5 Cool Things Mars Edition

Four Cool Things

Welcome to your newest guide to the coolest things from the coolest people we know.  Watch this space on the last friday of each month for a concise list of interesting and inspiring ‘things’ from our current universe.

Thomas – Watch me write this article

A lot of creation comes down to learning the mechanics. Not so much writing, where the act is invisible. But here is a tool that allows a writer to watch their own process, or the process of a master. It allows for an intriguing insight into how a singular piece of work can come into existence – that is, through the repeated destruction and mutation of its multiple selves. I just love the connection of writing and technology and what it could do for learning.

Chris – If I die on Mars
The Mars One program is intended to be the first manned mission to the red planet. If it succeeds, it’ll be a one-way ticket on a ride to set up an off-world colony. It sounds like science fiction, and it sounds pretty cool. But this short documentary, ‘If I Die on Mars’ really makes the situation more human and much more real. Worth a watch.
Mark – Scripnotes
Hosted by screenwriters John August (Go, Big Fish, Titan A.E.) and Craig Mazin (Identity Thief, Hangover II & III), this podcast is a fast-paced insight into the film and television industry from a writer’s point of view. It’s all entertaining, but it’s their insights into many of the mechanics of storytelling – structure, plot, character, dialogue, conflict, etc – that make Scriptnotes the one podcast I must listen to every single week.
Lucy – Sleepy Hollow

For lovers of modern recycling of fairy tales, a story out of Kazakhstan may be the point of inspiration for a gritty soviet-era retelling of Sleeping Beauty. Briar Roza spends her days in the forest with her three mysterious aunts, and by chance meets a party leader in the forest, on his way from closing the local uranium mine. As radon leaks through the soil, the entire village falls into a deep sleep, whereupon the princess can only be woken…days later with slight memory loss and a migraine. 152 people, a quarter of the town of Kalachi, have all fallen ill to a mysterious sleeping sickness since 2013.  Read more at the Smithsonian or The Guardian.

See you in April for more updates from other worlds!