DC Comics, Inc. is an American comic book publisher and the flagship unit of DC Entertainment, a subsidiary of Warner Bros. Discovery. DC is an initialism for "Detective Comics", an American comic book series first published in 1937.
Laurence van Cott Niven is an American science fiction writer. His 1970 novel Ringworld won the Hugo, Locus, Ditmar, and Nebula awards. With Jerry Pournelle he wrote The Mote in God's Eye (1974) and Lucifer's Hammer (1977). The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America gave him the 2015 Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master Award.
Michael John Moorcock is an English writer, particularly of science fiction and fantasy, who has published a number of well-received literary novels as well as comic thrillers, graphic novels and non-fiction. He has worked as an editor and is also a successful musician. He is best known for his novels about the character Elric of Melniboné, which were a seminal influence on the field of fantasy in the 1960s and 1970s.
A parallel universe, also known as an alternate universe, parallel world, parallel dimension, alternate reality, or alternative dimension, is a hypothetical universe co-existing with one's own, typically distinct in some way. The sum of all potential parallel universes that constitute reality is often called the "multiverse." Another common term for a parallel universe is "another dimension", stemming from the idea that if the 4th dimension is time, the 5th dimension—a direction at a right angle to the fourth—is a direction into any of the alternate spacetime realities.
A fantasy world or fictional world is a world created for fictional media, such as literature, film or games. Typical fantasy worlds feature magical abilities. Some worlds may be a parallel world connected to Earth via magical portals or items ; an imaginary universe hidden within ours ; a fictional Earth set in the remote past or future ; an alternative version of our History ; or an entirely independent world set in another part of the universe.
The Science of Discworld II: The Globe is a 2002 book written by British novelist Terry Pratchett and science writers Ian Stewart and Jack Cohen. It is a sequel to The Science of Discworld, and is followed by The Science of Discworld III: Darwin's Watch.
Low fantasy, or intrusion fantasy, is a subgenre of fantasy fiction in which magical events intrude on an otherwise-normal world. The term thus contrasts with high fantasy stories, which take place in fictional worlds that have their own sets of rules and physical laws.
Earth Prime is a term sometimes used in works of speculative fiction, most notably in DC Comics, involving parallel universes or a multiverse, and refers either to the universe containing "our" Earth, or to a parallel world with a bare minimum of divergence points from Earth as we know it — often the absence or near-absence of metahumans, or with their existence confined to fictional narratives like comics. The "Earth Prime" of a given fictional setting may or may not have an intrinsic value to or vital connection to the other Earths it exists alongside.
Rainbow Mars is a 1999 science fiction short story collection by American writer Larry Niven. It contains six stories of Hanville Svetz, five previously published and the longest, "Rainbow Mars", written for the collection. The setting of the Svetz stories is Earth in the distant future. The hereditary leader of the Earth, known as the Secretary General, is an inbred imbecile. In order to maintain the interest of the Secretary, different factions in the capitol use their advanced science to amuse him. Svetz's section uses time travel in an attempt to bring back long extinct animals from Earth's past. Unbeknownst to Svetz and his team, they are actually travelling back into fictional pasts, and returning with mythical creatures.
Elements of the supernatural and the fantastic were an element of literature from its beginning. The modern fantasy genre is distinguished from tales and folklore which contain fantastic elements, first by the acknowledged fictitious nature of the work, and second by the naming of an author. Authors like George MacDonald (1824–1905) created the first explicitly fantastic works.
Edward M. Lerner is an American author of science fiction, techno-thrillers, and popular science.
Worldbuilding is the process of constructing an imaginary world or setting, sometimes associated with a fictional universe. Developing the world with coherent qualities such as a history, geography, culture and ecology is a key task for many science fiction or fantasy writers. Worldbuilding often involves the creation of geography, a backstory, flora, fauna, inhabitants, technology and often if writing speculative fiction, different peoples. This may include social customs as well as invented languages for the world.
Hercules is a fictional Olympian god in the DC Universe based on the Greek demigod and hero of the same name.
Superhero fiction is a subgenre of speculative fiction examining the adventures, personalities and ethics of costumed crime fighters known as superheroes, who often possess superhuman powers and battle similarly powered criminals known as supervillains. The genre primarily falls between hard fantasy and soft science fiction in the spectrum of scientific realism. It is most commonly associated with American comic books, though it has expanded into other media through adaptations and original works.
"The Reign of the Superman" is a short story written by Jerry Siegel and illustrated by Joe Shuster. It was the writer/artist duo's first published use of the name Superman, which they later applied to their archetypal fictional superhero. The title character of this story is a telepathic villain, rather than a physically powerful hero like the well-known character. Although the name is hyphenated between syllables due to it being broken between pages on the story's opening spread, it is spelled Superman in the magazine's table of contents and in the story's text.
A shared universe or shared world is a fictional universe from a set of creative works where one or more writers independently contribute works that can stand alone but fits into the joint development of the storyline, characters, or world of the overall project. It is common in genres like science fiction. It differs from collaborative writing in which multiple artists are working together on the same work and from crossovers where the works and characters are independent except for a single meeting.
Magic in fiction is the endowment of characters or objects in works of fiction or fantasy with powers that do not naturally occur in the real world.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to fantasy:
A list of works by, or about, the American science fiction author Larry Niven.
