

Pushing Daisies: When pie maker Ned touches dead bodies, they become reanimated, without regard for mutilation or decay. But if he fails to deanimate them after more than a minute, a random person in close proximity dies, taking their place. And for Ned, bringing the dead back to life is further complicated by not being able to touch them, lest they fall dead once again.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer "After Life:" Actually, bringing a body-stealing demon into the world of the living was probably the least of the disastrous consequences of resurrecting the Slayer. Still, when a demon gets loose in Sunnydale, the Scoobies have to kill it before it kills Buffy.

Carnivale: Ben Hawkins has the power to bring people back from the dead, but it comes with a price: one person of Hawkins' choosing must die in exchange for the life. And, try though he might, he can't choose himself.

Torchwood "Dead Man Walking:" Another fun consequence of Owen's walking death is that Death himself comes along for the ride. He's looking for 13 souls to consume so he can remain in the world of the living and slake his thirst for destruction.

It Will Come at Great Personal Cost

The Dresden Files: The sorcerer Hrothbert of Bainbridge committed a crime against his order by bringing his beloved Winifred back from the dead, prompting the High Council to hand down a severe and lasting punishment: they imprison his spirit inside his skull for all eternity. Hrothbert, now "Bob," has been around over a thousand years, but he can't interact with the physical world.

Torchwood "They Keep Killing Suzie:" The other Resurrection Gauntlet actually does bring the dead back to full-fledged life. But naturally there's still a catch: the resurrected person draws life energy from the living wearer, and permanent resurrection means the death of the living wearer.

Full Metal Alchemist: After their mother dies, Edward and Alphonse try to revive her through alchemy. Not only do they fail to bring her back from the dead, they lose physical pieces of themselves in the process, with Edward losing his left leg and Alphonse losing his entire body.

Supernatural: The Winchesters thrive on death and resurrection. When Sam is shot and killed, Dean trades his soul for Sam's life, with the bartering demon collecting in just a year. Sure enough, after a year, Dean dies and head off to Hell.

It Will Attract Unwanted Attention

The Outer Limits "Josh:" When reclusive Josh Butler resurrects a young girl through a strange electromagnetic pulse, it attracts the attention of a tabloid TV reporter looking for a scoop. Unfortunately, it also attracts the attention of the US Air Force, who promptly seize Josh and start performing medical tests.

The 4400: Shawn Farrell manages to bring a bird back from the dead, just one example of his amazing healing abilities. But not everyone is thrilled about his strange new powers, and they bring him to the attention of Jordan Collier, which is a bit of a double-edged sword.

It's Only Temporary

AI: Artificial Intelligence: The evolved mechas who find David frozen beneath the water are able to give the robotic boy his greatest wish: time with his long-dead adoptive mother Monica. The resurrection only lasts a day and can never be repeated. David's okay with the arrangement, since that one day is perfect, but it's a clear audience tearjerker.

They Were Actually Okay With Being Dead

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Willow assumed that Buffy's death by interdimensional portal had sent the Slayer to a hell dimension, and conjured up some ill-advised magic to bring her back. Unfortunately, Willow never considered that Buffy might actually be in Heaven, leaving her in a major season-long depression as she adjusts to inferior life back on Earth.

Supernatural: Okay, so Dean didn't exactly enjoy his stay in Hell, but he's dealing with some very Buffy-like issues on his return to Earth. He clearly remembers his agonizing time in Hell and got a real taste for torture. And God might have pulled him out of Hell, but his plans for Dean on Earth involve more havoc and torture.

Green Lantern: Maura Rayner is infected with a sentient virus sent by Sinestro and her son Kyle failed to get back in time to save her. He uses his powers to revive her, but she won't have any of it. She senses that, once dead, there's something wrong with being alive and begs him to let her be dead once again.

You Never Really Liked Them in the First Place

The Venture Bros.: Dean and Hank Venture are a tad on the death-prone side, so their father always keeps a few clone slugs around to imprint with their memories. But once they're alive again, he generally treats them as nuisances — or ignores them entirely. But he does find it handy to have a spare organ donor (or two) around.

Red Dwarf: Nearly the entire complement of the Red Dwarf is killed off in the first episode, only to be resurrected in the eighth season thanks to a little nanobot magic. Lister is no longer the only human in the universe, but he and his cohorts immediately run afoul of the newly reconstructed crew.

It Makes for Unnecessary Sequels

And Another Thing... by Eoin Colfer: We said goodbye to several major characters from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series (as well as the entire planet Earth) at the end of Mostly Harmless. Presumably Eoin Colfer's sequel will see Arthur Dent, Ford Prefect, and Trillian ride again, and Arthur's none too pleased about it.

Whedon told Complex magazine's Tim Leong:

We're not [producing web-only content this year]. Just because they're not really looking to spend extra money on the show. The network has dropped their licensing dramatically, it's the studio who has really picked up the slack to make this happen. Ironically, we actually have what would be fabulous web content, which is the whole 2019 storyline from "Epitaph One." Whereas last year, it was like "I don't think we have anything for the Web." When they added 10 minutes to every episode, they gave it up. This year I'm like, "We have some great ideas for the Internet!" and they're like, "Yeah…no"... but what we are doing is pursuing the 2019 storyline in the show sporadically. Not so much that it takes over, but enough that it informs where we're going. I have some delightful surprises in store, and I got to shoot some of it myself for the first episode, which was delightful, because why should [producer/director David] Solomon have all the fun?

In the same interview, Whedon also confirmed a "Season Nine" Buffy comic to follow the current "Season Eight" series, promising something shorter and "very different" from the current run.

Exclusive: Joss Whedon Talks Exclusive: Joss Whedon Talks "Dollhouse" & Eliza Dushku [Complex]

When Vampire Bill and Angel came out together I nearly bit my hand off I was so surprised. But what's with the knowing look David Boreanaz? You are Angel, and you will always be Angel. Maybe I'm reading too much into it, but I'd love to see what you guys come up with as a caption for this photograph. What would these two have to say to one another?

Another great little moment from the Emmy's was Michael Emerson winning for Lost, and then going up on stage and creeping us all the hell out. He really is Ben, isn't he? I knew it.

Kristin Chenoweth won for the cruelly canceled series Pushing Daisies, but we already talked about that still her acceptance speech was terrific.

And finally fellow nerd and "I'm A PC" John Hodgman's narrations throughout the evening almost made up for the fact that Battlestar Galactica was completely forgotten in every drama category besides directing, for Daybreak 2, which they didn't win. Still Hodgman's introductory riffs was the icing on the cake....

"If Michael Emerson weren't on television right now, he would be in New York City, having a fancy cocktail with me. That is, until S. Epatha Merkerson walked into the room, then he'd blow me off. That's a true story." -On Michael Emerson's victory in the Best Supporting Actor, Drama category

Read more Hodgemanisms over at NY Magazine.

Thanks to S.J. Edwards, Elizabeth Bear, DJ Chaotica, Larry-Bob Roberts, Zack Stentz, Daphne Gottlieb, Paul McEnery, James McGirk, Jessy Randall, Kevin Schmidt, Morgan Johnson, Susie Kay, Kat Page and David Fraser for the suggestions!

The Mayor In City Of Ember
He's the textbook example of a corrupt mayor who's only interested in saving his own skin. He knows the underground city of Ember is on its way out, and soon it'll be uninhabitable due to power failures and dwindling supplies. But instead of trying to cope with the problem, the mayor tries to hoard as much stuff for himself as possible, in a secret room — and puts together meaningless commissions to study the problem. Here he is in this video, eating sardines in the grossest possible manner.

Lando Calrissian in Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back
Okay, so Lando is the kind of scoundrel we love to watch. And he's a perfect counterpart for Han Solo. But would you really want him in charge of your city? His Cloud City of Bespin seems like a pretty corrupt, messed-up place. And then he goes inviting Darth Vader and his crew there, which is not good city planning at all. And then after Vader has demolished half the city in his battle with Luke Skywalker, Lando takes off and leaves his city behind. Call that leadership?

Aunty Entity in Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome
She does keep the city of Bartertown humming along — except when she gets stuck into an idiotic power struggle with Master/Blaster, and everything grinds to a halt. Plus she rules with an iron fist, and forces people to fight to the death in a deadly arena. That's not the kind of leadership our post-apocalyptic cities need!

Mayor in RoboCop 2
He makes deals with drug dealers and criminals. And then he mismanages the city's finances and winds up handing the entire city over to the evil OCP. This clip pretty much says it all. And when he's in a tight corner, he just loses his shit.

Mayor Wilkins, in Buffy The Vampire Slayer, season 3
Your average terrible mayor may let the city fall apart, or make deals with drug lords, or bulldoze your house for no reason. But a really awful mayor, like Wilkins, makes cozy arrangements with vampires and tries to kill off the town's only protector. And then tries to turn into a demon so he can eat the high-school graduating class. Now that's bad leadership.

Vilos Cohaagen, in Total Recall.
He's an evil administrator of the Mars settlement, keeping the mutants down and ruling with an iron grip. He uses mind-control and brainwashing to keep his minions in line. And worst of all, he won't give the people air. WTF, Cohaagen?

Mayor Bentham Rudgutter, in Perdido Street Station by China Miéville.
He's always described as sitting "regally on his throne," or sitting "behind his desk with an air of utter command." He rules over New Crobuson, with its corruption and oppression — and he's not averse to making deals with the city's crime syndicates as well as its demons. He systematically rounds up dissidents and has them tortured, and he's not above imposing martial law if the situation gets out of hand.

Father in Equilibrium
Father rules over the city-state of Libria and outlaws all human emotion, even the love of a small puppy. To this end, he keeps the people doped up on a drug called Prozium, and keeps everyone under constant surveillance. (Similar to other figureheads like Big Brother in 1984, or Mustapha Mond in Brave New World — except that Father just rules over one city.) The only good thing "Father" has going for him is his kick-ass gun-centric martial art, gun-kata. Woo hoo!

Judge Cal, In Judge Dredd
This character, closely based on the Roman emperor Caligula, seized power after he had the Chief Judge of Mega-City One assassinated. In Mega-City One, the Chief Judge has absolute authority — an arrangement that's caused some problems on several occasions. So Judge Cal goes completely nuts, making it a crime to criticize him and appointing a goldfish as his deputy. He even shoots Judge Dredd! Dude!

Mayor Prentiss in The Knife Of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness.
Prentisstown is not a nice place to begin with — there are no women, and the males can all hear each other's thoughts all the time, whether they want to or not. But Mayor Prentiss makes matters worse, by figuring out a way to control men's minds. He declares himself President and invades the neighboring settlement of Haven, where there are some women. And that's just the beginning of his reign of terror. Runner up: The mayors in Truancy by Isamu Fukui.

Jennifer Check (Jennifer's Body)
Nature of Her Hunger: Demonic Possession — the result of a "virgin" sacrifice gone wrong.
Preferred Food Group: Boys, although she might make an exception for Amanda Seyfried.

Cal Thompson's ex-girlfriends (Peeps by Scott Westerfeld)
Nature of Their Hunger: Parasitic Infection, passed along through sexual activity.
Preferred Food Group: Whatever crosses their paths.

Lyekka (Lexx)
Nature of Her Hunger: Innate. She may look humanoid, but she's really a carnivorous plant.
Preferred Food Group: Pretty much anything and everything (including whole crews and countries at once), though she keeps her gums off the Lexx crew, out of affection for Stan.

The (Mostly Female) Carnivorous Dinosaurs of Jurassic Park (Jurassic Park)
Nature of Their Hunger: Innate. If you're going to keep Raptors and Tyrannosauri around, you have to expect a few casualties.
Preferred Food Group: Meat in general.

Heidi Barrie and Rhonda Kelley (Buffy the Vampire Slayer "The Pack")
Nature of Their Hunger: Hyena Possession, though they weren't very nice to begin with.
Preferred Food Group: High school principals.

Jodi Melville (Smallville, "Craving")
Nature of Her Hunger: Meteor-rock radiation, combined with an intense desire to be thin.
Preferred Food Group: Anything with fat on it.

Bilquis, The Queen of Sheba (American Gods by Neil Gaiman)
Nature of Her Hunger: Sacrificial. She devours men during the sex act to maintain her fertility goddess power.
Preferred Food Group: Men, though her preferred orifice for intake is not her mouth.

Zenelle (Madman)
Nature of Her Hunger: Mantis-like. Females of her species devour their mates.
Preferred Food Group: Men she's bedded, with the exception of one of the Mutant Street Beatniks, with whom she's fallen in love.

The Women of Eureka (Eureka, "Maneater")
Nature of Their Hunger: Chemical. An ancient spore turns the dial up on Carter and Dr. Stone's pheromones, and if what happened to the wolf whose lady friend got a whiff of his pheromones is any indication, the women of Eureka literally want to eat them up.
Preferred Food Group: Carter and Stone, though they never actually manage to sink their teeth into them.

Paula Gray, Doris Kearns and the Other Women of Dudley, Arkansas (The X-Files "Our Town")
Nature of Their Hunger: Cannibalism in an attempt to gain immortality.
Preferred Food Group: Anyone not in the cannibalism club. But they don't screen for diseases, and a good bit of the town ends up with Creutzfeldt-Jacob disease.

Frau Totenkinder (Fables)
Nature of Her Hunger: Sacrificial. She eats children to increase her magical power.
Preferred Food Group: Children, including her own infants.

Jillian Boone (Fringe, "Midnight")
Nature of Her Hunger: Bacterial. She's been infected with a sort of vampiric syphilis as part of an elaborate blackmail ploy.
Preferred Food Group: Spinal Fluid

The Women of Moodley (Doghouse)
Nature of Their Hunger: Infection by an Airborne Toxin.
Preferred Food Group: Men.

Giganta (DC Comics)
Nature of Her Hunger: Murderous. When you're giant, it's a handy way to dispose of people.
Preferred Food Group: Ryan Choi, The Atom, though just she ends up puking him up later.

Maryann Forrester (True Blood)
Nature of Her Hunger: Epicurean. She happens to know the perfect recipe for human (and shifter) hearts (and makes Tara an unwitting accomplice to her cannibalism), though she also needs a humanoid sacrifice for her god.
Preferred Food Group: She has a particular affinity for supernatural beings, though nothing undead.

Janet Weiss and Columbia (The Rocky Horror Picture Show)
Nature of Their Hunger: Unwitting. When you're invited to a dinner party, you generally eat what's placed in front of you.
Preferred Food Group: Meat Loaf — as in the person, not the stuff that's baked with tomato sauce.

Lizzie (My Favorite Martian)
Nature of Her Hunger: Monstrous. Thanks to a gumball that transforms humanoids into other creatures, Lizzie (who is normally shaped like Darryl Hannah) turns into a carnivorous alien beast.
Preferred Food Group: Bad guys.

Giggerota the Wicked (Lexx)
Nature of Her Hunger: Epicurean — in her words, she "likes to eat."
Preferred Food Group: Pretty much anything, although she finds brains too salty.

Audrey II (Little Shop of Horrors)
Nature of Her Hunger: Innate. She's a mean, green mother from outer space.
Preferred Food Group: Anything human.

Helen Sherman (Torchwood, "Countrycide")
Nature of Her Hunger: Epicurean. She and the other villagers happen to enjoy human flesh.
Preferred Food Group: Travelers.

Miss French (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, "Teacher's Pet")
Nature of Her Hunger: Mantis-Like. Actually, she is a giant praying mantis.
Preferred Food Group: Male virgins, no matter how much they boast about their supposed "experience."

Every Female Zombie Ever
Nature of Their Hunger: Innate. Fish gotta swim, zombies gotta chomp.
Preferred Food Group: Any living human, but there's sometimes a special emphasis on brains.

Now maybe you're knowingly dating a robot, or perhaps you've had one constructed for that very purpose. But if you think your guy or gal might be an artificial intelligence, but you're not sure, look for these symptoms:

You've Only Spoken to Them Online

xkcd: It's always risky dating someone online. You don't know if that cute girl you've been chatting with is really an octogenarian with great taste in movies — or a particularly sophisticated spambot. Fortunately, this savvy Internet user knows a test for artificial intelligence far more efficient that the Turing Test or the Voight-Kampff.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer "I Robot...You Jane:" We all learn a valuable lesson about chatting with strange men when sweet, awkward Willow starts an online romance with Malcolm. She thinks she's found the man of her dreams — or at least someone to help her forget Xander for a while. Tragically, "Malcolm" is actually "Moloch," an ancient demon trapped in the school's computer system whose only means of physical interaction is through a robot body.

There Are Multiple Copies

Battlestar Galactica: Glowing spines would have been a handy way to tell the Cylons from the humans, but barring that, there are a few other ways to tell if the person you're sexing up is a Cylon. Baltar and Tyrol both date Cylon women with a penchant for sabotage, but Helo gets the most definitive clue to his lady friend's true nature, when he spots her exact duplicate hanging around Caprica with a Number Six.

Star Trek "Requiem for Methuselah:" Rayna Kapec seems like the perfect woman: intelligent, beautiful, and a great pool players. It's no wonder that Captain Kirk, who falls in lust every other week, pursues her. But, alas it's not meant to be. Kirk and Spock stumble into a chamber belonging to Rayna's guardian Flint, containing several earlier gynoid versions of the lovely Rayna. The emotional impact of learning that she's a robot and being forced to choose between Kirk and Flint prove too much for Rayna's circuits to handle, prompting an irrevocable meltdown.

The Twilight Zone "In His Image:" Jessica Connelly never actually learns that Alan Talbot, the man she fell in love with, is a robot. His creator and physical doppleganger, Walter Ryder, just quietly takes his place after Alan malfunctions and starts developing homicidal impulses.

They're Three Laws Compliant

Foundation: We'd all like our significant others to respect human life and to protect us when we're in danger. But Dors Venabili, Hari Seldon's bodyguard and eventual wife, is actually programed to do just that. Seldon does suspect that she's a robot, but by then he has already fallen for her.

Their Affection Can Kill

Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me: British Intelligence never bothered to tell Austin Powers that his partner and new bride Vanessa Kensington is, in fact, a fembot planted by Dr. Evil. Austin learns soon enough when Vanessa points a pair of machine guns from her breasts, though she notes he would have figured it out sooner if he'd tried a little foreplay.

Kim Possible: So the Drama: When crime-fighting teenager Kim Possible needs a date to her junior prom, new student Eric appears just in the nick of time to be Kim's first steady boyfriend. She's understandably devastated when her nemesis Dr. Drakken kidnaps her new beau, and rushes to save him. But when Kim gives the newly liberated Eric a relieved hug, he electrocutes her, revealing himself to be one of Drakken's Synthodrones.

They Dance Like No Human Dances

"Der Sandmann" by ETA Hoffmann: Summer Glau's ballerina background may have been an excuse to place the Terminator Cameron in toe shoes, but gynoids have a long history of dancing. Olimpia, for example, is quiet adept at dance as well as singing and playing the harpsichord. Many find her cold and stiff movements a bit off-putting, but Nathanael, a young student already engaged to another woman, develops a passionate obsession with her. When he learns that Olimpia was an automaton all along, he's driven mad by the revelation, leaping to his death.

Metropolis: When the Joh Fredersen and Rotwang conspire to place a robot made to resemble the popular worker leader Maria upon the working caste, they hold a dance performance to see if the people of Metropolis see her as human. It works, and the men of Metropolis are immediately captivated. It's Fredersen's son Freder, who is in love with the real Maria, who eventually recognizes that she's not the girl he fell for, and must be a copy.

They've Returned from the Dead

Machine Teen: Carly Whitmere knows that her boyfriend, Adam Aaronson, is frequently ill, but never would she guess that his bouts of illness are the result of glitches in his robotic systems. It's actually not Carly, but Adam's best friend JT who first discovers his robotic nature, and later helps repair Adam after he is seemingly shot to death.

Star Trek "What Are Little Girls Made Of?:" Starfleet had lost contact with Nurse Christine Chapel's fiance Dr. Roger Korby for several years, so she was relieved to discover him apparently alive and well on Exo III. But it turns out the Korby she encounters is not quite the man she remembers, but an android copy that the dying Korby imbued with his appearance and memories, one who firmly believes in robot supremacy.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer "Ted:" When Joyce Summers starts dating Ted Buchanan, he seems to good to be true. He's charming, a fantastic cook, and happy to spend an afternoon playing miniature golf. Unfortunately, Ted also happens to be the robotic equivalent of Bluebeard, wooing women only to later hold them captive and watch them die. Although Buffy takes an instant dislike to this interloper, and accidentally "kills" him after Ted slaps her, Joyce only catches on to Ted's evil nature when Ted returns from the dead, all glitchy and malfunctioning.

The other day, I was watching Star Trek: The Next Generation reruns — and it turned out to be an episode all about Reg Barclay, the hypochondriac creep who likes to use Beverly Crusher as his holographic blow-up doll. He stars in like twenty episodes of the final season. And then I picked up the latest Buffy comic, and it was all about Andrew, the wet wiccan who inexplicably became one of the show's main characters in its last season. So, seriously: Why do annoying dweebs take over dying shows?

Usually, the arrival of the Andrew/Barclay character is a sign that the writers have run out of stories to tell about the existing cast. Hence the Reg Barclay effect, science fiction's version of the "Cousin Oliver" effect. (Actually, I realized that Reg first starred in an episode back in season three. But he definitely became more prominent in the last two seasons.) And often, this character has a few other notable qualities:

1) He/she is clearly a stand-in for the writers, being nerdy and full of exaggerated insecurity and self-mockery.
2) He/she contains qualities that existing characters already had, but they're pushed up to 11. Like, say, Andrew is like Xander on reverse-steroids, making him even weaker.
3) He/she is often put on some kind of accelerated character arc from clueless to loveable, or from good to evil, because all the other characters have already taken that journey and we need to see someone new take it.

Update: Thanks to all who commented. I had noticed that Barclay's first episode of TNG was in season three, but had been certain that he'd cropped up a lot more in seasons six and seven. But it turns out the Barclay pain was pretty evenly spread throughout seasons three, four, five, six and seven, with a slight spike in season six. He's referenced, but does not appear, in the Worf cowboy episode. So it's more accurate to say he took over Voyager, where he appears in a lot of the later episodes.

Here's our Hall Of Pain, showcasing the Reggiest Reg Barclays of SF television. Feel free to suggest your own additions, or argue with these choices:

The really annoying thing about both Andrew and Reg Barclay, of course, is that they went on to represent their respective shows on the inevitable spin-offs. While the actual cast members of TNG and Buffy were too busy trying to escape from being typecast, we got to revisit both Andrew and Reg on many, many occasions. Whenever Angel needed someone to pop up and be a mouthpiece of Buffy's new Slayer Army, Andrew fit the bill. And the final seasons of Star Trek: Voyager were almost as covered with Barclay's sweaty handprints as the final season of TNG was.

This is a plea to showrunners and TV producers everywhere — please don't Scrappy-Doo your final season. It's not worth it! If you think you're about to be canceled, don't project your anguish and insecurity onto the screen by giving us a character who has ever reason to be insecure. Don't pass your pain onto us, the viewers. And if you've run out of ideas for storylines about your actual main cast, turn them all into cyber-ninja-marmosets. We won't mind. Just please — don't inflict the Reg Barclay syndrome on us.

Note: As with everything in life, this post was greatly enriched by surfing TVTropes.org.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer (Riff Regan vs. Alyson Hannigan)

What they changed: Joss Whedon financed the original pilot himself, formatting it as a half-hour episode. It is, for the most part, a shortened version of "Welcome to the Hellmouth," but with different casting. The role of the Sunnydale library was played by Torrance High School's library — a much larger and airier room than the cramped Hellmouth library we've come to know and love, with a handy second floor for showing off those Buffy backflips. Instead of Ken "Hyena Chow" Lerner as Principal Flutie, we get a much more straightlaced interpretation from character actor Stephen Tobolowsky. But perhaps the biggest difference is in the role of Willow. Instead of Alyson Hannigan, the geeky witch was originally played by Riff Regan.

How might the series have been different? Flutie probably would have still ended up in the stomachs of his students, but the Scooby Gang might have never been the same. Regan's Willow was a sweet doormat, but she didn't have quite the neurotic, eager-to-please quality Hannigan brought to the role. Incidentally, it wasn't the first time Hannigan replaced an actress after the filming of a show's initial pilot. In 1989, she took over the role of Jessie Harper in the fantasy sitcom Free Spirit.

Unaired Pilot with Stephen Tobolowsky and Riff Regan:

Official Pilot — "Welcome to the Hellmouth:"

Dollhouse (Joss Whedon vs. Fox)

What they changed: The premise and the characters are the same, but the stories unfold in a rather different way. We're initially introduced to Echo through a trio of very different engagements: one philanthropic, one as a revenge date, and one where she talks down gangsters in Espagnol. Boyd is already Echo's handler, and Topher has already caught onto Echo's bison-like grouping with Victor and Sierra. Agent Paul Ballard also comes face-to-face with Echo in the original pilot...when Topher programs Echo to kill him.

How might the series have been different? The original pilot played more as the start of a noir series than as a proof-of-concept for an engagement-of-the-week serial (which is what the official pilot "Ghost" suggests). We probably would have leaped to Dollhouse's underlying plot more quickly, and spent more of the season focusing on Echo's emerging awareness. Plus, it seems the Dollhouse was originally going to be more hands on in addressing Ballard's investigation. We see some of that noir (and slightly more classically Whedonesque dialogue) in the original pilot clip below:

Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles (Bad-Ass Sarah vs. Vulnerable Sarah

What they changed: The most readily obvious difference between the unaired pilot and what aired on Fox is that Tim Guinee, who played Tomin in Stargate SG-1, was originally cast as Sarah's jilted fiance Charley, but was replaced in the official pilot by Dean Winters. But more significant is a key change in the final scene. In official pilot, when Sarah Connor delivers her final voiceover, we see her caress her son's face before walking into her home. In the original pilot, we instead see her pulling a gun out of its hiding place while Cameron and John sit in the same room preparing their weapons, showing that Sarah's focus is on the coming war.

How might the series have been different? It's hard to say to what extent this change represents a shift in tone across the series, but we worried that it signaled a "wimpifying" of Sarah Connor, showing her vulnerability where it could have shown her strength and determination. You can scene the unaired scenes and their official pilot counterparts below:

Life on Mars (US) (Sunny LA vs. Gritty NY)

What they changed: Pretty much whatever they could. The original pilot for the US adaptation of Life on Mars was thoroughly panned, and producers quickly moved the action from Los Angeles to New York (allowing for that Twin Towers shot), and recast several roles. Star Trek vet Colm Meaney was replaced by Harvey Keitel in the role of Gene Hunt and Gretchen Mol took over Rachelle Lefevre's role as Annie Norris (Lefevre might have experienced an unfortunate moment of deja vu when she was recently replaced in yet another role — as the vampire VIctoria in Eclipse). But beyond that, certain scenes from the original pilot were rewritten to more closely match the UK version, and made the scenes visually darker and more textured.

How might the series have been different? It simply wouldn't have been as good. The original US pilot genericized the UK version, washing it of all character. By ultimately sticking closer to the source material, the US version of Life on Mars was able to echo its tone while creating a new mythology to explain Sam Tyler's predicament.

Scene from the Unaired Pilot:

Scene from the Official Pilot:

Star Trek (Christopher Pike vs. James T. Kirk)

What they changed: The original pilot "The Cage" was a completely episode from the official Star Trek pilot "Where No Man Has Gone Before," with an almost completely different Enterprise crew. In lieu of William Shatner's syncopated Captain Kirk, Jeffrey Hunter was set to helm the ship as Captain Christopher Pike, and Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry's future wife, Majel Barrett, played his intellectual and rational second-in-command, known only as "Number One." Spock would be the sole crew member to make the transition from first pilot to official pilot, but even he would undergo some minor changes. The original pilot's Spock was known to smile and use human colloquialisms, while the final Spock inherited Number One's sense of cold, hard logic.

How might the series have been different? The basics of the Enterprise and the Federation would have remained largely the same (in fact, most of the footage from "The Cage" would be cannibalized for a later episode "The Menagerie"). But the dynamics of the crew would have been very different. Pike wasn't the emotive adventurer Kirk would be, and he wasn't cast in as nearly sharp relief against either Spock or Number One. Plus, the original pilot's entirely caucasian cast was hardly the rainbow coalition that made the final version of Star Trek such a progressive piece of television.

Original Pilot — "The Cage:"

Official Pilot — "Where No Man Has Gone Before:"

Doctor Who (The Doctor from the 49th Century vs. The Doctor from Another Time

What they changed: The original episode of the first Doctor Who serial "An Unearthly Child" has the feel of a filmed dress rehearsal, but there were a few changes made beyond tightening the performances and improving production values. The Doctor and Susan both undergo costume changes — Susan into a more casual, less futuristic look and the Doctor from a modern suit to an Edwardian one — and the Doctor is much less gruff than in the original pilot. Also, in the original pilot, the Doctor and Susan talk specifically about being from the 49th Century, rather than the being from "another time, another world."

How might the series have been different? Aside from making the First Doctor outright hostile to his new companions instead of largely indifferent to them, the original pilot is a bit less mysterious about the Doctor and Susan's origins. If it had gone to air, it might have set the stage for a Doctor who is less coy and more forthcoming.

Segment from the Original Version:

Segment from the Official Version: