A friend of mine and I were talking one day, while filming the teaser for Spider (a short film based on my short story). She said “Our next movie should be about killer tampons.”

“Hell yes it should,” I said.

I was not serious.

But the more we discussed it, and the more I thought about it, the more it seemed like a great idea. I’d never written a screenplay before, and had no idea how to do it, but goddammit, the world needs this movie. What better way to test my comedic horror skills than by creating this piece of ridiculousness?

And so, while on a writers retreat, I wrote the entire screenplay. In three days. And you guys, it was one of the funnest things I’ve ever done. Writing a screenplay is all the best parts of writing a novel, with none of the boring tedious parts. It’s all action and dialogue! THAT’S ALL IT IS.

In my screenplay, titled Red Wings, a woman is bitten by a bat, and then discovers that...

The fun thing about science fiction and speculative fiction, is it’s great conversation fodder. After seeing the movie Upgrade, my husband and I now have an agreement. If I ever become quadriplegic, and a creepy guy comes into my hospital room and offers me an implant that will restore my bodily function, the answer is YES. What if the implant takes over my body and turns me into a killing machine? We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. What if the guy who implants the chip is super sketchy, and is using me for his own nefarious experiements? So? Get me the fuck out of this wheelchair. The answer is yes, always yes, no matter what, yes.

It probably doesn’t say much good about me that I’d rather be a pawn in an evil genius plot than a quadriplegic, but there it is. I’m not sorry.

But here’s the thing. If you have the technology and know-how to create something as advanced and miraculous as Stem, then you have the ability to safeguard it from abuse....

I am a huge fan of The Karate Kid. The romance, the fighting, the triumph of the underdog — it’s a move that has it all. However, like many movies from the 1980s, it has a problem — namely, the cartoonish, one-dimensional portrayal of its villain, Johnny. In the original movie, Johnny is dumb, brutal, and mean. Why is he mean? It doesn’t matter. He’s a jerk, and that’s all we need to know.

The new series from YouTube Red, Cobra Kai, follows the further exploits of Johnny - now an adult, and fleshes out his character in ways that are believable, well conceived, and fun to watch.

That’s not to say that Johnny is a hero in this show. He’s not. He’s a deadbeat dad, a heavy drinker, a low-key racist, and a general loser stuck in the 1980s. But neither is he the brutal bully from the 1984 movie. He’s...complicated.

Daniel Larusso is stuck in the 1980s too, but to much different effect. He is a successful business owner who uses his former karate glory days...

The concept of pairing works for more than just food and wine. While you can enjoy something individually, sometimes when you consume it with something else complementary it becomes so much better.

The same is true for entertainment. Sometimes when you mix and match a few different things, they bring something out in one another that allows you to enjoy them even more collectively than you would have individually.

With that in mind, I’d like to start you out today on Three Courses - with The Daleks.

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Exterminate! The iconic battle-cry of the Daleks has defined the race of aliens in good ways and in bad. To newer fans of Doctor Who, the Daleks are simply a race of beings who think themselves superior to all other forms of life in the universe, who also want to exterminate those other forms of life. That characterization isn’t wrong, but the culture of the Daleks is a little more nuanced than that. Unfortunately, the format of the current Doctor...

If there’s one undeniable thing about the DC “Extended Universe” movies thus far, it’s that the response has been pretty divisive. The series that launched with Man of Steel in 2013 is typically viewed as being darker than expected, which has been a turn-off for some fans. When it was announced that a Shazam! film was being woven into the DCEU tapestry, then, some people were concerned. Shazam, after all, is a historically bright character. The hero originally known as Captain Marvel (long story, if you don’t already know it, ask in the comments) is a young boy who, through use of a magic word, is transformed into a hero with power levels to rival Superman. Since the protagonist is, in fact, a child, stories of the Marvel family have often taken a lighter tone than their contemporaries, and there was concern that this wouldn’t work within the context of the world that has been established.

Then, this week, we got the first poster for the film, and frankly, it’s exactly...