Subject to change, of course. (Why yes, I am sitting around in a hotel room [possibly in my underpants because I forgot to pack pajamas] and catching up on all the shit I should have been doing for the last month. Why do you ask?)
Saturday
- 16:30 – 18:00 – Just Three Cornettos
- The Simon Pegg/Nick Frost/Edgar Wright “Cornetto trilogy” concluded last year with The World’s End, following Sean of the Dead and Hot Fuzz. What is the trilogy’s place in British SF? The panel will discuss why the films’ endings are so unconventional, what the trilogy had to say about topics such as society and consumerism, masculinity and maturity, and the British landscape … And they’ll decide which fence gag is best.
Monday
- 10:00 – 11:00 – Mythology and Folklore in Anime
- Fantastical anime often have mythical or folkloric entities at their core, Japanese or otherwise: the demons of Inu Yasha, the many retellings of Journey to the West, the dragons of Spirited Away. Which tropes and stories seem to crop up most often? Which creators are most creative in their use of mythological and folkloric elements?
- 13:30 – 15:00 – Tapped Out – from Magic to Netrunner
- Discussing some of the best things about card games, past and present!
- 15:00 – 16:30 – The Scientific Culture
- Is there a scientific culture? The success of The Big Bang Theory, XKCD and PhD Comics suggest that there is, but if so, what is scientific culture? What values and attitudes can there be in common between fields as diverse as biology and cosmology? What experiences and views are shared by scientists across such disparate fields, and why are they different from the experience and views of non-scientists? Is this important, and should SF writers and fans be taking notes?