After a couple of months’ hiatus, the monthly geekgasm feature returns with four different Star Trek series, animated X-Men, lots of Lovecraft, the acclaimed, oddball horror flick Rubber, Mad Men, and hopefully the premiere of the previously announced The Final Programme. With both The Last Airbender and Skyline debuting on Netflix, July 16 shall forever be known as Crappy Sci-Fi Streaming Day.

* denotes streaming for the first time via Netflix.
* denotes streamng in HD

Premiering July 1:

18 Again
*1984
All Dogs Go to Heaven
Ancient Mysteries: Astrology
Ancient Mysteries: Bigfoot
Ancient Mysteries: Dragons
Ancient Mysteries: The Fountain of Youth
Ancient Mysteries: UFOs
Ancient Mysteries: Witches
Betty Boop: The Queen of Cartoons
Blessed (2004)
*Brain Dead (2007)
*The Broken
*Charmed Seasons 1-8
Crazy as Hell
*Crazy Eights
Dahmer
*Doctor Who and the Daleks
*Dracula A.D. 1972
Dragnet
*The Exorcist
*The Final Programme
Foxy Brown
The Fly (1958)
The Fly 2
*Glenn: The Flying Robot
*Godkiller
*Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack
History’s Mysteries: Roswell
History’s Mysteries: Secret Societies
In Search of History: The Knights Templar
*Let Me In (2010)
*Lewis Black: Stark Raving Black
*Link (1986)
*Lovecraft: Fear of the Unknown
*Lust for a Vampire
Man’s Best Friend(1993)
Memento
Mimic 3: Sentinel
*Night of the Comet
Nightmare Man (2006)
No Country for Old Men
The Pit and the Pendulum (1961)
Nostradamus: Prophet of Doom
The Omega Men
*One Touch of Venus
Osmosis Jones
*Pelt
*Perkins’ 14
Retrograde
*Rubber (2010)
Santa Claus Conquers the Martians
*Scars of Dracula
Seventeen Again
*Spy Kids
*Star Trek Seasons 1-3
*Star Trek: Enterprise Seasons 1-4
*Star Trek: The Next Generation Seasons 1-7
*Star Trek: Voyager Seasons 1-7
Street Fighter
*Superfly
*Tarzan, the Ape Man
*The Tomb (2006)
Tooth and Nail
True Stories
*The Tudors Season 3
Video Games: Behind the Fun
*Vince Vaughn’s Wild West Comedy Show
Warlock: The Armageddon
*When a Killer Calls
*The World of Drunken Master
*X-Men Seasons 1-5
*X-Men: Evolution Seasons 1-3

Premiering July 12:

Kung Fu Magoo

Premiering July 15:

*The Last Lovecraft: Relic of Cthulhu

Premiering July 16:

The Last Airbender
*Skyline

Premiering July 17:

Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home
*Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (All this new Star Trek and they choose to show this one in HD?!?!)

Premiering July 22:

*Birdemic: Shock and Terror

Premiering July 27:

*Mad Men Seasons 1-4

Info courtesy of FeedFliks.

Realizing that most average (the non-super geek unlike those that frequent RevSF and this very blog) film goer has no idea that not only will the forthcoming, much hyped Captain America: The First Avenger not be the first Cap movie but actually the fourth such attempt, I decided to compile a history of these largely forgotten films. Luckily, the mainstream film site Moving Pictures gladly hosted my endeavor.

Beyond just discussing the films, I established some of the sociopolitical realities around Cap’s original publication.

These excerpts are just a drop in the proverbial bucket to the kinds of info in the piece. Be sure to check it all out Moving Pictures. Perhaps even the super geeky can learn a thing or two.

Let’s take a quick look to see what’s arrived at the Geek Compound.

The Black Lung Captain
by Chris Wooding

Promo copy:

Chris Wooding, author of the thrilling novel Retribution Falls, returns to a fantastical world of spectacular sky battles and high-flying heroics for another epic adventure.

Deep in the heart of the Kurg rainforest lies a long-forgotten wreck. On board, behind a magically protected door, an elusive treasure awaits. Good thing Darian Frey, captain of the airship Ketty Jay, has the daemonist Crake on board. Crake is their best chance of getting that door open—if they can sober him up. For a prize this enticing, Frey is willing to brave the legendary monsters of the forbidding island and to ally himself with a partner who’s even less trustworthy than he is.

But what’s behind that door is not what any of the fortune hunters expect, any more than they anticipate their fiercest competitor for the treasure—a woman from Frey’s past who also happens to be the most feared pirate in the skies.

Earp: Saints for Sinners Issue 4
Created by: Matt Cirulnick and David Manpearl
Story by: Matt Cirulnick
Written by: M. Zachary Sherman
Illustrated by: Colin Lorimer
Cover by: Alex Maleev

Promo copy:

After the Pinkertons destroy the A.O.K., murder his brother, and kidnap his love, Wyatt Earp, furious and seeking vengeance, finally decides to rejoin the fray and bring old-fashioned justice back to Sin City. However, he’s not going to do it alone. Aided by his old partner, Doc Holliday, along with Jesse James and his gang of outlaws, newly-reappointed U.S. Marshal Wyatt Earp sets out on a mission to take down Mayor Flynn and the Pinkertons, bring bloody justice to those who deserve it and ultimately rid Las Vegas of the corrupt powers that have reigned over it for so long.

The Traitor’s Daughter
by Paula Brandon

Promo copy:

Here’s the beginning of a lush, epic, wholly original new trilogy that shines with magic, mystery, and captivating drama.

On the Veiled Isles, ominous signs are apparent to those with the talent to read them. The polarity of magic is wavering at its source, heralding a vast upheaval poised to alter the very balance of nature. Blissfully unaware of the cataclysmic events to come, Jianna Belandor, the beautiful, privileged daughter of a powerful Faerlonnish overlord, has only one concern: the journey to meet her prospective husband. But revolution is stirring as her own conquered people rise up against their oppressors, and Jianna is kidnapped and held captive at a rebel stronghold, insurance against what are perceived as her father’s crimes.

The resistance movement opens Jianna’s eyes―and her heart. Despite her belief in her father’s innocence, she is fascinated by the bold and charming nomadic physician and rebel sympathizer, Falaste Rione—who offers Jianna her only sanctuary in a cold and calculating web of intrigue. As plague and chaos grip the land, Jianna is pushed to the limits of her courage and resourcefulness, while virulent enemies discover that alliance is their only hope to save the human race.

Miral

Promo copy:

From Academy Award® nominated director Julian Schnabel (The Diving Bell and the Butterfly), and based on the acclaimed semi-autobiographical novel, Miral is the story of a Palestinian girl coming of age amidst the war zone of the Israeli-Arab conflict — unflinchingly told through the perspective of Miral (Freida Pinto, Slumdog Millionaire) herself. Following the death of her troubled mother, Miral’s father (Alexander Siddig) is forced to entrust her to the orphanage of Hind Husseini (Hiam Abbass), a woman whose commitment to peace through education has a profound impact on the maturing young woman as her epic journey to self-esteem and social consciousness proves both harrowing and hopeful. Also starring Willem Dafoe and Vanessa Redgrave.

Over at Moving Pictures, I reviewed this summer’s answer to District 9, Moon, and Monsters.

Check out the rest of my review at Moving Pictures.

Let’s take a quick look to see what’s arrived at the Geek Compound.

Raising Stony Mayhall
by Daryl Gregory

Promo copy:

From award-winning author Daryl Gregory, whom Library Journal called “[a] bright new voice of the twenty-first century,” comes a new breed of zombie novel—a surprisingly funny, vividly frightening, and ultimately deeply moving story of self-discovery and family love.

In 1968, after the first zombie outbreak, Wanda Mayhall and her three young daughters discover the body of a teenage mother during a snowstorm. Wrapped in the woman’s arms is a baby, stone-cold, not breathing, and without a pulse. But then his eyes open and look up at Wanda—and he begins to move.

The family hides the child—whom they name Stony—rather than turn him over to authorities that would destroy him. Against all scientific reason, the undead boy begins to grow. For years his adoptive mother and sisters manage to keep his existence a secret—until one terrifying night when Stony is forced to run and he learns that he is not the only living dead boy left in the world.

A new Daryl Gregory is always a good thing, even if it is yet another novel in the overcrowded zombie subgenre.

Hammered: The Iron Druid Chronicles
by Kevin Hearne
Cover by Gene Mollica

Promo copy:

Thor, the Norse god of thunder, is worse than a blowhard and a bully—he’s ruined countless lives and killed scores of innocents. After centuries, Viking vampire Leif Helgarson is ready to get his vengeance, and he’s asked his friend Atticus O’Sullivan, the last of the Druids, to help take down this Norse nightmare.

One survival strategy has worked for Atticus for more than two thousand years: stay away from the guy with the lightning bolts. But things are heating up in Atticus’s home base of Tempe, Arizona. There’s a vampire turf war brewing, and Russian demon hunters who call themselves the Hammers of God are running rampant. Despite multiple warnings and portents of dire consequences, Atticus and Leif journey to the Norse plain of Asgard, where they team up with a werewolf, a sorcerer, and an army of frost giants for an epic showdown against vicious Valkyries, angry gods, and the hammer-wielding Thunder Thug himself.

Star Wars: Choices of One
by Timothy Zahn
Cover by John Van Fleet

Promo copy:

From #1 New York Times bestselling author Timothy Zahn comes a brand-new Star Wars adventure, set in the time between A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back and featuring the young Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, Princess Leia Organa, and the beloved Mara Jade.

The fate of the Rebellion rests on Luke Skywalker’s next move.

But have the rebels entered a safe harbor or a death trap?

Eight months after the Battle of Yavin, the Rebellion is in desperate need of a new base. So when Governor Ferrouz of Candoras Sector proposes an alliance, offering the Rebels sanctuary in return for protection against the alien warlord Nuso Esva, Luke, Leia, Han, and Chewie are sent to evaluate the deal.

Mara Jade, the Emperor’s Hand, is also heading for Candoras, along with the five renegade stormtroopers known as the Hand of Judgment. Their mission: to punish Ferrouz’s treason and smash the Rebels for good.

But in this treacherous game of betrayals within betrayals, a wild card is waiting to be played.

Dragon’s Time
by Anne McCaffrey and Todd McCaffrey
Cover by Les Edwards

Promo copy:

For the first time in more than three years, bestselling authors Anne McCaffrey and Todd McCaffrey, mother and son, have teamed up again to do what they do best: add a fresh chapter to the most beloved science fiction series of all time, the Dragonriders of Pern.

Even though Lorana cured the plague that was killing the dragons of Pern, sacrificing her queen dragon in the process, the effects of the disease were so devastating that there are no longer enough dragons available to fight the fall of deadly Thread. And as the situation grows more dire, a pregnant Lorana decides that she must take drastic steps in the quest for help.

Meanwhile, back at Telgar Weyr, Weyrwoman Fiona, herself pregnant, and the harper Kindan must somehow keep morale from fading altogether in the face of the steadily mounting losses of dragons and their riders. But time weighs heavily against them—until Lorana finds a way to use time itself in their favor.

It’s a plan fraught with risk, however. For attempting time travel means tampering with the natural laws of the universe, which could drastically alter history—and destiny—forever. Or so it has always been thought. But Lorana discovers that if the laws of time can’t be broken without consequences, it may still be possible to bend them. To ensure the future of Pern, she’s willing to take the fateful chance—even if it demands another, even greater, sacrifice.

The new fascinating book concept from the fertile imagination of Jeff VanderMeer, creator of modern classics City of Saints and Madmen, Shriek: An Afterword, and Finch and the front man (often abetted by his wife Anne, Hugo award-winning editor of Weird Tales) for the groundbreaking anthologies The Steampunk Bible, Steampunk, The New Weird, and The Thackery T. Lambshead Pocket Guide to Eccentric & Discredited Diseases

This time VanderMeer is looking for some help.

In case you missed the link within the quote, go here to register your nomination. You could tell them Rick sent ya, but I doubt it’ll matter much.

Let’s take a quick look to see what’s arrived at the Geek Compound.

Godzilla Kaiju World Wars
Game Designed by Richard H. Berg
Cover by Ron Spencer with Zac Pensol and Chris Quilliams

Promo copy:

It’s an all-out brawl of monstrous proportions and Earth is the battlefield! The Xiliens have pitted Godzilla, Rodan, Gigan and King Ghidorah against each other in a catastrophic battle and only one monster will emerge victorious!

In Godzilla: Kaiju World Wars, players pick a monster and a scenario, stomping over terrain and destroying buildings on their warpath – all while fending off aggressive military attacks, bombs, traps and, of course, other KAIJU! Special abilities are used to eliminate the competition or to tuck their tail between their legs and run away before they are taken out.

The game is jam-packed with pieces sure to please any gamer. Along with the four fully painted 2 3/8 inch plastic Kaiju figurines, the game also includes 90 stackable plastic tiles for building skyscrapers, four individual monster playmats, 86 terrain and power tokens, and much more. You’ve never had so much fun ravaging the world as you will when you play GODZILLA: KAIJU WORLD WARS!

I’ve played several times and after deciphering the poorly written rules, I have enjoyed it. More detailed review forthcoming.

Let’s take a quick look to see what’s arrived at the Geek Compound.

Like a Sniper Lining Up His Shot
Adapted by Jacques Tardi
From the novel by Jean-Patrick Manchette

Promo copy:

The Tardi/Manchette team of West Coast Blues reunites for another brutal neo-noir classic.

Like many of the greatest noir thrillers, Like a Sniper Lining Up His Shot begins with a classic, even clichéd set-up: Martin Terrier, the hired killer, needs just one more big job so that he can turn in his guns, return to his native village to find and marry his childhood sweetheart, and retire.

But nothing goes as expected, his “last job” turns out to be a set-up that results in a bloody shoot-out from which Terrier barely escapes with his life, and soon he’s on the run from not only the authorities and his treacherous ex-bosses but also the members of a crime syndicate still seeking revenge for an earlier hit on one of theirs. (We won’t even mention what they do to his cat.)

With Like a Sniper Lining Up His Shot, Tardi, at the top of his form, once again puts his lushly efficient neo-clear-line style in the service of Manchette’s gleefully brisk prose for a spectacularly dark, violent and fast-paced crime thriller that will delight fans of their previous collaboration, West Coast Blues.

(NOTE: Manchette’s original 1981 novel, La Position du tireur couché, was released in English under the title The Prone Gunman by City Lights in 2001.)

Ever since Fantagraphics began reprinting Tardi’s works, I’ve become a HUGE fan! I devoted an entire "Nexus Graphica" to the extraordinary artist and reviewed his first collaboration with Manchette, West Coast Blues.

Blood Work
by Kim Harrison
Art by Pedro Maia and Gemma Magno

Promo copy:

When Ivy met Rachel, the result wasn’t exactly love at first sight. Sparks flew as the living vampire and the stubborn witch learned what it meant to be partners. Now Kim Harrison, the acclaimed author of Pale Demon and Black Magic Sanction, turns back the clock to tell the tale—in an original full-color graphic novel.

Hot-as-hell, tough-as-nails detective Ivy Tamwood has been demoted from homicide down to lowly street-crime detail. As if rousting trolls and policing pixies instead of catching killers wasn’t bad enough, she’s also been saddled with a newbie partner who’s an earth witch. It’s enough to make any living vampire bare her fangs. But when a coven of murderous witches begins preying on werewolves, Rachel Morgan quickly proves she’s a good witch who knows how to be a badass.

Together, Ivy and Rachel hit the mean streets to deal swift justice to the evil element among Cincinnati’s supernatural set. But there’s more to their partnership than they realize—and more blood and black magic in their future than they bargained for.

Krazy Kat & the Art of George Herriman: A Celebration
Edited and designed by Craig Yoe

Promo copy:

Krazy Kat & the Art of George Herriman is a tribute to one of the most influential and innovative comic strips and creators of all time. This unique collection of rare art, essays, memorabilia, and biography highlights the career of the first genius of comics, George Herriman, and his iconic creations, Krazy Kat and Ignatz Mouse.

During its 31-year run, Krazy Kat was enormously popular with the public, as well as influential writers, artists, and intellectuals of the time. This book includes original essays by Jay Cantor, Douglas Wolk, Harry Katz, Richard Thompson, Dee Cox (Herriman’s granddaughter), Craig McCracken, Bill Watterson, and authorized reprints of two seminal essays on Herriman by Gilbert Seldes and E. E. Cummings, alongside newly discovered vintage essays by TAD, Summerfield Baldwin, and Toots Herriman. With Krazy Kat & the Art of George Herriman, Craig Yoe reveals this influential artist and writer for a whole new generation.

Let’s take a quick look to see what’s arrived at the Geek Compound.

The Sacred Band
by David Anthony Durham

Promo copy:

With the first two books in the Acacia Trilogy, Acacia and The Other Lands, David Anthony Durham has created a vast and engrossing canvas of a world in turmoil, where the surviving children of a royal dynasty are on a quest to realize their fates—and perhaps right ancient wrongs once and for all. As The Sacred Band begins, one of them, Queen Corinn, bestrides the world as a result of her mastery of spells found in the ancient Book of Elenet. Her younger brother, Dariel, has been sent on a perilous mis­sion to the Other Lands, while her sister, Mena, travels to the far north to confront an invasion of the feared race of the Auldek. Their separate trajectories will converge in a series of world-shaping, earth-shattering battles, all ren­dered with vividly imagined detail and in heroic scale.

David Anthony Durham concludes his tale of kingdoms in collision in an exciting fashion. His fictional world is at once realistic and fantastic, informed with an eloquent and dis­tinctively Shakespearean sensibility.

I interviewed Durham when Volume 1 came out. RevSF’s resident book goddess Peggy Hailey called Acacia "a huge, sprawling epic that manages to weave together history, politics, intrigue and thunderous action scenes without ever losing track of the multitudes of finely-drawn characters."

Shadow’s Lure
by Jon Sprunk
Cover by Michael Komarck

Promo copy:

The unforgiving Northlands . . .

In Othir, he was at the top of the food chain—an assassin beyond compare, a dark shadow in the night. But Caim left that life behind when he helped an empress claim her throne. And now his past has come calling again.

Searching for the truth behind the murder and disappearance of his parents, Caim discovers a land in thrall to the Shadow. Haunted by temptations from the Other Side, he becomes mired in a war he does not want to fight.

But there are some things a son of the Shadow cannot ignore, and some fights from which he can’t run. In this battle, all of Caim’s strength and skill won’t be enough.

For none can resist the Shadow’s Lure.

Blood Secrets (Alexandra Sabian, Book 2)
by Jeannie Holmes
Cover by Kris Keller

Promo copy:

WHEN ALEXANDRA SABIAN SINKS HER TEETH INTO AN INVESTIGATION, SHE DOESN’T LET GO.

Alex allowed a case involving murdered vamps to get personal and is suspended from the Federal Bureau of Preternatural Investigation. Now she’s facing an official inquiry but has a chance to redeem herself. The catch: She must once again work with Varik Baudelaire, her former mentor and ex-fiancé, as he spearheads a search for a missing college student. But Varik has been keeping secrets from Alex, and his mysterious past is on a collision course with his present.

When Alex and Varik discover a carefully handcrafted doll at a crime scene, neither of them can see how close the danger really is or that a killer known as the Dollmaker has made Alex the object of his horrific desire. Now the only way out of the Dollmaker’s lair is through the twilight realm of the Shadowlands, where all secrets—for better or worse—will be revealed.

Part II

Let’s take a quick look to see what’s arrived at the Geek Compound.

Low Town
by Daniel Polansky

Promo copy

Drug dealers, hustlers, brothels, dirty politics, corrupt cops . . . and sorcery. Welcome to Low Town.

In the forgotten back alleys and flophouses that lie in the shadows of Rigus, the finest city of the Thirteen Lands, you will find Low Town. It is an ugly place, and its cham­pion is an ugly man. Disgraced intelligence agent. Forgotten war hero. Independent drug dealer. After a fall from grace five years ago, a man known as the Warden leads a life of crime, addicted to cheap violence and expensive drugs. Every day is a constant hustle to find new customers and protect his turf from low-life competition like Tancred the Harelip and Ling Chi, the enigmatic crime lord of the heathens.

The Warden’s life of drugged iniquity is shaken by his dis­covery of a murdered child down a dead-end street . . . set­ting him on a collision course with the life he left behind. As a former agent with Black House—the secret police—he knows better than anyone that murder in Low Town is an everyday thing, the kind of crime that doesn’t get investi­gated. To protect his home, he will take part in a dangerous game of deception between underworld bosses and the psy­chotic head of Black House, but the truth is far darker than he imagines. In Low Town, no one can be trusted.

Daniel Polansky has crafted a thrilling novel steeped in noir sensibilities and relentless action, and set in an original world of stunning imagination, leading to a gut-wrenching, unforeseeable conclusion. Low Town is an attention-grabbing debut that will leave readers riveted . . . and hun­gry for more.

Taken by Fire
by Sydney Croft
Cover by Jae Song

Promo copy:

HIS MISSION WAS TO DESTROY HER.
BUT DESIRE GOT IN THE WAY.

A product of genetic manipulation, Melanie Milan shares a body with her malevolent sister, Phoebe. A sleek, blond predator with a heart of pure darkness, Phoebe puts their body through the wicked underbelly of sex for thrills—when she’s not igniting her pyrokinetic skills for an evil organization bent on taking over the world. Melanie rarely gets out to play—much less fall in love. But that changes when rival ACRO agent Stryker Wills shows up, with a mission to terminate the woman who torched his partner.

An operative with rare abilities, Stryker soon realizes that the woman he’s about to kill isn’t the murderous fire starter he’s been hunting. But he does want her. Melanie, with the power to ice anything in her path, is heating things up in ways that are setting fire to his blood. As long as Melanie stays in control, she is his best ally to bring down her sister and stop hellish havoc from being unleashed. Walking a tightrope of longing and hate, Stryker and Melanie begin to understand that true power lies in sweet surrender to each other, to the flames between them, to the erotic adventure that’s joined their hearts and abilities to become their salvation—and perhaps the world’s.

ACK!

The Shadow Men
by Christopher Golden and Tim Lebbon

Promo copy:

From Beacon Hill to Southie, historic Boston is a town of vibrant neighborhoods knit into a seamless whole. But as Jim Banks and Trix Newcomb learn in a terrifying instant, it is also a city divided—split into three separate versions of itself by a mad magician once tasked with its protection.

Jim is happily married to Jenny, with whom he has a young daughter, Holly. Trix is Jenny’s best friend, practically a member of the family—although she has secretly been in love with Jenny for years. Then Jenny and Holly inexplicably disappear—and leave behind a Boston in which they never existed. Only Jim and Trix remember them. Only Jim and Trix can bring them back.

With the help of Boston’s Oracle, an elderly woman with magical powers, Jim and Trix travel between the fractured cities, for that is where Jenny and Holly have gone. But more is at stake than one family’s happiness. If Jim and Trix should fail, the spell holding the separate Bostons apart will fail too, and the cities will reintegrate in a cataclysmic implosion. Someone, it seems, wants just that. Someone with deadly shadow men at their disposal.

Part III