<![CDATA[io9: ultraviolet]]> http://tags.lifehacker.com/assets/base/img/thumbs140x140/io9.com.png <![CDATA[io9: ultraviolet]]> http://io9.com/tag/ultraviolet http://io9.com/tag/ultraviolet <![CDATA[The Science Fiction Gadgets That Make You Go... Wha?!]]> We have a serious love affair with the cool gadgets of science fiction, but every now and then one will come along that will make you scratch your head and say "What!?" Yes, even in the world of scifi, you can sometimes go a bit too far. Check out our list of beyond-the-pale gadgets.

  • The Masks from Mission Impossible: The latex masks which could apparently turn a thin Tom Cruise into a chunky Philip Seymour Hoffman weren't exclusive to the movies. They used a fair share of these disguises throughout the television show, and the best part was when they'd cut from the live person to the dead looking fake mask being peeled away to reveal the operative underneath. At least MI:3 showed us a bit of how the machine that makes them works, but it still doesn't explain how they fit so well. The company that makes those could have made a fortune at Halloween every year.
  • drd2a.jpgThe Translator Microbes in Farscape: Science fiction properties have tried for years to get around the problem of everyone speaking English on new worlds lightyears away from Earth, and this has led to everything from The Universal Translator in Star Trek, to the Babel Fish in Hitchhiker's Guide, and the telepathic translating done by the TARDIS in Doctor Who. So, by the time Farscape came around, the writers decided to make them injectable translator microbes that let you understand whatever languange was hurled at you. Other people could understand you as well, but only if they were likewise injected. They didn't work perfectly, and often failed to translate slang like "dren" and "frell."
  • Almost Everything in the 1960s Batman TV Show: Batman has had a slew of his own wacky gadgets, both in the comic books where he has an outfit for every possible encounter, and in the television show which really took the cake in creating bizarre items for Batman. Almost everything he used was a "Bat" something. In this clip from the show, you've got probably the lamest Batman gadget ever invented: The Bat Ladder. What exactly makes this a Bat Ladder, and why did he need to label it? In case he lost it somehow? Que ridiculo. Then there's the Bat-copter, the "Bat Auto Mode," and the Shark Repellent Bat Spray, which apparently makes sharks explode. He even has Barracuda, Whale, and Manta Ray repellent in there too.
  • doctor_who_302_the_shakespeare_code_01_psychic_paper.jpgThe Psychic Paper from Doctor Who: While this seems cool at first, eventually you start thinking it was an easy stopgap by the writers to get around the Doctor showing identification. In the old Tom Baker episode "The Talons of Weng-Chiang" (featuring the Doctor as a sleuth in Victorian London) the Doctor is asked to turn out his pockets, and he has everything in there from jelly babies to a toy Batmobile. We sure would have loved to see what Christopher Eccleston or David Tennant has crammed in there. Maybe a junior g-man badge would have worked just as well.
  • The Giant Amplifier from Back to the Future: Doc Brown was an eccentric inventor, to be sure, but why on Earth would he create a massive speaker? Watching this movie again, it seems like it was just created for comic effect, and surely it would have blown out both of Marty's eardrums, scrambled his brain, and broken a bone or two in the process. Slight chance of overload my ass. Maybe the terrorists had asked him to build this thing too.
  • UnstableMolecules.jpgReed Richards and his Unstable Molecules: Unstable molecules sound like they'd be, well... unstable. Seems like just an easy way to explain why the Human Torch's clothes don't burn up, or why Sue Storm doesn't have to strip naked every time she turns invisible. Were the Thing's blue shorts made out of unstable molecules too? No idea what he needed them for. Reed supposedly made a fortune for the Fantastic Four by selling the patents to all of his inventions, but were most of them stolen? One thing is for sure, while he could seemingly invent a teleportation device out of a wristwatch and sticks of gum, he sure couldn't invent anything to turn Ben Grimm human again. So, how did Reed invent these things? In the movie the cosmic rays did it, but in the comics, it was just pure Reed Richards pseudogenius. It's also the name of an awesome graphic novel about the "real life" Fantastic Four by James Sturm.
  • The Jetpack from The Rocketeer: Now, don't get me wrong, I wanted one of these things so bad that I could taste it. Who wouldn't want to slap on a funky helmet that makes you look like a hood ornament, a cool leather jacket, and just take to the skies? The problem was that later I realized this thing would totally burn your ass off. I mean, the flames shot out mere millimeters from his butt... how on Earth did he not scorch himself? Asbestos pants? Even one little throwaway line could have someone explained this, but now I just imagine Cliff Secord in a hospital bed with third-degree burns covering his backside. Plus, how could he even bend his legs upwards without melting those boots?
  • dicktr2.jpgDick Tracy's Magnetic Space Coupe: Dick Tracy is probably best known for his two-way wristwatch radio, which later became a two-way television and eventually housed a computer to help him solve crimes. However, in the 1960s things got a lot more ludicrous when Tracy and Co. traveled to the moon via his Magnetic Space Coupe. While they were there, Tracy met "The Governor of the Moon" and his daughter, "Moon Maid." She eventually married Tracy's adopted son Junior, and they had a daughter together who... sorry, my brain just exploded.
  • The Antigravity Belt Buckle in Ultraviolet: Or "Ultraviolent" as I like to call it. Milla Jovovich's badass vampire, er... "hemophage" with a conscience used this round little belt buckle to change her personal gravity, meaning she could walk on the ceiling, climb up walls, and it could even make her motorcycle drive up the sides of buildings. While we could (barely) buy the nanotech/portable hole technology in her wristbands and in that white plastic backpack, this thing just sent it over the top. What would keep her from flying off into the sky?
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<![CDATA[Ultraviolet Goes Noir In Anime Remake]]> Can an animated reboot make sense of Kurt Wimmer's Ultraviolet, two years later? Wimmer's visually stunning vampire-plague movie, set in a future dystopia where everything is always color-coordinated, became a confusing mess at least partly due to studio interference. And now acclaimed anime director Osamu Dezaki (Aim For The Ace!, Lupin III) is supervising an adaptation, called Ultraviolet: Code 044. It premieres on the Animax satellite channel in Japan on July 1. No word on when it hits the U.S., but here's a teaser trailer, which shows a much moodier, less candy-colored version of the saga. [Animax]

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<![CDATA[Read All About It In Weird Future Newspapers]]> This alien-looking newspaper from the movie Ultraviolet recently turned up on a movie props site. I love the weird font that screams "Vampire Epidemic!!!" with the three exclamation marks. It's good to know that even in a dark dystopian future where plague victims drink your blood, sober responsible journalism will reign supreme. Here's a roundup of the strangest scifi newspapers.

minority-report-epaper1.jpgIn Minority Report, newspapers constantly update themselves, thanks to miracle e-paper. While you look at the cover of this e-paper version of USA Today, the headline changes from "Molecular nano-technology?" to "Precrime Hunts its Own!"minority-report-epaper2.jpgMinority Report takes place in 2054, but we could have the technology to make this type of paper happen as soon as 2015, a Washington Post reporter predicts. And here's a prototype.

One of the earliest interactive newspapers turns up in Neal Stephenson's The Diamond Age, where it's called the mediatron:

Bud took a seat and skimmed a mediatron from the coffee table; it looked exactly like a dirty, wrinkled, blank sheet of paper. "'Annals of Self-Protection,'" he said, loud enough for everyone else in the place to hear him. The logo of his favorite meedfeed coalesced on the page. Mediaglyphics, mostly the cool animated ones, arranged themselves in a grid. Bud scanned through them until he found the one that denoted a comparison of a bunch of different stuff, and snapped at it with his fingernail. New mediaglyphics appeared, surrounding larger pictures in which Annals staff tested several models of skull guns against live and dead targets.
Minority Report isn't the only future vision to include USA Today, thanks to that paper's awesome powers of time-spanning product placement. Here's 2015's version of the paper, according to Back To The Future 2. Not much difference, except for spacey futuristic fonts:OUFJN-BTTFpaper1.jpgThe short-lived TV show Early Edition features a regular newspaper that time-travels. Gary Hobson mysteriously receives tomorrow's edition of the Chicago Tribune today, and tries to avert the terrible things he reads about there. Here he is trying to save a weathergirl (really!) from getting the forecast wrong:

The second-to-last episode of Journeyman featured our time-traveling newspaper reporter landing in 1984, where he drops a digital camera. When Dan returns to the present, everything has changed because someone reverse-engineered his digital camera. Everybody's using fancy nano-tech and smart electronic paper. It sucks that we don't get a really good look at the newspaper Dan works for in this alternate 2007 before he changes the timeline back.

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<![CDATA[Shine On You Radioactive Diamond]]> The famous blue Hope Diamond glows bright red when exposed to ultraviolet rays, even after the rays are turned off. This red blaze has been a mystery for years, but a new study credits the diamond's mixture of boron and nitrogen for the transformation. This discovery could help to "fingerprint" diamonds and identify fakes. [Associated Press]

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<![CDATA[Where Will The Weird Alien Kid Strike Next?]]> Since 2004, actor Cameron Bright has played four versions of the same freaky alien kid. You may remember him from Stargate, Ultraviolet, X-Men 3: The Last Stand, or The 4400. When a script calls for a "bizarre child with a powerful blank stare," he must be the only actor they phone up. Here are some highlights from his career as Weird Alien Kid.

  • Stargate: Bright played Orlin, an outcast "Ancient" (a humanoid race who claim to have started life in our galaxy, and now live on a higher plane of existence) who returns in the form of a human child. Apparently only a child's mind will allow him to keep the knowledge of the Ancients, but it slowly damages his brain and he can't remember anything. The best way he can show the onset of brain damage is: the blank stare.
  • Ultraviolet: This time, he's a biogenetically engineered clone who may or may not contain a cure for a hemophagia, which turns normal people into vampires. Supposedly he's a vegetative clone without the ability to speak, although we later find out that isn't the case. However, he does play up this vegetative state throughout the first half of the film, and you can guess how he does that.
  • X-Men: The Last Stand: this time Cameron plays a bald mutant who has the ability to cancel out mutant abilities in others. The government starts engineering a "cure" for mutants based on his DNA, and he spends most of his time staring at the wall or playing video games in a stark white cell.
  • The 4400: Bright played Graham Holt, who developed the ability to make others worship him like a god. People started to dress like him and throw themselves at him in a sort of bizarre David Koresh kind of way. The charismatic's weapon of choice appeared to be staring blankly at his followers.
  • Cameron doesn't have any science fiction film or television show appearances on the horizon, but you can never be sure where he'll pop up next. Just be sure to avert your eyes before his blank stare reaches you, or you'll be trapped like a deer in headlights.

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<![CDATA[The Lab Where the Cyber-Vampire Plague Started]]> Ultraviolet was a fantastic-looking, future-plague movie . . . that felt like the longest 87 minutes of our lives. Luckily, you can appreciate the film's gorgeous look without letting the nonsensical plot distract you. Check out this concept art for the "blood reservoir," a machine that's part of a government conspiracy vampire plague. See how the blood-sucking machine turned out in the movie's finished set, after the jump.



Every evil laboratory should have jaggedy pipes full of blood. But here you can see that the final sets had black pipes that hide the gore inside. Still, it looks pretty cool. Production designer Sung Pong Choo and art director Joel Chong have only worked on Chinese films apart from Ultraviolet.

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<![CDATA[Bring Home The Head Of Arnold Schwarzenegger]]> A genuine casting of Arnie's head from Batman & Robin is just one of the bizarre movie props available on eBay right now. You can also own the robot head of Robin Williams from Bicentennial Man, and the original helmet from the Rocketeer movie. Or if your loved ones are really obsessive, you can get them some even weirder crap.

If you're not satisfied with Robin Williams' head, you can also get his eyes and arm (also from Bicentennial Man) as well as some sort of weird animatronic prop. Also on eBay:

  • A ton of props from Southland Tales, including a belt worn by Sarah Michelle Gellar, Gellar's character's business card, an American flag, dog tags worn by Janeane Garofalo's soldier character and a wedding cake topper.
  • A weird-ass tumbler that John Travolta drank out of in Battlefield Earth. Probably still coated in his saliva.
  • A sign from the precog police station in Minority Report.
  • A crew-member uniform from Star Trek: Generations You could wear it to a Halloween party. But instead you'll probably just keep it in an acid-free box and fondle it occasionally.
  • The "tachyon admitter" the Fantastic Four used to separate the Silver Surfer from his surfboard in Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer.
  • Conference-room furniture from the Transformers movie. Just think, you could, ummm... use it in your conference room.
  • A rubber pick-axe and crampons from Alien vs. Predator.
  • A sign, in some alien script, from Ultraviolet.
  • A zombie plague victim mask from Resident Evil: Extinction.
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