People have been dreaming about loving giant women (or becoming giant women, for that matter) forever. But the Internet has fostered a really vibrant, creative community of people who've created artwork and lore. This fetish has a fancy name: macrophilia, according to this 1999 Salon article. There are actually two different types of macrophilia porn: There are women who've been hit with growth rays (or growth viruses) turning them into giants. And then there are men who've been hit with shrink rays or whatnot. The science-fiction origins of this fetish rest with movies like Attack OF The 50 Foot Woman and The Incredible Shrinking Man.

If you want to get the total awesomeness of giantess fetish, you have to go with artwork, which allows creators' imaginations to run wild. There are tons and tons of message boards and groups where people post their favorite art showing massive women and the doll-like men who love them. A lot.

And some of our favorite giantess art comes from Dream Tales, which kindly allowed us to feature a few images from their comics:

But adherents to this fetish also post tons and tons of homemade Photoshop collages, showing scantily dressed or naked women stomping across cities and trampling little men, including the one above, and these masterpieces:

There's even a giantess and shrunken men Flickr pool, where people post their own creations.

On the other hand, if you want actual professionally shot giantess porn, that exists as well. There are tons of pay porn sites that feature staged photos of women in their underwear, smashing model cities and stepping on toy soldiers. There's even HebrewGiantess.com, for those of you who just desperately needed "point of view" shots of a man looking up at a skyscraper-sized Jewish woman. Here are some of our favorite pay-site images:

But like many other niche fetishes, the love of giant women is (wait for it) big in Japan. Just check out this scene from a live-action video, featuring a man who's been shrunk to the size of a doll. The movie also includes scenes where the woman stimulates the helpless little man's tiny penis with a giant Q-tip. And the man climbs inside her vagina. But here's a nice scene where she licks his face and then he climbs onto her breast:

And then there's some amazing manga and hentai art from Japan, showing — among other things, a giant woman having sex with a giant robot.

Fans have also collected these amazing Kookai ads, featuring giant women and tiny men (via the defunct GTSFeet site):

So obviously, giantess porn, to some extent, is a fantasy about female power — women who grow to the size of a mountain are stand-ins for powerful women everywhere. But at the same time, you have to love the playfulness and sheer weirdness of the huge females crushing cities with the sheer force of their voluptuousness.

We're torn about Girl Comics; on the one hand, a series written, drawn, lettered, colored, edited and all production work (proofreading, design, etc.) by women seems very... gimmicky, for want of a better way of putting it, and not unlike a token move that "proves" that women can work for Marvel too. But on the other, whatever cynicism we have is quickly dispelled by the quality of creators involved in the three issue series (many making their Marvel debut): Kathryn Immonen, Ann Nocenti, Trina Robbins, Louise Simonson, G. Willow Wilson, Amanda Conner, Jill Thompson, Colleen Coover, Molly Crabapple and Carla Speed McNeil all contribute, and io9 favorite Devin Grayson makes a long overdue return to comics in the series as well. Editor Jeanine Schaefer talked to Publisher's Weekly's The Beat blog about the project:

Although some creators have gravitated towards their favorite female super hero, it's not specifically focused on our female characters, and I'm not trying to generate content that I think will appeal to more women... I think the characters and the stories will draw in just as many men in as women, and will get people thinking that good comics aren't about the gender of the writer or artist, it's about where what you like to read intersects with what they like to create.

The series debuts in March, to coincide with Women's History Month (and She-Hulk's 30th anniversary).

Exclusive: Marvel announces GIRL COMICS [The Beat]

Additional writing and reporting by Caitlin Petrakovitz.

Edward Reminds You To "Be Safe" In Bed


Get a shadowy Edward Silhouette wall decal to stand guard over your bed and remind you all that you shouldn't have sex until you're married and it kills you — or ride dirt bikes. It's $60, but think of it this way: it's an investment in your sex life. Contraceptives are expensive, but this wall decal will keep everyone out of your bedroom for years.

Share The Dream Together Sheets

Surround yourself with vampire love, hearts, and shame. Available at ebay.

Go Green With Twilight

Now you can be sparkly and Green. Team Jacob And Team Edward water bottles, sold at a fast food joint. Hypocrisy, thy name is Edward!

Smell Like Your Favorite New Moon Character

Vampire and Werewolf body lotions, soaps and oils. Poor Alice: her trademark scent is described as "spirited" while Edward is "intoxicating" and Bella is "irresistible." Anyone else wishing Jacob's smelled like wet dog?

Twilight Bed Crown

Live in your own moody death shroud, for a mere $14.00.

Twilight Checkbook Cover

This might be a really clever joke, since Twilight is one of the biggest cash cows in history — but we have a feeling there's no sardonic wit involved in this Twilight checkbook cover.

Bella's Womb

Well, it was bound to happen, someone was bound to make a felt version of Bella Swan's womb... wait WHAT. HER WOMB? SOMEONE FELTED HER WOMB? WITH THE MUTATED BLOOD-CRAVING ADULT BABY RENESMEE INSIDE? TELL US WHY. WHAT DO YOU DO WITH THIS??

Twilight Mosaic Table

Maybe Joseph Fiennes would want to decorate his back patio with this. Ha ha ha ha ha it's a FlashForward joke. But seriously, he probably would want this exquisitely crafted piece of furniture.

My Mommy's a "Bella" Onesie

If your mommy really is a "Bella", that means you are a demon spawn whose father had to rip through your mommy's stomach with his vampire teeth to release you from her womb. You also will grow abnormally fast, be a child forever, and have a totally consensual love affair with a werewolf 17 years your senior. So that's good.

Twilight Converse

Better not scuff these up, y'all. There is no greater art form than puffy paint-decorated Chucks.

Bella's St. Jude Bracelet

Bella's St. Jude bracelet from Hot Topic keeps the apocryphal apostle close to your heart, but we have no idea why - THIS IS NOT IN THE BOOK; THIS IS NOT CANON, PEOPLE.

Cross Stitch Abs

Who doesn't want to spend hours cross stitching abs on your sweat shit? Well now you can.

Bella's Wedding Ring

Yes you guys. You too can rush into a teen marriage prematurely, so that you can have sex without remorse. And have a demon grow in your uterus. And name her Renesmee. All because of this heavenly bauble.

Twilight Pillow
Apparently MS Paint is still the preferred mode of digital creativity in the wonderful world of Stephenie Meyer, so here is an artfully designed pillow featuring a lamb jumping off a cliff. IT'S A METAPHOR. For... Twilight girls with suicidal urges after their boyfriends break up with them. It's beautiful.

Golden Contacts

Fangs are so passé, everyone knows that eye color are the real indicator of a propensity for blood sucking and sex-abstaining.

Twi Shower

Nothing says "early morning heart attack" quite like a greeting from a giant, pissed off, floating vampire head in your bathroom. It's the Twilight shower curtain, and it's only $60.

Wolf Pack Packaging Tape

Now you can give your gifts a Wolf Pack tattoo when you wrap and send them! Not to mention the hours of entertainment you'll get out of "giving" some poor unsuspecting boy a tape tattoo ("I promise it won't hurt to take off!") . Available at the Twilight center for entertainment joy, Hot Topic.

Salt & Vampire Pringles

Now you don't need to continue stalking R-Patz to find out that vampires apparently taste exactly like vinegar and are in fact used as a substitute for it. Just try these limited edition Pringles!

Hey, if vamps can eat us, why not the other way around?

Cullen Crest bra

The jury's still out on whether or not this one is real, but if so, you had better be a well endowed girl who doesn't mind showing off that space where cleavage usually goes. If you're good with that, then show off this crest of a family you'll never belong to! Because they're fake! And not real! HEAR ME? IT'S A MOVIE, PEOPLE.

TwiCrotch: Edward Panties

I'm sure the vamp facing panties we introduced you to a few weeks ago are already high on your wish list, but we definitely wanted to remind you of the awesomeness of them. I mean, who doesn't need panties where the crotch faces INSIDE. Yeah, mull that one over, fans.

Some of the most sensational, embarrassing and frankly gross Twilight saying tees, buttons and bags.

Love at First Bite Cookbook

In Twilight, Esme and company invite Bella over for some Italiano, so now you too can extend a lil vampire hospitality to your favorite friends who will gaze at you in silence, shaking their heads with sadness that you trust Stephenie Meyer with your discerning palate, as you try to whip up some favorites from Love at First Bite including Bella's Lasagna, Harry's Famous Fish Fry, and of course mushroom ravioli as the main course. See Twilight lunchbox for further instructions.

Twilight board game
The Twiboard game (So I have a thing for prefacing random words with Twi. Sue me.) was first glimpsed with the release of the New Moon logo, and for that reson, I fear it my have been swept under the table. Not to worry, I'm here to remind you of all its cute family-crest play pieces, and the wonderfully poorly done Monopoly rip-off. Rush your order now, for hours of love and blood-sucking enjoyment. I mean, I'm just guessing.

Bella's Birthday Dress
For maximum effect, make sure your hair isn't done and you wear black cons - this is like the American Girl Doll dress up gone horribly wrong. Especially since this is the dress Bella gets smacked around in, for her protection. Available at Hot Topic not that we tried it on or anything, shut up!

Twilight Barbie replicas
Added to the category of slightly creepy yet totally keeping in tune with the rest of the great merch, Mattel commissioned replicas of Bella and Edward whose plastic skins are whiter than white (though Eddie doesn't seem to sparkle as much as we would have thought). They're not available yet, but come November 25, snatch one up for the Twilhards in your life, so they can creepily act out the books on their own!

The Vamp: The Sparkly Dildo
If nothing else on this slightly disturbing list can help you get as close to Edward as you'd like, please consider Tantus's sparkly The Vamp dildo in its cool pink color. Back when we showed you it was available, don't forget to throw it in the fridge before using it though, so you're sure to get that cold, lifeless feeling a real vamp's sparkly cock would be sure to have.

Eddie's Volvo

Are you a relatively affluent middle aged man or woman who loves both Twilight and midrange luxury vehicles? Then you should enter this contest. We don't think you will have that much competition.

Twi-Socks

So your ankles can be "beautiful."

Bumper Stickers

Two things about these bumper stickers and window decals. First, the Cullens are terrible drivers. And second, remember when moms used to be proud of their kids with those horrible "I have an honor students at such and such High School"? We miss those stickers.

Dell Twilight Skins

Yup, in additon to swathing your monetary woes (presumably from spending so much on Twilight junk) in your Twilove, you may now keep your poor Dell warm with Twilight skins!

Don't forget to rip that giant sticker off carefully when you grow up though.

Over at Hilobrow, Joshua Glenn writes:

What does this mean for men, you ask? John Broome, author of "It's a Woman's World," a science fiction story that appeared in the DC comic book Mystery in Space (#8), asked the same thing way back in July 1952. As the panels shown here demonstrate, Broome predicted that women would one day cruelly discriminate against men - force them to work in the home, while women ran businesses and fought wars.

But luckily, the men fight for their rights and come out back on top.

More awesomeness via Hilobrow

The hullabaloo is over an anonymous essay about the "feminization of science fiction" published on a conservative "men's issues" site called The Spearhead. The author writes, in part:

What has happened is that science fiction on television has for the most part become indistinguishable from most other television shows which are written for women filled with moronic relationship drama. Sure the moronic relationship drama is in space, but . . . its not science fiction anymore, and men are not interested in moronic relationship drama in space . . . As we know science fiction has inspired boys to pursue careers in science, engineering, and technology as men. With women killing science fiction on television, the current generation of boys won't have this opportunity to be inspired to work in these fields. There is still a great deal of written science fiction that is real science fiction so all is not lost. However, many boys who would have gone on to make scientific discoveries and invent new technologies will not do so since they will never be inspired by science fiction as boys.

The author singles out the new Battlestar Galactica as a prime example of feminized SF, and adds that this trend has led to the glut of paranormal romances filling science fiction aisles in bookstores.

Science fiction author John Scalzi had the right idea when he responded:

What? An insecure male nerd threatened by the idea that women exist for reasons other than the dispensing of sandwiches and topical applications of boobilies, mewling on the Internet about how girls are icky? That's unpossible!

Indeed there is nothing surprising about the fact that you can find hardcore sexist commentary on a site devoted to "men's rights." Give me a break. Unearthing this post and then pointing fingers at it is just as silly as when conservatives find a radical leftist site, link to an essay on it, and crow about how there are people who actually believe America should be destroyed. Congratulations: You found extremist ideas on the internet.

The thing about this guy writing on The Spearhead is that he's not the problem. He's not a science fiction editor or producer; he's just a guy writing his extreme opinions on a tiny blog. He has no ability to influence the course of science fiction publishing and broadcasting, and in fact that is precisely what he's complaining about in his commentary.

People are piling onto this guy in a giant hatefest not just because he's an easy target. He's also a safe target. And that's what worries me. Because sexism still exists in the world of science fiction, but it is just more politely masked than this guy's overt outlier opinions. Anthologies of "great" SF are still routinely published without a single woman's contribution included. Publishers often push women in a subtle way to focus on fantasy and paranormal writing. Even among so-called enlightened SF literati it is not uncommon to hear people say that women can't write hard SF.

The weird thing is that Spearhead guy is right in some ways. The movement to "feminize" SF has resulted in an attenuation of what science fiction means. The SyFy channel is planning to air a cooking show and tone down the spaceships. Fantasy publishing is exploding partly because it's one of the genres where women authors are valued by the publishing industry, and so women interested in speculative writing are fleeing to fantasy when they find the SF clubhouse doors locked. Where are the great new female hard SF writers and space opera directors and showrunners? We aren't hearing from them because the SF community doesn't believe that women truly love SF. And so people with power - unlike Spearhead guy - aren't publishing women or giving them development deals.

Women are being welcomed into science fiction, but it's though the back door. Let's not start patting ourselves on the back because we can recognize rank sexism when we see it written by an anonymous guy on a radical right wing opinion blog. We can celebrate how far we've come from our sexist past when women and men are equally represented in the pages of science fiction anthologies. And when the next big, blow-em-up spaceship movie is written and directed by a woman. Until then, we have a lot of work to do. Work that involves challenging people who actually have the power to alter the course of SF as a genre. Work that is a lot harder than ridiculing an anonymously published blog post.

If you somehow managed to exist within the American mediascape and miss the ads for Jennifer's Body, count yourself lucky. Nearly all of them featured Megan Fox (and her title-inspiring body) in a sexy pose, as if we were about to watch a teen sex comedy where boys slaver after the unapproachable cheerleader. Tease campaigns about the movie emphasized that there would be a sexy lesbian kiss between Fox and Amanda Seyfried, the film's nerdy, point-of-view character. In short, the ad campaigns were aimed at straight young men, who are the core audience for most movies starring Megan Fox.

But the problem is that Jennifer's Body is not an ejaculatory explosion movie like Transformers 2. It is a horror movie, which means its built-in audience is already predominantly female (stats show that horror movie-goers are often over 60 percent women). Megan Fox is also not the main character; and she's not the boy hero's plucky sidekick (there are no boy heroes in this movie). Instead, she's the toothy, gory, puke-soaked object of repulsion and disgust. In short, she is the monster.

And she's a very specific kind of monster, too. She embodies one of the scariest demons who haunts girls' dreams: The popular, pretty girl who pretends to be your friend while secretly trying to steal your boyfriend, your pride, and your life. Written and directed by women, Jennifer's Body is a film made in a women's genre about women's problems. It's a movie about why women want to stab Megan Fox in the tit with scissors.

Marketing Jennifer's Body like it was another version of The Hangover or American Pie, with sexy ladies and dick jokes, meant it was doomed to fail. Women saw posters that emphasized Megan Fox as slick sex object, and thought: I hate that chick - why would I want to see a movie about her? And men who saw the movie said: What the fuck? I thought this was going to be tits and lesbian kissing, and instead it's about dysfunctional teen girl relationships? Why do I want to see Amanda Seyfried talking about her feelings for 90 minutes?

Reviews of the film seem to bear this interpretation out. Women and Hollywood's Melissa Silverstein points to a quick survey that Screen Rant did of critical responses to the film:

There were many more reviews by men (77) than women (26). The majority of these were culled from the Rotten Tomatoes site . . . Here's the breakdown: Male movie reviewers: 39% liked it, 61% disliked it; Female movie reviewers: 54% liked it, 46% disliked it.

Director Karyn Kusama told MTV.com:

I don't know if selling the film as a straight horror film and selling it primarily to boys is really going to do any of us any favors, frankly.

And indeed it didn't. Marketing attracted primarily men to the movie (including male reviewers), and a majority disliked it. Fewer women saw it, but of those who did, a majority (including myself) liked it.

I think it's clear that misguided marketing was a huge factor in what destroyed Jennifer's Body. As I said, the movie isn't Criterion Collection material, but it's a damn good genre picture. It's better than most other horror movies out there, with an original premise and a smart, fresh take on a very old monster story. If the marketing droids at Fox had just been smart enough to realize that the movie was aimed at women - not unlike most horror movies - they might have had a cult hit on their hands.

To be fair, in these fine upstanding ladies' defense, no one was having sex with the TV show's version of Jack Nicholson, aka Darryl Van Horne (Paul Gross) just yet. But he walked around moaning and groaning, naked and getting people drunk off water that after an hour, I felt like I had the overall gist of a sexual encounter with the hot new man in town who stirs up sex, magic and crotch-raiding ants.

So let's beat this dead horse of a TV show shall we? Eastwick Starts off in the little "everyday sort of town" called Eastwick, see it's normal...

And by normal, they mean a picturesque fake-perfect movie town, via John Hughes and Gilmore Girls, that thinks staging the live burning of women accused of witch craft is totally adorable. Look she made the burning pile out of felt and pipe cleaners. Burn you unholy hand maiden of Satan burn...ha ha ha ha ha ha....sigh. Pretend persecution is fun.

But enough about crafts, let's get to the ladies. Here comes scandalous Roxanne (Rebecca Romijn). And right away my biggest issue with this show starts. The problem with Eastwick isn't its cuteness or puns, or even the magic — I adore all that shtick. I still own Practical Magic, parts of the Charmed series and wished The Craft actually happened in high school. Eastwick is very successful at being charming. But its downfall is when it flops around like three ladies "letting loose" in the town fountain, gasping for air, under the "we've seen this done to death and better" stereotypes. Each character is such a ridiculous caricature of a standard personality type, that you can actually SEE it on screen. For example...

Slut:


This is Roxy. Roxy is the town bicycle — see, here she is being slutty. Shame on you, Roxy. But not really — people are just mean and like to talk. But she is hitting it with Kyle XY, who is trying very open-shirty hard to be the sexy straight youngin. He's half there. Roxy can see the future in her dreams, and yet can't find her own path in life. I half expected Romijin to rip open her blouse, exposing a "See, that's irony" sign underneath, when she explained that she had dropped out of dancing school, art school, culinary school, crafts school, hippie school etc. In other words, their powers mimic their problems. The wit, it burns.

Which leads us to the other one, meet...

Meek Mouse Girl:

It's Joanna Frankel (Lindsay Price): she's shy because she's wearing a bun, glasses and conservative librarian clothes. She gets molested at work, and is in love with this totally normal photographer guy who isn't a model at all....

But Joanna is shy and nervous, and everytime she talks to Not Model Photographer she says something embarrassing, like how she named her vibrator after him. See, this is the show trying to be smarter than it really is: by inserting "real" conversations that women totally have. I can't tell you how many times my friends and I get together to gossip about naming our vibrators — mine's named FUCKING REALITY.

But enough about lady business, let's get back to mousy Jojo. Her power is eye contact, and imprinting people with her will. But she doesn't have confidence or much of a will — ah there it is again, sweet televisual irony. But seriously, she's really uptight and wears buns and glasses, in fact there is a whole terrible conversation with Daryll about her losing her bun, which in turn heals her and turns her into a tight dress wearing power lady. Wahoo.

Next Witch...

Over-Worked, Under-Appreciated


See the kids, the husband with the beers, and always with the carrying of the 11,000 children she birthed. Oh and she's a nurse. This is Kat Rougemont (Jaime Ray Newman) and she has the power of mother Earth, the healer who takes care of everyone, but no one is taking care of her. There's that itchy, irritating wit again.

Sadly, everyone else in the town of Eastwick suffers from this wide brush-stroke writing... see the nice mom witch has a husband who's a lazy drunk, see he's carrying around two beers — look, two of 'em! And he says things like "stupid tomatoes," and "What's gotten into you, woman?"

So naturally, these women are miserable. And they make a wish in a fountain for sex, confidence and a little lovin... which makes them all witches, Paul Gross the Demon appears, and causes these ants to run up this old lady's legs...

Gross.

Unfortunately in a show about three women, Paul Gross is really the highlight of the show. In walks demon Darryl looking really good — seriously good. I'm totally shamed that I found myself doing a cartoony wolf whistle when he started talking. But it, like this show, was a shallow moment of deep pleasure.

So Darryl comes in and fixes all the ladies' problems by hitting on them or making them feel pretty or confident or just asking if they want some sex. And excuse me Rebecca Romijn, but if someone who looked like Darryl was "I'll give you 50K to do this shitty job then we have sex," I'd blink and say, "Is here okay?" Times are hard, people — it's a recession. So yes I was all twitterpatted by Paul's demon — pardon the bad joke — that is, until Roxanne made the doooooooy that penis is HUGE face, and I was immediately zapped out of it. Here's that moment...

As time went on I realized that Darryl wasn't actually sexy at all, but just using the Chester Cheetah voice and what I was feeling was hunger and pity. It ain't easy being cheesy, guys....

Anyways Darryl shakes things, up the girls start wearing much more revealing clothing, and are wet a lot more, which is surely good for ratings. But it's not all fun and games, people — the two-dimensional husband doesn't like the way this is going for overworked, under-appreciated witch. She gets mad, and we see them start to use their powers only ever so slightly for evil.

She later zaps him with lighting, totes on accident, and he says that he's divorcing her and taking the kids because yesterday she was dancing in a fountain totally whilly nilly fancy free, and of course the courts will are so going to side with the unemployed alcoholic over the nice nurse lady who got wet that one time.

Then ant leg lady wakes up and gives the best almost death scene ever acted in a high school play ever.

I think we all know what she means by "the cone of power" AMIRITE Slutty?

But it's okay, because Darryl was there to help everyone. Under Appreciated is getting a lawyer, Mousy is getting confidence with her mind powers but maybe using it for bad — we don't know just yet — and Darryl even managed to save Slutty's daughter from getting date-raped which was oddly squeezed into this episode.

All in all, I was much more interested once they started using the magic, which was about eight minutes of the entire episode at best. There was not enough magic in this episode, by far, and the attempt to make everyone a mirror image of their soul induces a sort of gag reflex inside of me, but I'll keep watching because I'm still hopeful for a magical three-way and better future magic. And that Chester Cheetah voice.

io9: What's new about this horror film, why did it stand out to you?

Karyn Kusama: The humor comes from Diablo's vision of the world and I felt like the horror came out of the relationship. Which I thought was a really interesting idea, the idea that this toxic friendship could be the emotional foundation of the horror. A lot of times I think we watch horror movies that by default have a female character. But this movie - it's interesting to see that the so-called monster Jennifer is female, as is the heroine.

I really liked this relationship between the two girls, it's something many people experience. Was this always the foundation of the movie?

It was always supposed to be a relationship rooted in the past, rooted in childhood. And the toxic element of it developed between them as a sort of emotional codependence and role playing in which Jennifer always played the Alpha female in control and Needy was always willing to be her tagalong or sidekick and was subservient to her. I think there have been comedies and teen movies that explore that idea. But in this case that relationship is sort of realized into something pretty dark.

I really can't imagine anyone else playing that Alpha character - was Megan Fox always in mind?

She was an element to the movie very very early. Even before the producers came on.

She's pretty perfect for the role, how did you help her find her inner bitch for this character?

Well I'm sure all of us would love it if we could all find our inner bitchiness. She just relished the opportunity to have fun with that, she was very, very funny with that. But I really enjoyed working with her. She was very thoughtful, smart, very prepared. She brought a lot of humor to the role that I wouldn't have necessarily known she could do because that was something she hadn't done in Transformers.

There's been this new study out that says women watch more horror movies than men. Do you think that's accurate? What do you think about that?

I think actually women were probably always going to horror movies, we just weren't measuring it as religiously as we do now. I think it's a human condition to identify with being scared. There is something about the narrative of flight and survival that I think is very compelling for women. I find it very compelling. I don't watch all of the horror that's out there, because one, there's so much of it and two some of it is a little less emotionally engaging for me than others. I think there is something about watching women, well women and men, but often times young people fighting for their lives - it's a very compelling story. It's a way to deposit all of our anxieties about our own life. Particularly if those anxieties are more mundane but they feel like life and death. It's a way to articulate those anxieties in a safe place like a theater.

And this movie's focus on female relationships will probably bring out more female horror fans.

I feel like there have been plenty of horror movies where the main character is female. A lot of them that I really love. But this is one of those movies where the movie and the horror grows out of the female relationships. And I think that's pretty interesting.

And that relationship is pretty toxic. These two are friends but Jennifer, Megan, really goes after her friend. Can we talk about why you wanted this kind of a dynamic? Why is Jenny so angry with her best friend?

It's funny I was just talking about this with Megan the other day in another interview. And she had always approached this character as someone who was jealous of her best friend, Needy. Jealous of the attachments and the relationships that Needy has in her life. And that somehow there was some subconscious desire to take that away from her.

They dress very different as well. Small spoiler, at the formal Needy looks very 80s in a big pink dress with bad hair and make up while Jennifer has a lovely gown. Whose idea was this and why?

Diablo had always written that it was a really bad dress. By the time I was working with the costume designer I had shown her a lot of reference material, a lot of pretty terrible 80s prom dresses. The worse they got the better the look became. I always wanted her hair to be big and poofy and her makeup to be a little over-applied. I think our costume designer nailed it.

But why make them so different on the outside too?

I think the whole point with Needy was that she was an expression of some more 80s sensibility and that everyone else had been more attuned to the fashions of the times. Needy is a little more nostalgic in life, but also a little less tuned in to the relentless [fashion] magazine culture.

But Megan really was covered in blood half the time too. And the gore was pretty good.

There's a scene where she's literally scooping blood out of the carcass of one of our characters. I really wanted it to look as if she was at a fountain of youth and instead of drinking water, she was drinking blood. So I wanted it to look like she was slurping that blood and drinking it down. We could only get a couple of takes that were working because we had live rats in the scene at the same time which is a whole other absurd nightmare, especially rodents which are not highly trained animals. Meanwhile she's drinking this unholy combination of some kind of stand in for blood and corn syrup so she can ingest it. I felt like by the third take I was waiting for her to just puke into a pail. That scene was pretty painful for her because she was swallowing everything.

The side characters in this film really helped ground the movie in reality. Adam Brody was great and seriously disturbing in an off-putting way.

The great thing about Adam Brody he manages to keep things very charming and personable so it takes a while to really see the depth of his ambition and psychosis. There's a coldness to his single mindedness once he starts to reveal what his plan is and what he's done to Jennifer. So in an interesting way Jennifer gets to be the monster and he gets to be the villain.

When he looked towards the camera at the character Needy, it gave me chills.

It's funny because when we screened it and a lot of those looks generated really big laughs. And I wonder if that's just because people were nervously anticipating what's to come.

I'd bet it's also because they aren't used to seeing him that way either.

Yeah it's true, you have to get used to that the comedy is tied up with his very very bad intentions.

Jennifer's Body will be out in theaters this Friday.

My theory that Bewitched was the Buffy the Vampire Slayer of its day started, I admit, as a half-assed joke, but the more I thought about it, the more it made sense. It's not just that Elizabeth Montgomery was the Sarah Michelle Gellar of her day - albeit with a nose wrinkle instead of a stake, and much less annoying - or that Bewitched made fantasy mainstream in the mid-60s much as Buffy did the same in the late-90s (albeit in a more underhanded, more comedic way), either. Let us compare and contrast:

Samantha Stephens, Meet Buffy Summers
So, both Sam and Buffy are both modern women who just happen to be the latest in a long line of supernatural beings who have to hide their true selves in order to fit in with everyone else. They're both the strongest, most capable people in the room at most times - although both look for guidance to authority figures in times of trouble (Giles is the modern Dr. Bombay!) - and have issues with occasionally over-bearing mothers and comedic foil main men in their lives, although Buffy had the common sense not to fall for, or marry, Xander.

Maybe more importantly, both Buffy and Samantha were torn between two worlds; the mundane reality of most people and the supernatural "truth" of their natures. But, in both cases, they don't really belong to either world, and just want to be themselves, and that's the main thrust of their respective series, no matter how disguised they may be with recycled I Love Lucy plots or prosthetic make-up monster of the weeks.

Magic As Metaphor
Of course, by the late '90s, television was much more able to address "social topics" without worrying about pissing off sponsors, viewers or censors, so Buffy's track record with using magic as metaphor for real life is potentially stronger and certainly more obvious than Bewitched, but that's not to say that the latter show didn't try it, nonetheless; the first season episode "The Witches Are Out" substituted bigotry against witches for racism, and the entire show has long been the subject of a rumor that the witch/human marriage was really about the perceived difficulties of interracial marriage at the time. If true, it's certainly up there with Joss Whedon's "horror as high school" metaphor...

Girl (Magical) Power
Lots has been written, talked and, yes, even blogged, about Buffy's (post-)feminist qualities, but Sam was there first; critic Susan Douglas argued in her book Where the Girls Are: Growing Up Female With the Mass Media that Samantha's "irrational" magic rendered the "rational" male-dominated society impotent, which was why she was constantly being told by Darren not to use them... although, despite her promises to try and behave, she couldn't quite help herself. As much as Buffy showed a more straight forward example of women taking control of their surroundings, Bewitched showed societal rules as ridiculous, and easily detourned and subverted by a more subtle form of female empowerment.

Don't get me wrong; I'm not arguing that Buffy in any way rips off, or was even directly influenced by, Bewitched. But, at the same time, it shares enough characteristics that, any time someone dismisses Bewitched as a lightweight comedy show that meant nothing in the grand scheme of things, I get overly defensive. Watch out there, buddy, I want to say - Well, maybe without the "buddy" part - Show some respect. After all, that's the first Vampire Slayer you're talking about.

According to an article in the Metro, the fashionistas feel that women need to be transformed into space warriors to deal with the challenging economic situation:

There were even a few Stormtrooper helmets on the runways for fall collections. Clearly, the intention was to send a focused, futuristic warrior to do battle with the economy.

"This isn't the naive kind of '60s futuristic stuff you might think of," said Susan Cernek, senior fashion editor of Glamour.com. "This is more robotic. It's tougher. It's an android crossed with a biker."

Francisco Costa, creative director for Calvin Klein's womenswear collection, prefers to call the vibe "modernist," but he says he sees the space-age connection. "The house gives a sense of strength from structure, and that is actually nature-driven, and space is definitely a part of nature."

For the fall collection, Costa used an asymmetrical crescent hemline to soften aggressive laser cuts, and he played with fashion's equivalent of puzzle pieces that had the effect of mimicking the plates of Earth.

Cernek noted a toggling between the vast galaxy and the core of this planet as inspiration in many collections. They're opposite in some ways, she says, but similar in others: "We're looking for the light at the end of the tunnel."

I like the idea of toggling between the core of the planet and the edge of the galaxy. Can I get that toggle switch installed now, please? (Preferably with heat shields and artificial gravity and stuff.) But the new space-ageyness of fashion isn't just to do with fears about the economy. Apparently, cutting edge new fabrics make more science-fiction-looking garments possible:

Italo Zucchelli, the menswear designer at Calvin Klein, says that much of the modernity of his fall collection came from a new stiff, repellent fabric that bonded foam with traditional textiles. It probably wasn't possible to do five years ago, and, even if it was, it wouldn't have been right for the times, he says.

Foam is the new fashion look of 2010. You heard it hear first: Foam!

Images from AP, Getty Images and The Number 4 Blog.

Here's the drama: A lot of people are upset, and rightly so, that the first African American Disney Princess will spend the majority of the film as a green frog. That being said, I was pleasantly surprised at the seemingly diverse animated cast on this deck of cards that was being handed out at Comic Con:

But any feelings of multicultural warm-fuzzies were pretty much shot to hell after I played the Princess-centered little computer game on the movie's website. Needless to say the premise left me a bit, stunned. The main character, Tiana, is sent on a mission to retrieve the rich white girl's tiara, so she can borrow it, but along the way she's asked to fetch some hot sauce for the gumbo before she has permission to get to the rich girl's bedroom. For a movie in which every move is being scrutinized by the media, why go there? It's, well, disappointing and almost too easy, so I will say no more. Tell me I'm being hyper sensitive but I was pretty shocked one of the first errands they send the black Princess on is to basically wait on a white lady. Shouldn't someone be checking this?

Trailer

Costume designer Wanda Piety and prop master Dragon Drohnet were two of the judges for Saturday nights Masquerade, and were kind enough to give us a post-mortem on the show and offer their insight into what makes for a winning costume or performance. This is just a taste of the nearly four dozen entries to cross the Comic Con stage, but includes some of our favorites as well as the judges':

In a nutshell, this movie is exactly what it's being labeled as, A Diablo Cody Horror film. One girl's hot, the other is adorably awkward and relatable, the side characters are semi-intersting, there's an adorable puberty-stricken boyfriend, we get emo jokes at hipsters' expenses (they don't know they're laughing at themselves) and of course the extra-glib talky talk that defines a Diablo Cody movie.

It's becoming apparent that cheeseball dialog gleaned from the slang of fake teenage tongues are to Diablo Cody what sunsets and sepia tones are to Michael Bay. You know you're going to get it, no matter what you do or how much you protest. So you're either on for the ride, or get the heck off. If you can listen to Megan Fox say:

"You're totally Jell-O, you're lime green Jell-O and you can't even admit it to yourself,"

to her best friend's jealous boyfriend without digging your pencil into the side of your leg just to feel a different type of pain, then you can continue on the Diablo horror path knowing (and possibly enjoying) what you're getting. At its heart, this movie will be a litmus test for pure Cody fans — those that can hack it through the slutty girl from High School, complaining that she couldn't go to Flag's the day after losing her back door virginity and having to sit on a bag of iced peas for a day. Megan is the girl who says such things, while her blonde, innocent buddy Needy Lesnicky, played by Amanda Seyfried, is the "straight man" victim of the horror plot.

The film begins with a over-the-top-slutty Megan Fox, as Jennifer Check, beckoning her bestie away from a night out with her boyfriend to the local shit-hole pub. The place is full of students, locals, and people Jennifer has fucked or at least thought about fucking. Oh yeah, they say fuck...a lot, because you know teenagers and their swear words. In comparison when Needy gets super scared she blurts out replacement curse words "cheese fries," honest to blog.

Anyway, at said crap watering hole, Jennifer decides that they are going to sleep with the totally hot band that just so happens to be playing their terrible little town. The band is fronted by a side neck-tattooed, eyeliner smudged intentionally stereotyped Nikolai Wolf, (Adam Brody). The Megan and Adam back-and-forth was actually the cutest part of the footage we saw — say what you will about Fox's acting talents, she's learned the art of comedic timing. "Your....band....is....(ceiling eyes)...super good." I'm not sure if it was intentional, but I laughed.

So Jennifer has her heart set on becoming the next groupie, and runs off to bring back some 9/11 red, white and blue tribute shots served up by the bartender, Ms. Cody herself (irony or somethin' har har). Adam Brody then launches into a five-minute-long song that sets the bar on fire and mesmerizes young Jennifer. While the song was, for all intents and purposes, "nice," I have no doubt that it will now be a colossal hit, racing up the itunes charts and Adam Brody's lip sync video will no doubt be played over and over and over again on the youtubes.

We slowly discover that the Adam Brody band wants to get its mitts on Jennifer's body because they think she's a virgin (and as we discover, if they kill a virgin their band will continue down its path towards fame). But the hitch in the road for the next Panic At The Disco, that we all discover after Jennifer so sweetly tells us that she'd like to sex up the local Indian student because she's always wanted to sleep with a sea cucumber, Jennifer ain't no virgin. Thus, murdering her in this ritual turns her into a boy-eating demon (none of which we saw in this screening). We're left to assume most of this, when Jennifer appears in Needy's home covered in blood and feasting on her Mother's old Boston Market chicken. This is when it gets good. Jennifer spews out black vomit from the chicken, screams like a banshee and throws her best friend sexually up against the wall.

Jennifer is truly at her best when she's bad. I have to say, once I got over the initial Cody shock, I really wanted to continue watching this film. I like Jennifer all messed up, with her smile coated in fresh blood. I want to see her realize her demonic goal, to seduce and kill all the bad boys in her town, but not before the girl-on-girl kissing scene that Cody promised. And not because it's pervy, but because it's a parody or silly homage to horror — so they know you know it's stupid to have girls kissing in a flick, they just want you to know they know, DIABLO!

Banter aside, it looks like good old fashioned fun that comes complete with a soundtrack that will go out of style in three to two months.

We got the chance to chat via email with actor Michael McMillain, and learn a lot more vampire-loathing character, Steve Newlin, who's really a complicated enigma, combining fanaticism with a sense of compassion. There's even a bit of a King Arthur sprinkled into the fold of this character's persona.

What do you think about your character Steve Newlin as a person? He appears to have it all put together, but there's got to be something looming underneath it all (as is the way with all things True Blood).

This is why Steve's a fascinating character to me. He is a living ideology. It's like trying to figure out who [George W.] Bush really was, in some ways. Like, did he really think he was a hero? Did he really think he was a great Christian? Steve repeatedly speaks in terms of black and white — this "with us or against us" terminology we were so accustomed to hearing over the past decade. Is it all just bullshit? It's almost archaic in this modern day and age. I talked to Alan Ball and the writers about where Steve is coming from, and we all agreed on the same thing: he is absolutely being true to himself. He believes everything he says. He's driven by what he was raised to believe in and his conviction that his father was murdered by agents of evil. In some way's he's like Bruce Wayne. He's setting out to ensure that what happened to his family won't happen to anyone else. And, I mean, he has a point. Look what happened to Jessica. That scene in the first season, when she was kidnapped and turned, was a nightmare. So I'm not sure how troubled he really is, beyond the fact he's troubled by the growing acceptance and tolerance of Vampires.

How did you prep for Steve? I see your hair changed from last season, who's decision was that (we love the new look by the way)?

I grew up in the Midwest and had a lot of exposure to big religion. I went to church every Sunday — my mother even sang in the choir – and most families I knew where practicing Christians. I came from a more moderate church, but even at one point I had a Sunday school teacher who preached that Halloween was Satanic. She was eventually asked to step-down, but my point is that my idyllic suburban upbringing had aspects that were extremely conservative and peripherally racist and somewhat violent. My sister went to high school where kids wore homemade T-Shirts that read "Fagbusters." This was in the 90's! My family saw people waving "Jesus hates fags" signs at the grocery store when I was back there a few weeks ago. On the 4th of July! Absolutely batshit… So on an immediate level, I related to this type of character.

Beyond that, I read the books. I wanted to be as faithful as possible to Charlaine Harris's original vision because he's just so scary in the novels. I also spent a lot of time watching documentaries about the religious right, sermons on YouTube, lots of TBN, Ted Haggard, etc. Just trying to immerse myself in the mindset of contemporary religion and also modern-day cults. If you think the Light of Day Camp is ridiculous, then I dare you to watch Jesus Camp. That movie kept me up at night. There's obviously some Bush inspiration there, I think mostly because of the daddy issues, rhetoric and both men being from Texas. The hair style design was a collaboration between Alan and our lead hair stylist, Kelly Kline. I had come in with all this research done, saw the new ‘do in the mirror and went, "Oh. That's who he is." It was like seeing Steve truly for the first time. And it just gets bigger as the season goes on.

Do you think, do you even know if the Pastor is as crazy as he seems to be, with all his innuendos and weird quips?

I don't really look at Steve as "crazy." I tried to look at him like he was the good guy. He's the hero of his story. He's the one who is going to set the world to rights. Now, obviously, we're getting into some "crazy-talk" territory right there, but mostly I tried to play him as true to himself as I could be. I really hope some people may actually like him. But watching it back on TV, yeah, it certainly is creepy. I guess they knew what they were doing when they cast me.

Were you as hilariously uncomfortable as the rest of us during the Christian sexy dance to "Jesus Asked Me Out Today"? How do you get through the insanely campy scenes, laced as they are with sexual innuendo?

That scene was an absolute blast to shoot. Brian Buckner, the writer for that episode, wrote the lyrics to that song. It was just hilarious. Anna Camp (Mrs. Sarah Newlin) and I danced on the sidelines in character and just embraced it. She and Ryan Kwanten (Jason Stackhouse) both have the best senses of humor. A lot of my favorite moments between the three of us just kind of happened on set. We had a couple moments of improv that made it in – my favorite being when Ryan turns to look out the window during the dinner scene in episode three to see the "war going on out there" — but we were always inspired by what the writers had given us. Not to mention contributions from hair, makeup and costumes. I mean, sometimes we just couldn't look at each other without laughing. Audrey Fisher, our costume designer, is a genius. So much of her work informed the performance.

Do you have your own ring of honesty? Do you wear it out from time to time?

The ironic thing is that Steve does not wear a ring of honesty. Make of that what you will.

The best part about True Blood is the multi-faceted world building with the Fellowship, the Vampire league, vampire airplanes etc. What's something about the Fellowship of the Sun that we haven't seen yet or didn't make the cut? Are there anti-vampire campfire singalongs or a make-your-own-stake craft hour? Also do you get the lyrics to any of these songs and can you share it with us?

As the season goes along, the layers of the Fellowship get peeled back one by one. We've just learned, that the camp is a recruiting tool for this new elite army, "The Soldiers of the Sun," and we'll see more of that and the agenda there in upcoming episodes. We see that these guys really aren't fucking around. We'll also get into the heart of the Church itself, and get introduced to at least one important ritual. It ain't pretty. Sadly, I think most of the singing has happened for the season. Or maybe that's a good thing?

What's been the most fun to shoot so far and why?

I can't tell you because it hasn't happened yet, but you'll know it when you see it. Beyond that, the day out on the ATV, shooting paintballs with Ryan Kwanten was a lot of fun. Paintballs really can bring two men closer together. What other show allows its actors to drive around and pretend to kill vampires? That BBQ scene was also a favorite. Anna Camp was a real trooper, dancing around for Jason's fantasy. Lesser actresses would shy away for fear of looking stupid, but Anna committed! She managed to look seductive while essentially having a clown moment. And it was completely unrehearsed. The show provides so much room to play, and really, everyday on set was a joy.

What's it like having a TV wife?

I guess having a TV wife is pretty awesome. I don't have one in real life. But when I do, I hope she makes good pudding.

Sure, Sarah is Steve's draft picker, but what's the plan once these boys are in? You've convinced Jason to stay and hang out with the guys a little more, and teach him how to shoot vamps, but what's next? There's no way that's the end of the rabbit hole.

Again, that's part of watching how the season plays out, spoilers-be-damned. Seriously — spoilers are bad for you, kids! I will say that Jason, to Steve, represents many things that Steve isn't. Alan Ball has a great quote on the commentary to the first season DVD where he says something to the effect of Jason being the kind of guy that every other dude in town hates. But I think for all those same reasons — his charm, his killer looks — Steve loves him. I mean, what a great example of intelligent design! I think Steve was probably a pretty lonely kid. There's a guy in there that is just clamoring for a real friend. And as much as a warrior he sees in Jason, I think he's just as excited that he's made a close bond. That scene with them and the paintballs… Steve's really having an adolescent moment there he probably never got. It's sad, really. Steve, as "crazy" as he is, may wind up being a somewhat tragic figure. It was pointed out to me after I finished shooting that there's a rich Arthur/Lancelot dynamic playing out between him and Jason. I couldn't believe I didn't see it at the time. That's exactly what it is.

I see Sarah, the character, has a twitter account (whether it's officially sponsored or not), and do you have one?

Hmm. I don't think I do. I'm not sure I should burst the bubble here or not, but the actors are not the same people behind the character Tweets and facebook pages. That's all part of the viral campaign. My cousin recently learned that lesson when she wrote a personal message to "Steve" on facebook thinking it was me, in which she referred to me as "Butt-Cheeks." I got a message from "Steve's" writer saying, "Hey you might want to let this person know…"

Have you (or the show) ever received pro-vampire hate mail, or on the other hand, positive anti-vampire mail? You know support from those out there looking to end the vampire infestation?

I wouldn't be surprised. We have such a fervent fan following, but I don't really know. I do know they get a lot of fan art on the True Blood Wiki page. But, where's the Steve love? It's all about that Eric. Come on, peeps. Let's see some Newlin fan art!

We have to ask, what's it like working with Ryan Kwanten? Is he anything like Jason?

Ryan's a total pro. He's more reserved than Jason, and a hundred times smarter. He brings something fresh to a scene every take and never says "No" to an idea. It's a refreshing quality in Hollywood where so many actors are worried about looking cool. I love that he's essentially a leading man type, but he scores some of the series' funnier comedic moments. I think it's a testimony to the creative casting that happens on the show. He could have easily ended up playing "The Guy" on a prime-time soap, and done a great job, but True Blood has really given him a chance to go beyond his obvious type. I think it's somewhat the same story with Anna Paquin. Nobody who was familiar with the books saw her as Sookie. But she kicks ass and it's now impossible to picture anyone else in the role. She really owns it.

Right now it seems as though the Pastor's focused on recruiting a few good men for killing a few bad vamps. Any plans for global domination?

But of course. Case in point: Sarah says the first episode of the season, Steve "could be governor of Texas one day" if he "plays his cards right." And you know what happens to governors of Texas, right? Of course, Steve wouldn't see it as "domination." He'd see it as "salvation." It's all there in the Book of Revelations. It's Steve vs. The Apocalypse!

And finally what do True Blood fans have to look forward with your character?

He's an excellent tour guide…

Steve And Sarah's Reflections, Part of the Fellowship's Viral Campaign:

Cheating Death The Vampire Way Is Not The Answer. Don't Fear Your Eventual Demise:

Don't Flirt With Evil. A Fling With A Dead Man Or Woman Won't Cure Marital Blues:

A few weeks ago, the Los Angeles Times printed a terrifyingly awful article trying to get women to come to the traditionally male-centric Comic-Con by writing about what girls can do at the Con. Apparently they can drool over hot men, and that's pretty much it. Then, to add insult to injury, popular blog IGN.com held a contest whose prize was a trip to Comic-Con. The kicker? The contest was open only to men. (Later, the site apologized and created a separate contest for women.) So basically, the message has been that women don't go to Comic-Con. Unless somehow we can trick them into it by dangling hunky actors in front of them.

Because of course, women don't like movies. Or comics. Or TV. Or videogames. They just like cute boys.

Now, at least among Comic-Con attendees, that tune is changing. It seems now that the biggest threat to Comic-Con are all the women who will be coming.

The opening salvo in this latest round of complaints came from /Film's Peter Sciretta, who grumbled about how the Twilight panel will be right after the Avatar panel. Apparently all the excited female fans will push out the "normal people":

Anyone who attended last year's Comic-Con can attest to how much of a cluster-fuck was caused by Twilight's presentation in Hall H. Hundreds of tweens and Twilight Moms/Dads camped overnight to be the first ones into Hall H. By the time the "normal people" began to line up hours before doors were set to open, thousands of Twilighters were already in line.

As Movieline notes:

Sciretta then pretty much admits that actually the most anticipated film is the Twilight sequel New Moon, which doesn't count because girls.

Sciretta goes on to say:

By placing the Summit panel (AKA The Twilight Saga: New Moon panel) as the third panel of the day, they are forcing thousands of movie fanatics out of Hall H. Unless you're willing to brave the crowds and show up 4-5 hours before HALL-H opens, the seats will be taken by Twilight fans. Twilight fans who probably aren't interested in Avatar. Many of those people who want to see previews of A Christmas Carol, Alice In Wonderland, Tron 2 and Avatar will be left out.

He worries that these Twilight girls will take ALL THE SEATS that should be saved for "movie fanatics" - because, apparently, people who like the Twilight movie don't count as movie fans. Nobody who likes that silly vampire movie New Moon, full of sparkly otherworldly creatures, would ever be sophisticated enough to like the silly space movie Avatar, full of sparkly otherworldly creatures.

Imagine if this New Moon panel were replaced by a panel devoted to a new Star Wars movie. Would people be screaming about all those "fanatical" Star Wars fans who would undoubtedly line up all night long just to get a glimpse of George Lucas and pals? Would there be complaining that Star Wars fans were taking up space and driving out all the "normal people" who came to see Alice and A Christmas Carol? Would people be suggesting that the Star Wars panel should be moved to another place, or another day? No. Because Star Wars fans, even though they are more fanatical than Twilight fans, are mostly boys. And therefore they are tolerated as "normal people" at Comic-Con while hordes of girl fans are not.

Tellingly, Sciretta begins his post by saying:

Unlike others, I don't feel threatened by the [Twilight] books, films, or insane fandom. Why should I?

Obviously, however, he is threatened. Twilight fans are stealing movie fandom away from him. They're stealing his seat for Avatar. And they're willing to get up even earlier than he is to get into an event they're excited about. I dunno, but it sounds to me like he's threatened because women are better, stronger, more devoted movie fanatics than he is.

OK, boys, it's time to step up your game if you're going to conquer Comic-Con.

Recently, sci-fi has come under fire in certain circles for its lack of innovation in costume design. But meanwhile, the fashion world is eating up scifi frills. Just the other night at the BET awards, I was struck by the sheer amount of crazy buckles and unnecessary straps of sparkle, metal and nylon gracing the red carpet. We've noted before that retro robots seem to be dominating the catwalks nowadays.



While current upscale fashion seems to have fully embraced its inner Mad Max, the Financial Times' Peter Gutierrez touched upon lack of visual appeal in one of the biggest genre films to come out this year: Star Trek. While one could easily argue that Star Trek was merely attempting to adhere to the fashion established by the original series how can one forget things like this?


Or this? It's pretty obvious that Trek has created some…interesting spacewear, so why is it so drab now? Even the green girls of today aren't as exciting as those of yesteryear.


In a lot of ways genre films have struggled to become a legitimate category, and in its pursuit, it seems to believe that one cannot be taken seriously when you look like this.



So, now we've thrown camp aside for the sake of mainstream acceptance and we want our realistic sci-fi. No more space babes with foil bikinis - it's all tank tops, business attire and military jumpsuits.

Scifi fashion has forgotten its roots, and now it's being taken up as irony chic by fashionistas who wouldn't touch your very favorite episode of Farscape with a ten-foot pole. While I love the recent trend of realism in my sci-fi, I miss the wacky colors and unique use of latex in the stuff of old. This new streak of science fiction (like most streaks) is merely a trend and will probably swing back sometime with the right film. I'm holding out hope for new Bruce Willis flick Surrogates . It looks cool and all, but Bruce - can you get back to the basics? No, not ‘Yippie kay yay' basics, but ‘Mila Jovovich wearing band aids and battling aliens' basics. You know Chris Tucker could use the work, and I'm always looking for Halloween costume ideas.

A study published today in Science details a series of careful experiments Swedish researchers conducted on mating seed beetles (pictured). They want to find out what the benefits were to females who mated with multiple males, given that multiple matings could be dangerous to their health for a variety of reasons. The accepted wisdom is that females mate with many men because they can choose which sperm fertilize their eggs after mating. Basically, more men equals a bigger and better smorgasbord to choose from in the genetics department.

If this hypothesis were true, females would always choose sperm from the fittest males to fertilize their eggs. But they didn't. If you measure male fitness as the ability to produce a great number of offspring who themselves produce a great number of offspring, then the fittest males always lost. Inevitably, the females chose sperm from unfit males.

Why would these insects have sex with so many different men, only to choose the crappiest sperm? The researchers admit that they are baffled. Their experiment was only intended to determine whether females favored sperm from fit males – not to plumb the depths of the psychology behind female insect promiscuity.

However, what these Swedish researchers have done is eliminate one possible reason why female insects mate with multiple males. They're not doing it because of genetic benefits that come from the males. They are not picking sperm that have direct or indirect benefits on their offspring, as far as the researchers could tell. Though they do float the possibility that these females may be choosing sperm that are beneficial exclusively to female offspring. In other words, genes that make fathers fit may not make daughters who are fit.

According to researcher Göran Arnqvist:

The results support the suggestion that genes that are good for males may often be bad for their mates. Therefore, in beetles at least, multiple mating does not award females with genetic benefits.

So if multiple mating does not award females with genetic benefits, what exactly does it award them with? Is it possible that they're sleeping around just for fun?

via Science and Uppsala University

What makes both of these episodes of insane cluelessness so vexing is that Comic-Con has plenty of female attendees, and you can't walk down the hallways of the convention center without stepping over women in cute costumes camping out in line to see Joss Whedon or Lucy Lawless in person.

So, first the contest. The other day, comics blogger Johanna Draper Carlson broke the news that video-game site IGN was running a contest tying in with District 9, the new movie directed by Neill Blomkamp and produced by Peter Jackson. District 9, of course, is the movie about aliens landing on Earth and being forced into horrendous internment camps, thus demonstrating the evil of segregation and treating intelligent beings like second-class citizens. But this message was lost on IGN and the film's publicists, who put together a contest aimed only at males:

This sweepstakes is open only to males who are both legal residents of the fifty (50) United States and Washington D.C. and who are at least between 18-24 years of age as of July 23, 2009.

The winner of the contest would go to Comic-Con where he (and it has to be a "he") would take part in a "journalistic assignment" relating to District 9, interviewing people connected to the movie, under the supervision of someone from IGN. After Carlson and other bloggers protested this contest, IGN claimed it wasn't their fault:

Hello, IGN here...The eligibility requirements for this contest were determined by Columbia TriStar Marketing, the marketing team behind the District 9 film, and were passed on as a directive to IGN as Sponsor of this particular Sweepstakes running on the IGN.com site. While IGN supports gamers of all ages, genders, shapes and sizes, these guidelines were created to foster a buzz for the film among a very narrow target group that the film's promoters felt would be extremely passionate about the film's subject matter. Thanks for listening, we hope this provides some clarification...

Also know that we're aware of the frustration these guidelines created and will look to avoid such missteps in the future.

When the controversy continued over the weekend, IGN finally backed down and created a second contest, just for women. Men have until June 22 to enter their contest, women have until July 3, since their contest was created later. Still, the fact that IGN's contest was originally for men only sends a terrible message, and I'm left wondering if the contest's female winner will have the same "journalistic assignments" as the male one.

But speaking of sending a terrible message, the L.A. Times put out a "Girls' Guide To Comic-Con 2009," which starts out by assuring readers that contrary to what you might believe, the event "is not just for nerdy guys anymore. And it's not all just about the influx of squealing "Twilight" girls, either." Wow, really? You mean women can be into genre entertainment other than Twilight? Apparently so. Because there are more vampires, from True Blood and the upcoming show The Vampire Diaries. And there'll be "ass-kicking heroines" from TV shows like Dollhouse, plus maybe Brad Pitt will be there and you can ogle him!

Plus maybe Jake Gyllenhaal will be there for Prince of Persia:

Women will be rushing the stage, offering to do star Jake Gyllenhaal's laundry on those washboard abs that he acquired for the film, since he spends much of it fighting, shirtless or both.

Write-ups for other upcoming science fiction franchises assure us that they feature an "emotion-driven storyline" or "bittersweet tears."

So girls, don't feel intimidated by Comic-Con. You can do Jake Gyllenhaal's laundry!

Comic-Con middle finger pic by Omar Gutierrez on Flickr.

In the film, a man's blow-up sex doll comes to life one day (as Bae Doo-na, the Korean actress, whom genre film fans will recognize from The Host and Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance.) She steps out, discovers the world, gets a job, and starts dating a video store clerk. (No doubt one who has rented Mannequin a few too many times.) Sounds kinky, but in the hands of Kore-eda (After Life, Nobody Knows), frequently a poet of memory and loss, the premise becomes an opportunity for a haunting meditation on innocence and love. Or so say those who saw it at the Cannes Film Festival, and so it appears from the trailer below (h/t to Twitch, Nippon Cinema).

Fox made her lazy diss in an interview with the London Times last week, addressing rumors that she could take the lead in a potential WW movie:

Wonder Woman is a lame superhero... She flies around in her invisible jet and her weaponry is a lasso that makes you tell the truth. I just don't get it. Somebody has a big challenge on their hands whoever takes that role but I don't want to do it.

Commenting on the upset about her comment, Marvel Comics' Brian Michael Bendis - writer of New Avengers, Dark Avengers and the upcoming Spider-Woman, amongst many others - twittered a couple of additional jabs:

Spider-Woman is cooler than Wonder Woman in every way possible. Wonder Woman's got a pipply ass! she's the pipply ass of comics!! Spider-Woman has better hair, better costume, frank cho implants and a fucked up origin. Wonder Woman is a walking std farm!!

So, you know, let's put aside the whole "implants make a character better" thing, and even the "walking STD farm" thing, for a second (No, really; I know that's asking for a lot) and wonder out loud, just what is it that's so wrong with Wonder Woman? As Robot 6's Tom Bondurant, who's been writing about DC Comics characters for years, explains, the character's longevity alone should afford her some respect:

Brief breaks notwithstanding, Wonder Woman is one of the few Golden Age characters whose adventures have been published continuously ever since her introduction. Superman and Batman are the only others, so this alone puts them all in the same class.

However, if such minds as Bendis and Fox agree that she's lame and don't get what makes her an appealing character, then what is she doing wrong?

Maybe Bendis is right, in part; maybe it's the costume. That's something that even her writers have had trouble with in the past; here's what novelist Jodi Picoult - who wrote the character for a brief time in 2007 - told USA Today:

[R]ight off the bat, I tried to get her out of her bustier, 'cause let's face it, no woman would ever fight crime in one. But that was a no-no. (Laughs)

Greg Rucka, who wrote the Wonder Woman title for three years, fought a similar battle with no success:

I tried to get the costume changed from the start. Even had a story built around it. Despite repeated attempts, the response was a resounding no, and the arguments made were always commercial and economic ones, rather than those of story or content... the fact is, she's been hyper-sexualized from the moment of inception, and there's no likelihood that portrayal will ever change, no matter who's writing the book, nor who's drawing it. It's not unique to that character, though she is, I think, by far, the most visible example of it.

Is the problem, perhaps, that DC Comics are unsure about her audience? Picoult again:

It was very hard to gauge her readership. She obviously is drawn for the adolescent male. She has a lot of adult male fans reading her because of that and who are very tied to her and want to make sure she's not ruined by anybody. She has a huge gay following for both men and women. I think that DC has always hoped she would be a superhero for young women as well, but many of them at this point are reading Japanese comics.

Rucka has been less optimistic at times:

I honestly think DC/WB has no idea who her target audience is. I suspect, more often than not, they think she has none.

But why is that the case? Weirdly enough, I think that what makes Wonder Woman such an interesting character to those who love her is also her biggest weakness when it comes to explaining why she's not lame to everyone else: She's too complex a character to really match up with contemporaries Superman and Batman. Both Clark and Bruce can be summed up in one high concept sentence ("Last member of an alien race rocketed to Earth who personifies the best parts of humanity as he defends his adopted home planet" and "A man who's dedicated his life to fighting crime so that no-one ever has to suffer the same kind of tragedy that he has", respectively), and it's something that most successful DC superheroes have (Green Lantern: "Space cop with a magic wishing ring"; Flash: "The fastest man alive"; Aquaman: "King of the seas"). Wonder Woman, though...? Not so much. Here's Greg Rucka again, talking about what makes him love the character in a 2004 interview:

She's an Amazon. Amazons are a warriors, they're a martial culture. They can promote belief in peace in part because they've been living in absolute seclusion and isolation for so long, and also because if you mess with them, they'll kill you. It's easy to dictate peace when you're the baddest motherfucker on the block. Diana comes from this culture where she's bred for war, but is able to reap the rewards of 3000 years of peace - the art, the science, the philosophy. Add to that these divine elements, like the wisdom of Athena and so on, and you've got this person who has all these ingredients and they are in many ways pulling her in different directions, but she somehow manages to unify them all for a single direction. She's not going crazy, she's not neurotic - you look at every other superhero ever and they are all malfunctioning in some way [laughs]. In some way, they are internally malfunctioning - Diana really isn't, even with all the paradoxes and conflicts, she may be the most well-adjusted superhero out there. At least when I look at her, that's what I see. She's somebody who knows what she's about and has absolute conviction in what she believes and is willing to fight for those things she believes, be it with words or swords. I love the character and the more I work with her, the more I love her.

That mix of warrior and peacemaker is just one of things that makes her attractive to current Wonder Woman writer Gail Simone:

I have a scene in one of my early issues where Wonder Woman lets an opponent kick the crap out of her, without fighting back, just her extending an open hand to him, no matter what his rage makes him do. I think that's a big part of it - she COULD tear someone's head off, she COULD destroy a country if she chose. But she would consider that a failure as a warrior for peace. The death of an enemy is not victory to her. I love that stuff. I think it's a far better blueprint for the future than most of the action hero stuff out there right now.

The problem with Wonder Woman may be that the conflicts within her character - even if, as Rucka points out, the character herself has come to terms with them - make it harder for people to come up with an idea of who Wonder Woman is (Not for nothing was her series relaunched in 2007 with a storyline called "Who Is Wonder Woman," after all), and they end up looking at all the... well, the unimportant things, instead. It's understandable, in one sense, for people to focus on the way the character looks; comics are a visual medium, and she's not alone in that sense of objectification (Captain America, Batman and Superman are three male characters who have become similarly misunderstood because of their iconic, somewhat dated, looks), and just as easy for people to base misconceptions of the character on the little bits of her pop culture identity that they can remember: the invisible plane, the lasso of truth, and so on. But none of those things are who Wonder Woman is. It's as if Batman was reduced to half-remembered snippets from the Adam West television show from the 1960s.

It's a catch-22, of course; most people think Wonder Woman is lame because they don't know who Wonder Woman is, but they're unlikely to get to know Wonder Woman because they think Wonder Woman is lame. What she lacks is a Dark Knight Returns (or, for that matter, a The Dark Knight); a high-profile project that pushes people to re-evaluate the preconceptions and redefines the character in the mainstream consciousness, and not in the "Out of my way, sperm bank" direction... Something made by people with enough name recognition that could overcome concerns or apathy about the character enough to convince the masses to at least give it a try, and enough understanding of what makes the character interesting, unlike her peers and... well, wonderful.

Anyone want to see if we can convince Joss Whedon to come back to the idea of a Wonder Woman movie after all?