Science Fiction and Fantasy Society of UBC... The Official Blog
The Electronic Home of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Society of UBC
Friday, October 16, 2015
Vancouver Events Roundup
Halloween night (Saturday, October 31) will see the popular horror-comedy podcast Welcome to Night Vale bring its live show to Vancouver. In fact, it will be right here at UBC's Chan Centre for the Performing Arts! I can't think of a better way to spend Halloween night. The Night Vale novel will also be available by then, so it might be a good time to head to your book retailer of choice as well.
While it's not really sci-fi or fantasy related, I know there are a few of you who are fans of The Room. Star Mark Sestero will be at The Rio Theatre November 20 for a screening of the cult classic, a live reading of Tommy Wiseau's original script, and showing of his new film Dude Bro Party Massacre III. Can't go wrong with a title like that!
That takes us through October...um...and into November. This is your VP Hunter saying: I need a witty sign off signature.
- Hunter
Friday, September 25, 2015
Icebreaker Tonight!
This is the first chance for members and prospective members to get to know the rest of the club! Meet the execs! Meet the new members! Catch up with old friends. There will be games and "get-to-know-you" activities, and a vote on which movie to watch tonight: Shrek or Underworld! The movies offer laughs and/or thrills, and romance is guaranteed!
It all goes down in Buchanan B213 tonight (Friday, September 25) at 6pm! All are welcome! Be there! Don't miss it! The event of the season!
- Hunter
Friday, September 18, 2015
Non-SFS Events in Town: October 3 Swap Meet
I promised on this blog that I would keep you guys up to date on some cool stuff happening around town. Well, Saturday October 3 the Scottish Cultural Centre is hosting the Vancouver Pop Culture Collectibles Fair and Computer Swap Meet from 11am-4pm. This is a big nerdy swap meet featuring computer parts, comic books, collectible toys and figures, DVDs, CDs, vinyl, video games and more. And since it's in October, there will be a special, though not exclusive, focus on Halloween and horror themed items. Admission is $3 and there is free parking on site.
If anyone is interested, feel free to leave a comment here or on the Facebook page. Maybe we can get a group together.
- Hunter
Event link here: http://www.fun-promo.com/
Monday, September 14, 2015
The Year's First Delectable Double Feature
VP Hunter here again. On the very off chance that some of you are using this blog as your primary source of club news, be it known that the details of the movie night for this Friday, September 18, 2015 have been released! This week we'll be taking a trip into worlds of stunning fantasy with two movies with titles that start with the letter "S." Spirited Away is arguably the quintessential Studio Ghibli film, about a young girl transported into a strange world of ghosts and otherworldly spirits. Then we come crashing down to earth...uh, in a good way...with Stardust. It's a fun fantasy filled with romance, witches, and pirates, and if you haven't seen it, it comes highly recommended from yours truly. Meet us in Buchanan B213 at 5:30pm for a night of high adventure!
In other news, the SFS Office Hours have been sent to our mailing list and posted on the Facebook page. If you want to hang out with me specifically, you can catch me taking over the reins on Mondays from 2-4pm and Fridays from 2pm until the movie night starts. If you haven't checked out our club room yet, (Room 3206D in the Nest) I highly suggest you do. See our huge library, watch some Godzilla movies on VHS, play some Nintendo, or sit quietly and do some homework. The room is located within a larger common area, where you can hang out with our close friends at the Wargamers and Anime Club. Other geeky clubs, including the Mah Jong Club, UBC eSports, Magicians and Illusionists, and Origami Club also share this area! I'm sure it will become your home away from dorm on campus.
Keep your eyes on this blog and I'll type at you again soon.
- Hunter
Friday, September 11, 2015
New Year! New Events! New People!
Monday, January 5, 2015
Happy New Year and the Plan for the Future
Thursday, October 2, 2014
Monsters and Mayhem!
Good evening!
I hope everybody who came to the Icebreaker enjoyed themselves - I definitely did! Lots of interesting people and I had some great conversations - I really do hope you come back again, and that we didn't manage to scare you off.
This week, we will be back in Buchanan B215 at 5:30pm, kicking off the month of October by taking a (brief) retrospective through Monster Movies, with the theme of Unexplored Regions and the Creatures That Live There... So if you feel like engaging with some unknown beasties and taking a voyage to distant lands, then this is the night for you! (There will almost certainly be snark, never fear!)
Our first offering, starting about 6pm, will be the 1954 classic Creature from the Black Lagoon, starring Richard Carlson, Julia Adams, Richard Denning, Antonio Moreno and Whit Bissell. The Creature itself is played by Ben Chapman (on land) and Ricou Browning (underwater); I confess to not actually having seen this film, so I cannot shed any illumination on why this is so.
The film begins with a geology expedition in the Amazon uncovering a Devonian period fossil that suggests a link between land and sea animals. This fossil is a hand with webbed fingers, and as the leader of the expedition manages to gain funding and convince a bunch of other people to venture back into the jungle with him, it perhaps isn't a surprise that this turns out to be somewhat unfortunate...
As an aside (because I am incorrigible) while the Devonian is sometimes called 'The Age of Fishes' because of the huge diversification of fish that occurred, it was also a pretty good period for the diversification of other life - including the first tetrapods, which was good news for you and me, as these guys ended up the ancestors of all four-limbed animals today. While life was already terrestrial before the Devonian period, with arthropods and insects having made it to land previously, the Devonian was the period in which tetrapods evolved from lobe-limbed fishes and began to walk on land - so the film is not entirely incorrect right on that front!
One of the most famous fossils from this era is Tiktaalik (which also has a great name) which is a key link between land and sea tetrapods: it had a crocodile-like head, and strong front fins that are postulated to have been able to allow it to raise its head out of the shallow seas that covered a lot of the planet at the time. To prevent me getting too carried away with enthusiasm for fossils and palaeontology, let me just drop off this website all about Tiktaalik, for those of you you get excited by fossils: http://tiktaalik.uchicago.edu
And now back to the actual point.
There will be a 30-40 minute break between films in case people want to get food (alas, our budget does not stretch to providing food at all events) or talk, and then our second offering of the evening, and the one that will be particularly snarky, will be Man Beast, starring the Yeti! At least, I hope so. Made in 1956, on the human side it stars Rock Madison, Asa Maynor and George Skaff. The action begins when Connie Hayward mounts an expedition into the Himalayas to find her missing brother, who has not yet returned from his efforts to find the Yeti...
In other news, we are gearing up for our Treasure Hunt to be on Friday the 17th of October. It will be entirely on campus, and will be conducted in teams. After running around madly(ish) we will cap the night off with a movie. If you would be interested in participating in the Treasure Hunt, please do email sfssoco@gmail.com (replying to this email works) to let me know how much interest there is. More details will come at a later date!
I shall sign off by wishing everyone 'good luck!' with midterms, and I hope to see you soon,
Catriona
Your Friendly Neighbourhood SoCo