Mass Attack! Science Fact and Science Fiction – Higgs bosons and Comic Con!

Well, you’d have to have spent the past month in a galaxy far, far away to have missed the two major pieces of news that are dominating the media. The first is of course the discovery of the Higgs boson – the so-called ‘God particle’ by scientists at CERN. It didn’t take long for this one to appear:

A Higgs boson walks into a church and the priest says ‘I’m sorry, but we don’t allow Higgs bosons to worship here.’ And the Higgs boson replies: ‘Fine. But without me you’ll have no mass.’

The mass effect brings us to the even bigger news – Comic Con 2012. If there’s one thing guaranteed to get us excited more than Mad Men and Don’s suits it has to be the yearly event at San Diego where Hollywood showcases its upcoming blockbusters. Returning triumphant was Joss Whedon, fresh from the success of the mighty Avengers. We’ve got to wait for the Avengers ensemble to return but fortunately, we’ve only got to wait until 2013 for the next Iron Man adventure. Robert Downey Jr arrived in character – complete with designer suit and sunglasses and Iron Man hand. ‘I’ve got three questions,’ Downey Jr. began. ‘Question one, how much do I love you? Question two, how much do you love me? Question three, why aren’t we watching any footage yet?’

Fans were treated to a clip showing Tony Stark in his lab and pieces of his suit flying to Tony one by one. However, a Skype chat reveals Happy Hogan (Jon Favreau) is no longer Tony’s head of security. We wonder what will happen when Tony has to face-down The Mandarin (Ben Kingsley)?

Ben is not the only Brit making a splash as all eyes were on the new Superman, British actor Henry Cavill. Director Zack Snyder showed off the new Man of Steel footage. The story re-boots the franchise but General Zod is set to reappear.

Time travelling Matt Smith and Karen Gillan were also there answering questions about their seventh season of Dr. Who which goes to air on BBC America.

Outside the centre, another Brit Sons of Anarchy star Charlie Hunnam arrived in character and riding his Harley.

Charlie stars in the upcoming  “Pacific Rim” directed by Guillermo Del Toro who calls the film a “big fat obscene Christmas gift”. The film, which comes out next July, basically pits giant human-created robots to fight giant monsters, also features Sons of Anarchy co-star Ron Perlman, who was also in attendance at the event. The footage featured massively scaled set pieces of soldiers and robots gearing up to smash and mash equally large monsters, and ended on a rousing speech by the actor Idris Elba intoning: “Today we are cancelling the apocalypse.” Del Toro told the audience that principal photography only wrapped 12 weeks ago and he would go into total radio silence about the film until the end of the year.

While time travelling Matt Smith and Karen Gillan answered questions about Dr. Who which goes to air on BBC America.

The biggest surprise both literally and figuratively was the announcement by Warner Bros and Legendary Pictures that Godzilla will be back to destroying cities near you shortly. That is – if there is anything left after the monsters and robots have finished.

British director Gareth Edwards (Monsters) said he was trying not to cry as he came on stage to talk about the footage he brought – which was shown twice – and ended with a brief image of the giant, city-destroying lizard. Before leaving, Edwards joked he hadn’t worked this hard for something so short since he lost his virginity.