SFX Spurious Awards

A Fringe- Twin Peaks crossover, a US Misfits , a chocolate spaceship and a whole load more

UNEXPECTED CROSSOVER OF THE WEEK

Fringe and Twin Peaks exist in a shared universe – it’s official. Walter puts on a pair of 3D glasses and says he got the idea from his good friend Dr Jacoby in Washington State. Dr Jacoby, of course, is the character played by Russ Tamblyn in Twin Peaks ! Damn fine in-joke.

DULLEST FIGHT OF THE WEEK

The Cape this week came up with the exciting idea of the hero and villain having a fight on top of a moving train. Unfortunately, one was in a black costume, the other in a dark suit and it took place at night. Hello? Anybody there? Has the screen just done a fade to black?

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MOST OPTIMISTIC VILLAIN OF THE WEEK

And staying with The Cape, Vinnie Jones’s Scales conducts an opportunistic heist in a train carriage. Having not planned such villainy, he grabs the nearest receptacle for his booty, shouting, “I want all your wallets, jewellery, cell phones in the bag.” Sadly, the bag is a teeny tiny ladies’ purse. If he wants to make it as a big-time villain, he really needs more ambition.

DEJA VU OF THE WEEK

In a week when Russell T Davies was telling the press, “There are so many good locations in Wales,” the televisual evidence seemed to prove otherwise. How else can that explain Being Human’ s George and Nina ending up working in the exact same hospital where the Doctor saved the world from the Atraxi in “The Eleventh Hour”? It’s St Cadoc's Hospital in Caerleon, Gwent, and possibly lays claim to being one of the most distinctive hospitals in Britain. Oh, and yes, we did recognise it as the fun fair from The Sarah Jane Adventures too. How long before the filming of one show gets caught on camera by one of the others?

SIGN OFF OF THE WEEK

Last Friday, a show that lasted seven years, and never jumped the shark, disappeared from our screens with little fanfare and much dignity. SFX has always been fond of Medium , even if, after all this time, they still kept the bedroom phone on Joe’s side of the bed (those midnight calls were never for him) and Allison still always blinded accepted what she saw in her psychic dreams, even if nine times out of ten they were playing naughty tricks on her (ghosts must be great at cryptic crosswords). We’re not going to spoil the plot of the final episode fro you, but it was a blinder, and typically bittersweet, but we did love the final sign-off with all the cast waving goodbye as the sets were being struck around them. Tears? We had a few. Bye bye Medium .

GUN-CONCEALING SKILLS OF THE WEEK

Okay, we mentioned this in our review of last Saturday’s Primeval, but it’s worth reiterating with some picture evidence. In the scene before this, Connor and Abby were in a pub, apparently weaponless. Then they went outside, had a quick natter, then headed straight for the farm, without going back to the car. Cut to the next scene and… Whoa! Where did those blasters come from? Let’s hope Connor wasn’t concealing it where Captain Jack keeps his back-up arsenal (with the emphasis on arse, if you don’t recall…)

WHAT’S WRONG WITH THIS PICTURE OF THE WEEK

A sexy woman in a black, PVC catsuit in a prison full of men who haven’t had sex for quite a while. Convicts are just so damned gentlemanly in Chuck.

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SWIMWEAR OF THE WEEK

Nope, it’s not the Telos synchronised swimming team in practice for the 2012 Olympics. A competitor in a Cyberman swimming cap competes in the UK Cold Water Swimming Championships at the Tooting Bec lido in London. It was so cold it brought tears to his eyes.

MISFITS REMAKE OF THE WEEK
Okay, we’re exaggerating that slightly – it’s just a fan-made video. But it’s the nearest thing you’ll see to a US version of Misfits until Syfy buys the rights and blands it out. Apparently the director made the thing for only $300. The man deserves some kind of award for that. Oh yeah, that’s what we’re here for. This is Spurious gold.

More Spurious Awards on the next page…

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WASTED ON THE KIDS OF THE WEEK
Dalek dodgems! We demand adult-sized versions of these now! And even better, they’re new-style Daleks without the hump.

EDIBLE SPACESHIP OF THE WEEK

It’s the Battlestar Choclactica, created – possibly – from Galaxy and Milky Way bars. But probably not. This work of art was sculpted by Malaki Keller after somebody put him up to the challenge. And yes, it did get eaten during a party at a Battlestar auction. While we’re on the subject of sweet, sticky sci-fi…

CAKE OF THE WEEK
Well, it’s one way of getting the kids to eat mushrooms, we suppose… Created by The Retroist .

BRICKING IT OF THE WEEK

Know what this is? It’s a scene from Inception rendered in Lego, built by Lego artist Alex Eylar as part of a set celebrating all the films that have been nominated for Best Film at the Oscars this year. Plastic fantastic.

AGEING DISGRACEFULLY AWARD OF THE WEEK
William Shatner is at it again. The man is to singing what Herod was to birth control, and yet somehow he creates musical masterpieces that surpass such trivialities as holding a melody and creates aural sculptures of devastating force, they're once heard, never forgotten. And he’s got musical greats queuing up to work with him. A few years back he teamed up with Ben Folds for Has Been , an album which included an esoteric rendering of Pulp’s “Common People”, so bizarre even ardent Pulp fans had to admit its genius. Now the Shat is teaming up with Zakk Wylde, former axe-man for Ozzy and Black Label Society, on an album of rock covers to come out later this year called Seeking Major Tom . Tracks confirmed so far include Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody” (“Mama, I just killed a song…”) and Black Sabbath’s “Iron Man”. Presumably, going by the title, there’ll be a Bowie cover as well, but what we’d really like to hear is Shatner’s version of “Stair… WAY to Heav… En.”

LOST CAUSE OF THE WEEK

Mission: Impossible. Artist Andy Kuhn threw out a challenge to his fellow scribblers on the Comic Twart Collective site to try to make Jar Jar Binks looks cool. “Originally I was going to do a jokey drawing of Jar Jar,” he posts. “Then I thought it’s way harder to make Jar Jar look cool than stupid. It turns out the only way for me to make Jar Jar Binks look cool, is to draw him really small on the page!” Seems the other artists on the site are experiencing a similar inability to keep to commission; the results virtually all take the piss out of the lop-eared loon in one way or another.

ODDEST CV OF THE WEEK

While doing a bit of research on one of our latest guests to be announced at the SFX Weekender, Jonathan Byrne – who plays the villainous time traveller Ethan – we went to the official Primeval site to look up his character’s profile. What we didn’t expect to find was an entry for “hobbies”. It’s not exactly the kind of info you get when you look up Davros or Blofeld on Wikipedia. Sadly all it said was “unknown”, which is a crying shame. We’d love to know if he knits, goes fly fishing, or goes to Babylon 5 conventions dressed as a Vorlon.

WIKILEAK OF THE WEEK
The dark secret of Superman revealed, courtesy of Cracked.com .

Dave Golder
Freelance Writer

Dave is a TV and film journalist who specializes in the science fiction and fantasy genres. He's written books about film posters and post-apocalypses, alongside writing for SFX Magazine for many years.