Welcome to the all-new Bilim Kurgu, which of course English-speakers know as Science Fiction or Sci-Fi.

Here at Bilim Kurgu, we love Sci Fi so much that we can’t bear for it to be taken too seriously, lest it get too arrogant and end up in some sort of world-destroying rampage that only our intrepid hero can stop.

 

Loving Sci Fi gives us quite an appetite so whenever we decide to spend the weekend watching sci-movies we tend to order food laden gift baskets from a local gourmet food store. Boy, do they have a selection of gift baskets to choose from. Some of us are sweet freaks as well as sci-fi freaks so we tend to order gift baskets that are heavy on the delicious sweet treat side. One of my favorite gift baskets is filled with only cookies. The other guys like the gift baskets that have a combination of sweet stuff like cookies, candies, chocolate covered almonds, as well as crackers, cheeses, popcorn, oh yes, lots of different flavored popcorn, salamis, spicy snacks treats, and other stuff. Get a dozen six packs along with those gift baskets and the Sci Fi nerds are set for the weekend.

You don’t meet a lot of Sci Fi nerds on diets or avid exercisers, but you will meet those who recognize that when you’re really into Sci Fi culture you sometimes get pretty active. What I mean is LARPING. What is LARPING? Live Action Role Play-ing. Find your alter ego, your inner swordsman or wizard and let’s get physical. The next year has some pretty exciting events coming up. One is a big event in NJ called Earthfall, often LARPING events like this will have some sponsors similar to a sporting event to help keep the players in their best health. From protein snacks to hydration. Las Vegas events have access to spring water delivery from Tahoe Spring water as well as catering of all kinds. Even planners sometimes disguise the water bottles as parts of the scenaery or have reward systems to win more hydration, food or weapons. When you are an avid larper and sci fi-er fanatic, health and hydration are key if you want to last long in the game!

We have a particular soft spot for Turkish science fiction. Like many of you, our first real exposure came with the deliriously off-kilter so-called “Turkish Star Wars” (a.k.a. “The Man Who Saved the World”). Few things before or since have come close to pushing all of our buttons simultaneously (Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy came close, but it didn’t have the ‘lost in translation’ effect that we adore in foreign films, or the ‘so bad it’s good’ effect that so many people get wrong anyway!).

But there is so much more to Turkish SciFi than Turkish Star Wars. There’s also Turkish Star Trek, and Turkish Spider-Man vs. Turkish Captain America and Turkish Santos (a.k.a. 3 Dev Adam)…and for you fans of classic European murder comics (and who isn’t?) there’s Turkish Superman vs. Turkish Diabolik/Fantomas/Killing/Kriminal (a.k.a. Kilink, proving that Turkey has no monopoly on derivative products!).

Now, before you go accusing us of putting down the Turks, we’ll readily admit that Hollywood’s “Golden Age of SciFi” produced more formulaic, derivative, low-budget Sci-Fi films than the rest of the world put together. A relatively common question is: aren’t you just laughing at foreigners and isn’t that xenophobia or racism or something? The answer is: well, you may have a point. For some reason, we enjoy letting foreign filmmakers get away with things that we’d never allow from a homegrown production company (aside from Troma, and Full Moon, and Asylum, and…oh, never mind).

The point is that we genuinely love stuff like that, and we think that the only way Plan 9 From Outer Space could have given us more joy would be if it had been made in another country. And nobody comes as close as Turkey…