Sci-Fi Quotes Of The Year 2012
Real world quotations from sci-fi’s stars and creators, plus some of the best lines from movie and TV
A sci-fi smörgåsbord of memorable quotes from 2012, both from behind and (at the end of the article) in front of the camera…
Compiled by William Salmon
“In an effort to be more like my fellow Avenger, Tony Stark, I have had an electronic pacemaker placed near my heart to ensure that I'll be able to lead thee for another 90 years.” Stan Lee
“I love Matt Smith... He may only be 12, but inside there is a 900-year old Time Lord and I absolutely believe it. I love it.” Colin Baker gives 11 the thumbs up
“The Railway Arms is heaven, isn’t it? Maybe that’s what we’ll do. Unite the two shows.” Ashley Pharoah on the Eternal Law / Life On Mars crossover that never was.
“The last one was awful. It tried hard, not that they didn’t try, the acting and everything. It missed the boat.” Arnie on Terminator: Salvation
“Maybe I'll make people stand on their tippy-toes just to change it up a little. ‘Stand on your tippy-toes before Zod.’” Man Of Steel 's Michael Shannon
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“Seeing Yoda advertise Vodafone is like seeing a picture of my grandmother in a phone box, advertising cut price blow jobs.” Simon Pegg
“Some of my best friends are preternaturally attractive. Sometimes it's kind of annoying. Because I look in the mirror and I’m like … ‘I’m a freak. I should ring the bells.’” Joss Whedon
“What is needed today now more than ever is star peace, for there is an ominous mutual threat to all science fiction. It’s called Twilight , and it is really, really bad.” George Takei attempts to broker a treaty between Trekkers and Star Wars fans against a greater evil
“I’d love to tell you I’m now qualified to join the Round Table and declare war on Narnia but the truth is absolutely nothing has changed.” Grant Morrison on his OBE
“If I DID write Hunger Games , everyone would talk about God a lot and we’d never find out who won.” Damon Lindelof
“I know believing in mutated talking turtles is kinda silly to begin with, but am I supposed to believe there are ninjas from another planet? The rape of our childhood memories continues.” Actor and musician, Robbie Rist on the upcoming Michael Bay-backed Turtles movies
“As you know from my background I don’t really have a problem with showing violence; all I do is show what happens, even if that is impaling kids” King of the Bs, Uwe Boll
“He beat up some of his critics and that is something I would like to do as well.” Dolph Lundgren has a hero in Uwe Boll
“I’m doing this so that the films will have a longer life, so that more fans and people can enjoy them into the future. It’s a very big universe I’ve created and there’s a lot of stories that are sitting in there. I get to be a fan now.” George Lucas on the rebirth of Star Wars
“I could so care less. No, sorry. Especially if Disney’s going to do it. I’m not interested in the Simon West version of Star Wars .” Quentin Tarantino is less than impressed
“To be fair, I was saying Lucasfilm was a Mickey Mouse outfit back in 1999.” Simon Pegg, still not letting it go
“My twitter feed: 38% : ‘You should write the new Star Wars !’ 47% : ‘Don't f••king touch the new Star Wars ’. 15% : Undecided.” Go on, Damon Lindelof, do it to annoy the haters
“I’m looking for my franchise as we speak. My ears pricked up recently when it was said that Disney was buying Star Wars . Oh, 'Come in, Sir Alec Guinness.' On to the agent immediately!” Sir Derek Jacobi has his eye on Star Wars
“I don't think that DC are interested in comics anymore. They're interested in growing franchises, like a pumpkin patch.” Alan Moore surprises everyone with his attitudes towards his former employers
“WHEN THE OLYMPICS END, CTHULHU WILL RISE FROM THE WAVES.” Osama author Lavie Tidhar
More quotations on the next page…
“My list of top ten movies this year is just Looper eleven times.” Bryan Lee O'Malley
“I think culture has caught up with subculture. I distrust ghettos, now. People who think that as fans they are persecuted and special... I think outside the ghetto walls there are lots and lots of people enjoying exactly the same things that people enjoy inside. This wasn't the case when I was a kid.” Paul Cornell on the changing nature of fandom
“'I’ve been expecting you, Mr. Bond’ – James Bond's mother giving birth.” Peter Serafinowitz
“Batman can be miserable but Superman can’t? HE WAS CREATED BY JEWS, PEOPLE!!! Affectionately, A Miserable Jew...” Damon Lindelof
“I’ve always wondered since Alien ; who were the space jockeys? I guess I know now. They were jerks. The end.” Sam Witwer
“I reckon The Dark Knight Rises will be so pretentious, Batman will start calling himself ‘Bartholomew Man’ in it.” Charlie Brooker
“As a British actor people ask you, 'What’s next?' and you just think, 'Whatever I’m f••king given.' This is Britain mate, you get what you’re given. And if you’re lucky enough to go to Serbia and given an action film, in the f**king middle of space, you better grab it by the bullocks and give it your frigging best. Which is what I’ve done. Get out there, and do the damned thing. And it was brilliant. It was the best fun ever. Christ I’ve burnt myself today. I look like a f**king lobster. I’ve got rings where my fatty like rolls have been… very British. I look very, very British.” Joe Gilgun, talking about outer space prison movie Lockout while camping. Um...
“Smaller. More personal, more painful,” Joss Whedon on his plans for Avengers 2 ( Avengers Reassembled , anyone?)
“Sci-fi fans are the best fans you can have. You could be doing the worst piece of tat which might have a robot or vampire in and some people will become obsessed by it and know every little detail.” Russell Tovey. Thanks... er, we think
“I didn't care about it, I didn’t think about it. It was meaningless to me. I don’t mean that in any nasty way. I did it. My link to Michael Bay is so minimal. I have never met him.” Hugo Weaving on his Transformers experience
“What happened to people who did a job, got paid for their hard work, and just smiled afterward? Be happy you even have a job – let alone a job that pays you more than 98% of the people in America.” Michael Bay responds to Weaving's criticisms
“ Alien Vs Predator ? Believe it or not I've actually still not seen it all the way through.” Ewen Bremner. And he was in it!
“It's nice to be thought of but I do not want the part and would not accept if it were offered to me. I did my Who time and I died. The end.” Simon Pegg on being the next Doctor Who
“It’s enjoyable bibble, and as good as superhero films are ever likely to get, which is excellent news because it means they can stop making them now. Seriously, they needn’t bother releasing Batman Bum Attack or whatever the next one’s called.” Charlie Brooker has faint praise for The Avengers
“I think if they ask me nicely or I can see what they want me to do, I'd consider it. I think the fans have been so good to me, they'd expect me to at least make an appearance.” Tom Baker on appearing in Doctor Who's 50th anniversary celebrations
“When I watched that first Spidey film, I lost my mind and I watched it back-to-back – I watched it twice in a row when I first saw it.” Andrew Garfield
“I think it's a little darker. I can't say if it's more vile, but it's definitely not less.” Franke Potente on American Horror Story: Asylum
“My Doctor Who Jim’ll Fix It : if only I’d known who the real monster was...” Former “A Fix With Sontarans” star Gareth Jenkins, post-Savilegate
“I remember sitting in the cinema watching Batman Begins going 'someone's made an art movie for this much money?’ Whatever reservations you have about The Dark Knight Rises , don't forget just what a miracle that is.” Mark Kermode on The Dark Knight Rises
“I want the Doctor to meet Heisenberg from Breaking Bad . It’s amazing: he’d just go, ‘You’re a badass, man. I’m gonna make you good, I’m going to bring you back to my side; it’s going to be alright dude, don’t worry.” Matt Smith on an unlikely crossover that we'd kill to see...
More quotations on the next page…
“Best of luck cry babies.” Arthur Darvill tweets his sympathies to viewers before “The Angels Take Manhattan”
“I was crying for pretty much the entire two weeks we were shooting... Little things were setting me off. 'Oh god, tender stem broccoli!'” Karen Gillan on the end of the Ponds
“Described on the poster as, 'The movie the Vatican didn't want you to see.' Why? Because it's crap. 'Hey we didn't come up with an ending. Maybe you brought one yourself? Or why not go to our website and see if we did any better there.'” Mark Kermode on The Devil Inside
“I've never worked this hard, this long and been this emotionally involved in something that's lasted only a few seconds since I lost my virginity.” Gareth Edwards on Godzilla
“Working on Star Trek really opened me up. I was a very young boy. I think I had only been working nine months when I got Star Trek , and it was huge. It was very overwhelming. So that opened my eyes a bit at an early age, kind of how not be frightened when walking into a responsibility of something like villain in Batman.” Tom Hardy on Star Trek: Nemesis and Bane
“Doing a western was instantly appealing. There's just something very specific about putting Matt in a Western town... His legs look like they were made to be around a horse, don't they? They look as if they've had their horse recently taken out!” Steven Moffat, always full of praise for his star's appearance
“At this point I was doing it for the fans. These are people who will make you weep. These are 16-year-old girls who decide that two characters should be together, so they make YouTube videos. They spend more time editing them then the people who edit the television show.” Dan Harmon admits that maybe he got a tiny bit indulgent with Community season 3
“Every so often, it’s time to make a change with the showrunner. You sort of evaluate the creative and how the show is run and how the writing staff works. Sometimes you want to freshen the show. We just decided it was time to do that on Community . No disrespect to anyone.” Bob Greenblatt on Dan Harmon's firing from Community
“This quote from Bob Greenblatt in which he says he's sure I'm going to be involved somehow... That's a misquote. I think he meant to say he's sure cookies are yummy, because he's never called me once in the entire duration of his employment at NBC. He didn't call me to say he was starting to work there, he didn't call me to say I was no longer working there and he definitely didn't call to ask if I was going to be involved. I'm not saying it's wrong for him to have bigger fish to fry, I'm just saying, NBC is not a credible source of All News Dan Harmon." Dan Harmon on his firing from Community
“The hours are hideous, and it’s still a sitcom on television, which is probably the lowest form of television. That's my feeling about it.” Chevy Chase, in one of his more magnanimous rants about Community
“If you’re not a nerd I don’t want to speak to you. You must at least have taken the lid off your computer at some point?” Terry Pratchett
“Every time there’s been a superhero boom it always comes around the same time as something terrible happening in the world, it’s great for us but terrible for everyone else.” Mark Millar on the enduring popularity of costumed heroes
“I’ve done it with somebody else in front of my husband before so I think it was actually much more awkward for Colin. He was the one who was like, ‘Are we done? Are we good?’” Kate Beckinsale on her Total Recall sex scene
“Duh! It’s paradise! It’s a secular heaven. I think you’d have to be slightly mad not to want to live in the Culture.” Iain Banks, on wishing that his fictional universe was real
“I don't think it's a perfect movie. I don't even think it's a great movie. I think it's a great time, and I'm proud of it.” Joss Whedon is self-deprecating about The Avengers
More quotations on the next page…
“When we were acquiring the license rights from the guys that own the comic, 2000AD , that Dredd appears in, it was written into the contract that he couldn’t take his helmet off.” Alex Garland on getting the priorities right for Dredd
“The question of 3D is a very straightforward one. I never meet anybody who actually likes the format, and it’s always a source of great concern to me when you’re charging a higher price for something that nobody seems to really say they have any great love for.” Chris Nolan doesn’t like 3D
“All things are better in 3D.” James Cameron disagrees
“I don’t make much connection between [Gandalf the] White and Grey, and I’ve never really liked the White. I never said I didn’t like playing him, but I didn’t warm to him. He’s a man with a mission, and he’s a commander, and he’s a man working right at the end of his tether.” Sir Ian McKellen
“I'm the only British actor who wasn't in Harry Potter !” Martin Freeman
“'Oh! 3D 48fps. NOW I love 3D!' What no part of my brain is saying right now.” Moon director Duncan Jones
“We saw our version of The Hobbit as an extension or prequel, so it can be thought of as six films.” Andy Serkis explains the expansion of The Hobbit
“His style is almost indistinguishable from mine. His ideas are better than mine.” Stephen King is impressed by his son, Joe Hill
“In life, like in Skyrim , I sometimes feel like I spend too much time on side missions and not enough on the main story.” James Gunn
“Even speaking as someone who loves geek culture at its best, nevertheless I think the sense of priorities is often skewed to the point of being demented.” China Miéville
“Hello. I’m Simon Pegg. I play the lead character in the new film, Star Wars … I play a character in the new film Star Trek Into Darkness , that character, of course, being Montgomery ‘Scotty’ Scott. I can’t be there today... I have a job: my new film, The World’s End , at Ealing Studios – not too far away from you, but a little too far to come in, a galaxy far, far away. Hmm, wrong franchise...” Simon Pegg.
“To those mourning the loss of Merlin from our screens, I guarantee the last five eps are something special. Proud to have been a part of it.” Alexander Vlahos (aka Mordred) on the end of Merlin
“I play a character called John and not that other name.” Benedict Cumberbatch on the Khan question
“I was a lesbian and had an affair with my best friend, Debbie. Then I got pregnant by her dad and I had an abortion and killed him with a chair leg.” Jenna Louise Coleman on her pre- Doctor Who life in Emmerdale
“What swayed me was Ryan’s insistence that he was going to write a part that would be fascinating for me to play. There aren’t a lot of writers who promise you that. And I haven’t been disappointed at all.” Jessica Lange on her evolving roles in American Horror Story
"I don’t think any showrunner or future showrunner of Doctor Who would tolerate the idea that David Yates was talking about, of rebooting it and having a second continuity. That’s just nonsense. Absolutely insane and a straightforward insult to the audience. We’d never, ever do that. The question would be how could we do it without delaying or harming the TV show?" Steven Moffat on the alleged Doctor Who movie
TV and Movie quotations 2012 on the next page…
AND THE BEST DIALOGUE FROM 2012'S TV AND MOVIES
“If I want to be a fool then I will be a fool! That is my God given right as an American!” Jason, True Blood
“Yes, that’s brilliant, using your dad’s cancerous tumours to get into her knickers.” Rudy, Misfits
“Without a gun you’re a tricycle with a roof!” The Doctor to a Dalek, Doctor Who
“I don’t want to hurt you. I want this to be as painless for you as possible, so I will give you a choice: I can either cut your throat or I can strangle you. I don’t believe in guns.” Dr Thredson, American Horror Story: Asylum
“There’s a storm coming, Mr Wayne. You and your friends better batten down the hatches, because when it hits, you're all gonna wonder how you ever thought you could live so large and leave so little for the rest of us.” Selina Kyle, The Dark Knight Rises
“Your face is a poem, your voice is wine and your eyes are a symphony… and you have spectacular jubblies.” Adam, Being Human
“Cleanse them. Cleanse the world of their ignorance and sin. Bathe them in the crimson of... Am I on speakerphone?” Mordecai, The Cabin In The Woods
"There's men out there want to f••k your corpses – outside, now!" Yoren, Game Of Thrones
“She sent us a bitergram!” Merle, The Walking Dead
“More and more I find your face resembles the back end of a cat.” Arthur, Merlin
“I look like something you give to your kid when you tell 'em grandma died” Ted, Ted
“Alright, give me the lesbian and the Indian and I've got a story." Jeff, Safety Not Guaranteed
“I wanna gorge on human blood not because some f••king bible tells me to, but because I like it. It’s fun. It makes my dick hard.” Russell, True Blood
“I'll hazard I can do more damage on my laptop sitting in my pyjamas before my first cup of Earl Grey than you can do in a year in the field.” Q, Skyfall
“I bet the Magna Carta doesn’t have a nipple on it.” Cutler, Being Human
“The last time I was in New York I kind of broke... Harlem.” Bruce Banner, The Avengers
“You’re using your calm voice today. Who’s getting killed?” Stefan to Klaus, The Vampire Diaries
“Myka, please don’t let my last words be ‘I should have done yoga.’” Pete, Warehouse 13
“Look, I'm just a geologist. I like rocks. I love rocks! Now, it's clear you two don't give a shit about rocks. But what you do seem to care about is gigantic dead bodies. And as I don't really have anything to contribute in the gigantic dead body arena, I'm gonna go back to the ship.” Fifield, Prometheus
"I've been with a different girl every day. And they don't care about getting pregnant, they don't care about diseases or if you're going to call them back or can you provide for them or are you related, alright? And, it's like the apocalypse has levelled the field, man." Roache, Seeking A Friend For The End Of The World
“It’s a design flaw. Why didn’t they give us bigger vaginas? You know, How are you supposed to get something so big out of something so small? Apparently they suck the life out of your tits, so you can kiss them goodbye.” Abbey, Misfits
“Thanks for putting me underwear on the radiator. It’s AMAZING! It’s like having sex but you can get your whole bottom inside.” Gerry, Switch
“I like your tights – you look like a bee, and I like bees.” Tom, Being Human
“I'm hearing that the new Spider-Man is played by Garfield. Is the villain Mondays?” Ted, Ted
“This time travel crap just fries your brain like an egg!” Abe, Looper
"I don't know who told you that pouting was an option for you, but all you're making me feel right now is hatred for Rene Zellweger." Dean Pelton, Community
"I've got nothing against nymphomania as an affliction. In a woman it's much more appealing than having one giant eyebrow, but it's really hard work. My dick hurts, Dawn. It really, really hurts.” Anders, The Almighty Johnsons
“Sounds like this is a game-changing day for all of us. I almost sat on my balls, but adjusted at the last second.” Pierce, Community
“A bald mullet. A skullet. Bald at the front, mullet at the back. You wouldn’t want to go out in public with this guy.” Rimmer, Red Dwarf
“Today, we are cancelling the apocalypse!” Idris Elba in the Pacific Rim trailer. Okay, so the film's not out until next year, but come ON!
Will Salmon is the Comics Editor for GamesRadar/Newsarama. He has been writing about comics, film, TV, and music for more than 15 years, which is quite a long time if you stop and think about it. At Future he has previously launched scary movie magazine Horrorville, relaunched Comic Heroes, and has written for every issue of SFX magazine for over a decade. He sometimes feels very old, like Guy Pearce in Prometheus. His music writing has appeared in The Quietus, MOJO, Electronic Sound, Clash, and loads of other places and he runs the micro-label Modern Aviation, which puts out experimental music on cassette tape.