Ronald.phillips

After melting a hole through the Ross Ice Shelf, scientists make a surprising find.

Enforcing the "double-extortion" technique aka pay-now-or-get-breached emerged as a head-turner last year.  May 6th, 2022 is a recent example. The State Department said the Conti strain of ransomware was the most costly in terms of payments made by victims as of January. Conti, a ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS) program, is one of the most notorious ransomware groups and has been responsible for

Let's just say Amazon can send superheroes where Marvel can't. We talked to the showrunner about how that scene from the third season opener came to be.

Even though we're knee-deep in the era of comic adaptations, I'm shocked by what Hollywood has left on the table. After the glowing reception that The Walking Dead and Invincible have earned in recent years, I can't believe that every book from Robert Kirkman hasn't already been optioned yet. — Read the rest

Sequels have it rough. If the creative team behind the sequel for a successful movie plays things too safely and barely deviates from the original film, fans become disenchanted with the franchise. Paradoxically, if a sequel veers too far from the original- either in tone or plot- fans are equally unkind to the movie. — Read the rest

One of my favorite scenes in Batman Begins is when Bruce escapes from the League of Shadow's HQ. No matter how many times I've seen it, the scene remains as pulse-pounding and exhilarating as the first time I watched it in theaters. — Read the rest

We have a great challenge with the gap in cybersecurity jobs in general, with estimates ranging from 2.72 million to 3.5 million job openings in 2021.

read more

Anyone who has more money than they know what to do with eventually tries to cure aging. Google founder Larry Page has tried it. Jeff Bezos has tried it. Tech billionaires Larry Ellison and Peter Thiel have tried it. Now the kingdom of Saudi Arabia, which has about as much money as all of them put together, is going to try it. From a report: The Saudi royal family has started a not-for-profit organization called the Hevolution Foundation that plans to spend up to $1 billion a year of its oil wealth supporting basic research on the biology of aging and finding ways to extend the number of years people live in good health, a concept known as "health span." The sum, if the Saudis can spend it, could make the Gulf state the largest single sponsor of researchers attempting to understand the underlying causes of aging -- and how it might be slowed down with drugs. The foundation hasn't yet made a formal announcement, but the scope of its effort has been outlined at scientific meetings and is the subject of excited chatter among aging researchers, who hope it will underwrite large human studies of potential anti-aging drugs. The fund is managed by Mehmood Khan, a former Mayo Clinic endocrinologist and the onetime chief scientist at PespsiCo, who was recruited to the CEO job in 2020. "Our primary goal is to extend the period of healthy lifespan," Khan said in an interview. "There is not a bigger medical problem on the planet than this one." The idea, popular among some longevity scientists, is that if you can slow the body's aging process, you can delay the onset of multiple diseases and extend the healthy years people are able to enjoy as they grow older. Khan says the fund is going to give grants for basic scientific research on what causes aging, just as others have done, but it also plans to go a step further by supporting drug studies, including trials of "treatments that are patent expired or never got commercialized."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

When Peter Parker first swung onto the pages of Marvel Comics in 1962, he changed the world. For the first time, here was a relatable, flawed superhero for the teens — a stark difference from all the aspirational heroes who came before him. But as Spider-Man exploded in popularity, he lost some of his outcast relatability — though the comics would constantly try to recapture it with multiple amnesiac episodes and alternate universe reboots. Enter: Kamala Khan.

Making her debut on the pages of "Captain Marvel" before getting her solo series soon after in 2014, Kamala Khan's Ms. Marvel was the source of much hoopla: for being the first Muslim superhero to headline her own series, and for being Marvel's hamfisted way of trying to make the "Inhumans" retconning stick (the less said about that, the better). But underneath all the annoying chatter about identity politics and comic book lore, there was a wonderful story about an insecure teenage superhero that managed to recapture what made Spider-Man so magical.

Kamala Khan was silly, shortsighted, overeager, and a fangirl totally out of her depth. And as depicted by writer G. Willow Wilson and artist Adrian Alphona, she was utterly charming. The combination of her relatable teen life — schoolwork, school crushes, parties — and her rich home life courtesy of her Muslim upbringing made the "Ms. Marvel" comics feel like a breath of fresh air.

The "Ms. Marvel" TV series translates all that to the screen — and more. The delightful new Disney+ series, created by Bisha K. Ali and directed by "Bad Boys for Life" duo Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah, is more than just a Spider-Man redux. "Ms. Marvel" is a shot of candy-colored joy, a fantastic coming-of-age comedy that happens to moonlight as a superhero show.

Like An Idea Come To Life

Newcomer Iman Vellani delivers a star-making turn as Kamala Khan, an average 16-year-old who loves the Avengers. But not just any Avenger: she is a total fangirl for Carol Danvers, aka Captain Marvel.

In a sequence that takes a few cues from the opening scenes of the groundbreaking "Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse" and "Mitchells vs. the Machines" (both of which were shot-to-the-arms to the animation medium), Kamala recounts the Avengers' awesome battle against Thanos, her doodles springing to life and dancing off the page to re-enact the fight, as she gushes about how the only hero to stand above the rest was Carol Danvers. Crayon drawings explode and transform into Captain Marvel or the Hulk in the blink of an eye, crinkled lined notebook paper becomes the war-torn backdrop of New York, all while Vellani joyfully narrates what turns into a YouTube video with hundreds of views and dozens of equally gushing comments. Already Kamala leads a double life — though one that exists only online.

This fizzy opening sequence sets the stage for the visually imaginative palette that directors El Arbi and Fallah would maintain for the first two episodes made available to critics. The show is jam-packed with stylistic flourishes — split screens, camera whips and zooms, doodles that wink and blow kisses at the screen, murals that come to life as Kamala and her best friend Bruno (a sweetly endearing Matt Lintz) blow through town on their bikes, their thoughts and conversations playing out in the backgrounds behind them. It's a visual language that feels tailor-made for Gen Z audiences who live and breathe fast cuts and frenetic edits. And it's one that makes sense for Kamala Khan, who spends most of her time with her head in the clouds, frequently imagining a much more exciting life than the dull one she lives as a weird loser at a Jersey City high school.

That all changes when Kamala sneaks out of her house one day to attend the first annual Avengers Con, bringing along with her a homemade Captain Marvel costume and a mysterious bangle that she unearthed from among her grandmother's box of family trinkets. While onstage at the con's Captain Marvel costume contest, Kamala puts on the bangle, and immediately feels a strange sensation that appears to send her briefly careening through some cosmic realm. She snaps back to reality and a beam of light shoots out of her hand and hardens: she has superpowers.

A Breath Of Fresh Air

As breathlessly imaginative as the visuals of "Ms. Marvel" visuals are, the great appeal of the series isn't in the stylistic flourishes or even in the gleeful sincerity with which the show treats its superhero origin story, but in its delightful coming-of-age story.

"Ms. Marvel" is a teen comedy series first and foremost, Ali bringing with her some of the charm, wit, and understanding of teen angst she showed in her contributions to Netflix's "Sex Education" (albeit without any of the raunchier elements). It's nothing groundbreaking, but the show's low-key stakes, anchored in teen drama and cultural authenticity, nonetheless make "Ms. Marvel" stand out from the other Marvel Disney+ shows.

Kamala's awkward training scenes with her friend Bruno (the only one who knows about her powers) sit comfortably alongside subplots about Kamala crushing on the hot new guy at school, or Kamala's friend Nakia's (Yasmeen Fletcher) campaign to improve conditions at the mosque for women. Interwoven throughout is an ongoing mystery about Kamala's ancestry, stretching back to the Partition of India and Pakistan (a subject that is only recently getting more coverage in movies and TV).

As a high school comedy, "Ms. Marvel" is nothing new. As a superhero origin story with a relatable teen protagonist, "Ms. Marvel" is nothing new. But the particular alchemy of elements that make up "Ms. Marvel" — Kamala's Peter Parker-like relatability, her authentic cultural background, El Arbi and Fallah's vibrant directorial style, and the frankly adorable teen escapades — make "Ms. Marvel" feel like something truly special.

"Ms. Marvel" launches on Disney+ on June 8, 2022.

Read this next: Every MCU Post-Credits Sequence Ranked From Worst To Best

The post Ms. Marvel Review: A Breathlessly Imaginative Teen Comedy, and Breath of Fresh of Air for Superhero Shows appeared first on /Film.

JavaScript is responsible for many elements in a web page. As you read this on any mobile or desktop browser, it most likely supports loading up JavaScript to help you navigate the web. Some popular examples would include Twitter, GitHub, Trello, and countless others. The exceptions may include text-based webpages with no dynamic resources and classic HTML-powered websites.

After director Dan Trachtenberg impressed us with his feature debut "10 Cloverfield Lane" back in 2016, we've been eagerly awaiting his next film. He's flirted with a few options for a follow-up, but largely spent his time directing episodes of shows like "The Boys" and "Black Mirror" while waiting for the right situation to the world of movies. Six years later, that time has finally come: He's behind the camera of "Prey," a "Predator" film set 300 years ago in which a skilled warrior named Naru (Amber Midthunder) comes face to (invisible) face with a terrifying alien hunter.

20th Century Studios has just released a new trailer for the film, and I had the opportunity to speak with Trachtenberg and producer Jhane Myers about inspirations for the project, the current state of IP filmmaking, and the cool language options this movie will offer to viewers at home. Check out the trailer and our conversation below.

Prey Trailer

I love how this trailer grounds you in Naru's journey before revealing that she has a much bigger fight on her hands than the one she originally anticipated. Oddly, the trailer's structure sort of mirrors the public trajectory of this movie itself. This project was initially developed under the code name "Skulls" in the hopes of keeping the fact that it was a "Predator" movie under wraps, which would have been incredibly cool -- but alas, the cat was let out of the bag. But hey, at least the marketing team now has access to all of the familiar iconography of a "Predator" project (the clicking sounds, the triangle-shaped laser sight, the hair tendrils) that will likely convince a much wider audience to click "play" on opening weekend.

Here's the movie's official synopsis:

Set in the Comanche Nation 300 years ago, "Prey" is the story of a young woman, Naru, a fierce and highly skilled warrior. She has been raised in the shadow of some of the most legendary hunters who roam the Great Plains, so when danger threatens her camp, she sets out to protect her people. The prey she stalks, and ultimately confronts, turns out to be a highly evolved alien predator with a technically advanced arsenal, resulting in a vicious and terrifying showdown between the two adversaries.

A Conversation With Director Dan Trachtenberg And Producer Jhane Myers

Dan, there's been some discussion in recent years about how, because of the IP-obsessed nature of the industry, filmmakers are increasingly having to smuggle their ideas and interests into a larger property in order to get these stories told at all. I'm curious if that's been true in your experience, because with both this and "10 Cloverfield Lane," it almost feels like both of those are stories that start out as one thing and then eventually become part of a larger, more familiar world. Do you feel like that's an accurate assessment of how the industry is operating right now?

Trachtenberg: I think so. Frankly -- I've mentioned this to some friends before -- I think Marvel is more of a platform for movies than just a company that makes comic book movies. I think the way we are getting our heist movies and our road movies and our political thrillers are just through IP. One of the things that I've been searching for when I've dabbled in trying to develop stuff for an IP is like, "Is this movie awesome without the IP? Is this already a cool movie?" But not how do I smuggle it into the IP but more, with this one, does that make it even more awesome?

I was a little bit heartbroken when -- this movie started out as a Fox thing, and then the merger happened and I didn't know that this could exist, could still happen. And I was thinking about, "Can we take this idea and make it non-IP?" But the themes of the movie, so much in the engine of this, is based on the IP, is stronger because of how the Predator functions and interacts with what our main character is going through. So to answer your question, yes, I think that is absolutely happening. I don't think that's the worst thing in the world. But I think what makes something great is when it feels like it's already an awesome idea, and then when it's connected to the IP that makes it even more special.

Jhane, I was wondering if you could tell me about the language in this movie. Is there a "Valkyrie"-esque moment in the beginning where the characters are speaking in a certain language and then it seamlessly transitions into English? How did you guys approach that?

Myers: Thank you for asking that question. That's really important to me being Comanche and working with our Comanche language department, also with working with Comanche language speakers. But just the fact that people will have a choice, the world will have a choice to listen to the whole film in Comanche is amazing.

Oh, wow.

Myers: That's never been done for my tribe, ever. There's only a couple of movies. I think "Star Wars," which was 30 years old when they transcribed it into Navajo, and then there was Navajo again for "Finding Nemo," which was 20 years old when they did that. But this is the first time for a brand new film to come out and have that option to hear it all in the whole language. So that not only inspires the young language speakers of my nation, but that inspires a lot of other people and shows them, and like I said, shows the world what our language is about. Which is thrilling for me.

Trachtenberg: To be specific, so in the movie, we did wrestle a lot with doing a "Hunt For Red October" thing. Ultimately never quite came up with any aggressive gimmick for it. But the movie was shot in English and Comanche, both languages are spoken, but when you hear English, it's as if it's Comanche. But what Jhane is speaking to is on Hulu, there will be a Comanche dub of the movie. So you can watch the entire movie in Comanche with the original actors returning to perform their roles.

Myers: Which is so cool. Hopefully, this happening at the beginning in this film will reset that paradigm for native language. So when other directors and people are producing films that have a native narrative, they'll go the whole mile and do the film in that language. When I first read the script I was so excited and I talked to Dan I'm like, "Dan, I can't wait to hear...!" Because I'm a big "Predator" fan, and I wanted [the Predator] to push that little language thing and get the Comanche language and then play it back. I thought that would be so cool, and that was in one of my first conversations with Dan, because that's just what popped into my head.

Cinematic Influences

What movies were you looking at for inspiration here, Dan? I was curious if you saw the movie "Big Game" from around 10 years ago.

Trachtenberg: Sam Jackson?

Yep.

Trachtenberg: Never saw it. I remember the trailer and the poster. Maybe I should watch it now. Is it the director of the Santa Claus movie?

Yeah, "Rare Exports."

Trachtenberg: Yeah. No, never saw that. Inspiration, originally and conceptually, I was very driven to make something along the lines of "Fury Road" or "Gravity" that was very visual, as few words as possible, survivor story. But as we developed the movie, my cinematographer and I, visually, took a lot of inspiration from the Justin Kurzel "Macbeth" movie. There's a sequence, one that's a little bit in the trailer and that initial poster image we sent out in the burnt glade that takes a lot of visual inspiration from that movie. Those were the biggies. And then sports movies. Stuff like "Rudy" and "Rocky" and any underdog story, I could not have referenced enough -- especially in editorial as we were shaping more of the story. That was all we talked about.

"Prey" premieres on Hulu on August 5, 2022.

Read this next: 12 Shows Like Stranger Things You Definitely Need To Stream

The post Prey Trailer: A Comanche Woman Hunts a Predator; Dan Trachtenberg Tells Us About His Prequel appeared first on /Film.

Netflix has a new documentary series airing next week — “Web of Make Believe: Death, Lies & the Internet” — in which Yours Truly apparently has a decent amount of screen time. The debut episode explores the far-too-common harassment tactic of “swatting” — wherein fake bomb threats or hostage situations are phoned in to police as part of a scheme to trick them into visiting potentially deadly force on a target’s address.

The producers of the Netflix show said footage from an interview I sat for in early 2020 on swatting and other threats should appear in the first episode. They didn’t specify what additional topics the series would scrutinize, but Netflix’s teaser for the show suggests it concerns cybercrimes that result in deadly, real-world kinetic attacks.

“Conspiracy. Fraud. Violence. Murder,” reads the Netflix short description for the series. “What starts out virtual can get real all too quickly — and when the web is worldwide, so are the consequences.”

Our family has been victimized by multiple swatting attacks over the past decade. Our first swatting, in March 2013, resulted in Fairfax County, Va. police surrounding our home and forcing me into handcuffs at gunpoint. For an excruciating two minutes, I had multiple police officers pointing rifles, shotguns and pistols directly at me.

More recently, our family was subjected to swatting attacks by a neo-Nazi group that targeted journalists, judges and corporate executives. We’ve been fortunate that none of our swatting events ended in physical harm, and that our assailants have all faced justice.

But these dangerous hoaxes can quickly turn deadly: In March 2019, 26-year-old serial swatter Tyler Barriss was sentenced to 20 years in prison for making a phony emergency call to police in late 2017 that resulted in the shooting death of an innocent Kansas resident.

In 2021, an 18-year-old Tennessee man who helped set in motion a fraudulent distress call to police that led to the death of a 60-year-old grandfather in was sentenced to five years in prison.

The first season of the new documentary series will be available on Netflix starting June 15. See you on TV!

Check out the intense new trailer for PREY, an all-new action-thriller from 20th Century Studios directed by Dan Trachtenberg (“The Boys,” 10 Cloverfield Lane).

Set in the Comanche Nation 300 years ago, PREY is the story of a young woman, Naru, a fierce and highly skilled warrior. She has been raised in the shadow of some of the most legendary hunters who roam the Great Plains, so when danger threatens her camp, she sets out to protect her people. The prey she stalks, and ultimately confronts, turns out to be a highly evolved alien predator with a technically advanced arsenal, resulting in a vicious and terrifying showdown between the two adversaries.

PREY is directed by Dan Trachtenberg, written by Patrick Aison (“Jack Ryan,” “Treadstone”), and produced by John Davis (Jungle Cruise, The Predator) and Jhane Myers (Monsters of God), with Lawrence Gordon (“Watchmen”), Marty Ewing (It: Chapter Two), James E. Thomas, John C. Thomas and Marc Toberoff (Fantasy Island) serving as executive producers.

The filmmakers were committed to creating a film that provides an accurate portrayal of the Comanche and brings a level of authenticity that rings true to its Indigenous peoples. Myers, an acclaimed filmmaker, Sundance Fellow and member of the Comanche nation herself, is known for her attention and dedication to films surrounding the Comanche and Blackfeet nations and her passion for honoring the legacies of the Native communities. As a result, the film features a cast comprised almost entirely of Native and First Nation’s talent, including Amber Midthunder (The Ice Road, “Roswell, New Mexico”), newcomer Dakota Beavers, Stormee Kipp (Sooyii), Michelle Thrush (The Journey Home), and Julian Black Antelope (“Tribal”).

PREY will be available on Hulu entirely in Comanche as a language option, or with Comanche subtitles, which is the first time a feature-length movie on a direct-to-consumer streaming platform has been available in the Comanche language in its entirety.

The newest entry in the Predator franchise, PREY will stream August 5, 2022, as a Hulu Original in the U.S., Star+ in Latin America and Disney+ under the Star banner in all other territories.

The post [News] PREY, The Latest Predator Movie, Gets Trailer! appeared first on Nightmarish Conjurings.

Over the weekend," Daniel Espinosa's film "Morbius" was re-released in theaters to utter indifference. When "Morbius" was first released in early April of 2022, it was met with critical dismissal and relatively modest numbers (when compared to other movies based on Marvel Comics). The film was roundly mocked for its bad writing and silly vampire shenanigans, and it didn't take the irony-mongers very long to begin sarcastically overpraising the film. The phrase "It's Morbin' Time" began to enter the temporary lexicon, even to the point that star Jared Leto playfully shared a video of himself reading a fake script with that very title. Other memes declared "Morbius" to have achieved a 203% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 800 million reviews (its actual rating is 17%, based on 258 reviews) with an audience approval rating of 142% (in actuality, 71%). That same meme also declared that the PG-13-rated film was rated NC-17, and that its running time was four hours and 56 minutes ("Morbius," mercifully, only runs 104 minutes). #MorbiusSweep appeared on Twitter, mockingly congratulating the film for its inevitable awards season dominance, and we all had a good chuckle. 

Living by the adage that there is no such thing as bad press, Sony leaned into the ironic non-affection social media was heaping onto "Morbius," leading to the above-mentioned nationwide re-release. In 1,000 theaters again, "Morbius" added a scant additional sum to its earnings. The film's secondary flop was proof that, despite the overwhelming chatter about it, "Morbius" was not the ironic cult film that studio heads might have assumed it to be. Audiences were in no mood to rewatch the Living Vampire, even if it was to mock him.

The lesson here is simple: Cult films cannot be forced. They must happen organically.

Showgirls

This author is old enough to remember the fiasco that was Paul Verhoeven's "Showgirls," one of 1995's more notorious bombs. A big-budget, oversexed showbiz story, "Showgirls" told the story of the unscrupulous Nomi Malone (Elizabeth Berkeley) as she attempted to rise to stardom through the Las Vegas strip revue world. The film was bloated, expensive, and, despite its copious nudity (the film was rated NC-17), not at all sexy. It bombed horribly, and attracted the attention of the notorious Golden Raspberries. 

Not long after "Showgirls'" initial theatrical run -- once its infamy was cemented -- MGM, in their finite wisdom, attempted to pull a Morbius, and re-released the film as a camp classic. The advertising shifted to a kitschier leopard-print motif, and the studio attempted to roll with its immediate reputation as a turkey. Here in Los Angeles, "Showgirls" was booked as a Friday midnight movie at the Nuart Theater, the venue that hosts "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" every Saturday. The intent was clear: You can't hurt us if we're in on the joke. "Showgirls," however, tanked a second time. 

It took many years of reconsideration and repeated analysis of "Showgirls" before audiences came to understand how strange, campy, queer, and enjoyably terrible the picture actually was. The studio's re-release of "Showgirls" didn't bolster its reputation as a camp classic. It was the film's fans that did it. After the culture had generally shifter over the course of a decade did special edition DVDs of the movie finally begin to sell.

Snakes On A Plane

It's worth noting that both "Morbius" and "Showgirls" have looked to Jim Sharman's 1975 musical "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" as a model of success. "Rocky Horror," against all odds, remains the unchallenged queen of the midnight movie set, attracting large crowds of curious teens and aging perverts for decades (and I use "pervert" with the utmost affection). That film's mixture of music, oddness, celebrity, over-the-top performances, and aggressive queerness allowed it a permanent toehold in the pop consciousness. It has become its own scene; a movement unto itself. 

Over the years, several films have attempted to sell themselves as pre-packaged cult movies, as the next "Rocky Horror." They never paused to realize that, well, we already have a "Rocky Horror."

What the studios sought was a low budget oddity, or unapologetic exploitation film that audiences can laugh at and with simultaneously. Example: New Line Cinema released David R. Ellis "Snakes on a Plane" in 2006 with scuttlebutt in the industry as to its outrageousness. Once the SyFy-ready title took hold in the joke centers of the public's brain (this was prior to its release), New Line dumped money into a campy ad campaign, and even added campier content to the movie itself (the sex scenes were added after the fact, as was Samuel L. Jackson's notorious "motherf***in' snakes" line of dialogue). Jackson recorded personalized phone calls you could order for friends. The film was released to modest success. Few have talked about the film since, and it did not become a midnight staple. 

Repo! The Genetic Opera

The closest a studio ever came to manufacturing a cult movie was probably Darren Lynn Bousman's "Repo! The Genetic Opera" in 2008. Set in the future, the opera was about a medical system run amok, forcing people into surgeries they can't afford, and the repo man who repossesses said organs when payment lapses. The film came with a cult pedigree of the highest order. Bouseman was already known for his work on the "Saw" movies, the star was Anthony Head from fan favorite "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," Paris Hilton had a supporting role, there was a lot of rockin' music, and Joan Jett even appeared in a cameo. 

Like "Rocky Horror," "Repo!" began seeing live shadowcast performers accompanying screenings with customers arriving in costume to celebrate. For a short while in the late '00s, a few theaters hosted "Repo!" performances. And while the film does have its fans, the shadowcasting felt forced. Like they were trying to make "Repo!" happen. Why it never caught on in the same way as "Rocky Horror" is a matter of critical speculation, but one might say that "Repo!" was too self-aware. Too pleased with its place as an oddity. 

There's a difference between a weird film made by genuinely weird people trying to share their weird interests, and a normal person trying to make a "weird film" to shock normal audiences. "Repo!" is certainly the latter.   

Notes On Camp

If we are to abide by Susan Sontag's 1964 essay "Notes on Camp," then it should be instinctually understood that cult appeal cannot be manufactured. The distributors of "Morbius" were operating on the false assertion that an aggressive ad campaign could simply conjure a cult out of thin air. "Rocky Horror" didn't set out to be a cult hit. It happened by dint of its fans. It was exhibitors, not studios, that asked for multiple screenings.

Cult films gain traction among their followers typically because they are a little ... "off" somehow. Off-center. They either need to be made by a weird person, as stated above, or they need to possess an element of fascinating failure; The filmmakers sought to make something genuine and entertaining, but made so many bad, unusual decisions, that the finished product comes out the sewer pipe with no resemblance to common entertainment. Your "Plan 9 from Outer Spaces." Indeed, your "Showgirls." 

Morbin' Time Has Run Out

"Morbius" had the potential to be of the latter camp. It was certainly a bad film. The irony is, unfortunately, that "Morbius" is almost too competent. It's easy to wrap one's head around a mad scientist who turns himself into a half-vampire bat monster, even within the context of a superhero universe. And while there are some truly weird things in "Morbius" (the cop who attempts to attract a cat by shaking its litterbox, then surmising the owner is gone when the cat doesn't come ... to its litterbox), there's nothing so odd as to be fascinating. 

That's the central problem with "Morbius": It's not a fascinating failure, nor is it weird. It's just bad. Films that are merely bad don't become cult hits. At best, they'll be the subject of "redemptive" essays in 20 years, claiming that all this time, they were good, actually. 

One can re-release "Morbius" all they want, hoping that ironic memes are the same thing as a cult audience. But it's not the studio's job to dictate to the people how they feel about a crappy vampire movie, and it will never be up to them to decide that "Morbius" is a cult hit. Let it gestate. Wait a decade. If the cult audience is there, it will come. If it isn't ... then Morbin' Time is at an end.

Read this next: 13 Box Office Bombs That Are Truly Worth A Watch

The post Morbius Proves Why You Can't Force a Cult Classic Into Existence appeared first on /Film.

During this Summer Sale on GOG, we would like to see how gaming changed across the generations. What can give us a better perspective on that, if not the iconic point & click games?

Then: The Legend of Kyrandia (Book One) – 1994

Do you remember the enchanting title about a prince Brandon who sets off on a journey to end the tyrannical rule of an evil court jester in his kingdom? This classic from Westwood Studios captivated gamers with its fairy tale atmosphere and simple interface. Using items and starting a dialogue has become inconvenient as ever.

Now: Broken Age: The Complete Adventure – 2014

The game from Double Fine Productions and the legendary developer Tim Schafer is a great example of how point & click games evolved over the years. The interface became more refined – for example, to use an item now you need to drag it onto a context-sensitive area. Also, the story of two teenagers living in similar situations, but radically different worlds, is a masterclass of modern screenwriting for games.

Check out more outstanding games in our Adventure Collection during this Summer Sale on GOG!

Time for the next-generation of Apple Silicon chips.

It's complicated.

Apple’s iOS 16 and macOS Ventura will introduce passwordless login for apps and websites. It’s only the beginning.

That fourth film in a franchise is always a tricky one, and for every "Mad Max: Fury Road," there are many more like "Indiana Jones and The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull," a movie that not only stinks in its own right but manages to diminish a well-loved series by merely existing.

"Alien Resurrection" fell somewhere towards the latter, although the damage was softened by following David Fincher's much-maligned "Alien 3." It's a weird movie, but if you're going to resurrect your main character to keep your franchise going beyond its logical end point ("Alien 3" was a bummer, but Ripley's arc made sense), then making her an human-alien hybrid is at least an interesting way to go.

Despite the extremely muted response to "Alien 3," 20th Century Fox pushed ahead with plans for a fourth entry, envisaging a story focusing on a cloned version of Newt, the young girl Ripley battled so ferociously to save in "Aliens" but killed off so callously at the beginning of the third film. To this end, they hired Joss Whedon to write the screenplay. As Whedon told In Focus magazine (via Go Into The Story):

 "Because I'd done some action movies and I'd done 'Buffy,' they said, 'Well, he can write teenage girls, and he can write action, so let's give him a shot.'"

Fox soon changed their minds and chose to bring back Ripley, as she was the backbone of the franchise. Whedon complied, and the studio was pleased with the results. There was just a little problem with the ending.

So What Happens In Alien Resurrection Again?

Two centuries after Ellen Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) took a dive into a pool of molten metal, taking her newborn Alien Queen with her, those dastardly military types have figured out a way of cloning her and her parasitic offspring. It's all very shady, carrying out their experiments on the USM Auriga outside regulated space. A band of space pirates arrive with a cargo of illicit human subjects for impregnation by a fresh batch of eggs, overseen by the transparently villainous Dr. Wren (J.E. Freeman) and his weirdo colleague Dr. Gediman (Brad Dourif).

It doesn't take long for a new squad of Xenomorph warriors to bust loose and decimate the Auriga's crew, leaving Ripley (enhanced by Xenomorph DNA) to help the pirates battle their way to their ship and escape. Naturally, the Alien Queen's gloopy human-alien newborn hitches a ride.

Jean-Pierre Jeunet was a brave choice as director, but his penchant for grotesque humor often distracts from the suspense. Still, he has a unique vision and gives the franchise's usual dark steel corridors a new perspective, and he stages one outstanding underwater set piece. The practical effects are vivid, with the eggs, facehuggers, warriors, and the queen getting an extra-lifelike revamp, although the CG aliens have dated badly. The performances are a mixed bag, with Weaver clearly having fun with Ripley's new sinister side. The rest of the cast don't fare so well, veering from hopelessly miscast (a whiny Winona Ryder) to pantomime (just about everyone else). Then we have the movie-breaking newborn...

The Worst Of All Possible Endings?

Joss Whedon's original screenplay for "Alien Resurrection" finally took the franchise to the place Ripley spent three films trying to prevent the Xenomorphs reaching: Earth. In his first draft, Ripley battles the newborn in a forest before it can reach civilization. Whedon, an outspoken critic of the final film, told In Focus (via Go Into the Story):

"I just kept saying, 'The reason people are here is we're going to do the thing we've never done; we're gonna go to Earth.' But there were a lot of things that we hadn't done that we ended up not doing because of a singular lack of vision."

Whedon's first conclusion was rejected, so he wrote three more in a junkyard, a maternity ward, and a desert. Eventually, the prospect of an Earth-bound showdown was cut due to financial concerns, resulting in the existing denouement where the newborn is sucked out of a spaceship via a small hole in the hull.

Whedon also took issue with the design of the creature itself, which he wrote as a white bloodsucking spider-like monster with pincers:

"I just gave them dialogue and stuff, but I don't remember writing, 'A withered, granny-lookin', Pumpkinhead-kinda-thing makes out with Ripley...' Pretty sure that stage direction never existed in any of my drafts."

A final scene set on Earth was shot with a post-apocalyptic Paris, but thankfully it was cut because it had a chance to give us strong groan-inducing "Planet of the Apes" vibes. 

"Alien Resurrection" looks better nowadays, especially after all that "Alien vs Predator" malarkey. Plus, Ridley Scott's "Prometheus" and "Alien: Covenant" prequels stripped the creatures of their mystery and terror. If anything, the sequel is a fascinating failure, and I'm not convinced that Whedon's original vision would have worked in Jeunet's hands anyway. As relentless as the Xenomorphs are, Earth may have been one step too far for the deadly creatures.

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When Tim Burton's "Batman Returns" came out in 1992, the superhero film was deemed too dark and violent by most critics, despite being praised for its nuanced portrayal of the inhabitants of Gotham city. The "darker" aspects of the film that were considered extremely skewed at the time have obviously undergone a reappraisal over the years, especially after the release and explosive success of Matt Reeves' "The Batman," which amps up fantastical, gothic elements like never before.

In an interview with Empire on the occasion of "Batman Returns'" 30th anniversary, Burton talks about this aspect of the film, and how he feels "really fondly about it" due to the "weird experiment" it was:

"It is funny to see this [darker iterations of Batman] now because all these memories come back of, 'It's too dark.' So, it makes me laugh a little bit...I'm not just overly dark. That represents me in the sense that... that's how I see things. It's not meant as pure darkness. There's a mixture. I feel really fondly about it because of the weird experiment that it felt like."

Burton has every right to be proud — while some aspects of the film might feel a bit too weird for some, it is this unique brand of weirdness that characterized Burton's Gotham in significant ways.

It's Important To Root For Offbeat Superhero Storylines

"Batman Returns" has managed to carve a unique legacy of its own, as it allowed Burton to exercise greater creative control in comparison to his "Batman." There are elements of German Expressionism that seep through the stylistic flourish of "Batman Returns," hard to miss in the grimy, rundown alleyways of Gotham at night, with imposing gargoyles positioned atop highrises. There's a sensual undercurrent ever-present, adding to the unhinged, playful aura of the sequel.

Burton explores the primal aspects of the identities of the central trio — Batman (Michael Keaton), the Penguin (Danny Devito), and Catwoman (Michelle Pfeiffer). There are terrifying moments worth remembering, infused with moments that are extremely camp and entertaining. This balanced approach helps elevate the film significantly, and the horror elements only help cement a fantastical, psychosexual aspect that aids the narrative, infusing the characters with incredible depth and multifacetedness.

There's also Christopher Walken as the corporate scumbag Max Shreck, who is incredibly delightful to watch (as is always the case, no matter what the role). Shreck's presence leads to some tongue-in-cheek moments mixed with exaggerated tragedy. Overall, a fun, gritty, well-rounded Burton film worth revisiting, for sure.

It is also important to acknowledge that Reeves' "The Batman," and some aspects of Christopher Nolan's "The Dark Knight" trilogy, has been greatly influenced by Burton's vision, which is undeniably important to understanding Batman as a character. So, basically, "Batman Returns" rules. Obviously.

Empire's June 9, 2022 issue is available for preorder here. 

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Your eyes are not deceiving you; your energy bill has gone up. According to the Consumer Index Report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the price of energy services (including electric and other utilities) has gone up by 13.7% compared to this time last year. Luckily, there are a few ways to lower your utility bills…

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As befitting a production of this scope (and budget level), the upcoming "The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power" will include a bevy of new characters and subplots for viewers to wrap their minds around. Set thousands of years before the events of "The Lord of the Rings" and "The Hobbit" -- though, importantly, taking place in a separate continuity from the Peter Jackson films -- the Prime Video series may feel a bit overwhelming to take in all at once, even with five total seasons to tell this complete story. There will be proto Hobbits, characters falling from the sky, and the looming specter of a young, but no less formidable, Dark Lord Sauron hanging over it all.

The famous villain of J.R.R. Tolkien's novels may have been rather unhealthily obsessed with jewelry, forming his entire villainous plan around the forging of dozens of immensely powerful rings and controlling them all (and their wearers) through the One Ring itself, but he didn't do it alone. Tolkien nerds know that he initially recruited the unwitting race of Elves, the master craftspeople to whom Sauron taught the fine art of ring-making. Fans have long guessed that the main plot of the series would focus on this particularly dramatic storyline, and now we have the biggest piece of evidence in support of that theory.

Of the many new and familiar faces included in the series, such as the eventual Elven queen Galadriel (played by Cate Blanchett in the movies and by Morfydd Clark here), one name to remember will be Celebrimbor. Here's why.

Blame It On The Ring(maker)

In short, if you're looking for someone to cast blame on for the many evils that would befall Middle-earth in the ages to come ... well, it'd be unfair to put it all on Celebrimbor (rather than, you know, Sauron himself), but there's no denying the incredibly significant role he plays in the grand scheme of things.

Empire has released our first real look at the Elf Celebrimbor, played by Charles Edwards in "The Rings of Power." To his credit, he was no ignorant accomplice of Sauron -- unlike much of his kin, Celebrimbor was immediately suspicious of Sauron's motivations, long before he was decked out in evil-looking armor or took the form of a giant flaming eye, back when he actually went by the much less sinister-sounding name of Annatar. But you don't need to hear me ramble on about it. Take it straight from showrunners J.D. Payne and Patrick McKay. As Payne puts it:

"We're dealing with one of the greatest villains that's ever been created in Sauron. And one of the central figures in the story is the character of Celebrimbor. He's an Elven smith who was manipulated into helping create the Rings Of Power. We're excited to be bringing him to Middle-earth. He's very mysterious."

Ultimately, Celebrimbor was responsible for forging the three Rings gifted to the Elves, as glimpsed in the prologue of Peter Jackson's "The Fellowship of the Ring." It's fair to assume that much of the first season of "The Rings of Power" will concern the trustworthiness of Sauron, the very beginnings of his scheme to rule the world through his Rings, and the many well-intentioned figures who will resist.

Keep an eye on /Film for more "The Rings of Power" goodness to come this week, ahead of the series' debut on Prime Video on September 2, 2022.

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The post The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power Offers First Look at Celebrimbor – Here's Why He Matters appeared first on /Film.

"Justified" is potentially the most unfairly neglected TV drama of all time. It was always critically acclaimed with a dedicated fanbase, but it had the misfortune of airing during the same time as "Breaking Bad" — there was no competing with that! As such, it remains a hidden gem of television, a modern-day western following deputy marshal Raylan Givens (Timothy Olyphant) as he is reassigned from Miami to his hometown of Harlan, Kentucky, where he faces numerous ghosts from his past.  

Possibly the best adaptation of any Elmore Leonard material (at least as good as "Out of Sight", "Jackie Brown," and "Get Shorty"), with playful dialogue and some truly great performances, "Justified" perfectly captures Leonard's distinct style and cadence. Even more impressive is the fact the show's entire premise is built from one short story, with showrunner Graham Yost and his team of writers keeping the quality mostly consistent throughout. Unlike much prestige television, "Justified" is incredibly fun, and as such remains eminently rewatchable, with some of the most colorful, idiosyncratic characters ever seen on television. A revival of "Justified," titled "Justified: City Primeval," was announced in January 2022. Now is as good a time as any to take a look at the 22 best characters from the original series. 

Daryl Crowe Jr.

In a show full of dysfunctional criminal families, the Crowes stand out as the worst of the bunch, and Daryl Crowe Jr. might be the most repellent villain of the entire series. The head of the family, Daryl is a hypocritical, self-serving bully who spouts rhetoric about sticking by his family while throwing them under the bus to save his own skin. Michael Rapaport drew derision for his shaky accent, but he makes Daryl a physically imposing and consistently entertaining antagonist, who holds his own against the charismatic Boyd. His rough, scruffy exterior belies his ruthless cunning. He is one slippery character, using a combination of wiles and his lawyer sister, Wendy (Alicia Witt), to insulate himself from the legal ramifications of his criminal activities. 

He also has an innate ability to manipulate his family and turn any situation to his advantage, including intimidating Dewey when he learns of his cousin's windfall, and wrapping Wendy around his little finger. This backfires fatally, however, after he coerces his nephew into taking the rap for a shooting Daryl himself committed, a move that turns Wendy against him for good.

Ty Walker

Season 6 of "Justified" introduced a plethora of new villains, from the ruthless Avery Markham (Sam Elliott) to Ava's mad uncle Zachariah Walker (Jeff Fahey). It sometimes felt like the writers didn't know what to do with them all. Perhaps the most glaring victim was Garret Dillahunt's former soldier Ty Walker, who serves as Markham's right-hand man for the first half of the season. What makes Walker stand out from the huge cast of moronic villains the show had accumulated by this point is his sheer competence. 

When Markham turns on him, Walker does everything possible to survive and nearly gets away. The sight of him fishing a bullet out of his shoulder in a service station makes it impossible for us not to sympathize with him, but any goodwill dissipates when he coldly guns down a couple of paramedics trying to cash in on the reward for his capture. When one begs for mercy, telling Walker he can just tie him up, Walker replies, "Yeah, I could do that ... but it's been such a day," and guns him down. Dillahunt didn't stay long on "Justified," but he made the most of his limited screen time, creating a genuinely menacing, eerily cool-headed villain. You can't help but wish he'd stuck around a bit longer.

Constable Bob Sweeney

A longtime fan of the show himself, Patton Oswalt was a surprise addition to the "Justified" cast. When Constable Bob was introduced, you could be forgiven for thinking that the showrunners had jumped the shark and introduced a purely comic relief character, something especially redundant in a series like this where pretty much everyone gets witty dialogue. Thankfully Oswalt's winning, vulnerable performance prevents him from being purely a joke. 

A high school classmate of Raylan, Bob is constantly trying to prove himself to the marshal. Whether he's challenging criminals to quick draw contests or dropping lines like, "I got a badge and balls like Death Stars," Bob is one of the most endearing characters in the series. The culmination of his arc in Season 4 firmly grounds his character in reality, as well as providing one of the show's most cathartic scenes. Captured by the Dixie Mafia and tortured for information, he proves his mettle and then some, withstanding a brutal beating and overpowering his captor. As Raylan puts it: "People underestimate Bob at their peril."

Rachel Brooks

Truth be told, Erica Tazel was a little ill-served by "Justified." While Tim got to crack wise and act as Raylan's backup on multiple occasions, Rachel is the character who takes her job seriously. She's always the adult in the room when paired up with Raylan or Tim, and is easily the most professional in the Harlan Marshal's Office. Unfortunately, that doesn't always translate into a dynamic character.

The few times where she is the focal point of the story though, Tazel shines. In the episode where she hunts down the man responsible for her sister's death, we get an insight into her personal life in a moving storyline that we wish had been explored in more depth. Named by Art as his successor in the Marshal's Office, in the final episode we learn that she's been promoted and transferred; so at the very least, her career hasn't been wrecked by her association with Raylan.

Colton Rhodes

Boyd had his share of henchmen over the course of the series, but they tended to suffer from incompetence, disloyalty, or simply not being that memorable. Colton Rhodes, Boyd's PTSD suffering army buddy, is the exception. Of course, he still messes up big time, singularly failing to murder Ellen May and relapsing into his heroin addiction. But he's a riveting character, with more expertise and personality than most of Boyd's crew. He also serves as a negative reflection of Tim Gutterson (Jacob Pitts), a relationship that pays off in one of the series' best episodes, as the two use their shared experiences in military tactics to outwit each other. 

You get the sense that the war has rid Rhodes of much of his humanity, leading to him casually killing for Boyd without a second thought. Nonetheless, Ron Eldard's performance brings a level of melancholy to the role, along with a wry sense of humor, that makes him a compelling character regardless.

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If you or anyone you know is struggling with addiction issues, help is available. Visit the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration website or contact SAMHSA's National Helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357).

Winona Hawkins

Raylan's ex-wife has a bit of a thankless role, effectively serving as a sensible foil for all the hijinks that Raylan gets up to. Nonetheless, she provides a much-needed voice of sanity amidst the gunplay and banter. While Raylan has several romantic entanglements throughout the series, he never finds anyone who understands him as well as Winona, and she isn't afraid to call him out on his behavior. Without Winona we'd think of Raylan as a standard renegade lawman; with her we see how damaging his actions can be. 

It helps that Natalie Zea and Timothy Olyphant have such great chemistry, making us root for them as a couple through the entire series. For a supposedly grounded character, though, she can be indecisive and often acts erratically (see the moment she impulsively steals money from an evidence locker, relying on Raylan to put it back). She is still cool under pressure, though, as seen in the scene where hoods threaten their daughter and she and Raylan leap into action together. Also, it's difficult to completely dislike a character whose response to being asked if they moved an incriminating piece of evidence is, "What am I, an a**hole?"

Katherine Hale

The final season of was rich with antagonists, such as the ostensible big bad, Avery Markham, Walker and his veterans, and the quick draw artist Boon (Jonathan Tucker). And then there was Boyd, who by this point had fully embraced his villainous nature. Markham's lover, Katherine Hale, was a very different kind of villain. Introduced in Season 5 as a sort of criminal consultant — for a substantial fee, of course — her true agenda is revealed in the final season: she plans on robbing and killing Markham, who she believed ratted out her deceased husband. 

The reason Markham never felt like a truly threatening presence in the show is that we know that he is being outwitted by his lover throughout, and Mary Steenburgen makes Katherine such an ice-cold character that he can never quite measure up. She's an unforgiving presence on the show, deploying her disarming smile and silky soft voice to devastating effect. Markham is an intimidating villain, but he's sheer brute force, with all the subtlety of a shotgun. Katherine is just as deadly, but more like a stiletto that slides in between your ribs before you realize what's happening. 

Sheriff Shelby Parlow

Another "Deadwood" alum (along with Timothy Olyphant, Garret Dillahunt, and many more), Jim Beaver brings his usual brand of grizzled decency to the role of Shelby Parlow. The mild-mannered security guard at the Black Hills coal mine ends up running for sheriff of Harlan County and winning the election — with a little help from Boyd.

While dismissed as weak-willed and corrupt by pretty much everyone, he's shown to be increasingly uncomfortable under Boyd's thumb and eventually works against him by actively protecting Ellen May. The sheriff also takes an active interest in detective work, assisting Raylan in the hunt for the mysterious Drew Thompson. Shelby is one of the best instances in the show of a seemingly minor character taking on a life of their own. After hanging around for two seasons, he is shown to be a layered character with a colorful past, and greater links with Harlan's past than even Raylan realized.

Loretta McCready

One of Raylan's few genuine blind spots, 14-year-old Loretta McCready is orphaned in her first appearance in Season 2 after her father is murdered by the Bennetts. Taken under the wing of Mags Bennett (Margo Martindale) and treated as a surrogate daughter, she might be a strong-willed character and a canny operator in her own right, but she is still a child, and Raylan casts a protective eye on her that lasts throughout the series. Loretta learns quickly from those around her, and by the end of the series, she has matured into Harlan's youngest drug lord. 

Level-headed and imbued with a shrewd entrepreneurial spirit, she boldly faces down threats from the likes of Hot Rod Dunham and Avery Markham. She also has her own ruthless streak; she knows exactly how to manipulate Raylan and leads on the guileless Derek, indirectly getting him killed. Kaitlyn Dever is impressive from her very first appearance and only gets better as the series goes on. Her final showdown with Mags is incredibly powerful, and Dever's delivery of, "I want my daddy here to tell me!" is simply heartbreaking. Dever makes the unlikely characterization of Loretta plausible and holds her own against the more seasoned actors she shares scenes with.

If you or anyone you know is struggling with addiction issues, help is available. Visit the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration website or contact SAMHSA's National Helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357).

Ellstin Limehouse

Not quite a villain, but equally not a good guy, the boss of Noble's Holler is an imposing, fairly enigmatic character in the series, ruling his community with an iron fist. Ostensibly a banker for the criminal underworld of Harlan, he looks after their ill-gotten gains, as well as trading in information, and provides shelter to vulnerable women — or, at least, those who can afford it. 

Mykelti Williamson plays the hell out of this character, making him alternately sinister and honorable. He gets one of the most menacing introductions of the show, threatening to pour lye on the hand of a subordinate for falling asleep on the job. He is loyal to nobody except his own people, and clearly enjoys toying with the other criminal elements, as well as Raylan. Despite this, he remains one of the few comparatively honorable characters in the series, respecting the wishes of Mags Bennett, and providing Ellen May with much-needed sanctuary, even as he flaunts his knowledge of Boyd's illicit activities to his face.

Robert Quarles

One of the most memorable big bads of the entire series, Neal McDonough makes Robert Quarles a uniquely disarming character, with bright blue eyes and an unnerving grin. Arriving on the scene as just about the slickest, most professional villain the show had ever seen, he quickly dispatches the inefficient gangsters in charge with his signature weapon, a "Taxi Driver" inspired gun up his sleeve.

Cut off by the Dixie Mafia, Quarles' plan for an OxyContin clinic is his big swing to get back in the good books of crime boss Theo Tonin (Adam Arkin). He's a truly terrifying character, genially talking to his son on the phone while preparing to torture a semi-naked man tied to a bed in a back room of his house. We never see what he does to his victim, but we hear the screams, and his behavior is enough to terrify the unflappable killer Wynn Duffy. Like many "Justified" villains, Quarles gets even more scary and unpredictable when his plans are derailed by the separate efforts of Raylan and Boyd, and he quickly spirals out of control. He transforms into a pill-popping, unhinged psychopath, and embarks on a personal vendetta against the marshal.

If you or anyone you know is struggling with addiction issues, help is available. Visit the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration website or contact SAMHSA's National Helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357).

Johnny Crowder

Cousin Johnny might not have the vocabulary or quite the same level of suave cunning as Boyd, but he's still a Crowder, with the wild hair and scheming nature that go along with the name. Cut in half with a shotgun at the end of Season 1 as a result of Boyd's plotting, Johnny is revealed to have survived, albeit stuck in a wheelchair. He rejoins his cousin, but continues to nurse a bitter grudge against Boyd, and secretly works against him for the remainder of the series.

It remains one of the biggest shames of the series that David Meunier wasn't fully available during Season 5, where he could easily have been the season's primary antagonist. As it is, he ended up being one of many loose ends that needed tying up before the final season. He became more a thorn in Boyd's side than a villain in his own right, although he still manages to land a few blows against Boyd's empire along the way. Ultimately, Johnny is too smart to be a lackey, but nowhere near charismatic enough to take over from Boyd. As Boyd puts it himself: "Some men lead and some men follow, and when you can't lead and you refuse to follow, you die alone in the desert."

Dewey Crowe

A gator poaching neo-Nazi who constantly talks about himself in the third person ("The third person? You mean this guy?"), Dewey is a career criminal who is uniquely ill-equipped for a life of crime. He's a fool, to put it plainly, and could be dismissed as just a joke character if it wasn't for the pathos that Damon Herriman brings to the role.

Introduced in the pilot, and lasting all the way through to the final season, Dewey was a constant pain in the neck to both Raylan and Boyd, blowing crucial moments for both of them by being his idiotic self. Spewing aphorisms left, right, and center, Dewey is just the right side of incompetent to be an endearing character. He's easily the most likable villain on the show, right up until he is intimidated into killing his best friend. In his lowest moment, he is coerced into committing a crime spree after being led to believe that he's had his kidneys removed. When it's revealed that he still has both of them, he exclaims, "You mean I had 4 kidneys?"

Arlo Givens

Raylan's father gets such a big build-up in the show that when we finally meet him you could be forgiven for feeling a little letdown. A slight, gray-haired petty criminal, he nonetheless casts a looming shadow over the series and Raylan in particular. Actor Raymond J. Barry described Arlo as "pleasantly unpleasant," and that's just a perfect description of the character. He's charming to strangers but a monstrous father to Raylan, and in many ways, it's this relationship that defines Raylan's character.

Arlo's irascible relationship with Raylan's aunt Helen (Linda Gehringer) is his character's one redeeming feature, as evidenced when he quickly goes off the rails after her death. He's still a formidable character though, as demonstrated in the scene where he attacks the men who assaulted Helen with a baseball bat, or when beating up his attackers during an attempted murder in a prison barbershop. A lesser show might have featured some final reconciliation between Arlo and Raylan, but "Justified" wisely steers clear of this and never softens his character. His final words to his son? "Kiss my a**."

Dickie Bennett

In a series full of duplicitous villains, Dickie Bennett might just be the most weaselly of them all. Jeremy Davies' performance style can be an acquired taste, full of awkward tics and twitches, but it's entirely fitting here. The most enterprising of Mags' offspring, Dickie is a sinister presence, and as the season goes on, he is shown to be both cruel and cowardly. He presents an unlikely but credible threat to both Raylan and Boyd throughout the season, ruthlessly killing without hesitation, and even managing to get the upper hand on Raylan with a baseball bat.

Bearing a bitter grudge against Raylan for breaking his leg when they were in high school, their relationship is a combination of loathing and a weird kind of affection, as shown in their final scene together. They clearly hate each other, but there is an undeniable connection that exists between them — Raylan can barely suppress a smile at Dickie's final joke. Dickie is an abhorrent, pathetic character, with just about the goofiest haircut on television, but he's almost redeemed through his child-like friendship with Dewey Crowe. The glee on his face when Dewey visits him in prison makes it impossible to hate him entirely.

Tim Gutterson

Apart from Art, Raylan's colleagues in the Marshals Service were rather under-utilized across the series, and former army sniper Tim Gutterson is no exception. The key difference between the characterization of him and Rachel, though, is that Tim gets a lot more cool lines, and is often sent out to rein Raylan in or clear up his mess. Jacob Pitts quickly became a fan favorite thanks to his unflappable demeanor and perfect dry delivery of some of the series' funniest lines. As with Rachel, we don't get much insight into his personal life, just that he's incredibly good at his job, efficient, and a dead shot. You get the sense that Tim has only started acting out since Raylan arrives in town, and the dynamic between them often feels like two brothers, constantly getting on each other's nerves.

While he suffers from a lack of development, Tim does at least get some incredibly badass moments. He also gets a neat story arc in Season 4, in the form of his rivalry with Colton Rhodes. The two have an interesting relationship, adversaries with a shared history that bonds them together despite being on opposite sides of the law, in a similar way to Boyd and Raylan.

Art Mullen

Nick Searcy's grouchy but good-natured performance makes Art one of the most likable characters on the show. He's a mentor and father figure to Raylan, whose exasperation is initially played for laughs before giving way to some serious drama as he realizes the self-destructive path Raylan is intent on going down. While he gets some of the most memorable bits of dialogue — much of which was improvised by the actor — what Searcy absolutely nails is the sense in disappointment Art feels towards Raylan as a lawman, combined with the paternal instinct he feels despite himself. 

What's frustrating is that we as an audience know that Raylan isn't dirty; Art doesn't and his disappointment over Raylan's actions is more devastating than anything his actual father could say to him. While he's unfailingly moral, he can never bring himself to formally reprimand Raylan, but this leniency leads to the two falling out irrevocably in the fallout from the death of Nicky Augustine (Mike O'Malley). He's also shown to be something of a badass himself, facing off against Alan Tudyk's deadly hitman, chasing down an aging bank robber on foot, and beating up the man who murdered his friend.

Mags Bennett

Mags may only have appeared in one season, but of all the series' villains, she made the greatest impact. The matriarch of the Bennett clan, Mags and her "tads" run the weed business in Bennett county, but she has bigger plans for her family. What makes Mags such a formidable villain is the way she plays up her persona as a kindly and unassuming town elder, but there's a steel to her performance that betrays her outwardly friendly nature. Margo Martindale gets to play the entire emotional spectrum as Mags, coolly poisoning those who betray her with her homemade apple pie moonshine and even smashing her son's hand with a ball-peen hammer, to showing her tender side with her surrogate daughter, Loretta.

Martindale is incredible in the role, securing one of the show's only Emmy wins for her performance (Jeremy Davies also won one for playing Dickie). She is nuanced and real, rather than wholly detestable. Two examples include the scene after her son is killed, and when Loretta is taken away from her forever. Her facial expression goes from mourning to vengeful determination subtly but assuredly. Just watching Martindale is like taking a masterclass in acting.

Wynn Duffy

Despite supposedly coming close to being killed off on a number of occasions, Wynn Duffy is the cockroach that somehow manages to survive, through a combination of duplicity, self-preservation, and sheer luck. He's another character who develops far beyond his initial characterization, evolving from a sadistic debt collector into a professional criminal who emerges as a major player in the final seasons.

He's one of the series' most memorably slick and pragmatic villains, with a disquieting manner, softly spoken voice, and frankly insane eyebrows. Operating out of a Winnebago with his loyal bodyguard Mike (Jonathan Kowalsky), his love of women's tennis, tanning beds, and unique put-downs are some of the series' high points, to say nothing of Jere Burns' masterful deadpan reactions. The moment where a corrupt FBI agent sitting next to him is shot in the head is both shocking and hilarious thanks to Duffy's nonplussed facial expression. 

His relationship with Mike gets an emotional payoff that has no business being as moving as it is. We end up in the strange position of rooting for the "ice-cold remorseless bottled-blonde s**t-bag killer," who by the end of the series seems more principled, and somehow more honorable, than the majority of the baddies we've encountered. 

Ava Crowder

The quintessential Elmore Leonard woman, Ava defies the many labels attached to her over the course of the series. She's neither a damsel in distress, a kept woman, or a gangster's moll, with an agency and personality that makes her endlessly fun to watch. Her arc is one of the most dramatic of the entire series, going from a victim of domestic abuse to, essentially, a pimp. Along the way, she compromises more of her morals until she becomes an active part of Boyd's criminal activities.

At various points in the show, Ava is the love interest for both Raylan Givens and Boyd Crowder, and as such knows both of them at least as well as they know each other. So when she is flipped to inform on Boyd, she chooses a solution that flummoxes both of them and the Marshals Service to boot. Dismissed by both Boyd and Raylan, she refuses to passively accept her fate as just a pawn in their respective plans, as shown in the final run of the series, where she outsmarts both of them and emerges as one of the few characters in the series to break free of the criminal life and start again, ending the show entirely on her own terms.

If you or someone you know is dealing with domestic abuse, you can call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1−800−799−7233. You can also find more information, resources, and support at their website.

Boyd Crowder

It's crazy to think that Walton Goggins' verbose pyromaniac was originally supposed to die at the end of the pilot. The relationship between Boyd and Raylan is the heart of the show, two men on opposite sides of the law who nonetheless have affection and tolerance for each other due to their shared history of having dug coal together. Graham Yost enjoyed the interplay between Goggins and Timothy Olyphant so much that he repurposed the character, and he quickly became one of television's most intriguing antagonists.

While each season had its own big bad, Boyd was a constant presence, sometimes aiding the marshals, sometimes hindering them, and always with his own angle. His florid speeches became a defining trait of his character, "Using 40 words where four will do." In lesser hands, the character's multiple heel turns could come across as inconsistent, but Goggins sells the hell out of every character beat, even in the final season where he finally embraces his outlaw nature, murdering several people in cold blood in the pursuit of his final payday. Elmore Leonard himself loved Goggins' charismatic performance: "I don't believe a word he says, but I love to hear him say it."

Raylan Givens

Timothy Olyphant's laconic depiction of the Kentucky-born marshal is one of the most complex, fun, and downright cool protagonists of modern television history. He proved so iconic that he even made an in-character cameo in "The Good Place." With his Gary Cooper walk and his ever-present cowboy hat, Raylan could easily be a caricature, but Olyphant gives him a depth that makes him so much more layered than his appearance would have you believe. His attitude towards law enforcement can be best summed up in his introduction, strolling through a Miami pool party to inform a gun thug that he has two minutes to leave town or he's going to shoot him.

Olyphant is great in the role, full of swagger and a wry sense of humor, but shaded with heavily-guarded vulnerability. Raylan has the instincts for his job, but there's a darkness to him that is largely cloaked in his cocky outward persona and southern charm. As Winona puts it, "Honestly, you're the angriest person I've ever met." He's alternately friendly with the show's villains and filled with contempt for them — sometimes at the same time — and he regularly skirts the line between unconventional and corrupt, though only coming close to outright corruption on a couple of occasions. He tends to do the wrong thing for the right reasons, which is what makes him such a great hero, even if it also makes him a pain in the neck to work with.

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The post The 22 Best Characters In Justified Ranked appeared first on /Film.

In Mysuru, India, a judge reflected on a recent case in which a husband and wife divorced because "the husband said his wife did not know how to prepare any food other than Maggi (instant) noodles."

"It was noodles for breakfast, lunch and dinner," Judge ML Raghunath said the man told him. — Read the rest

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It's worth remembering that Michael Keaton was a controversial choice to play Batman in Tim Burton's 1989 film. Better known at the time for comedy films like "Mr. Mom" and "Beetlejuice," Keaton was seen an too "normal" and not tough enough to play a superhero. To add to the controversy, Burton designed the Batman costume with fake musculature sculpted onto its torso, giving Batman a nice set of rubber abdominal muscles. In the Faber & Faber book "Burton on Burton," edited by Mark Salisbury, the director talked about how he couldn't see a man who was already superheroic — say, a muscle man like Arnold Schwarzenegger — putting on a bat suit. An Adonis does not have to dress up and assume another identity to be a superhero; they already kind of are. As such, Burton cast someone who wanted to change their identity when they became Batman. An ordinary guy seemed more likely to dress up in a vigilante costume at night than someone who projected heroism during the daylight hours. 

Tim Burton's "cosplay fantasy" elements of the Batman suit were cranked up to 11 in Joel Schumacher's 1995 sequel "Batman Forever." In that film, the suit was fetishized to within an inch of its life, arguing that a large part of being Batman is the opportunity to wear the costume; Batman wouldn't be a vigilante if he didn't get to wear it. Many took note of the fact that the fake musculature on the suit now included prominent nipples as well. The nipples caused a minor uproar, and Schumacher eventually explained that they were meant to resemble statues of Greek gods. 

But Burton resented those nipples.

'Go F*** Yourself'

To celebrate the anniversary of his sequel "Batman Returns," Burton was interviewed in Empire, and he expressed bitterness over the way he was treated on that film. While "Batman" was an immense success, "Batman Returns" was noted for how weird it was. The film was darker and notably kinkier. Catwoman (played by Michelle Pfeiffer) wore skintight vinyl, a corset, spike heel shoes, and carried a whip, the very image of a professional dominatrix. Her superhero kink expanded to Batman as well, whose costume became a kink accessory by association. Many modern audiences appreciate the bare-faced sexual themes on display, but in 1992, when "Returns" came out, it was lambasted for being off-putting and strange.

In the Empire interview, Burton recalls being told — too often — that "Returns" was too dark and kinky, a rich complaint, especially given that the ultimate studio decision would be to include fetish-ready nipples on the bat suit. Burton recalled:

"[In 1992] they went the other way. That's the funny thing about it. But then I was like: 'Wait a minute. Okay. Hold on a second here. You complain about me, I'm too weird, I'm too dark, and then you put nipples on the costume? Go f*** yourself.' Seriously. So yeah, I think that's why I didn't end up ['Batman Forever']."

Darker And Darker

With his Batman films, Tim Burton kicked off a cinematic trend with Caped Crusader. Taking tonal cues from the "darker" Batman comics of the '80s, the popular version of the character turned from something broad and comedic — a perception lingering from the (excellent) 1966 "Batman" TV show — into something more brooding and stylized. As the films went, Batman became a more po-faced, "serious" character, and his darkness became a more pervasively definitive characteristic. That Schumacher tried to lighten the tone a bit — a choice, he admits, was dictated by studio heads seeking a younger audience — was antithetical to Batman now. Ever since, the trend — again, only as the films go — has been to make Batman more and more "gritty," more and more "realistic," and darker and darker as time passes. 

Schumacher's goofy "Batman & Robin" gave way to the relatively grounded "Batman Begins" in 2005, made by Christopher Nolan. In the 2010s, Batman became a bitter, greying man who fit into Zack Snyder's grim vision of the world. Earlier this year, director Matt Reeves made "The Batman," the grittiest Batman flick yet, made to resemble the aggressively dour 1995 serial killer film "Seven." Looking back at "Batman Returns," it seems cartoonish and even quaint in comparison. 

The nipples on the bat suit are now just one small detail in a bouillabaisse of Batman mythology that needs to be parsed more carefully than ever. Perhaps it's time to unclamp the nipples and set them free. 

Read this next: Batman Movies Ranked From Worst To Best

The post Tim Burton Has Some Harsh Words For Batman Forever's Bat-Nipples appeared first on /Film.

The influential manga, will continue under the supervision of Kouji Mori.

Somewhat surprisingly, the open-source SDL library that is widely used by games for cross-platform handling and abstracting of various software interfaces has added a Microsoft DirectX 12 renderer...

This article contains potential spoilers for the first three episodes of "The Boys" season 3.

Based on the first three episodes, it looks like the search for Soldier Boy, America's first superhero (and "the most idiotic of them all"), will be the main plot line driving "The Boys" season 3. If Homelander (Anthony Starr) is the show's Superman analog, then Soldier Boy, played by Jensen Ackles, is its Captain America. Since Soldier Boy is thought to be dead in the present — though he was seemingly un-killable like Homelander — Billy Butcher (Karl Urban) wants to find out what killed him and use that same weapon against Homelander.

To do so, Butcher has to excavate the past. It's something that Ackles found himself doing, too, as he got into character as Soldier Boy for "The Boys" season 3. /Film's Rafael Motomayor recently spoke with Ackles about his role on the show, and the actor said this about his inspiration for Soldier Boy:

"I kind of went back to, not anyone specifically, or any actor, any character specifically, but some of those old movies and those old movie stars from the '40s, the '50s and stuff, and just how they carried themselves, how they spoke, it was a different ... it had a different cadence to it. I just tried to do something a little different than, I think, what we're normally used to hearing, just to give him a little slight variation."

Everyone's A Hero At Voughtland

So far, Soldier Boy has been more of an offscreen presence, spoken of if not always seen, in "The Boys" season 3. In episode 3, "Barbary Coast," he did finally show up in a flashback, as former CIA director Grace Mallory (Laila Robins) related her experience dealing with him in Nicaragua during the Cold War.

In this scene, Soldier Boy does speak with a different cadence, as Ackles mentioned, while loading up a bazooka and making sexist comments to Grace. Though Ackles shied away from naming a specific actor or character as inspiration for Soldier Boy, his costume consciously evokes the one worn by Chris Evans in "Captain America: The First Avenger." 

That movie, helmed by Joe Johnston, the same director behind "The Rocketeer," was steeped in Golden Age nostalgia, but "The Boys" is far less sentimental about America's past and present. Soldier Boy's NRA-friendly sidekick, Gunpowder, is all the more disturbing in light of recent real-life shootings, which have only served to hammer home the same message, again and again, that the country's gun culture is out of control. That's just the tip of the iceberg in a show that explores the dark underbelly of a crumbling capitalist society where "everyone's a hero at Voughtland" and superheroes are the opium of the people.

The first three episodes of "The Boys" season 3 are now streaming on Prime Video.

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The post The Boys' Jensen Ackles Took Inspiration From Golden Age Actors to Portray Soldier Boy [Exclusive] appeared first on /Film.

At WWDC22, Apple compared its next-gen M2 SOC to Intel's Alder Lake mobility CPUs, claiming similar or better performance in various scenarios.

Apple Claims Its Next-Gen M2 SOC Is 90% Faster Than 10 Core Intel Alder Lake at Half The Power, Similar Performance As 12 Core Chip at Quarter The Power

It's been only a few hours since Apple revealed its M2 SOC and several MacBook designs that make use of the new chip. To give a quick recap, the Apple M2 SOC is based on an optimized 5nm node & it is claimed to be a second-generation node, consisting of 20 Billion transistors. This is a 25 percent increase over the M1 SOC. The die size has also seen a small increase and while we have the same 8 core count as the last-generation M1, the cores themselves have been upgraded. That's also a 25 percent increase over its predecessors. It is not clear if the cores are split evenly (4 P-Cores + 4 E-Cores) or if we are looking at a different config but based on the die shot, we can see four P-Cores.

The new Apple M2 SOC makes use of brand new Performance and Efficiency cores with a larger cache, offering up to 18% faster multi-threaded performance versus M1. The SOC also gets 24 GB of LPDDR5 memory which acts as unified memory. This is a feature on the same package as the M2 SOC and consists of two 12 GB (128-bit wide) LPDDR5 DRAM chips for up to 50% higher bandwidth (100 GB/s).

An upgraded Neural Engine offers 40% higher performance with its 16-core design and up to 15.8 trillion operations per second. The GPU on the Apple M2 SOC has also been upgraded by 10 cores, a 25 percent increase over the M1, and features a larger L2 cache which when combined with the higher bandwidth, offers up to 35% better performance. The GPU offers 111 GTexels/s & 55 GPixels per second throughput.

Coming to the performance benchmarks, Apple claims that M2 offers an 18% boost in performance relative to the CPU versus M1 at the same power draw. Compared to an Intel Core i7-1265U on the Samsung GalaxyBook2 360 laptop which is a 10-Core Alder Lake-M chip, the company claims a 90% performance uplift at half the power and similar performance at a quarter the power. Apple does not stop there and goes ahead to compare a 12-Core Alder Lake-P chip, the Core i7-1260P on MSI's Prestige 14Evo laptop. Apple says that the M2 SOC offers nearly similar performance (87% of Intel's 12-Core Alder Lake) at a quarter the power.

Nearly all of the performance measured for the Apple M2 SOC are within multi-threaded workloads so the company has yet to show us single-threaded or more importantly, the IPC gains for its next-gen SOC.

The new CPU features faster performance cores paired with a larger cache, while the efficiency cores have been significantly enhanced for even greater performance gains. Together, they deliver 18 percent greater multithreaded performance than M1, so M2 can rip through CPU-intensive tasks using very little power, like creating music with layers of effects or applying complex filters to photos.

Compared with the latest 10-core PC laptop chip, the CPU in M2 provides nearly twice the performance at the same power level. And, M2 delivers the peak performance of the PC chip while using just a quarter of the power.² When compared to the latest 12-core PC laptop chip — which needs dramatically more power to deliver an increase in performance and is therefore found in thicker, hotter, more noisy systems with less battery life — M2 provides nearly 90 percent of the peak performance of the 12-core chip while using just one-fourth the power.

Via Apple

Moving over to the GPU benchmarks, Apple claims that the M2 SOC offers a 35% performance boost over the M1. They once again used the same Intel 10-Core Alder Lake chip and used its integrated Iris Xe GPU for comparisons. The M2 offers a 2.3x increase in performance at 1/5th the power draw.

M2 also features Apple’s next-generation GPU with up to 10 cores — two more than M1. Combined with a larger cache and higher memory bandwidth, the 10-core GPU delivers a big boost in graphics performance, bringing up to 25 percent higher graphics performance than M1 at the same power level, and up to 35 percent better performance at its max power.

Compared with the integrated graphics of the latest PC laptop chip, the GPU in M2 delivers 2.3x faster performance at the same power level, and matches its peak performance using a fifth of the power. The higher performance per watt from M2 enables systems to have exceptional battery life, and run cool and quietly, even when playing graphics-intensive games or editing massive RAW images.

Via Apple

That's a pretty good increase going from M1 to M2 but we should consider the fact that Apple's own benchmarks aren't that much indicative of real-world performance. We've seen their previous claims being shattered in independent tests so one should be cautious of believing these benchmarks and wait for actual tests from independent reviews to be available before you land a decision to get a new M2-powered Macbook.

Apple M2 SOC Performance Tests Footnotes:

1. Testing conducted by Apple in May 2022 using preproduction 13-inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M2, 8-core CPU, 10-core GPU, and 16GB of RAM; and production 13-inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M1, 8-core CPU, 8-core GPU, and 16GB of RAM. Performance measured using select industry‑standard benchmarks. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of MacBook Pro.
2. Testing conducted by Apple in May 2022 using preproduction 13-inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M2, 8-core CPU, 10-core GPU, and 16GB of RAM. Performance measured using select industry‑standard benchmarks. 10-core PC laptop chip performance data from testing Samsung Galaxy Book2 360 (NP730QED-KA1US) with Core i7-1255U and 16GB of RAM. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of MacBook Pro.
3. Testing conducted by Apple in May 2022 using preproduction 13-inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M2, 8-core CPU, 10-core GPU, and 16GB of RAM. Performance measured using select industry‑standard benchmarks. 12-core PC laptop chip performance data from testing MSI Prestige 14Evo (A12M-011) with Core i7-1260P and 16GB of RAM. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of MacBook Pro.

The post Apple Compares Next-Gen M2 SOC To Intel’s Alder Lake CPUs, Claims Nearly Similar Performance as 12-Core CPU With Quarter The Power by Hassan Mujtaba appeared first on Wccftech.