San Antonio's Best SF/F of 2009

We started Missions Unknown on May 24th, 2009, looking to delve into the SF/F/H happenings in the Alamo City. Frankly, we’ve been amazed at some of the killer things we’ve seen this year. Once again we weigh in with the best of San Antonio’s SF scene and we even solicited some other opinions as well. Read on for the perspectives of Sanford Allen, John Picacio, Mistah Pete, James Hartz, Paul Vaughn, Jeff from Hyperbubble, Frank Zieglar, Scott A. Cupp and Michael Mehl. If we missed something, drop us a comment and let us know.

Thank you all for the great year. We look forward to much more in the year to come.

Sanford Allen

Quarantined by Joe McKinney: Part murder mystery, part apocalyptic SF, McKinney’s latest novel moves quickly but carries real character depth. Detective Lily Harris investigates the mysterious death of a World Health Organization doctor as San Antonio grapples with a viral outbreak that’s wiped out a huge swath of the population. An SAPD detective himself, Joe ably handles the action sequences and the procedural stuff. The pleasant surprise is how well he weaves domestic drama into the story as Lily tries to keep her family sane, stable and together as the world falls apart around them.

John Picacio

The Texas in 2013 WorldCon Bid: The most exciting San Antonio science fiction news of the year was that San Antonio is a proposed city for the 2013 World Science Fiction Convention bid. Note that San Antonio is NOT guaranteed to win the bid, and at this point, there’s no word which cities are bidding against Texas for that year’s convention. One way or the other, the Texas bid will have its work cut out for it, but it’s quite an opportunity for San Antonio’s sf/f community to rally together. If you’re a San Antonian who wants a more literate, sophisticated sf/f scene in SA, or just a driveby Alamo City fan of sf/f media, now’s your chance to make a difference and make San Antonio a better science fiction city.

Mistah Pete - Left Foot Red Productions

The Brain that Wouldn’t Die at the Overtime Theater: Let it first be said, I hate theater.  I don’t go to plays.  I have the attention-span of a caffeinated gibbon, and you’ve got a very brief window before I’m bored enough to start ripping up the seats and lighting fires. And unlike movies and books and music, I feel an obligation to sit through it all; the people who made it are there in front of me and will look at me walking out and suddenly it’s the screaming pyromaniac vandal who’s the bad guy.  But the Overtime Theater’s production of The Brain That Wouldn’t Die was fun. Even for me. The songs were peppy, the set design was beyond clever (that car was aaaawesome!), and the cast was engaging. What’s more, it adhered to that great San Anto tradition of snatching up the discards of those with more money than sense and turning it into something useful: the producers took a cheesy public domain movie, copped the plot and title and characters, and fed it back to us with a heaping tablespoon of attitude. It worked. Worked enough that they should take it on the road.  And one day, I hope to see the movie of a play of a movie, raking in the bucks at the multiplex. That’ll show the fatcats. Next time they’ll spend their money more wisely!  Wait, then maybe they’ll not make the bad movies that the Overtime can rip off… hmm, gotta rethink this…

James Hartz – Film Classics Productions

Dr. S Battles the Sex-Crazed Reefer Zombies: OK, since I’m obviously biased as all hell on this one I’ll let part of this review from Quiet Earth do the talking: “[Bryan] Ortiz gives us three chapters, which help to structure the story and keep-up a flowing narrative in a film that could have easily fallen apart. With the imposed three-act structure in Doctor S, as well as a rather saucy intermission, it’s a fun ride to follow the story without worrying too much about missing any important plot-points. I’d go as far as to say that Doctor S is a film that doesn’t really require in-depth analysis, it’s simply an excellent example of itself as a spoof/homage and any attempt to see it as anything other than a bit of fun, anyone trying to seriously look at it as a morality tale or cautionary warning on drugs, communism or teenage sex is going to be left scratching their head by the end. It’s presented as a wacky horror comedy, that’s clear from the poster and tag-line, but the talent on display is at times quite staggering. Ortiz uses the fact that the budget was low to his advantage, basing the film on a style of 50’s sci-fi that was cheap and, by today’s standards, laughably cheesy. He manages, however, to create enough moments where the viewers expectations are confounded; special effects actually look special, fight scenes are amazingly graphic and well co-ordinated, jokes are laugh-out-loud funny, references to old horror films and b-movies are noticeable and witty, etc, etc, to transcend it’s limitations and to seriously impress. Honestly, there were moments during the two viewings I’ve seen of Doctor S. where the word genius wasn’t far from mind…”

Paul Vaughn

In Astrovision by The Sandworms: I love music that caters to my genre taste and this disc I picked up at a live show did that in spades. I actually missed the Sandworms when they were on stage, but everybody said they killed so I purchased their CD, In Astrovision. It was a great choice. Straight ahead goth surf rock instrumentals. Like if Dick Dale was pierced, tattooed and alienated. With song titles like Red Planet Green Love, Frankencrisp, Thundercorpse, Agents of Terror, Vampire Clam Babies from Outer Space and Invasion of the Octopus People it’s almost like they were making the disc with me in mind. If you are looking for some high-energy instrumental music for your next goth rave or the perfect score for your vampire zombie surf movie, take a look at The Sandworms. A close second was Hyperbubble’s Better Set Your Phasers to Stun. A synthpop homage to Star Trek is always worth a listen!

Jeff from Hyperbubble

1984 by The City of San Antonio: The City of San Antonio gets The Maxwell Award this year for covering downtown with shiny new closed-circuit TV cameras. Now everyone is a star. The National Security Agency is also working on a new data archive in SA, said to be about the size of The Alamodome, to house our email, phone calls, web searches, bookstore visits etc. For more info on the NSA, read The Secret Sentry: The Untold History of the National Security Agency by Matthew Aid (2009)… Hola, Big Brother.

Frank Zieglar - KiDDandGEEZER

Missions Unknown: Not to be brown nosing, but honestly, the best genre-related item from San Antonio in 2009 is Missions Unknown. I’ve known for years that San Antonio is home to some great stuff, but I had no idea about most of the things I’ve learned about from this website. The people and events that you guys bring to my attention is unbelievable sometimes. Thanks guys for all your work!

Scott A. Cupp

The Texas in 2013 WorldCon Bid: The best Genre related thing to come out of San Antonio in 2009 did not actually come out of San Antonio. More accurately, it came into San Antonio. I am talking about the announcement of bid for the 2013 World Science Fiction Convention. While this is nowhere near a sure thing, I will be working hard for the next two years on the bid process. The bid will be determined at the 2011 World Science Fiction Convention in Reno, NV. The various bids will be voted on there and the 2013 site will be selected. Then the real work begins to show the rest of the world what a cool place we live in. The last Texas World Convention was held in San Antonio in 1997. I did not live here then, but I attended and it was an extreme amount of fun and work. I worked briefly on that convention and now that San Antonio is once again my home (my third tour here in the last 42 years) I want us to give the most exciting Texas related whup-ass convention seen in a long time. I will keep touting the bid here during the two year bid time and will be trying to get locals very involved. It takes a lot of folks to make one of these things run. The more locals involved, the better. Check out the website.

Michael Mehl – Fotoseptiembre USA

The Sasquatch Bigfoot of the Southside: Or as I call it: El Sasquatchale Patotas. Of course, it’s only fitting that El Sasquatchale will breed with El Chupacabras (at the end of the day all SF monsters are gay), begetting the heretofore renowned -and feared- El Chupaquatchale. Hear the actual 911 call below.