Last Friday night I had the privilege to be part of a unique panel discussion. Signum University hosted an impromptu Signum Symposium called “One Fantastic Rogue Beast.” The discussion featured a team of fantasy bloggers and podcasters who spend their time thinking about the intersection of culture and film.

Sørina Higgins, chair of Literature and Language at SignumU, hosted a discussion of two hot films: Rogue One and Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. These are two hot insertions, one into the Star Wars universe and one into the Harry Potter fictional world. We had a great chat, and Sørina signed off after the 90 minutes we had allotted. When she slid away, the rest of us stayed on the software to chat for a bit, thinking that we were now a closed room. Obviously there was more to say as none of us actually agreed to keep talking. It just happened, and we had a great discussion for about 45 minutes afterwards.

The great joke on us was that the film was still rolling and there were dozens of people still online! You can catch it all on the SignumU youtube page, or just click on the video below. The panel helped me think through the films, and you can see how the conversation spun off into all kinds of interesting ways.

Here are the quick media details of each of the panelists:

• Sørina Higgins @SorinaHiggins
• Kelly Orazi @the_middle_page
• Kat Sas @Katherine_Sas
• Emily Strand @ekcstrand
• Curtis Weyant @curtdubya