Based on your handle, I'm assuming you're in New Zealand. According to the Orion Book group website, the Gollancz anthology of the first three books (The Stainless Steel Rat, The Stainless Steel Rat's Revenge, and The Stainless Steel Rat Saves The World) was republished in 2008 and is still in print. …

and all those wonderful short stories

I'm trying to recall seeing a Liefeld drawing of a woman that isn't a combo of physically impossible, deeply creepy and strongly suggestive that he failed life drawing at art school.

Not really - the Minbari are a race who, for around a thousand years, have been holding their internal divisions together through this complex web of tradition, ritual and taboo where honour and face are paramount. This first contact went so horribly wrong precisely because it was an almost accidental meeting…

NOOOOOOO!!! Where will I get my exposition dump sass and plot hole filling magical detective fu from now?

Yup, that's Meredith's nom de recap for Monroe. And I still find him infinitely more interesting than the ostensible protagonist of this show.

This would finally tempt me to buy an e-reader if only the bank manager wasn't insisting I revert to the traditional arrangement of depositing money with them occasionally. :) It's also great to see the earlier volumes back "in print", and I understand good condition second-hand ones are hard to find and v. expensive.

I honestly wouldn't notice if Hank got eaten by were-roaches, or something. At least he could be written out fairly painlessly; a protagonist that always seems to be the least interesting character around? Houston...

Memo from The Desk of S.H.I.E.L.D. Director Nick Fury:

There's potential for a companion post: How Not To Make Friends and Influence Aliens. "It's rude for aliens to anally probe strangers without as much as a by-your-leave, so why have you got E.T. strapped to that operating table again?"

Is it wrong that the most interesting character in the show isn't the lead, but the second string sidekick? (I honestly wouldn't notice if Hank went on vacation and never came back.)

Oh Grimm! What are we going to do with you?

By the one-eye of The All-Father, don't spring anything like that on me again without warning. :)

I suspect it's more the latter — people like Alice Krige's performance better. IIRC, the producers of Voyager were trying to work out scheduling conflicts with Krige until pretty late in the pre-production process for both 'Dark Frontier' & 'Unimatrix Zero' but it just didn't work out.

They wouldn't only "look disturbing" but cause agonizing lower back pain. I remember seeing a documentary that asked what life would be like if women really had the proportions of Barbie dolls. Ugh...

I'm just thankful Scarlet Johansson didn't end up with CGI comic book wank fantasy zeppelin boobs in The Avengers. Saved my brain having to rationalize how Black Widow could walk, move and stand up straight without crippling back pain.

Okay, so how does the Susanna version fit into the ST universe? Alice's queen is killed in First Contact, but Voyager's queen (and the storyline) takes place well after FC. Or was Susanna's version never referred to as "queen?" I'm confused.

Thanks for including 'Maggie' from Love and Rockets. Then again, all the women in L&R aren't only cooler than Batman but infinitely more awesome than the spandex-wrapped zepplin-tit wank fantasies and distressed damsels in lamestream comics.

I've been watching Doctor Who for over thirty five years. Do I think Moffat is some golden geek God who can do no wrong? Don't be silly. There's been aspects of every era of Who I've been meh-some about, has had it's vocal haters AND fanboys. But I'm also solidly grounded in reality: The BBC isn't notably…

Hopefully they ditch Moffat soon though.