That hunt for dark energy got you down? Can't find dark matter anywhere, not even in that Tupperware bowl you've been afraid to open for the lurking for last three years deep in the 'fridge ? Don't worry, Taiwanese physicist Wun-Yi Shu has put forth a new cosmological framework which does away with those pesky concepts as they're no longer needed to explain certain observed aftereffects of the Big Bang. How so? He kicks the Big Bang Theory to the curb in favor of a far more Hindu cosmology of never-ending cycles of expansion and contraction. No Big Bang Theory? Whatever will Sheldon and the gang do?

At least the creators of Reno 9-11 have a new job. FX has picked up their pilot titled Alabama! described thusly:

...a comedy pilot co-created and starring Reno 911! masterminds Robert Ben Garant and Thomas Lennon. The pilot is set a thousand years in the future, aboard the United Nations peacekeeping spaceship: The USS Alabama. It follows the crew, who are in the sixth year of the their seven-year mission to maintain peace and enforce treaties between planets in their jurisdiction.

Joblo.com reports The Forever War helmer Ridley Scott has brought in his scribe from Blade Runner, David Peoples, to adapt the Joe Haldeman novel. See, the voice over narration is appropriate here; with Electric Sheep, not so much.

If you've never read Matt Wagner's excellent Mage comic series, I highly recommend it. That is, if you don't want to wait for the film adaptation . The first volume, collected as The Hero Discovered, is an interesting modern spin on Arthurian legend, while the second series, The Hero Defined, spins the story across a much broader mythic range.

From the field:
Holley points out the Genreville link to Cybermage's recent series of posts discussing Formidable Female Protagonists in Science Fiction — all 16 of them! Why not just link to Cybermage's blog? Because Genreville looked like it had a number of interesting posts on it as well.

From Mary Anne comes a series of robot movie poster mash-ups posted on Empire Online, some of which are pretty doggone funny.

Up to fifteen titles so far for "Out of the Box #2" I can see the first change will be posting summaries for each one. As in not. Any more new releases and we're gonna need a bigger box.