🍿 All hail 'Three Thousand Years of Longing'

Good morning

August 25 2022

I’ve been thinking a lot about prophecies recently, and not just because HBO’s House of the Dragon has made one of the most infuriating prophecies in TV history relevant again.

Prophecies are one of the most powerful storytelling tools we have, both in fiction and in real life. They drive the plot lines of some of the biggest books, shows, and movies. The concept of prophecy even makes its way into Joseph Campbell’s “Hero’s Journey,” often serving as the motivation that kickstarts an adventure. Of course, prophecies are just as relevant in real life. They inspire conspiracy theories, fuel cults, and blur the lines between politics and religion. Prophecies can be as dangerous as they are powerful.

In 2019, when the dust settled and Game of Thrones was finished, it turned out the show’s central prophecy hadn’t amounted to much at all. Will that be the case again with this prequel series? We’ll just have to wait and see. But in the meantime, try not to get too wrapped up in any prophecies either in your entertainment or IRL.

What's New

Review

Movies

Three Thousand Years of Longing review: All hail George Miller’s lush, loony fantasia

A world away from Mad Max, Idris Elba and Tilda Swinton star in this intensely imaginative ode to the powers of storytelling.

Three Thousand Years of Longing sets George Miller’s singularly intense imagination free to play. Of course, the Australian maverick never makes films any other way. Miller crafts dementedly high-octane fantasies with an engineer’s precision.

His latest (in theaters August 26) finds the director operating in a more strangely intimate and emotional key than usual. As if particularly seeking sanctuary from the savage, sun-scorched wastelands of Mad Max: Fury Road and its upcoming prequel Furiosa, or at least refreshment in between, Three Thousand Years of Longing plunges headfirst into a lush fantasy of wish fulfillment.

Read our review

Medical

Innovation

Scientists want to give you a bionic skin

From anti-infidelity rings to masks that change color with your emotions, wearable technology seems to have creeped into nearly every aspect of daily life. These rapidly developing sensors can serve as valuable tools for athletes, futuristic fashionistas, and even military personnel due to the massive amounts of helpful data they can amass.

But most wearable devices use circuit chips to record such information, making them relatively bulky and energy-intensive. What’s more, chips are in short supply, so these devices tend to be expensive. But new research may point to a cheaper, lighter solution.

A team of engineers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has developed a pliable electronic “skin” capable of collecting data on a wide range of health indicators, including heart rate, stress hormones, and the sodium ion concentrations in sweat. The sensor is super flexible and about as thick as a piece of scotch tape. Best of all, it can monitor all those metrics chip-free. The proof-of-concept paper was recently published in the journal Science.

HBO	Television

Why 'House of the Dragon' probably won’t be as long as Game of Thrones

HBO’s long-awaited Game of Thrones prequel series, House of the Dragon, got off to an epic, ominous start last week.

The prequel’s premiere plunged viewers back into the world of Game of Thrones, offering the same kind of brutality, explicit nudity, and breathtaking fantasy visuals that its parent series became known for over the course of its eight seasons. However, just because House of the Dragon offers many of the same pleasures that Game of Thrones did, doesn’t mean the new series will follow the same path as its predecessor.

As a matter of fact, House of the Dragon viewers should already start preparing themselves for the fact that the series likely won’t stay on the air nearly as long as Game of Thrones did.

Learn more

Feature

Innovation

Alzheimer's disease has no cure — but unproven treatments claim otherwise

The Reverse Alzheimer’s Summit 2022, an online event held last month,presented a grab bag of purported solutions to one of the world’s most dreaded diseases.

Speakers (some well-known in alternative medicine circles) blamed head trauma, mold, bad oral health, and neglect of care for the skull for contributing to the disease.

As for remedies, you could take your pick. Speakers touted the keto diet, hormone therapy, and time in a hyperbaric oxygen tank. One has an eight-week plan for “reversal of biological aging” that claims to take off three years’ worth of decline. Another authored a book on the “healing power of music” for brain health. This was the third summit organized under one central premise.

“Solutions exist. Alzheimer’s is optional,” summit organizer Heather Sandison, a naturopath and self-described “neurohacker,” tells Inverse. “The hard work is changing the narrative, so people know to get help early. So many are suffering unnecessarily.”

This message counters the consensus of mainstream neurology, which holds that dementia (the syndrome of age-related loss of one’s faculties) and Alzheimer’s disease (the most common form of dementia) are not reversible under current scientific knowledge.

Books

Entertainment

The Winds of Winter update no one wanted to hear

In a recent interview with Vanity Fair for House of the Dragon, George R. R. Martin admitted that he is no longer interested in predicting when The Winds of Winter will be completed. “I’m making progress, but I’ve given up on any hope of predicting the end,” Martin said. “Every time I do, I don’t make it and everybody gets mad at me, and there’s no sense. It’ll be done when it’s done.”

The author did note in the same interview that he has made considerable progress on The Winds of Winter over the past two years, largely due to the isolation the past few years have forced on him and the rest of the world. “The two years of enforced isolation enabled me to get a lot more writing done, because I was doing a lot less traveling and public appearances and speeches and all of that stuff,” the author said.

While Martin still seems optimistic about the progress he’s making on The Winds of Winter, this update is undoubtedly not the one that fans hoped to hear this week.

🍿 All hail 'Three Thousand Years of Longing'

Older messages

🚀 Back to the Moon

🦠 Fugitive gut bacteria

🛸 UFO committee members wanted

🍿 Reviewing 'House of the Dragon'

🧠 Let’s talk about therapists

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