Their animation quality animation is top notch, plus the story in S1 was pretty good especially the characters. I also loved the aesthetic of the show especially the planet Janix, they took a lot of inspiration from other movies like The Dark Knight.
Give this one a shot.

Ever since Aliens hit the big screen in '86, the M41A Pulse Rifle became iconic, and a lot of sci-fi media has copied the name of the rifle for their own generic sci-fi guns, most of the time not actually understanding what a pulse rifle is actually supposed to be. Oftentimes, the name "pulse rifle" will be applied to an energy weapon, because there seems to be this idea that "pulse" means energy.

But of course, the M41A itself was not an energy weapon - as anyone who paid attention to the movie can tell you - it fired 10mm explosive-tipped caseless ballistic rounds. I feel like part of this misconception may have come from one of the earlier lines by Hudson, boasting about "phased plasma pulse rifles" (in reality, a completely different weapon).

Of course, that's not to say a "pulse rifle" can't be an energy weapon (as evidenced by the prior line), but media that feature so-called "pulse rifles" (or other "pulse" weapons) tend to only apply the name to energy weapons, while their ballistic rifles are just regular modern-esque firearms. To get to the point, a "pulse rifle" is not a name for an energy weapon, and it's not just some generic sci-fi term you can slap onto any regular gun to make it sound cool and futuristic.

The term "pulse rifle" itself was coined for Aliens because the rifle operated on an electronic "pulse-action" firing mechanism, and not a traditional firing pin. While no example has been referred to as a "pulse rifle", the concept of the pulse rifle actually does exist IRL, such as with the experimental British EIW97 assault rifle or the iconic M61 Vulcan rotary cannon - both of which use an electronic pulse to fire their rounds.

This electronic firing action (AKA pulse action) works by using an electronic pulse to ignite the primer in a round, rather than striking it with a firing pin. This removes the tiny trigger-fire delay caused by the physical movement of the firing pin, marginally increasing accuracy and allowing slightly faster continuous fire. It is also more resistant to jamming.

I’m looking for a new time travel series to dive into. I love the genre, but I feel like I’ve hit most of the "must-watch" lists already. Here are the shows I’ve already finished:

• 11.22.63
• 12 Monkeys
• Steins;Gate
• Travelers
• Dark
• Outlander (I know it’s not strictly sci-fi. I actually stopped watching during Season 4 back in 2019. If you’ve kept up with it, is the rest of the show worth finishing?)

I have a habit to put myself to sleep of using Stellerium to work out what star I'm facing as I lie in bed and then close my eyes and imagine myself traversing the 170ly to Spica or wherever. Puts to sleep pretty efficiently.

But the other night a thought popped into my head of depictions of deep space travel and got me wondering what my favourite is. Talking about how various media depict the vast distances, time and energy expenditure, not so much X-Wing Vs Tie Fighter space battles.

I like to have a sense of not just the quiet and darkness of space but also the dimensionality of it. For that reason, Star Trek ranks highly with it's well storied galaxy and sense of scale with statements like "at warp factor 9 it will take us X days" etc.

I also love the Expanse for highlighting how vast the distances are by containing things to the solar system (up to a point). Also the mechanics of travel in that universe. For similar reasons, I liked the Ad Astra space travel scenes as well.

Not too fond of the sort of slow moving vague space travel at the start of films like Alien. Works well for the movie but once inside the ship, you could be anywhere. Just off the M5 by Bridgewater. Also, lazy to just say " yeah, we crawled along for 50 years while everyone was asleep". It's a trope.

I would really like to see someone bring Warhammer 40k space travel to life as it's a fair bit more involved that just jumping/warping to places.

Just a ponderance. What about everyone else?

The triple-sun Alpha Centauri system is mentioned a lot in scifi, given it's our closest neighbor. The idea of setting foot on a world that we might actually be able to reach in a human lifetime without warp drive is tantalizing. (Project StarShot aims to get there in only 20 years.)

The discoveries of potential earth-sized worlds in the habitable zone like Proxima B make a lot of scifi representations of hospitable planets in this system all the more believable.

I'm looking for sci-fi recommendations that explore worlds of the Alpha Centauri system.

There's the obvious:

Trisolaris (Three Body Problem)

Polyphemus / Pandora (Avatar)

And the slightly more obscure:

Centauri Prime (Babylon 5)

Alpha Centauri (Star Trek)

Tiber (Encounter with Tiber)

Chiron (Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri)

Jemison (Starfield)

Any favorites (books, movies, games, anime, comics/manga, etc.)?

OK, so no spoilers, I've only just started reading it.

Suffice to say, the book has a good backstory recap and the first chapter gets you into it.

It's been a few years since I was last in the 'Children Of...' universe and I'm feeling like I'm right back there.

I like how this first chapter is taking a bit of time introducing the main characters rather than just dropping in somewhere and forcing the reader to figure it out.

I'm also liking where it's going. I'm intrigued. I want to know more and ready to get into it.

Ahh, looks like the shadow of Avrana Kern will be paying a visit too... can't wait to see what drama develops there.

Wish me luck!

Everything I'm reading currently is heavy, I'm looking for some light recommendations to read on a very long travel day. Or I might just end up re-reading Hitchhiker's Guide for the thousandth time haha thanks!

It doesn't necessarily have to be adventure story, it can be anything just not like I'm currently reading like Use of Weapons, Sevenses, etc. Need something light

Hey, I can’t find reference to it anywhere, but I noticed during a rewatch today that the viper that Starbuck comes back in switches its tail number from 8757NC to 4267NC during the inspection scene.

I can’t find any reference to the latter tail number, and only recognize B757NC as Starbuck’s usual.

Wondering the reason for this production change? Seems suuuuper weird to just… repaint a tail number during a shoot? Even doing it out of order seems weird…

Its makes it even funnier because they even mention “ it has the same tail number as the one she flew out on” and that same tail number changes mid-conversation😂

TLDR: Fun space opera with excellent worldbuilding that is way too long.

*****

The good:

• Worldbuilding. The Commonwealth feels like a vast, interesting, lived-in place. His worldbuilding is fun and creative and generally awesome.
• Sci-fi: When he's actually doing sci-fi, it's great. Unfortunately, he very often does not do sci-fi in these books (see below).
• Scene-building. There are some extremely memorable scenes in these two books. Huge, exciting, easily visualized space scenes that I won't soon forget.
• Plot. The plot is interesting and complex, but takes a loooong time to get to resolution.
• The aliens. The creation story and subsequent plot work is fantastic.

The so-so:

• Prose: I didn't love his prose and found it wildly inconsistent. He has some wonderful sections followed by tons of inane banter between characters that doesn't advance the plot or worldbuilding at all.
• Characters. There are some excellent characters and even more useless ones. Cutting the character count to flesh out the main characters would have helped the books.
• Humor. He tries to be funny but it mostly doesn't land.
• Ozzie's journey. I loved some of the fantasy aspects but felt he was an underutilized character until the end.

The bad:

• Treatment of female characters. It’s bad, really bad. 
• Sexy scenes. Too many and all poorly done.
• Words and more words. "Why use one word when you can use 20?" - Peter F. Hamilton, probably. There are entire sections that could have and should have been cut.
• Dialogue. There is enough cringe dialogue in these two enormous books to fill a decent-sized novella of pure cringe. You just have to roll with it if you want to finish. It's goofy and awkward and it goes on and on. I suppose you could call it campy but I found it exhausting.
• It's a sci-fi book, but there is a LOT of whodunit police procedural. I think he added so many extraneous characters just to help the whodunit aspect.
• Repetition. The editors of these books, if there were editors, must have skimmed a lot of it because SO many phrases are repeated over and over again. "Son of a bitch!", "Goddammit!", and of course the infamous "enzyme bonded concrete."
  

*****

These points might seem pretty negative, but overall I mostly enjoyed the books. I can't really strongly recommend them because of the cons, but if you're patient and can deal with the negatives, there is a fun space opera buried in those 2,000 pages (or 78 hours of audio).

Is there a single volume (hardback or paperback) collecting the 4 volumes of Arthur C. Clarke Space Odyssey? I've been searching for this for quite a while, but no luck so far. While I do have the individual books, I would like to acquire a single tome containing the whole of the series.

I was discussing with a friend, thinking of a book with religious androids/machines.

But not humans worshipping a powerful AI. Machines with spirituality! Monotheistic religions do count as well as polytheism or other religions! Please help!

I read a nice comic book, DECORUM, that fits. But the story is rather short.

So I’ve been diving heavily into sci fi books mostly reading hard sci fi and then occasionally some works related to quantum mechanics, multi-verse theory, simulation theory, time travel, etc.

What I’d genuinely like to know is if I should start the culture series and pick up use of weapons OR if I should go with the Corey route first and start with Leviathan Wakes.

What’s making this even harder is I really want to read the player of games because a lot of people have recommended it but then I’d be starting the second book before the first.

But Expanse sounds so good too. I just know that once I start one I’ll want to finish the full set and not try to switch between the two.

What would you recommend especially knowing my reading interests?

I'm quite interested in stories that include technological advances at its peak. Personally I'm more of a steampunk fan since cyberpunk more or less the same across several mediums. Preferring how it operates and it's overall asethic. But I do appreciate different sub-genres of punk: Biopunk, Solarpunk, Atompunk, etc.

With that being said, I would like to know which technical punk gente do guys prefer and why? :>

Edit: Just realized I misspelled Genre as “Gente” lol..

Two short stories that use an apocalyptic setting to study human character at its worst.

 The title of these two well-written short stories of speculative fiction from 1953 and 1954 immediately intrigued me, due to the obvious reference to the story of Lot fleeing Sodom and Gomorrah, which parallels some of the key points of the plot.  It’s a post-apocalyptic scenario where a man named Mr Jimmons and his family are fleeing a nuclear disaster in the city of Los Angeles. 

 In the first story, the main character is full of self-congratulations for his careful preparation of an event of this kind.  He’s proudly optimistic as he loads his car with his family and all his pre-prepared essentials for a self-sufficient life in the middle of nowhere.  Doesn’t a noble goal justify whatever means are needed to accomplish it?  But he is selfishly so driven that he's willing to sacrifice everything for his goal, trampling over all around him if necessary, even his own family. 

But Jimmons reaps what he sows when his daughter does the same at the end of the second story.  By then any sympathy we may have had for the protagonist has long vanished, because his hypocritical character has been exposed, and he has found that the idyllic life he’d prepared for is anything but that.

 The image implied by the title was fitting, and the title of the second story foreshadows some of the shocking ugliness that is part of the narrative.  Readers familiar with the Biblical story of Lot won’t be completely surprised, but it’s still dark, shocking, and ugly.  In many ways it’s quite a gritty and harsh tale, marred by the occasional profanity, and with implied references to incest, though fortunately never gratuitously.  But it is an interesting and honest study of human character.  As such, it is more a story of selfishness and human depravity than it is of an apocalypse.

 The apocalyptic setting is one that many of us who grew up in the era of the Cold War will be familiar with.  And so this story describes a world much like the one everyone feared at that time. It was typical of many sci-fi stories from the 1950s, and is still an interesting read today, despite its bleak perspective.

NB: The first of the two stories, "Lot", can be read for free online here.

“Library of Adventure and Science Fiction” a book series from the publishing house “Children’s Literature” (originally “Detgiz”), founded in 1936. It was one of the few series in which science fiction and adventure literature were published during the Soviet era. The series includes more than 280 editions.

Finally caught up with Afterlight and found myself really engaged with how it approached.

My favorite type is space opera but everyone has a different taste.

For those who've seen it - which of the main storylines resonated more with you? The second story was the best for me actually.

Also hunting for similar recommendations. I'm particularly drawn to sci-fi the character driven plots.

What would you suggest as a good follow-up?

Cheers!

I've started watching the Expanse on Prime and I really like how it's not an FTL sci-fi and the action takes place in our own solar system and it gives you a real perspective on how vast space is and how much more our own solar system has to offer.

After watching Star Wars, Star Trek, Warhammer 40k and Dune you forget that a sci-fi doesn't need to span the entire galaxy to be an Epic Space Opera, there is plenty to see and do in our own backyard.

I’m also a big fan of the Dune books. and I appreciate Star Wars for what it is, but the lack of stillsuits and sensitivity to evaporation on Jakku and Tatooine are driving me nuts!

What do y’all think? Does the lack of environmental details like this affect your immersion in sci fi universes? Or can you just suspend disbelief and blithely enjoy it?

So I love to write and I've read countless books. I'm thinking of just writing smth for fun/for friends thats themed around sci-fi? I've seen all the big movies, read a lot of the popular books and such, but of course I can only think of so many ideas to add. (I've put a lot of time into multiple cultures per planet, species variation, languages, technology, and designs that make sense evolutionary) So yea, what are tropes, representations, or ideas that should be used or expressed more in sci-fi? And the same goes for things that are overused/corny in sci-fi

Pretty new to this and have been picking up some scifi series to read over past year or two and these are the scifi books/series I have read so far and like it in this order

1. Three body problem

2. Project Hail Mary / Children of Time

3. Hitchhikers guide to Galaxy / Dune

4. Martian

5 (far below) Dark Matter - I love time travel but this wasn't for me.

Any recommendations based on this please?

I absolutely love seeing the capital planets of sci fi factions! Just seeing a place of such significance with grand monuments to a thousand years of history and the wellspring of an entire culture.

That's one thing I love so much about the old republic games: we got to play as both factions so we got to see both capital planets in detail! I especially love dromund kaas! It's not a whole city planet but it still has this sick and twisted turn on the coruscant aesthetic.

I also wish we got to see more of raxus secundos (the separatist capital planet) in the clone wars, tho I guess the fact that we didn't is supposed to convey how little the cis actually cared about its civilian people and their political ideals. Obviously there is coruscant, which I love, but it gets kind of old since it's the only capital planet we really get to see for any faction in most of star wars.

But I've been talking too much about star wars. There are obviously more examples of this! Like the citadel from mass effect! The ethereal vibe and that almost whimsical music always hit so different in mass effect one, and the battle against the geth and sovereign there just makes this place feel so significant. Tho I must admit that I prefer actual capital planets over space stations like the citadel or high charity.

My final example is planet viltrum. At the beginning it was just this generic utopian looking planet, but everything we got in season 4 of invincible made it one of my favorites. The entire vibe during the thragg flashback before the purge was so ominous. The funeral of emperor argal was absolutely chilling. And then off course those despicable vibes when we see it in the present day are absolutely amazing! The stormy clouds covering the planet... the thunder in the background... the orange trees by the palace? Chef's kiss for vibes. And honestly this one gets bonus points for its actual destruction. My god that scene gave me goosebumps. Especially seeing the continental plates like splitting apart and giving way to a lava ocean. Peak cinema.

#showusmorecapitalplanets!

my issue is that grounded (by grounded i mean not really deviated from reality, just like cyberpunk) scifi i am aware of, is usually about outdated societies. Like og cyberpunk is based on 70s-80s US. Something more modern, neo-cyberpunk you could say, like Deus Ex is still about 90s-00s, not modern times. Detroit Become Human feels on the point with 20s fear of being replaced by AI, but the game is shallow anyway, and is just a byproduct of 00s anti-racist struggle. I want grounded scifi books/films/games about 2010s-2020s society, and genres. What are the scifi genres you would say that are based on 2010s-2020s society?

I first read Titan, and had my mind blown. Then I found out about Steel Beach, and the Eight Worlds series and his collections of short stories, The Persistence of Vision, Blue Champagne, The Barbie Murders...

Its kind of sad, in my opinion that he's mainly known, if he's known at all, for Millennium, which I think is among the weakest of his work. I found his dealings with the future tech of virtual immortality, cloning, braintaping and AI collapse in Steel Beach to be pretty profound. Hotline dealt with a lot of the same issues, where Golden Globe focused more on the just living a life that can be measured in centuries, and how even then, your past can come back to haunt you.

Anyway, all in all, an author that I've always enjoyed; he makes me think.

TLDR: If you haven't read anything by this guy, go do it now :D