On October 23, an icon of Japanese pop culture and manga will make his way to the big screen. Astro Boy, product of "god of manga" Osamu Tezuka, was created in the early 1950s and has remained adored by Japan ever since. The Sci-Fi Block was able to steal some time from Tezuka expert Frederik L. Schodt for an in-depth phone interview back in August.

When Random House’s Del Ray imprint began considering the idea of a horror novel set in the Star Wars universe, horror author Joe Schreiber was convinced he was the man for the job. When he was able to convince his editor of the same, he became the author of Star Wars: Death Troopers, the first Star Wars horror novel ever written.

It is perhaps natural that all of the writers for The Sci-Fi Block also happen to be huge fans of the horror genre. Both genres offer a wealth of dynamic visuals, bold storytelling, and uninhibited imagination, so it only makes sense that combining them leads to amazing things. The sci-fi/horror subgenre provides what may be the most fertile platform for movie-making possible. Whether they're man-eating extra-terrestrials or horrendous creations of science, the subjects of these movies alone are often worth the time and money spent to watch them.

In 2002, a Borders clerk and striving author named Robert Venditti decided to write a comic. He turned to his copies of Astro City and Watchmen for guidance and managed to get The Surrogates running by 2005. The comic was linear and short, running five issues by design, and was based on the idea of a future in which people live vicariously through machines, called Surrogates, that look and feel just like humans themselves and that relay the physical sensations they encounter back to their operators.

On September 25, Surrogates will be playing in theaters. The film is based on the 2005-2006 comic The Surrogates, which is about a future in which people live everyday life vicariously through mechanical, remote-controlled, human-like machines. It was written by first-time comic author Robert Venditti and illustrated by Brett Weldele. Sci-Fi Block editor in chief Robert Ring got the chance to interview Venditti about his comic, his influence, and his upcoming work.

The most memorable aspects of science fiction films are often their characters. A well-written, well-acted character has the ability to draw a whole new level of involvement from the audience. They can at times inspire, they can at times entertain, and they can always give us someone through whom we can to relate to the events on screen. This month, we celebrate science fiction's best, most unforgettable characters, made great both by their scripts and by their actors.

It's the age of science fiction that everyone loves: the 1950s. During this decade, the genre truly blossomed, presenting some of the most iconic and archetypal plots and creations that sci-fi films would ever see. We've got aliens and monsters. We've got standalone protagonists and full-scale invasions. We've got science gone awry and human ingenuity saving the day. These films set the stage for many to come. Here are our top ten.

With all the sequels and prequels being released lately, we thought it would be a good idea to pay homage to the best franchises science fiction cinema has to offer. There are a lot of good ones out there, and this list required a bit of painful cutting, but after poring over our master list of franchises days on end with no sleep, we feel these ten are the best.

With last month's release of the Star Trek prequel, we got thinking, what would a full ranking of all Trek films look like? Naturally, the best way to figure that out was to use that as our Top 10 Countdown for this month. So, here we go, at the risk of angry email from Trekkies across the globe, The Sci-Fi Block is daring to make its claim as to how all the Star Trek films rank.

This month we're going to take a look at who's responsible for our greatest science fiction movies. To do so we will count down the single most important creative position in any type of film: that of the director. The directors on this list are those who had a vision (actually, they had multiple visions) and executed it elegantly. They are those who have given the genre its greatest films. They are those to whom we are the most thankful.