Exclusive Evil - More Sci-Fi Warnings to Ignore
Bonus humor. If you love it, spread the joy. If you hate it, spread the plague. Either way, check out my new, perfect book.
Chasing Skynet has produced an iron bubble of prosperity. Why stop there? The dreams of Gibson, Orwell, and Lovecraft are inches away.
Interstellar Colonialism
Source: Revenge of the Pissed-Off Martians by Threnody Pictures
Summary: A classic, nearly-watchable 1956 blockbuster. Decades after launching wealth-challenged communities off-planet to better themselves, Earth stops receiving messages or tribute from their sister planet. The first warship lands minutes later.
Population Control
Source: The Department of Rabbits by Arnault Barrow
Summary: The debut novel of sci-fi satirist Arnault Barrow depicts a farcical attempt to quadruple Maine’s citizens in one year, despite population control's record of crushing, inhuman failure. After the "orphan boom," roaming packs of stray infants become a public health hazard. Considered cartoonish fun in reviews. Recently cited as "inspirational" by the Freedom Institute.
Germ Warfare
Source: Mankind's Dying Waltz, Mankind's Funeral March, and Remembrance of Mankind Which is Dead Now by Leon Anthraxman Jr.
Summary: A trilogy following survivors of "Freedom's Ring," a virus designed by an unnamed capitalist superpower. The author cited his father, Leon Anthraxman Sr., as inspiration, saying "Seeing Dad’s notes once gave me a lifetime of quotable night terrors." Half of the final book is blank, due to the last POV character/human dying.
Punching Your Own Genitals for the Internet
Source: The Department of Slapstick by Arnault Barrow
Summary: Barrow’s breakout hit, wherein artists compete for a telepathic populace’s attention. Striking oneself in the groin emerges as the dominant strategy in psychic branding, combining sharp sensation with relatable agony. The story follows a long-limbed, pain-resistant painter’s journey to the top. Many elements resemble Barrow’s time hosting the podcast SackWap.
Aphrodite's Infinite Pleasure Garden
Source: Escape from the Infinite Pleasure Garden by Lotus Eater Games
Summary: Xbox roguelike praised as "too goddamn hard" and "impossible for human fingers." Players attempt to escape the Pleasure Garden, a virtual maze of mandatory fulfillment, as their body withers in a labor cube. Difficulty scales to time spent in the Pleasure Garden. After ten hours of gameplay, avatars stop moving altogether.
Simulating the Dead
Source: The Department of Necromancy by Arnault Barrow
Summary: Barrow’s third farce, in which twins capitalize on dead celebrities, family members, and pets with half-baked digital projections. Both twins decide the other is a projection, leading to a double homicide.
The Grandma Laser
Source: Platinum Valkyrie Orihime by Studio LunaSea
Summary: The quintessential mecha classic. After devolving into space blocs to satisfy space oligarchs' whims, space humanity learns that vaporizing grandmothers yields massive amounts of semi-clean energy. Pursuit of "grandma energy" drives high-budget conflict across the galaxy, and an arms race of stylish grandma-powered superweapons. The conflict wipes out 98% of the human population, and 100% of grandmothers.
Defictionalizing Science Fiction Nightmares
Source: Wait, Are You People Specifically Doing What I Say Not To? by Arnault Barrow
Summary: Barrow's experiment in metafiction, in which a despairing sci-fi author begs a heartless world to stop adapting his nightmares. Deemed "plotless" by the Chicago Review of Books, and lacking much of the humor defining his catalog.
Oppression Cyborgs
Source: Captain Oppression is a Bad Person in a Sad World, Vol. 1–14 by Various Authors
Summary: Europa Comics' flagship series, depicting a technofascist hellscape through the crimes and suffering of Captain Oppression. To thank the state for executing his thought-rebel son, the titular cyborg hunts, prosecutes, and sentences other latent offenders. Today, Captain Oppression sequels, films, action figures, first-person shooters, t-shirts, armbands, and batons reach a new generation of fans.
Decentralized Virtual Currency
Source: I Can't Overstate How Badly Decentralized Virtual Currency Will Go, Listen This Time by Arnault Barrow
Summary: A more domestic turn for Barrow, following a pair of former crypto traders learning to grow wheat, hunt game, and stitch hide clothes together. Ultimately, they learn to invest in love.
Beating a Franchise to Death
Source: Return of the Resurrected Pissed-Off Martians
Summary: The Pissed-Off Martians franchise takes a reflective turn, as diplomats from New Terra and Newer Mars unpack fifty years of spinoffs, reboots, retcons, and bonus scenes. The first entry in six years to include Martians, warfare, or anger.
Tormenting Arnault Barrow
Source: Why Are You Doing This to Me, By Arnault Barrow
Summary: Another disappointing showing from Barrow. A bitter profile of a friendless, loveless venture capitalist investing exclusively in software plagiarizing “Barney Arrow.” The novel ends in the executive kissing a dictator’s ring, followed by romantic favors described at length.
Pursuing Time Travel
Source: Jennifer Doesn’t Invent Time Travel by B+ Films
Summary: B+ Films defies genre again, mixing speculative ideas, freshman shot selection, and a discernible character arc. Physicist Lydia Reilly spends forty years, sixteen grants, and two marriages attempting to build a working time machine. In a divisive epilogue, Lydia finds a note in her handwriting saying “don’t bother.”
Ditching Fossil Fuels
Source: Wait, I Can Use This, by Arnault Barrow
Summary: Barrow’s light-footed comeback, and first crossover hit. John Exxon, the last oil tycoon, wanders a world ravaged by carbon deficiency. Unchecked by hurricanes, Jamaican warlords divide the forest-blighted world into fiefdoms. By journeying from Nueve Rios to New Kingston, John hopes to tap the last pipeline. A week after the novel’s release, The US returned to the Paris Agreement.
Universal Nuclear Disarmament
Source: The Department of Total Global Denuclearization, by Arnault Barrow
Summary: The long-awaited sequel to Wait, I Can Use This. John Exxon Jr. has a simple dream: instant vaporization in a petty imperial squabble. Sadly, the nukeless future prefers prosperous complacency to a proper human finale. Junior has one hope: his father’s journal, and a map to a resource that just might inspire mankind’s last argument. Two months post-release, U.S. and Chinese officials drafted the “Joint Anti-Suicide Pact.”
Executing All Dictators
Source: Screw It, by Arnault Barrow
Summary: A forthcoming Barrow jape, depicting the slapstick execution of each living autocrat. The novel takes a more research-driven, hard sci-fi approach than Barrow's past work, exhaustively touring the bottom half of Freedom House rankings. Peaks in a twenty-page fall down every step of the Statue of Liberty. Early reviews are positive.
My first volley for the new year. Consider the book.
