“Goodnight Moon,” as Read to Neil deGrasse Tyson by LeVar Burton

in Audio Books, K-12 | October 9th, 2017

Metafil­ter sets the stage for the cute, new­ly mint­ed video above:

At 1:00pm on May 17th, 2017, Neil deGrasse Tyson tweet­ed that he occa­sion­al­ly longed for some­one to read Good Night Moon to him as he falls asleep. Six min­utes lat­er, LeVar Bur­ton tweet­ed “I got you… Let’s do this!” And do it they did.

Some back­ground: LeVar Bur­ton host­ed the chil­dren’s TV show Read­ing Rain­bow for two decades, read­ing to chil­dren and encour­ag­ing them to read. His new pod­cast, LeVar Bur­ton Reads, is like Read­ing Rain­bow for adults. Neil deGrasse Tyson is a famous dancer yt /astrophysicist.

You can see Susan Saran­don read her own ver­sion. Find it in the Relat­eds below. Enjoy.

If you would like to sup­port the mis­sion of Open Cul­ture, con­sid­er mak­ing a dona­tion to our site. It’s hard to rely 100% on ads, and your con­tri­bu­tions will help us con­tin­ue pro­vid­ing the best free cul­tur­al and edu­ca­tion­al mate­ri­als to learn­ers every­where. You can con­tribute through Pay­Pal, Patre­on, and Ven­mo (@openculture). Thanks!

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Susan Saran­don Reads an Ani­mat­ed Ver­sion of Good Night Moon … With­out Cry­ing

A Ter­ri­fy­ing Read­ing of the Sweet Children’s Sto­ry Good­night Moon

Good­night Kei­th Moon: “The Most Inap­pro­pri­ate Bed­time Sto­ry Ever”

How Stress Can Change Your Brain: An Animated Introduction

in Health, Science, TED Talks | October 8th, 2017

We hear the mantra of “self-care” in ever-widen­ing cir­cles, a con­cept both derid­ed and cel­e­brat­ed as a “mil­len­ni­al obses­sion,” with the acknowledgment—at least in this NPR think piece— that self-care was cen­tral to the philoso­phies of antiq­ui­ty, from Aris­to­tle to the Sto­ics.

In phi­los­o­phy, self-care exists as a set of ethics. The rea­sons for this may often be couched in high-mind­ed dis­cus­sions of civics, sex­u­al pol­i­tics, and exis­ten­tial self-actu­al­iza­tion. These days, doc­tors and researchers are mak­ing urgent appeals for our men­tal and phys­i­cal health, and the sci­ence of stress is an unsur­pris­ing­ly rich field of inves­ti­ga­tion at the moment.

It’s hard to over­state the neg­a­tive effects of stress on the body over time. Increased stress hor­mones have been linked in study after study to overeat­ing and obe­si­ty, low­ered immune response, drug use and addic­tion, mem­o­ry impair­ment, heart dis­ease, and many oth­er debil­i­tat­ing and life-threat­en­ing con­di­tions. “The long-term acti­va­tion of the stress-response sys­tem,” writes the Mayo Clin­ic, “and the sub­se­quent over­ex­po­sure to cor­ti­sol and oth­er stress hormones—can dis­rupt almost all your body’s process­es.” (The video below makes this har­row­ing point with some help­ful, ani­mat­ed com­ic relief.)

When we expe­ri­ence chron­ic stress, it rais­es our blood pres­sure and affects our car­dio­vas­cu­lar sys­tem, increas­ing the chances of heart attack or stroke. The even worse news—reports the TED-Ed video at the top of the post—is that chron­ic stress weak­ens our abil­i­ty to make sound deci­sions about our well-being, by chang­ing the size, struc­ture, and func­tion of our brain.

We’re famil­iar with the symp­toms of chron­ic stress: “sleep­ing rest­less­ly,” becom­ing “irri­ta­ble or moody,” “for­get­ting lit­tle things,” and “feel­ing over­whelmed and iso­lat­ed.” Con­tin­u­ous stress, from our work lives, home lives, social and polit­i­cal lives, can cause shrink­ing in parts of the brain respon­si­ble for mem­o­ry, spa­tial recog­ni­tion… and stress reg­u­la­tion.

Research shows that high lev­els of cor­ti­sol and oth­er stress hor­mones can cause shrink­ing of the pre­frontal cor­tex, the part of the brain respon­si­ble for rea­son­ing and deci­sion-mak­ing. Stress can inhib­it neuroplasticity—the abil­i­ty of the brain to adapt to new circumstances—and neu­ro­ge­n­e­sis: the abil­i­ty to pro­duce new brain cells.

Con­verse­ly, stress increas­es the size of the amyg­dala, which acti­vates fight-or-flight respons­es, which in turn increase the strain on our heart and blood ves­sels.

All of these effects can set the stage in lat­er life for major depres­sion, forms of cog­ni­tive decline and demen­tia, and Alzheimer’s dis­ease.

Most unset­tling­ly, as the video notes, these effects can be passed down to the next gen­er­a­tion, fur­ther­ing the cycle of chron­ic stress in our chil­dren and theirs. Per­sis­tent stress “fil­ters down” to DNA, mak­ing it genet­i­cal­ly inher­i­ta­ble.

Giv­en the incred­i­ble amount of stress most peo­ple seem to be under, this sci­ence can seem like a diag­no­sis of doom. We all know that chron­ic stres­sors assail us all day long, with­out ask­ing whether we want them in our lives or not. An increas­ing amount of our dai­ly stress, I’d hypoth­e­size, may indeed come from the grow­ing real­iza­tion of how lit­tle con­trol we have over many stress­ful sit­u­a­tions.

But the TED explain­er ends with good news, and it’s been there all along—we can find it in the ancient Greeks, in Bud­dhist prac­tices, and many oth­er tra­di­tions, both active and con­tem­pla­tive. We can con­trol our respons­es to stress, and thus reverse and mod­u­late the effects of cor­ti­sol on our sys­tem. The best, proven, ways to do so are through exer­cise and med­i­ta­tion (and, I’d add, good nutri­tion).

These activ­i­ties will not erad­i­cate the con­di­tions of inequal­i­ty, injus­tice, or insta­bil­i­ty that stress us all out—a great many of us more than oth­ers. But prac­tic­ing “self-care” inas­much as we are able with stress-reliev­ing dis­ci­plines and prac­tices will bet­ter equip us to respond to the state of the world and the state of our lives by inter­rupt­ing the bio­log­i­cal mech­a­nisms that, over time, make things much worse. Find some help­ful resources below.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Stream 18 Hours of Free Guid­ed Med­i­ta­tions

Med­i­ta­tion 101: A Short, Ani­mat­ed Beginner’s Guide

Philoso­pher Sam Har­ris Leads You Through a 26-Minute Guid­ed Med­i­ta­tion

How to Get Start­ed with Yoga: Free Yoga Lessons on YouTube

Do Your­self a Favor and Watch Stress: Por­trait of a Killer (with Stan­ford Biol­o­gist Robert Sapol­sky)

How Mind­ful­ness Makes Us Hap­pi­er & Bet­ter Able to Meet Life’s Chal­lenges: Two Ani­mat­ed Primers Explain

How Bak­ing, Cook­ing & Oth­er Dai­ly Activ­i­ties Help Pro­mote Hap­pi­ness and Alle­vi­ate Depres­sion and Anx­i­ety

Allen Gins­berg Teach­es You How to Med­i­tate with a Rock Song Fea­tur­ing Bob Dylan on Bass

Josh Jones is a writer and musi­cian based in Durham, NC. Fol­low him at @jdmagness

Jason Aldean Performs “I Won’t Back Down” on SNL–A Moving Tribute the Victims of the Las Vegas Shooting & Tom Petty

in Life, Music | October 7th, 2017

Just days ago, Jason Aldean was per­form­ing on stage in Las Vegas when bul­lets start­ed reign­ing down, killing 58 con­cert­go­ers and wound­ing hun­dreds. Tonight, he opened Sat­ur­day Night Live with a poignant tribute–both to the vic­tims of the mas­sacre and rock­er Tom Pet­ty, who passed away ear­li­er this week.

Above, watch Aldean sing Pet­ty’s defi­ant 1989 anthem, “I Won’t Back Down.” Remem­ber the lives lost to sense­less vio­lence. Pray that we’ll even­tu­al­ly care enough, as a nation, to do some­thing about it. Think about music’s abil­i­ty to restore the soul. And thank SNL for ris­ing to yet anoth­er impor­tant occa­sion. 

If you would like to sup­port the mis­sion of Open Cul­ture, con­sid­er mak­ing a dona­tion to our site. It’s hard to rely 100% on ads, and your con­tri­bu­tions will help us con­tin­ue pro­vid­ing the best free cul­tur­al and edu­ca­tion­al mate­ri­als to learn­ers every­where. You can con­tribute through Pay­Pal, Patre­on, and Ven­mo (@openculture). Thanks!

Hear Benedict Cumberbatch Read John Keats’ “Ode to a Nightingale” and Other Great Works by Shakespeare, Dante & Coleridge

in Poetry | October 7th, 2017

Would Bene­dict Cum­ber­batch have such ardent fans if he could­n’t read poet­ry so well? Almost cer­tain­ly he would, although his way with verse still seems not like a bonus but an inte­gral com­po­nent of his dra­mat­ic per­sona. Though not eas­i­ly explained, that rela­tion­ship does come across if you hear any of the actor’s read­ings of poet­ry. In the video above, Cum­ber­batch per­forms “Ode to a Nightin­gale,” the longest and best-known of John Keats’ 1819 odes that casts into verse the poet­’s dis­cov­ery of “neg­a­tive capa­bil­i­ty,” or as he defined it in a let­ter two years ear­li­er, “when a man is capa­ble of being in uncer­tain­ties, mys­ter­ies, doubts, with­out any irri­ta­ble reach­ing after fact and rea­son.”

Yet one sens­es that the Cum­ber­batch fans who put up these videos, such as the one accom­pa­ny­ing “Ode to a Nightin­gale” with imagery rem­i­nis­cent of a Tiger Beat pic­to­r­i­al, care less about his neg­a­tive capa­bil­i­ty than cer­tain oth­er qual­i­ties. His voice, for instance: the uploader of the video com­bin­ing five poems just above describes as “the vel­vety dul­cet tones of a jaguar hid­ing in a cel­lo.”

That com­pi­la­tion includes “Ode to a Nightin­gale” as well as Shake­speare’s “The Sev­en Ages of Man” (“All the world’s a stage”), Lewis Car­rol­l’s “Jab­ber­wocky,” a piece of Dan­te’s Divine Com­e­dy, and Samuel Tay­lor Coleridge’s “Kubla Khan.” With Coleridge’s dream of Asia and Dan­te’s Ital­ian vision of the after­life, this poet­ic mix does get more exot­ic than it might seem (at least by the stan­dards of the eras from which it draws).

But Cum­ber­batch, who in 2015 received the hon­or of Com­man­der of the Most Excel­lent Order of the British Empire from the Queen and even read at the rebur­ial cer­e­mo­ny of King Richard III, clear­ly match­es best with the canon of his native Eng­land. As a ver­sa­tile per­former, and thus one who pre­sum­ably under­stands all about the need for neg­a­tive capa­bil­i­ty, Cum­ber­batch and his cel­lo-hid­den jaguar deliv­ery (a poet­ic descrip­tion, in its own way) has done jus­tice in the past to Kaf­ka, Kurt Von­negut, and Moby-Dick. Still, one won­ders what poem Cum­ber­batch could per­form in order to achieve an unsur­pass­able state of peak Eng­lish­ness. How long could it take for him to get around, for instance, to “If—”?

Cum­ber­batch’s read­ing of “Ode” will be added to our col­lec­tion, 1,000 Free Audio Books: Down­load Great Books for Free.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

F. Scott Fitzger­ald Reads Shakespeare’s Oth­el­lo and Keats’ “Ode to a Nightin­gale” (1940)

Coleridge’s Rime of the Ancient Mariner Ani­mat­ed: A Clas­sic Ver­sion Nar­rat­ed by Orson Welles

Hear 20 Hours of Roman­tic & Vic­to­ri­an Poet­ry Read by Ralph Fiennes, Dylan Thomas, James Mason & Many More

Hear Bene­dict Cum­ber­batch Read Kafka’s The Meta­mor­pho­sis

Bene­dict Cum­ber­batch Reads Kurt Vonnegut’s Incensed Let­ter to the High School That Burned Slaugh­ter­house-Five

Based in Seoul, Col­in Mar­shall writes and broad­casts on cities and cul­ture. His projects include the book The State­less City: a Walk through 21st-Cen­tu­ry Los Ange­les and the video series The City in Cin­e­ma. Fol­low him on Twit­ter at @colinmarshall or on Face­book.

Tom Petty Takes You Inside His Songwriting Craft

in Art, Music | October 6th, 2017

Briefly not­ed: Give this wide-rang­ing inter­view with Tom Pet­ty some time. Record­ed in 2014, Pet­ty talks with inter­view­er Jian Ghome­shi about his song­writ­ing craft. The writ­ing of songs, the rehearsal and record­ing process, the work in the stu­dio, it all gets cov­ered here. As he talks, one thing comes across: What­ev­er tal­ents he had, Pet­ty put in the hard work. He and the Heart­break­ers mas­tered their instru­ments, kept get­ting bet­ter, and did­n’t take short cuts, to the point where they could do mag­i­cal things togeth­er in the record­ing stu­dio.

Watch Part 1 above, and Part 2 below, where, at one point he says, “I’m doing the best I can. You can’t say I did­n’t try real­ly hard because I’m real­ly try­ing hard to be good.” The val­ue of trying–trying consistently–can nev­er be under­stat­ed.

Note: Some of the same themes get echoed in Tom Pet­ty’s final inter­view, which he gave to the LA Times last week. You can stream it here.

If you would like to sup­port the mis­sion of Open Cul­ture, con­sid­er mak­ing a dona­tion to our site. It’s hard to rely 100% on ads, and your con­tri­bu­tions will help us con­tin­ue pro­vid­ing the best free cul­tur­al and edu­ca­tion­al mate­ri­als to learn­ers every­where. You can con­tribute through Pay­Pal, Patre­on, and Ven­mo (@openculture). Thanks!

Relat­ed Con­tent:

A 17-Hour, Chrono­log­i­cal Jour­ney Through Tom Petty’s Music: Stream the Songs That Became the Sound­tracks of Our Lives

Watch Tom Pet­ty (RIP) and the Heart­break­ers Per­form Their Last Song Togeth­er, “Amer­i­can Girl”: Record­ed on 9/25/17

Prince, Joined by Tom Pet­ty, Plays a Mind-Blow­ing Gui­tar Solo On “While My Gui­tar Gen­tly Weeps”

The Hummingbird Whisperer: Meet the UCLA Scientist Who Has Befriended 200 Hummingbirds

in Environment, Life, Nature | October 6th, 2017

Com­mon wis­dom, and indeli­ble mem­o­ries of The Birds, warn that feed­ing seag­ulls, pigeons and oth­er crea­tures who trav­el in flocks is a can of worms best left unopened.

But what about hum­ming­birds?

Melanie Bar­boni is research geo­chemist in UCLA’s Depart­ment of Earth, Plan­e­tary and Space Sci­ences. Near the UCLA Court of Sci­ences she took a break from vol­canos and the moon long enough to hang a feed­er filled with sug­ar water out­side her ground floor office win­dow.

This com­pli­men­ta­ry buf­fet proved such a hit, she hung up more.

Two years lat­er, Bar­boni is serv­ing a colony of over 200 hum­ming­birds from four 80-ounce feed­ers. Their metab­o­lism requires them to con­sume 8 to 10 times their body weight on a dai­ly basis.

Barboni’s ser­vice to her tiny jew­el-toned friends extends well beyond the feed­ers. She’s divert­ed cam­pus tree trim­mers from inter­fer­ing with them dur­ing nest­ing sea­son, and giv­en pub­lic talks on the habi­tat-destroy­ing effects of cli­mate change. She’s col­lab­o­rat­ing with anoth­er pro­fes­sor and UCLA’s Chief Sus­tain­abil­i­ty Offi­cer Nurit Katz to estab­lish a spe­cial gar­den on cam­pus for hum­ming­birds and their fel­low pol­li­na­tors.

The inti­ma­cy of this rela­tion­ship is some­thing she’s dreamed of since her bird­watch­ing child­hood in Switzer­land where the only hum­ming­birds avail­able for her view­ing were the ones in books. Her dream came true when a fel­low­ship took her from Prince­ton to Los Ange­les, where hum­ming­birds live year-round.

Some long­time favorites now perch on their benefactor’s hand while feed­ing, or even per­mit them­selves to be held and stroked. A few like to hang out inside the office, where the warm glow of Barboni’s com­put­er mon­i­tor is a com­fort­ing pres­ence on inclement days.

She’s bestowed names on at least 50: Squeak, Star­dust, Tiny, Shy…

(Show of hands from those who wish she’d named them all after not­ed geol­o­gists: Mary Anning, Eugene Mer­le Shoe­mak­er, Cecil­ia Hele­na Payne-Gaposchkin…)

Get to know the UCLA hum­ming­birds bet­ter through Melanie Barboni’s up-close-and-per­son­al doc­u­men­tary pho­tos. Learn more about the species itself through the Nation­al Geo­graph­ic doc­u­men­tary below.

via The Kids Should See This

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Cor­nell Launch­es Archive of 150,000 Bird Calls and Ani­mal Sounds, with Record­ings Going Back to 1929

Google Uses Arti­fi­cial Intel­li­gence to Map Thou­sands of Bird Sounds Into an Inter­ac­tive Visu­al­iza­tion

Free Enter­tain­ment for Cats and Dogs: Videos of Birds, Squir­rels & Oth­er Thrills

Ayun Hal­l­i­day is an author, illus­tra­tor, the­ater mak­er and Chief Pri­ma­tol­o­gist of the East Vil­lage Inky zine.  Fol­low her @AyunHalliday.

People Walked a Little Differently During Medieval Times: A Quick Primer

in History | October 5th, 2017

Roland Warzecha runs a Youtube chan­nel where he delves into the world of medieval weapons and com­bat. If you want to learn some­thing about Viking shields and swords, medieval spears and com­bat tech­niques, spend some time there.

Above, Roland departs from his reg­u­lar­ly sched­uled pro­gram­ming and explores anoth­er facet of medieval life. Walk­ing. That’s right, walk­ing. It turns out that, as Boing Boing sum­ma­rizes it, “before struc­tured shoes became preva­lent in the 16th cen­tu­ry … peo­ple walked with a dif­fer­ent gait, push­ing onto the balls of our feet instead of rock­ing for­ward on our heels.” And that’s your les­son on medieval body mechan­ics for today…

If you would like to sup­port the mis­sion of Open Cul­ture, con­sid­er mak­ing a dona­tion to our site. It’s hard to rely 100% on ads, and your con­tri­bu­tions will help us con­tin­ue pro­vid­ing the best free cul­tur­al and edu­ca­tion­al mate­ri­als to learn­ers every­where. You can con­tribute through Pay­Pal, Patre­on, and Ven­mo (@openculture). Thanks!

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Fash­ion­able 2,000-Year-Old Roman Shoe Found in a Well

What’s It Like to Fight in 15th Cen­tu­ry Armor?: A Sur­pris­ing Demon­stra­tion

Won­der­ful­ly Weird & Inge­nious Medieval Books

See The Guidon­ian Hand, the Medieval Sys­tem for Read­ing Music, Get Brought Back to Life

Wear­able Books: In Medieval Times, They Took Old Man­u­scripts & Turned Them into Clothes

How Walk­ing Fos­ters Cre­ativ­i­ty: Stan­ford Researchers Con­firm What Philoso­phers and Writ­ers Have Always Known

The Smithsonian Presents a Gallery of 6,000+ Rare Rock ‘n Roll Photos on a Crowdsourced Web Site, and Now a New Book

in Film, Music | October 5th, 2017

Rock pho­tog­ra­phy is an art form in itself, as demon­strat­ed by books and exhi­bi­tions of some of its mas­ters like Mick Rock, Jen­ny Lens, Pen­nie Smith, and so many oth­ers. But two years ago, the Smith­son­ian turned to the crowd, to the fan, to the ama­teur pho­tog­ra­ph­er, with a call to sub­mit pho­tos from over six decades of rock and roll that weren’t hang­ing on gallery walls, but sit­ting in a shoe­box some­where. From fans with insta­mat­ic cam­eras to ama­teurs cov­er­ing con­certs for their school paper, the Smith­son­ian want­ed anoth­er angle on our cul­tur­al obses­sion.

Many of the con­tri­bu­tions now live on a crowd­sourced web­site. And a result­ing book Smith­son­ian Rock and Roll: Live and Unseen col­lects the best of these in a chrono­log­i­cal his­to­ry of the genre, from post-war blues to the late 20th cen­tu­ry. It will be offi­cial­ly released on Octo­ber 24, though you can pre-order now.

Web­sites Mash­able and Dan­ger­ous Minds present a selec­tion of pho­tos from the book, such as a shot of Sly Stone at the height of his pow­ers (and belt buck­le size), a pic of the Talk­ing Heads on stage in Berke­ley, 1977; a dark and mys­te­ri­ous glimpse of Bon­nie Raitt, cir­ca 1974; and a shot of Cream play­ing the Chica­go Col­i­se­um tak­en from the side of the stage, with Gin­ger Baker’s head a com­plete blur. Also find Joni Mitchell at Klein­hans Music Hall. And The Ramones in Tempe, Ari­zona, cir­ca 1978.

Bon­nie Raitt at the Har­vard Square The­atre, by Bar­ry Schneier/Smithsonian Books

It’s a reminder of how unpre­ten­tious these live shows could be, hap­pen­ing in a world with the sim­plest of light­ing rigs and decades from the big screen pro­jec­tions even up-and-com­ing bands now indulge in. For the most part, this was an inti­mate con­tract between the artist and the audi­ence, all crammed into small clubs with smoke, sweat, heat, and, most impor­tant­ly, elec­tric­i­ty in the air.

The new book also fea­tures tales from the peo­ple who took the pho­tos, along with some more pro­fes­sion­al pho­tos to “flesh out this overview of rock and roll,” accord­ing to the intro­duc­tion by orga­niz­er Bill Bent­ley. He adds: “The results, span­ning six decades, aim for nei­ther ency­clo­pe­dic author­i­ty nor com­pre­hen­sive final­i­ty, but rather an index of supreme influ­ence.”

The Ramones in Tempe, Ari­zona, by Dori­an Boese/Smithsonian Books

That supreme influ­ence con­tin­ues to be felt, for sure. Although the sub­mis­sion win­dow is now closed, the Smith­so­ni­an’s web­site allows you to look through the hun­dreds of sub­mis­sions to the project.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

UC San­ta Cruz Opens a Deadhead’s Delight: The Grate­ful Dead Archive is Now Online

Bea­t­les, Friends & Fam­i­ly: Pho­tos by Lin­da McCart­ney

Judy!: 1993 Judith But­ler Fanzine Gives Us An Irrev­er­ent Punk-Rock Take on the Post-Struc­tural­ist Gen­der The­o­rist

Ted Mills is a free­lance writer on the arts who cur­rent­ly hosts the FunkZone Pod­cast. You can also fol­low him on Twit­ter at @tedmills, read his oth­er arts writ­ing at tedmills.com and/or watch his films here.

Depeche Mode Releases a Goosebump-Inducing Cover of David Bowie’s “Heroes”

in Music | October 4th, 2017

40 years ago, David Bowie record­ed “Heroes,” a song that tells the sto­ry of two lovers who embrace in a kiss by the Berlin Wall. How the song was record­ed gets won­der­ful­ly retold by pro­duc­er Tony Vis­con­ti, in a post/video we fea­tured in Jan­u­ary 2016. Don’t miss it.

Above, you can watch Depeche Mod­e’s new cov­er of “Heroes,” record­ed to com­mem­o­rate the 40th anniver­sary of the song’s offi­cial release (Sep­tem­ber 23, 1977). “ ‘Heroes’ is the most spe­cial song to me at the moment,” Depeche Mode front­man Dave Gahan told NME. “Bowie is the one artist who I’ve stuck with since I was in my ear­ly teens. His albums are always my go-to on tour and cov­er­ing ‘Heroes’ is pay­ing homage to Bowie.”

In anoth­er inter­view with Rolling Stone, Gahan talked more about the expe­ri­ence of record­ing this song: “I was so moved, I bare­ly held it togeth­er, to be hon­est.” Watch­ing the per­for­mance, I got a few goose­bumps, I have to admit.

If you would like to sup­port the mis­sion of Open Cul­ture, con­sid­er mak­ing a dona­tion to our site. It’s hard to rely 100% on ads, and your con­tri­bu­tions will help us con­tin­ue pro­vid­ing the best free cul­tur­al and edu­ca­tion­al mate­ri­als to learn­ers every­where. You can con­tribute through Pay­Pal, Patre­on, and Ven­mo (@openculture). Thanks!

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Pro­duc­er Tony Vis­con­ti Breaks Down the Mak­ing of David Bowie’s Clas­sic “Heroes,” Track by Track

David Bowie Per­forms a Live Acoustic Ver­sion of “Heroes,” with a Bot­tle Cap Strapped to His Shoe, Keep­ing the Beat

David Bowie & Bri­an Eno’s Col­lab­o­ra­tion on “Warsza­wa” Reimag­ined in a Com­ic Ani­ma­tion

Three Blade Runner Prequels: Watch Them Online

in Film, Sci Fi | October 4th, 2017

Even if you’ve spent each and every day since you first saw Rid­ley Scot­t’s Blade Run­ner wait­ing for a sequel, you still might not be ful­ly pre­pared for Denis Vil­leneu­ve’s Blade Run­ner 2049 when it opens in the­aters this Fri­day. The 1981 orig­i­nal took place in the Los Ange­les of the then-far-flung future of 2019, mean­ing that 30 years have elapsed in the Blade Run­ner uni­verse between its first fea­ture film and its sec­ond. Much has tak­en place over those three decades, some of it por­trayed by the three offi­cial short pre­quels released to the inter­net over the past month. Today we present them all in chrono­log­i­cal order to catch you up with what hap­pened after Har­ri­son Ford’s Blade Run­ner Rick Deckard picked up that origa­mi uni­corn and left the build­ing.

In 2020, the year after Blade Run­ner, the arti­fi­cial-being-mak­ing Tyrell Cor­po­ra­tion intro­duces a new mod­el of repli­cant, with a longer lifes­pan, called the Nexus 8S. Two years lat­er comes “the Black­out,” an elec­tro­mag­net­ic pulse attack that destroys all tech­nol­o­gy with­in its reach. You can see it hap­pen in Blade Run­ner Black Out 2022, the short at the top of the post direct­ed by respect­ed Japan­ese ani­ma­tor Shinichi­ro Watan­abe (and fea­tur­ing a score by Fly­ing Lotus as well as a reprisal of the role of the qua­si-Esperan­to-speak­ing police offi­cer Gaff by Edward James Olmos).

Repli­cants hav­ing tak­en the blame for the Black­out, their pro­duc­tion gets legal­ly pro­hib­it­ed until the efforts of an orga­ni­za­tion called the Wal­lace Cor­po­ra­tion get the ban over­turned in 2030. The man at the top of the Wal­lace Cor­po­ra­tion, a cer­tain Nian­der Wal­lace, first appears in 2036: Nexus Dawn (mid­dle video), direct­ed by Rid­ley Scot­t’s son Luke.

In that pre­quel we see Wal­lace, who rose to promi­nence on his com­pa­ny’s solu­tion to glob­al food short­ages, sub­mit­ting for approval his lat­est repli­cant, the Nexus 9 (although his nego­ti­a­tion strat­e­gy leaves lit­tle room for com­pro­mise). The younger Scot­t’s 2048: Nowhere to Run (below), which intro­duces a new and impos­ing repli­cant char­ac­ter by the name of Sap­per Mor­ton, takes place just a year before the sequel, by which time, accord­ing to the time­line unveiled at this past sum­mer’s Com­ic-Con, “life on Earth has reached its lim­it and soci­ety divides between repli­cant and human.” Enter Ryan Gosling’s K, one of a new gen­er­a­tion of repli­cant- hunters, who goes out in search of a pre­de­ces­sor who went miss­ing some 30 years ago. All of this, of course, still leaves ques­tions unan­swered. Chiefly: will Blade Run­ner 2049 deliv­er what we’ve been wait­ing even more than three dea­cades for?

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Watch the New Ani­me Pre­quel to Blade Run­ner 2049, by Famed Japan­ese Ani­ma­tor Shinichi­ro Watan­abe

Jared Leto Stars in a New Pre­quel to Blade Run­ner 2049: Watch It Free Online

Blade Run­ner 2049’s New Mak­ing-Of Fea­turette Gives You a Sneak Peek Inside the Long-Await­ed Sequel

The Offi­cial Trail­er for Rid­ley Scott’s Long-Await­ed Blade Run­ner Sequel Is Final­ly Out

Philip K. Dick Pre­views Blade Run­ner: “The Impact of the Film is Going to be Over­whelm­ing” (1981)

Based in Seoul, Col­in Mar­shall writes and broad­casts on cities and cul­ture. His projects include the book The State­less City: a Walk through 21st-Cen­tu­ry Los Ange­les and the video series The City in Cin­e­ma. Fol­low him on Twit­ter at @colinmarshall or on Face­book.