Ant-Boy

Cinema small Talk

by Christopher Geary and Stephen Lee

Made on a tiny budget by Toothpick Media and Pocket Money Productions, Ultimate Marvels cast little Tommy Cruise for a reduced fee in superhero flick Ant-Boy! We interview the Cruiser while he’s immersed in his new role.

What’s it like being under a movie director’s magnifying glass, again?

“It’s great. Awesome! I look up and wave. The director looks down at me and squints a lot. I beg him, like, not to shout at me.”

How do you get on with the film crew?

“I have to be careful when they’re busy. I don’t wanna get trampled on if they fail to see me. The sound guy keeps telling me to speak up while techies adjust matchstick–boom microphones - and when I say micro… I mean a really miniature audio pickup. It’s the littlest one they have. The cameras are actually microscopes, of course.”

Is your character half-ant, half-man, like the ‘Mant’ of Joe Dante’s movie Matinee?

“No! Nothing of that sort... I’m playing the smallest action hero, not a comedy cliché.”

Will you be doing all of your own stunts, as usual..?

“Oh, sure - I grew up on an ant-farm!” explains Tommy. “I’ve been riding them six-legged steeds and bronco bugs since I was knee-high to a grasshopper.”
     Since you were..?
“Well, you know - maybe I’ll be a growing boy, someday.”

As a big… oops, sorry! As a Hollywood star, do you have a trailer?

“No, I have a shoebox. It’s very roomy for me, though.”

So, your mini-superhero will be fighting the Human Centipede?

“Not the 'full sequence', no. Just the first version…”

Your costumes for the movie are made by Elves & Sons, right?

“They make all my outfits, actually. It’s hard to find a human tailor with perfect eyesight for threading nano-needles.”

Does Ant-Boy really have a secret base made of Junior Lego?

“Oh yeah, absolutely! All the models… I mean the sets, are customised for my height by the studio’s artists, you know.”

Matchbox’s bid to provide the cars fell short of your needs. What happened there, Tommy?

“Well the Mini coupes they made were simply too damn big for us so we shrunk the script and wrote those scenes out.”

Are there other villains or adversaries, and will there be any marketing areas to exploit?

“Bad boys, yes… I go up against the 'Ant Hill Mob', but the boys toys designed to cash-in on the movie were banned in case infants swallowed them. Scale is a difficult subject. I find it challenging after other movies where I am at altitude, and this little flick brings me down to earth.

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Thomas Jerome Newton - exclusive interview

The Scary Creep Who Fell To Earth

He was here way back then, he’s still here now.

The alien who fell to Earth, and stayed. So what

happened to THOMAS JEROME NEWTON since

DAVID BOWIE played him in the biopic

‘The Man Who Fell To Earth’?

At last, ANDREW DARLINGTON can reveal the truth

in this interview exclusive to ‘Fax 21’…

‘There are secrets and lies. Then there are bigger lies. There is reality, and there is truth. Then there are scary monsters and super-creeps.’ In a darkened room, temperature at low chill-level, he folds his angular frame neatly into Louis Quinze velveteen-upholstery with all the grace of a long-legged flamingo. Behind him, a wall of silent TV’s swarm collages of squirming movement in a low-level luminous glow that outlines him to black. This figure is unable to see the colour red. But he can see X-rays. His exotic air of androgyny and his near-transparent ‘snow-white tan’ combine to betray his alien origins. He was the nazz. Now he’s below the radar. But he’s still here.

‘Yes, I am Thomas Jerome Newton, the Thin White Duke. On good days, my life is tolerable. I live by the ocean, and watch its endless rhythms. It’s something I still find wonderful. All that water. The stuff we hoard and ration on drought-stricken Anthea. So much of it here. I walk the beach, 198cm-&-a-bit tall. But I have long thin fingers with no natural fingernails, which makes it awkward, it necessitates prosthetic implants like translucent coins. I can also blend in by wearing false nipples. But having four toes means no sandals, and some degree of concealment. And my retinal membranes conceal screwed-up feline-eyes. There are traces of accent I work to disguise, the tendency to enunciate too precisely, too formally. Then there’s the weight of this place. The pain in my gravity-sensitive joints and the bird-frail bones at the small of my back. Caused by gravitational pull on my own slight weight.’

He has the sickly appearance of a consumptive poet. Look into his eyes and they are blue, but no-one’s home. For his pensive gaze is detached from his surroundings. And it took a long convoluted search to track this Cracked Actor down. His visibility is deliberately negligible. As though he’d like to come and meet us, but he’s afraid of the consequences. On both parties. He works by stealth, learned by cruel experience. ‘They say you can never be too thin, or too rich. I’ve been both’ he comments softly, in hazily dismissive cosmic jive. ‘There’s this idea about a twenty-first century person thrown back in time to the Paleolithic, and revolutionising Cro-Magnon society into premature techno-geekery. Except of course, it wouldn’t work out that way. Far from churning out proto-versions of micro-waves, iPods and Blu-Rays he wouldn’t cut it with the most basic survival skills. Without a lighter he couldn’t even make man’s red fire. He can’t program the DVD timer without the manual anyway, never mind build one from bits of sharpened flints. Cro-Magnons might take pity on him and toss him the occasional bit of Mammoth, because he’d be lost without the gastro-Pubs where he usually grazes. It doesn’t work that way. It works this way. You adapt to your environment before you can begin adapting it. Same with me. I’m here. I’m the twenty-first century person thrown back into Cro-Magnon society. Washed up on the reefs of space. Like Icarus, the boy who fell from the sky. And it takes time. I began with existing technology. Rudimentary baby-step patents, such as self-developing photographic film. That’s the way it had to be. I couldn’t leap directly into digital because the infrastructure wasn’t there to support it. So instead I tweak TV antennae and transistors, cheap junk-trinkets to amaze the natives. Ten-thousand years of Anthean technology to draw on, but I had to introduce it gradually. Through my ‘World Enterprises Corporation’ conglomerates. But that takes time. And time inflicts other changes.’

‘Trouble is, you can adapt to your new environment a little too far, making it less easy to begin adapting it. I live among clever, devious apes. A man surrounded by animals long enough becomes more of an animal than he should. Have I ‘gone native’? There are moments I think that’s so. I had Earthling pets, lawyer Oliver V Farnsworth who first negotiated my entry into marketing, Betty-Jo Masher who – loving the alien, introduced me to the numbing intoxications of Beaujolais and Gordon’s gin. And fuel-technician Nathan Bryce who was smart enough to work out my extraterrestrial origins. They age. I don’t. How human have I become? I’m not human. But human enough. Where do I belong? I no longer know for sure.’

This Space Oddity sips from a glass of clear water. His biographer, Walter Tevis, attempted two novelisation of his story, with ‘The Man Who Fell To Earth’ in 1963, then revised in 1978. More high-profile there’s Nicholas Roeg’s movie-interpretation (March 1976) with the ‘starman’ who whirled the soul played by David Bowie, and the novel’s plain Betty-Jo prettied-up as Mary-Lou in the luscious guise of actress Candy Clark. There’s even an MGM-TV pilot by David Gerber (1987) featuring Lewis Smith, Will Wheaton and Robert Picardo. They all cover the same span of years from slightly altered perspectives, but they all end with Newton’s extraordinary-rendition ordeal at the hands of FBI & CIA government agents. Hitting an all-time low. Since then, there must have been changes? He gives little more than an enigmatic smile. ‘I now realise how much brutality lurks beneath the face of your liberal democracy. I’d been too trusting. Too open. In time, my eyes regenerated. Slowly, over a painful period. But they did regenerate. For years I assumed the guise of ‘John Dory’, a reclusive hermit. A man apart. A Greta Garbo, Howard Hughes, or a JD Salinger. Now, chastened, I find it’s more efficacious to operate through shadowy behind-the-scenes manoeuvres, using entrepreneur front-men. So ‘World Enterprises Corporation’ operates more covertly, through avatars. I’d come so far. Achieved so much. But I was impatient, so impatient for more. These smart-chimps are so slow. So mired in their social-inertia. So intent on looting, plundering and irresponsibly over-breeding Earth into premature-extinction. Not all humans are insane. But many of you are. Enough of you. It’s also become apparent that, within the political dialogue about asylum-seekers and illegal-alien migrants, that I’m far from alone in my unfortunate predicament. The ‘Men In Black’ movie (1997) and its sequels – for which I acted as adviser, played it as comedy. ‘Alien Nation’ (1988) treated it slightly more sympathetically. Now there’s NBC’s on-going ‘The Event’ with its aliens interned in a kind of Alaskan Guantanamo. But yes, there are other extraterrestrial scary monsters and super-creeps here with their own agendas, which sometimes conflict with my own. Sordid details following… at least one totalitarian dictator I know for certain is a Sirian shape-shifter. A devious secret clique of Kreggari pod-people engineered the financial credit-crunch meltdown for their own acquisitive motives. My objectives are more benevolent.

‘For me, stage two of my project began with searching out Steven Wozniak. As with Bryce, I intuited potential. He was a high school drop-out employed by Hewlett-Packard, dabbling in computer-design, but with guidance, with nudges and prompts he had potential to inch it further. Yes, he would suffice. My networking also turned up his high school buddy Steven Jobs. He was with Atari, another project I’d nursed into being with low-grade gadget-toys. Through one-to-one tutorials they became my fine-tuned tools. With me as the third corner, the invisible partner injecting fairly basic Anthean upgrades – user-friendly interface, windows, drag-and-drop file moveability, and plug-in-and-play compatibility, evolving into velocity-engine and simple 128-bit-wide architecture, we went hot-tech start-up April 1, 1976. A slow development curve for me, revolutionary for the newly wired-world I’m stranded in.’

Behind him the wall of silent TV’s blare their chaotic news-feeds from around our troubled globe. Can he be trusted, can the words of this strange Man-Insane be believed? ‘That my initial mission failed is a tragedy, for us all. Now, it might be too late. Together we might have saved the Earth. I’m closer now. Closer to the next phase that will prod this monstrous, beautiful, terrifying planet another paradigm step towards my objective. If only things hang together long enough for me to complete. That’s what I’m most unsettled about. I fear this is a race we might lose. It’s a race between time… and time-out.’ He waves his hand dismissively. A pale ghost now, ethereal. Obviously tired by the exertion. Signaling that he’s winding down. He’s talked so much. Time for just one more shot.

So why are you divulging this now? Why grant this interview after so lengthy a silence? ‘Why not? Who will believe it? No-one will accept that this is not a spoof contrived to amuse. That this is not the desperate fabrication of a hack with an Apple lap-top…’

BY ANDREW DARLINGTON

For the full Thomas Jerome-Newton back-story check out the helpful DVD review of The Man Who Fell To Earth on the excellent VideoVista website…

It's the End of the World as we know it (and I feel fine)

A Pop Song on the radio? The prediction of a

deranged prophet? Or a new condition pervading the

multiverse? A special report from the CERN Large

Hadron Collider by ‘FAX 21’ correspondent

ANDREW DARLINGTON

A strangely volatile atmosphere pervades the plush PR suite of the CERN Large Hadron Collider. The kind of hush the tabloid hacks usually refer to as ‘expectant’, as the assembled multi-platform representatives of global media gather in feeding-frenzy mode. In truth, they’re mostly technical correspondents from academic journals and dedicated sites, anticipating the long-awaited announcement. High-profile in their limited fields, their numbers are swelled by popularisers from the more mainstream titles hoping for a sexy angle. As they sip complimentary wine, monitors and wifi’s are given fine-tuning tweaks and the panoramic glassed-in walls overlook the tranquil Franco-Swiss border countryside, with a few high white clouds in the sharp still air as dusk falls over Geneva. The first stars just visible. In every way, it seems very much a normal evening. The tall bespectacled Dr Harold Camping of the facility’s theoretical physics discipline opens proceedings with the deceptively simple prepared statement that the most recent particle acceleration sequences have finally yielded evidence of the elusive Higgs Boson, with data-files recording the creation of the nano-particle – and the release of related phenomenon, a condition existing for a billionth-of-a-second, yet confirming the twelfth-dimensional quantum nature of Einstein’s final enigmatic equations, and the teasing enigma of the Mass of elementary particles.

Invited questions follow the rapturous reception of the news, as events take a stranger turn. From the display of eagerly raised hands Camping stabs the air with his pen to indicate Ms Persson of the ZEN website, perhaps expecting an easy ride. She stands, brandishes her iTablet, and asks ‘in the statement, you refer to the ‘release of related phenomenon’. What is the nature of these phenomena?’ Camping hurriedly confers with his colleagues. ‘Dealing with highly exotic particles there’s an integral element of indeterminacy. What occurred happened within the same billionth-of-a-second time-frame, but involved the creation of spontaneous bubbles of micro-singularities that nevertheless set up a ripple-cascade of consequences percolating across, and annihilating a series of parallel or alternate continuums.’ There was a pause of perhaps ten long seconds of perfect silence. Then a low hum of confused comment. Camping makes as if to move along to the next questioner. But Ms Persson persists, ‘would these alternate continuums have been inhabited, and if so, would they have been aware of what was happening to them?’ Camping squirms in his seat, obviously agitated. ‘We are entering highly conjectural terrain here. If I can hazard theoretical data I’d suggest yes, each parallel universe is both superimposed on, and separated from each other, by the slightest step apart, like layers of an onion. Certain individuals are more sensitive than others, it’s not impossible some may have picked up advance tremors of what was happening. In all likelihood they would fail to understand what they were sensing, and interpret it through some simple superstitious belief-system. Now perhaps we can move along to another questioner…?’

There’s a scuffle at the back of the hall. Camping carefully removes his spectacles, and cleans them with a precise circular motion. But attention continues to focus on the tall ZEN scribe. ‘Dr Camping, if these parallel continuums duplicate ours so exactly, how can we be sure they’re not also carrying out particle acceleration experiments that will leak over and annihilate our universe?’ ‘Ms Persson, we can’t be sure. In fact, this might already be the case, and even now we are existing in a highly attenuated echo-state, which will only continue to become yet more tenuous.’ ‘You mean, as in the movie ‘The Sixth Sense’, we’re all dead but don’t realise it yet?’ ‘To a lay-person, yes.’ ‘And what can we do to stop this happening?’ ‘We can’t. It’s already happened. The Higgs Boson data is time-coded 18:00hrs on 21st May 2011. So it’s already happened….’

There’s a strangely volatile atmosphere pervading the plush PR suite of the CERN Large Hadron Collider. Outside, the stars are winking out…

Slow death

Ponderous but mighty, the gigantic mutant spawn of that nuclear accident on the Galapagos Islands continue to wreck havoc across South America. As you know, the infamous Great Tortoise Invasion began in Ecuador, shortly after the crash of half a squadron of USAF atomic bombers in 1951 made an entire chain of Pacific islands uninhabitable. But when a batch of irradiated eggs hatched into gargantuan beasts, vast swathes of tropical territories in the southern hemisphere were overrun by a new species. 

Gigantortoise menace in 1950s

A veritable army of unstoppable semi-aquatic reptiles with heavily armoured shells and a penchant for carnivore feeding habits that soon overwhelmed their placid herbivore cousins, whilst breeding with giant sea turtles resulted in the population explosion which dominates the Caribbean and many regions of central and south America, today. Slow but deadly; these flightless gameras have bought a new reign of terror to citizens of every nation from Belize down to Paraguay.

Monsters are still a threat in 21st century

US military efforts to corral and contain the fierce creatures have intensified in recent years, but their conquests of Peru, Colombia, Bolivia and Venezuela, their occupation of central Brazil, and most of Argentina, and the bloodthirsty monsters’ increasingly frequent ‘surfing’ appearances along beaches of the Baja peninsula, alarms strategic authorities in Mexico and California.

4D Hits Cinemas!

As 3D hits the high streets and the digital airwaves, movie makers are moving with the times to add another dimension to the cinema going experience for those willing to make a drastic change to their look. A third eye made out of the revolutionary 4D Matter© uses quantum entanglement to allowing viewer to not just see the movie, but to see all the other movies that the film makers might have made if they hadn't been working on this particular movie.

Julie Designerjeans enjoys the inifnite alternative endings to the latest Harry Potter movie

“This really takes movies to the next level,” chronic early-adopter Julie Designerjeans told me after a screening of James Cameron's latest sci fi epic, Megalomania 2. “Oh, the movie was rubbish, but in another version of reality, the catering company was involved in this really terrific drama with Helen Mirren as a feisty, no-nonsense Queen and Christopher Lee as a wise-cracking robot. It was amazing, the best movie Cameron never made!”

The 4D technology works by wiring an extra eyeball that's been constructed entirely from exotic 4D Matter©, into the viewer's optic nerve. The process has been developed by high tech start up company, Godel-Escher-Bark Enterprises.

GEB's head of marketing, Jeorg Wensleslas explains: “4D Matter© picks up photons emitted by light sources excluded from our universe by quantum wave collapses. Every time Tom Cruise agrees to do a film, he has to turn down another film. In another universe, however, the decision went the other way, and he was in – say – Inglourious Basterds instead of Brad Pitt. Wouldn't you want to see that? Of course you would! Well now the 4D Matter© viewing system allows you to see all these movies at once!”

On the small matter of having a third eye implanted in one's forehead, Wensleslas is dismissive. “A public that can accept wearing those silly 3D glasses is surely ready for major brain surgery. It's not that big a step.”

Julie Designerjeans agrees. “It's quite a fad, and all the girls want to know about it! On the other hand, it does make choosing dinner a nuisance. I'm never quite sure what I'm going to get.”

So far, movie studios have been lukewarm on the idea, but legendary cult film director Geezer Weinberg has high hopes for the new technology. “Look, I don't even have to make a movie at all anymore. Just hire a bunch of nobodies sitting in an empty room for two hours and release it uncut. The audience get to the see the movie I might have made if I gave a crap. Let some schmuck in another universe go to all the trouble of actually making the movie!”

Interocitor

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Wow! That 3D looks great!

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Fresh Air Fares

FRESH AIR FARES

by Jake Elliot

Nearly 3 weeks ago several large vans sealed off a 5-mile quadrate of London as Trans-Parent Enterprises bought up the inaugural test package from the sell-off of the air. Commentators quickly labelled this the 'first puff' and watched with interest prior to the scheme being rolled out nationwide.

A number of high-level complaints and protests have expressed outrage, but considerable amounts have been spent in order to explain that introducing the free market into the atmosphere will lead to immeasurably better quality. We will all notice the improvement immediately.

Picture by Toby Fearnside

The new supply will not be free, but through a particular system of rebates and credit arrangements, nobody will be in actual danger of suffocation or even left short of breath. Furthermore, there will be the recently appointed Off-Air watchdog to safeguard our interests. As the Trans-Parent presentation document, Breathe With Us, assures, “competition ultimately benefits the consumer more than anyone.”

This hasn't ended the disquiet from both civil liberties campaigners and prominent environmentalists. The air-pressure group GASP (Get Air-Stealing Prohibited) has voiced continual claims about the legitimacy and practicality of the proposals. In an ill-tempered and explosive public meeting, supporters of the plans accused GASP of picking over theoretical arguments and living in a vacuum. They could always have a go themselves and distribute it through the network for free, an irate shareholder heckled.

Opposition has also been registered in some corporate sectors. London Underground dispute the results of a report that found air quality in their trains and stations so low they would be liable for substantial surcharges. Haulage firms have questioned whether they could face import duties on foreign air. Also, the scientific community have expressed doubts. Professor Miller of the Lagado Institute believes natural phenomena could jeopardise the scheme. “Rogue air currents could play havoc with the business plans,” he warns.

Already there have been a few glitches, which have been put down to teething troubles. Somehow, a few streets around Whitechapel were overlooked. A press release apologised very sincerely and the clear up was organised quickly and discreetly. Some older people, heavy smokers and asthmatics have also experienced difficulties. The rebates don't go far enough, they gasped. Off-Air pledged to investigate. Later, they agreed that the complaints procedure had responded too slowly; however, they said lessons have been learned through this regrettable incident.

There have also been a few instances of 'air-rustling' reported. In one case, police say thieves raided a building firm and stole canisters of oxygen used in welding. More recently, breathing apparatus was taken from a fire engine responding to a hoax call. Legislation is to be prepared to tackle unlicensed air, although civil servants are said to be struggling to exempt gardeners, farmers and groundskeepers.

Lately we were told that due to warm weather and traffic fumes supplies of marketable quality were running well below capacity. We may have to enforce regulations, the industry announced, as demand has become excessively high. It was thought some people were stocking up on air, just in case. The news caused panic and bated breath on the stock markets, and even a sell-off of stale reserves to Russian states failed to stabilise the share price. Today eyewitnesses reported seeing ventilation tents being erected and breathing equipment being tested.

Critical mass

A CRITICAL MASS by Dr Heinz Varieties

Genevapolis, Federal Europe

Tempers flared amongst elderly professors and intellectual pillars of the world’s scientific genius establishment at this week’s International Congress on Space Physics, where the main topic of heated discussion are some recently published findings by controversial American theorist, Karl Sageun, a balding Texan once shortlisted for the Noble prize when his book, 1001 Things You Didn’t Know About The Sun, revolutionised star development theory 10 years ago.

The central burning issue of this 25th conference, is the new paper by Sageun, giving the esoteric results of his five year experiment in an underground Ozark salt mine to detect the long-puzzling ‘missing mass’ - that cosmic material which scientists have claimed must exist, somewhere - and which even our galactic corner of the universe, must somewhere contain - if modern cosmology theories are correct. Sageun’s work may herald a major breakthrough in this quest, as his research appears to prove what was previously just a wild, and a few have said woolly, abstract theory.

Some have received the discovery of Sageun’s so-called ‘fancy matter’ (FM) with utter contempt, while others claim it is the divine word. Composed of energetic clouds of ultra subatomic soup scattered throughout our galactic local group, fancy matter is said to emit a fierce stream of “queerer than quark dust” particles, and has replaced the discredited theories about ‘dark matter’ as the physicist’s new grail.

“Really, we had all this fuss when ol’ Ray Davies caught his first neutrinos with a tank of cleaning fluid. Sure Karl’s results seem a mite freaky, but then, look at initial problems of cataloguing the weirdo quarks,” a supporter of Mr Sageun explained excitedly. The main detractor and lifelong rival of Sageun, Professor Pauline Coincidence, has noted on occasion that Sageun’s “absurd fancy matter” would be “unbound, even by superstrings” and “could not, therefore, exist or function… as he [Sageun] describes... except possibly in ectoplasmic form.”

The debate rages on, with neither side willing to concede a Planck length to the other, even when observers amongst my colleagues in the scientific press have reported - objectively of course - that both sides seem to be withholding crucial evidence in support of their respective claims. Highly problematical, is the sheer fantastical oddity of FM characteristics. With the curio-particles being dubbed ‘interstate’, ‘rustic’, ‘quizzical’, ‘condemnable’, ‘unctuous’, and the specially contentious ‘sacred’ – it’s small wonder that many scientifically learned folk are at a loss to understand and comprehend Sageun’s alleged, though as yet still veiled, proof positive... let alone non-physicists or the general public getting to rational grips with FM theory’s most obvious absurdities.

In layman’s terms, it appears Sageun has either breached the scienti-theologic divide and, as one wag puts it, “found god’s Lego bricks,” or he’s “playing a huge practical joke on us all, and deluding himself into the bargain, if he thinks his little scheme will work.” If Sageun is right, commented a pro-FM insider, “we’re in for the biggest shake up of cosmology since the 1990s, when they collected the first evidence of the Big Bang.”

Redrock

The Moon has already been conquered and Earth rock climbing is for wimps

If you have a head for heights and relish a challenge why not try...

It’s the great new sport for real macho men (and tough women).

Forget about Everest and the Alps...

Why bother with dusty craters in the airless lunar void?

Come to the red planet and scale the peaks!

Mars has mountains to dwarf the pitiful green hills of Earth.

Have you got what it takes to climb Mount Olympus?

Aim for the top of a new world now…

Call your local inter-planetary travel agency and ask for Redrock Tours.

SG-TC Gotham

Coming soon: to a holo-theatre near you!

Project: Spectrum

In the style of brilliant documentary Thunderbirds (about those secretive heroes from International Rescue), this new Americanised big-screen remake tackles a far grander story: interplanetary defence of the Earth against illegal visitations by alien terrorists. Not since War of the Worlds has there been such a terrifyingly outrageous tale of our ‘war of nerves’ against mysterious foes - reportedly so weird they are unknowable to human science.

With its operational HQ aboard the flying aircraft carrier dubbed ‘Cloud Base 9’, the planetary organisation officially known as ‘Spectrum’ is led by elite military veteran Colonel White (succeeding Colonel Straker, top star cop and Cold War spymaster of last century’s SHADO). Primary agents from Spectrum’s cadre of astronaut warriors include Captain Eddie Blue, and his partner - the reportedly ‘indestructible’ Captain Pete Scarlet, ultimate champion of Spectrum’s heroic defence strategy against outer zone mysterians. Not since the era of Quatermass, has Britain, and indeed the world, faced such implacable enemies from space. 

The mysterians (previously notorious as ‘mysterons’) are like psychic wizards with an almost supreme power over matter and energy, using alien technology which enables them (if that pronoun can be applied to what human scientists now suspect to be a hive mind) to regenerate living tissue from death, re-create wrecked machines, and any sabotaged devices, or specific objects of interest/ value, that have already been destroyed in spectacular explosions. Spectrum’s - and especially Scarlet’s - nemesis is the tortured soul of zombie maniac Captain Black (photo not available due to inter-world security concerns), who is represents the ultimate villainy of betrayal - once a Spectrum agent, identified as Conrad Turncoat, now a teleporting madman who will stop at nothing (“Nothing I tell you!”) to bring harm or doom and gloom to innocent lives of humankind. And there’s only Captain Scarlet, proving that one man can make a difference, with his famously bizarre ability of ‘retro-metabolism’ (which Dr Gold has so far failed to replicate in other Spectrum agents), to get in the mysterians’ way.

WHEN WHORLS COLLIDE

Leggy lovely Lieut. Green 

has parachute trouble…

Scarlet and Blue’s mission to save the world federation by thwarting each mystery ET plot, is performed with savvy and brio, with irregular but invaluable assistance from Lieutenant Green, plus various other Spectrum agents with codenames such as Grey, Beige, Amber, Magnolia, Pink, Khaki, Carrot, Ruby, Turquoise, Ivory, Sand, Crimson, Maroon, Pearl, Copper, Ultraviolet, Mint, Cyan, Vanilla, Slate, Lime, Mauve, android helpmates Chrome and Silver, and the unfortunate Yellow bastard. Impressionable or young fans and space cadets of Spectrum are warned never to copy the heroism of the organisation’s greatest asset: “Captain Scarlet is indestructible. You are not. Don’t try to imitate him.”

All-female ‘top guns’, former Angel interceptor pilots, Destiny, Symphony, Rhapsody, Melody, and Harmony, have since been promoted to the frontline of space defence on Moonbase Alpha - where they are deployed in tactical command of upgraded Lunar interceptors (older designs of the vehicles that Spectrum inherited from SHADO were deemed “too phallic” by women pilots), despite some criticism of the special initiative for its ‘affirmative action’ - resulting in rightwing political anger (prompted by notion of “chicks with nukes”), while lefty liberals directed their fury at Spectrum command for sanctioning the boosting to squadron status of these new-fangled orbital bombers. Meanwhile, back on Earth, the Charlie agency franchise has supplied new recruits as replacement Angels, always on standby, ready for immediate launch from Cloud Base 9 action stations, using codenames: Tragedy, Parody, Jeopardy, Veracity, and Apathy.

New pilots for Angel interceptors!

Spectrum is GO!

(With sincere apologies to sci-fi visionary Gerry Anderson, a singular genius architect of TV utopian futurism, and remarkable adventures in superb technocracy.)

All creatures...

All creatures, great or small…

Avoid confrontations with the infamous Giga-beasts of lore and yore, of course, but also beware of their many and various tiny cousins, which can infest your homes or workplaces, and wreck even greater domestic or industrial havoc than mischievous imps and gremlins.

 

Often mistaken for innocuous playthings, homunculi are very fast-breeding little monsters. They are vicious killers. They are destroyers of calm and order in all human affairs. They are receptacles for purest evil, eagerly providing a physical expression or predatory aspect for long–festering vengeance. As homunculi–phobia extends its clammy grip across Europe from Prague, all British citizens are being warned against ignoring the horrific threats from such insidious creepy-crawlies, which are genuinely alarming in their fierce proficiency for mayhem, and pose a more substantial menace to civilisation than any empire’s darth, or mythically hellish demon, you can name.

shredded wheat homonculus

Beware of the formidable shredded wheat homunculus at breakfast! These crispy spry critters are cereal killers that dodge your spoon, escape from bowls of milk, and can ruin your morning repast. Never, ever, try to eat three of these fibrous ghouls at one sitting. Watch out also for chocophile ‘pod–people’, especially the bubbly aero blob (genus: cocoa nestle series), which crushes all meaning from a TV aerobics workout. It appears to be sweet and edible, yet they are really calorie monsters that eke out a confectionary existence, while accelerating your sugar dependency to addiction via quasi-supernatural means.

aero blob

In the political sphere’s draughty corridors of power, a familiar Penfield homunculus has been spotted causing a ruckus amongst bean brains in UK.gov domains, wherein tactical counter-homunculus strategies are currently subject to parliamentary debate. Several unconfirmed reports of appalling new hybrids without any hubris include the dreadful hovisunculus. This particularly nasty brown loafer scatters breadcrumbs in its wake. The general public are cautioned to be very careful never to step barefoot in any messy crusty fragments - which may be poisonous on contact with bare skin, or follow its toxic trail of half–baked horrors to your mortal doom. 

  

Penfield homunculus makes havoc in HoP

Many of you will recall the grisly true story behind the ‘mannikins of horror’ segment of 1972’s docudrama known as Asylum, where Dr Byron is portrayed by Herbert Lom in the anthology of dark tales. It’s a further warning, should any be needed again, that Czech madmen locked up in British loony bins are particularly likely to create robotic homunculi for nefarious purposes!   

DemDaleks

FAX 21’s on-going coverage of Dalek utopia…

#2

Beeb announced further news TV-movie biopic about Democracy Of The Daleks, which sees British ‘actress’ Gemma Arterton (schooled at St Trinian’s; a former spy – codename: ‘Strawberry’, fresh from her Persian assignment), cast in key role of the hybrid dalek empress, who was the dethroned loser of internecine AI & ‘spare parts’ wars against a benevolent pure-machine intelligence, despite her cyber-enhancements (including android human features), and stealth dalek tech.

Dalek-utopia

'Supporting our victorious invasion troops on the machine conquest of England!' - InfoManiac A.I.

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