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Can anyone recommend a good streaming #scifi series that's not too weird and not too violent?
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Reading through books from the "More Reading" list on the #Traveller wiki.
Current book is The Cosmic Computer by H. Beam Piper. I'm just short of halfway through it. I'm really enjoying it, except for where the fact that it's from the early 1960s comes screaming to the foreground with things "but we can't expect the women folk to use logic." Otherwise loving the plot about trying to use an almost religious devotion to a falsity to motivate a community to improve
8. Howard Waldrop’s “Mary Margaret Road-Grader” (1976). After the “Highway wars,” Native American groups within North-Eastern Texas are on the ascent. At the annual Sun Dance and Big Tractor Pull, the Fossil Creek people gather for masculine demonstrations of honor and strength. But something seems different this year. https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2024/01/28/short-story-reviews-howard-waldrops-mary-margaret-road-grader-1976-david-j-skals-chains-1971-and-tom-purdoms-courting-time-1966/
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7. Clifford D. Simak’s “Conditions of Employment” (1960) operates on the premise that space travel places inhuman stress on the worker: intense work hours, sleep deprivation, the terror that a slight mistake would spell death, tension and psychical discomfort, and the existential “dead, black fear of space itself.” https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2024/07/11/short-story-reviews-clifford-d-simaks-conditions-of-employment-1960-retrograde-evolution-1953-and-youll-never-go-home-again-variant-title-beachhead-1951/
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#17. Clifford D. Simak’s “Full Cycle” (1955). Due to fears of nuclear war, industry moves into the countryside. Workers join moveable trailer camp unions that can strike at will. Fragments of humanity's potential appear. https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2024/02/10/book-review-clifford-d-simaks-worlds-without-end-1964/
#9. Robert Abernathy’s “Single Combat” (1955). A nameless man, in a nameless city, plants a bomb in a basement. The city, cloaked with a heady dystopian gloom of racial violence and pollution, attempts to prevent his desperate escape. https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2024/06/02/short-story-review-robert-abernathys-single-combat-1955/
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8. Howard Waldrop’s “Mary Margaret Road-Grader” (1976). After the “Highway wars,” Native American groups within North-Eastern Texas are on the ascent. At the annual Sun Dance and Big Tractor Pull, the Fossil Creek people gather for masculine demonstrations of honor and strength. But something seems different this year. https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2024/01/28/short-story-reviews-howard-waldrops-mary-margaret-road-grader-1976-david-j-skals-chains-1971-and-tom-purdoms-courting-time-1966/
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# 16. Clifford D. Simak’s “You’ll Never Go Home Again!” (variant title: “Beachhead”) (1951). This bleak nightmare follows a seemingly routine expedition of the Human Planetary Survey Party to establish a bridgehead on an alien planet. https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2024/07/11/short-story-reviews-clifford-d-simaks-conditions-of-employment-1960-retrograde-evolution-1953-and-youll-never-go-home-again-variant-title-beachhead-1951/
#scifi #sciencefiction
#scifi #sciencefiction
10. Fred Saberhagen”s “Birthdays” (1976),. Bart, fourteen years old, awakes alone on a colony ship. The nature of the Ship isn’t entirely clear as Bart’s memories have been carefully edited. His task? Serve as the sole human parent to a squalling group of babies. https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2024/05/04/generation-ship-short-story-review-fred-saberhagens-birthdays-1976/
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#9. Robert Abernathy’s “Single Combat” (1955). A nameless man, in a nameless city, plants a bomb in a basement. The city, cloaked with a heady dystopian gloom of racial violence and pollution, attempts to prevent his desperate escape. https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2024/06/02/short-story-review-robert-abernathys-single-combat-1955/
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15. Felix C. Gotschalk’s “The Day of the Big Test” (1976). A jarring and jumbling jaunt through a future mindscape conveyed via inundating linguistic displays, strange implanted tech, and subvocal communication. https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2025/01/01/book-review-future-power-ed-jack-dann-and-gardner-dozois-1976-ursula-k-le-guin-damon-knight-james-tiptree-jr-gene-wolfe-etc/
#11. Lisa Tuttle’s “Stone Circle” (1976). As the forces of fascism transform a near-future America, a nameless female narrator attempts to find meaning in the ashes. https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2024/09/08/short-story-reviews-lisa-tuttles-the-stone-circle-1976-and-grania-davis-new-way-groovers-stew-1976/
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10. Fred Saberhagen”s “Birthdays” (1976),. Bart, fourteen years old, awakes alone on a colony ship. The nature of the Ship isn’t entirely clear as Bart’s memories have been carefully edited. His task? Serve as the sole human parent to a squalling group of babies. https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2024/05/04/generation-ship-short-story-review-fred-saberhagens-birthdays-1976/
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#14. Alice Eleanor Jones’ “Recruiting Officer” (1955) follows a shape-shifting entity on her recruit-collecting rounds. She takes the appearance of a grandmotherly woman named Mrs. Quimby. In her convertible, she preys on nubile young men. https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2024/03/09/short-fiction-reviews-alice-eleanor-jones-life-incorporated-1955-miss-quarto-1955-and-recruiting-officer-1955/
#12. Clifford D. Simak’s “City” (1944). Cheap transportation technology gives humanity the opportunity to flee the cities for acred estates in the countryside. Effectively establishes the rest of the memorable series compiled in City (1952). https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2024/08/18/short-story-reviews-clifford-d-simaks-city-1944-ogre-1944-and-spaceship-in-a-flask-1941/
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#11. Lisa Tuttle’s “Stone Circle” (1976). As the forces of fascism transform a near-future America, a nameless female narrator attempts to find meaning in the ashes. https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2024/09/08/short-story-reviews-lisa-tuttles-the-stone-circle-1976-and-grania-davis-new-way-groovers-stew-1976/
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#13. Clifford D. Simak’s “New Folks’ Home” (1963) ruminates on age and memory and the possibility of a new path as death approaches. Frederick Gray, a retired professor, heads off on a fishing trip he used to take with his good friend Ben Lovell. He encounters a new building near a nostalgic spot. What is inside? https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2024/10/26/book-review-best-science-fiction-stories-of-clifford-d-simak-clifford-d-simak-1967/
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#12. Clifford D. Simak’s “City” (1944). Cheap transportation technology gives humanity the opportunity to flee the cities for acred estates in the countryside. Effectively establishes the rest of the memorable series compiled in City (1952). https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2024/08/18/short-story-reviews-clifford-d-simaks-city-1944-ogre-1944-and-spaceship-in-a-flask-1941/
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Short Fiction Reviews: Philip K. Dick’s “Explorers We” (1959) and James Tiptree, Jr.’s “Painwise” (1972) https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2025/01/18/short-fiction-reviews-philip-k-dicks-explorers-we-1959-and-james-tiptree-jr-s-painwise-1972/
Burt Tanner’s cover illustrating “Painwise” for The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, ed. Edward L. Ferman (February 1972). Illustrates the Tiptree story I cover in the review. In the bottom right there's an explorer in his scout ship about to go down to the alien surface. He's visibly decaying.
Ed Emshwiller’s cover for The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, ed. Robert P. Mills (January 1959). Illustrates Leiber's The Silver Eggheads. A hand squeezes a dropper into a metal container holding a brain. There are also other scenes behind it -- a pile of metal, people fighting in the distance, etc.
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Memory fails me. Time for wisdom of crowds.
What is this #scifi book/series from the 70's or early 80's?
▪ human ship encounters alien ship, which ejects its occupants in fear upon detection
▪ humans zoom in on ejected aliens, find they are different sizes, morphologies, two thumbs in each hand.
▪ turns out they're rather teddybear-looking, & with sharp teeth, I think.
▪ books deal with two alien races being puzzled and learning about one another ...
Edit: see title in thread! \o/
#bookstodon
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Roku just made me feel super old #scifi #theexpanse
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I know I sound like a broken record, but buy the physical media versions of the movies and shows you love NOW.
#SciFi #Streaming#Television
#SciFi #Streaming#Television
Hurry! This amazing sci-fi series is about to leave Prime Video | What to Watch
https://www.whattowatch.com/news/hurry-one-of-the-best-sci-fi-series-of-all-time-is-about-to-leave-the-streaming-service-that-made-it