Otaking's 'TIE Fighter' Is The Star Wars Anime Tie-in We Deserve

The Force is strong with this year. While sci-fi afficiandos and movie-goers patiently wait on further news and publicity concerning the seventh Star Wars film slated for release this December, Paul "Otaking" Johnson's fan-made short TIE Fighter only proves that the franchise's future continues to resonate long after the films.

The short follows a troupe of rebel X-Wings embroiled in a deseperate fight against a fleet of Star Destroyers and their host of TIE Fighters. Accompanied by Zakir Rahman's inspired heavy metal soundtrack riffing off of the musical troupes of early 90's anime, TIE Fighter is an impressive fan-short that takes as much inspiration from Lucas' iconic space-opera as it does from the works of anime titans such as Yoshiyuki Tomino (Mobile Suit Gundam) and Leiji Matsumoto (Space Battleship Yamato). And to top it off, not only is it painstakingly well-animated, it's canonically accurate as well! Now that's what I call dedication

'The Landing' is a Phenomenal Short-film of Poise and Substance

Damn. Right on the heels of last week's stellar sci-fi short Anomaly comes another equally captivating short film of mesmerizing tone and visual grace.

Modern-Day. A man argues frantically with a 911 dispatcher as he marches into a barren field, touting a shovel in hand. August 6th, 1960. A young boy named Edward plays a game of army-men versus aliens on his front porch before witnessing an frightening omen of cosmic significance.

"The program you are about to hear is largely fiction; Science-fiction. We make no guarantee however how long it will remain fiction."

These two seemingly-disparate stories dove-tailed into The Landing; A beautiful 20-minute short film about the love between a father and his son, innocence lost, and how the sins of the past come to bear on our future. The film's already racked up five nominations and eleven wins from festivals across the world, even eliciting talks of a Oscar nomination for best short film. And it's not hard to see why. Take some time out of your day to check this one out; It's undoubtedly something special.

The Art of Halil Ural

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As soon as I saw Halil Ural's portfolio, I knew I had to post him on Awesome Robo. Gorgeous color compositions, a brilliant pulp sci-fi aesthetic, and epic alien worlds both bizarre and beautiful. It's genuinely hard to look through his work and have to choose which pieces to spotlight, this guy is sick.

Halil is a professional illustrator based out of Turkey. Besides just being all around awesome, he also created the impressive cover and promotional art for the action platform-shooter Gunlord. Check after the break for more of his artwork!