Ronald.phillips

Ubisoft Support shared a list of PC applications that can cause various types of issues, such as crashes or lower than expected performance, if left running alongside its games.

The list includes extremely popular software like Discord, Skype, OBS, MSI Afterburner, and Overwolf.

Software likely to interfere with Ubisoft games

The following list of examples is not exhaustive and advisory only:

Fullscreen overlays	Overwolf
Hardware monitoring software	MSI Afterburner, Riva Tuner
Peer-to-Peer software	BitTorrent, uTorrent
RGB Controllers or game optimisers	Razer Synapse, SteelSeries Engine
Streaming application	OBS, XSplit Gamecaster
Software impacting applications	f.lux, Nexus Launcher
VPN software	Hamachi
Video chat services	Skype
Virtualising software	Vmware
VoIP applications	Discord, TeamSpeak

We also recommend disabling experimental features available through NVIDIA GeForce Experience and Radeon Settings.

The Ubisoft Support even goes as far as recommending the removal of non-Microsoft services.

Identifying problematic non-Microsoft services

You can easily disable multiple non-Microsoft services by following the steps outlined below:

- Press the Windows and R keys simultaneously.
- Type msconfig into the box and press Enter.
- Navigate to the Services tab.
- Check Hide all Microsoft services.
Please note that this step is important. Failing to do so will prevent your system from starting up.
- Click Disable all or manually uncheck the boxes of the services you would like to disable.
- Reboot your system.

If you choose to disable services manually, you can repeat this process until you identify the problematic one.

Checking if a background application is causing the issue

Before trying the steps outlined, please close all open programs and reboot your system:

- Press the Windows and R keys simultaneously.
- Type msconfig into the box and press Enter.
- Choose Selective startup.
- Uncheck Load startup items.
- Reboot your system.

If this has resolved your issue, it is likely that a background application was the cause.

Checking which background application is causing the issue

Before trying the steps outlined in the following guides, please close all open programs and reboot your system:

- Windows 7
- Windows 8
- Windows 10

If the issue does not occur, follow the same steps checking the next startup item on the list.

Repeat this until you come across the issue again - the last startup item you checked will be the one interfering with your game.

Please note that this process will likely lead to disabling the firewall and security software. Once you have finished testing the game, do not forget to re-enable it.

Let us know in the comments section if these steps truly helped you with fixing any issue encountered in recent Ubisoft games.

The post Ubisoft Says Apps like Discord, Skype Can Cause Issues in Its Games by Alessio Palumbo appeared first on Wccftech.

Despite being presumed by many "Dune" fans to be unadaptable (and doubly so after David Lynch's film, though it has its defenders), Frank Herbert's novel has finally received another adaptation. Denis Villeneuve's film is currently in theaters and, what's more, seems to have been embraced by general audiences. With so many concepts to introduce and an expansive list of characters to juggle, it's less surprising that certain backstories, motivations, and bits of lore would be left out of the final cut of the film -- either to be addressed in a future sequel or simply relegated to fun trivia for those who wish to dive deeper on their own. It'd be a little odd to say that the monstrous Baron Vladimir Harkonnen left fans "wanting more," but the enigmatic villain behind the events of "Dune" certainly had to make the most of his relatively small amount of screen time and shockingly monologue-free dialogue.

Portrayed by Stellan Skarsgård, Baron Harkonnen likely left newcomers with a wealth of questions and we're going to answer them here: who is he, what does he have against the Atreides, what exactly was his plan with the Emperor, and most importantly ... what's the deal with his whole levitation thing?

Read on, but be mindful that there will be major spoilers for "Dune" to follow.

An Unmistakable Presence

According to official channels, Baron Harkonnen is described as the following:

Greed and tyranny personified, Baron Vladimir Harkonnen is a force of malevolence, determined to feed his addiction to brutality. A gravity-defying monster of a man, gliding through the air like a phantom, the imposing figurehead of House Harkonnen ensures his family stands in stark opposition to House Atreides, ruling through fear, and determined to exploit the natural resources of Dune no matter the cost to its people.

By the time the events of "Dune" begin, the brutal Harkonnens have spent decades oppressing and exploiting the indigenous population of Arrakis for their wealth of spice. Though the face of their persecution is in the form of Rabban Harkonnen (Dave Bautista), his uncle Vladimir remains the true figurehead behind their suffering. In one of Herbert's more unfortunately dated tropes, the Baron's greed and hunger for power is reflected through his disturbing desire for young boys (which is wisely done away with in the film) as well as his ugly, bloated, and inhumanely overweight physicality. He's memorably introduced in the second chapter of the novel while literally remaining in the shadows, described as "grossly and immensely fat" and requiring the need of gravity-defying "portable suspensors harnessed to his flesh" to help keep the weight off his feet. Though his general description is maintained, Villeneuve reimagines this particular aspect to have the Baron levitate and hover over those around him -- a more visual way of highlighting his power and influence. In another slight deviation from the novel, this is what saves his life when Duke Leto uses his last gasp of strength to unleash a poison gas cloud on his enemies.

Obviously serving as the inspiration for other "Man behind the curtain" villains like Emperor Palpatine in "Star Wars," Baron Harkonnen rules with an iron fist and the constant threat of mercilessly dispatching anyone -- even his closest advisors -- who dares displease him in any way.

More To Come

Villeneuve's film doesn't spend a wealth of time on the political machinations between the Baron and the Padishah Emperor, both of whom temporarily join forces in order to cause the downfall of House Atreides. It's clear that the removal of the Harkonnens from Arrakis and the installation of the Atreides family in their place is done at the Emperor's behest and that the Atreides are well aware of the dangers of following these orders. In the novel, it's made immediately apparent that the Baron is acting to take advantage of the prime opportunity to make a power grab for the Harkonnens, as well as in accordance with his long-held grudge against the Atreides family. This latter complication stems from an ancient battle in which a Harkonnen soldier was banished by an Atreides officer for the sin of cowardice, inspiring a wave hatred against the Atreides clan that has been passed down from generation to generation.

The Baron in the novel also spends far more time monologuing about his villainous plots and reflecting on his inner thoughts. Villeneuve chose to do away with this entirely for the film, instead relying on the nuances of the actor's performance. According to Skarsgård, this was taken to such an extent that he admitted to reading his dialogue in the script and that, initially, "My first reaction was, 'This is not much.'" For those disappointed that the Baron wasn't given more of a focus, however, Villeneuve promises good things to those who wait. "This movie is really focused on Paul and I brought in a little bit of the Harkonnens just for context, to understand the geopolitics of the story. This movie just gives a little glimpse into the Harkonnens. The second movie is much more about them." Expect to see far more of the dastardly Baron if or when the sequel is officially greenlit.

Read this next: The 14 Greatest Science Fiction Movies Of The 21st Century

The post Who is the Main Dune Villain? Vladimir Harkonnen Explained appeared first on /Film.

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(Welcome to The Daily Stream, an ongoing series in which the /Film team shares what they've been watching, why it's worth checking out, and where you can stream it.)

The Movie: "The Halloween Tree"

Where You Can Stream It: Tubi TV

The Pitch: On Halloween night, a group of kids dress up and head out to meet their friend Pipkin before trick or treating. But Pip doesn't show up, and the ambulance at his house makes it look like he may be on the verge of a tragic and sudden death. But the kids soon spot an apparition of their pal, and when they chase him into a haunted house on the edge of town, they discover a massive tree filled with thousands of lit jack o'lanterns: The Halloween Tree. Pip grabs a pumpkin off the tree – a pumpkin that looks just like him, and which happens to contain his soul – and escapes back in time in an effort to stave off his impending demise. The eccentric man who owns the house turns out to have magical powers, and he whisks the rest of the kids off through various eras in time so they can simultaneously find Pipkin, learn about the origins of Halloween, and gain an understanding of the iconic costumes they've chosen to wear to celebrate All Hallow's Eve.

Why It's Essential Viewing

Not only did Ray Bradbury write the novel on which this animated film is based, but he also wrote the screenplay for this movie and served as the project's narrator. As a writer, Bradbury's prose is incredibly evocative, painting a vivid picture for the reader and immersing them in his worlds. As a narrator, he has a rich, deep voice and the ability to translate the magic of his words into a vocal performance that seems as if it's experiencing the same wonder and awe as the characters at the center of this tale. The result is a narration that feels like your grandfather sitting you down to tell you a story – only your grandfather happens to be one of the most beloved authors of the 20th century. I mean, just read this:

"It was a small town by a small river and a small lake in a small northern part of a Midwest state. There wasn't so much wilderness around that you couldn't see the town. On the other hand, there wasn't so much town around that you couldn't see and feel and touch the wilderness. The town was full of fences to walk on and sidewalks to skate on, and the muted cries and laughter of boys and girls full of costumes, dreams, and pumpkin spirits preparing for the greatest night of the year. Better than Easter, better than Christmas: Halloween."

Another great bit of narration comes as Bradbury describes Pipkin, who is one of the story's key characters – but since Pip is on the run for the whole movie, he's not someone the audience has the chance to know very well. This narration, which happens very early in the story, does a ton of heavy lifting in terms of establishing why the rest of these kids love Pip so much and why they're willing to go to such extreme lengths to get him back:

"Ah, yes. Joe Pipkin. Some say that on the day he was born, all the soda pop bottles in the world fizzed over. Pipkin, who could yell louder, sing better, and eat more popcorn. Pip, the greatest boy who ever lived."

"Know Why You're Wearing Bones, Boy?"

I was a kid when "The Halloween Tree" premiered on TV in 1993, and I remember thinking one of the coolest things about the movie was how the eccentric and spooky Mr. Moundshroud (wonderfully voiced by "Star Trek" legend Leonard Nimoy) took the group of kids through time to explore the origins of Halloween and teach each of them why they're wearing their costumes. Traveling from ancient Egypt (learning about mummies) to the fields of ancient England (learning about the history of witches), and from a cathedral (learning about gargoyles) to Mexico (to learn about the Day of the Dead), the movie whips through a crash course on the origins of the holiday. The exploration into each of those topics is admittedly not super deep, but it was definitely enough to capture my imagination as a kid and inspire me to learn more on my own. It also inspired me to check out the book version of "The Halloween Tree" and explore more of Bradbury's writing, including "Something Wicked This Way Comes," a book which conjures a similar sense of that ineffable magic of being a small town kid who comes face to face with something mysterious and dangerous.

Read this next: The Daily Stream: Sin City Is One Of The Most Faithful — And Fun — Comic Adaptations Out There

The post The Daily Stream: The Halloween Tree is a Perfect Gateway into the World of Ray Bradbury appeared first on /Film.

Microsoft said on Monday that a Russian state-sponsored hacking group known as Nobelium had attacked more than 140 IT and cloud services providers, successfully breaching 14 companies. From a report: The Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center (MSTIC) said the attacks were part of a planned campaign that began in May this year. The attacks included spear-phishing campaigns and password-spraying operations that targeted employees of companies that manage IT and cloud infrastructure on behalf of their clients. "We believe Nobelium ultimately hopes to piggyback on any direct access that resellers may have to their customers' IT systems and more easily impersonate an organization's trusted technology partner to gain access to their downstream customers," said Tom Burt, Corporate Vice President for Customer Security & Trust at Microsoft.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Microsoft has shared more details about a recent cyberattack campaign orchestrated by the Russian state-sponsored group blamed for last year's devastating SolarWinds hack. The company's cybersecurity experts warned that Nobelium is once again trying to access government and corporate networks around the world, despite President Joe Biden sanctioning Russia over previous cyberattacks.

According to Microsoft, the group is using the same strategy it employed in the successful SolarWinds attack — targeting companies whose products form core parts of global IT systems. In this campaign, Microsoft says, Nobelium has focused on a different aspect of the IT supply chain, namely resellers and service suppliers that provide cloud services and other tech.

The company says it has informed more than 140 providers and resellers that the group has targeted them. It believes Nobelium breached up to 14 of these companies' networks. However, Microsoft says it detected the campaign in its early stages in May, which should help mitigate the fallout.

Microsoft notes these hack attempts are part of a huge series of attacks conducted by Nobelium over the last few months. Between July 1st and October 19th, it told 609 of its customers that Nobelium had attempted to hack them on 22,868 occasions, with fewer than 10 successes. In the three years prior to July 1st, Microsoft told its customers about 20,500 attacks from all nation-state actors — not just Nobelium.

"This latest activity shares the hallmarks of Nobelium’s compromise-one-to-compromise-many approach and use of a diverse and dynamic toolkit that includes sophisticated malware, password sprays, supply chain attacks, token theft, API abuse [and] spear phishing," Microsoft's security intelligence division wrote in a tweet. Nobelium has also been known as Cozy Bear and APT29.

In 2020, hackers created a backdoor in a SolarWinds product called Orion, which was used by around 30,000 customers in the public and private sector. Nobelium is said to have carried out further hacks on the systems of nine US agencies and around 100 companies. Other hackers piggybacked onto the backdoor to facilitate their own attacks. The US sanctioned six Russian companies and 32 individuals and entities in April over alleged misconduct connected to the SolarWinds attack and attempts to interfere with the 2020 presidential election.

"This recent activity is another indicator that Russia is trying to gain long-term, systematic access to a variety of points in the technology supply chain and establish a mechanism for surveilling — now or in the future — targets of interest to the Russian government," Tom Burt, Microsoft's corporate vice president of customer security and trust, wrote in a blog post.

Today, we will walk you through the process, taking you step by step on how to create a macOS Monterey USB installer disk. This disk can simply be used for clean installing the OS.

Create a macOS Monterey Bootable USB Installer Disk for Clean Installing Apple's Latest OS for the Mac

A macOS Monterey USB installer disk sounds primitive and most likely something which you would have used in the 90s. Besides, you can simply download and install the entire update through thin air, without having to connect even a single cable or any USB drive; Apple's internet recovery feature is that brilliant on a Mac.

Nevertheless, if you want to perform an upright and swift installation of the update on your compatible Mac, and you choose to do it using a USB installer disk, then you've come to the right place.

Before you begin the installation, you will need to:

• Make sure you have a 16GB or more USB drive with you.
• Download and save the macOS Monterey installer in the Applications folder from the Mac App Store. Do not rename it and do not open it, specifically.
• Lastly, use Disk Utility to erase the flash drive. Make sure you name the USB drive to 'Untitled.'

Tutorial

Step 1: Connect the USB flash drive to your Mac's USB port.

Step 2: Following the prerequisites correctly, you would be able to smoothly launch Terminal.

Step 3: Type in the following command exactly how it's shown below:

sudo /Applications/Install\ macOS\ Monterey.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/Untitled --nointeraction

Step 4: Press the Return key on your keyboard.

Step 5: You might be asked to enter your Mac's password, so you would need to type that in.

Step 6: Carefully remove the USB drive once the progress bar hits 100%. You can now use this installer disk to perform an effortless installation of macOS Monterey on any Mac you might be using.

It is a convenient idea to keep this drive around just in case of any emergencies. Or instead, you can simply lend it to anyone who wants to perform a clean and substantial installation of macOS Monterey. But again, it is preferable to stick to the through the air installment, or simply use internet recovery. One, they're easy; two, they do not involve the use of command lines; and last, they simply work.

But, how do you do a clean install? Follow the tutorial below:

• How to Clean Install macOS Monterey on Your Mac [Tutorail]

Also check out the following:

• macOS Monterey Final Update is Now Available for All Mac Computers
• Download macOS Monterey Final Installer from Mac App Store [Direct link]

The post How to Create macOS Monterey Bootable USB Installer [Tutorial] by Uzair Ghani appeared first on Wccftech.

Looking to download the official macOS Monterey final installer from the Mac App Store? We have the direct download link for it.

Download the macOS Monterey Installer from Mac App Store for Clean Install, Creating a USB Drive, More

Although many of you will just go right ahead and download macOS Monterey straight from the Software Update tool in macOS, but there are going to be people who would want to keep the installer file with them for a wide variety of reasons.

For example, you want to install the update on a wide range of Macs at home or office. So, you simply download the installer from the Mac App Store, toss it inside a USB drive, plug it into the Mac which you want to update and away you go. It's super convenient and saves you from the trouble of downloading the update over and over again on every Mac you may have.

Before you download the installer, we will recommend that you have made sure the device you're going to install macOS Monterey on is fully compatible. Just quickly check the list below and move further:

• iMac (late 2015 and later)
• iMac Pro (2017 and later)
• MacBook Air (early 2015 and later)
• MacBook Pro (early 2015 and later)
• Mac Pro (late 2013 and later)
• Mac mini (late 2014 and later)
• MacBook (early 2016 and later)

Follow the steps below in order to download the installer:

• Launch the Mac App Store.
• Search for macOS Monterey in the search bar on the top left.
• You'll see macOS Monterey show right up. Click on it.
• Now simply click on GET and enter your Apple ID password if you're required to do so.
• Once the download is complete and you're prompted for installation, just ignore it all.
• You will find the installer file sitting casually in the /Applications folder.

If you think the above steps are a bit too much, you can head straight over to the installer location on the Mac App Store by clicking on the link below:

• Download macOS Monterey Final Installer [Mac App Store link]

It is a good idea to keep the installer file with you in a flash drive for later use. You never know when things go south and you end up reinstalling the entire operating system only to find out that your internet connection is causing all sorts of problems in the time of need.

While you are here, check out the following too:

• macOS Monterey Final Update is Now Available for All Mac Computers
• How to Clean Install macOS Monterey on Your Mac
• How to Create macOS Monterey Bootable USB Installer [Tutorial]

The post Download macOS Monterey Final Installer from Mac App Store [Direct link] by Uzair Ghani appeared first on Wccftech.

8K video rendering would have brought any hardware to its knees, but modern-day computing has made it possible to export such clips at insanely high resolutions and at a faster rate on portable machines like the 2021 MacBook Pro. Unfortunately, if you thought the top-end model from Apple featuring the company’s most powerful chipset, the M1 Max, would blow away the competition, you are in for a serious surprise as it barely scrapes past the Surface Laptop Studio, which is Microsoft’s flagship notebook that touts disappointing specs for the price it is stamped with.

8K Video Rendering Test Was Performed on Adobe Premiere Pro, Which Would Explain Why the M1 Max MacBook Pro Severely Underperformed

The 8K video rendering results were provided by XDA Developers’ managing editor, Rich Woods, stating that the 2021 MacBook Pro featuring the M1 Max finished exporting a 4-minute project on Adobe Premiere Pro in a time of 21 minutes and 11 seconds. By comparison, it barely managed to beat the Surface Laptop Studio, which armed with a lackluster quad-core Core i7-11370H and RTX 3050 Ti completed the same task in 22 minutes and 41 seconds.

Both machines were beaten by the Lenovo ThinkPad P15, which handed out a mauling thanks to its 8-core Core i9-11950H and RTX A5000 GPU. It completed the 8K video render test in just 13 minutes and 48 seconds. The test was carried out on Adobe Premiere Pro, which would explain why the M1 Max had a difficult time. In Final Cut Pro, however, Woods states that the results are far better, but did not provide a comparison because the video editing program is not supported by Windows 10 or Windows 11 machines.

Time to render a four-ish minute 8K video in Adobe Premiere Pro:

Lenovo ThinkPad P15 (Core i9-11950H, RTX A5000): 13:48
16-inch MacBook Pro (M1 Max): 21:11
Surface Laptop Studio (Core i7-11370H, RTX 3050 Ti): 22:41

— Rich Woods (@TheRichWoods) October 25, 2021

The test also did not reveal if the M1 Max features a 16-core, 24-core, or 32-core GPU. A higher GPU core configuration may have reduced the time it took to render the 4-minute clip, possibly putting the 2021 MacBook Pro in a commanding lead against the aforementioned notebooks. In a previously published gaming benchmark, the M1 Max with a 32-core GPU posted very impressive results, even though it lost to a laptop RTX 3080 with a 100W power limit.

If you are disappointed at the underwhelming performance of the M1 Max, do note that Adobe Premiere Pro is not optimized for Macs, and there are better programs that will deliver jaw-dropping results. For instance, DaVinci Resolve boasts around five times faster editing with 8K videos on the 2021 MacBook Pro models, so you might want to look into that next time you are working on a high-resolution project.

The post MacBook Pro With M1 Max Is Barely Faster Than Microsoft’s Surface Laptop Studio in 8K Video Render Test by Omar Sohail appeared first on Wccftech.

As a somewhat rational, somewhat-grown-up, I can handle ghost movies. Once the movie ends, I can safely resume normal life knowing that those ghosts, demons, and zombies probably can’t hurt me. But psychological thrillers? Home invasions? Vengeful ex-lovers? Those are the kinds of scary movies that get under my skin…

Read more...

“Foreign” cinema has a reputation for being more erudite than mainstream American film—after all, watching a film with subtitles means you’re reading while you’re watching a movie, and reading is the smartest thing someone can do.

Read more...

Conducting scaled and cost-effective attack surface and digital threat monitoring gives organizations of all sizes the best chance of identifying and defeating their adversaries  

read more

The United States Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) over the weekend issued an alert on a critical vulnerability in open source discussion platform Discourse.

read more

Once a year or so I replace our dishtowels with a new set. I usually get this 24-pack of 15 x 25 inch cotton towels. They're durable, absorb water well, and stand up to repeated washings. The old ones will become cleaning and shop rags.

A long time ago, I dashed off a quick blog post with a curious finding after studying the ISO-9660 spec: The format stores multi-byte numbers in a format I termed “omni-endian”– the committee developing the format apparently couldn’t come to an agreement on this basic point regarding big- vs. little-endian encoding (I’m envisioning something along the lines of “tastes great! … less filling!” in the committee meetings).

I recently discovered another bit of compromise in the ISO-9660 spec: It seems that there are 2 different methods for processing the directory structure. That means it’s incumbent upon ISO-9660 creation software to fill in the data structures to support both methods, because some ISO-reading programs out there rely on one set of data structures while the rest prefer to read the other set.

Background

As a refresher, the “ISO” extension of an ISO file refers to the ISO-9660 specification. This is a type of read-only filesystem (i.e, the filesystem is created once and never updated after initial creation) for the purpose of storing on a read-only medium, often an optical disc (CD-ROM, DVD-ROM). The level of nostalgic interest I display for the ISO-9660 filesystem reminds me of my computer science curriculum professors from the mid-90s reminiscing about ye olden days of punchcard programming, but such is my lot. I’m probably also alone in my frustration of seeing rips of, e.g., GameCube or Xbox or 3DO games being tagged with the extension .ISO since those systems use different read-only filesystems.

I recently fell in with an odd bunch called the eXoDOS project and was trying to help fill in a few gaps. One request was a 1994 game called Power Drive for DOS.

My usual CD-ROM ripping method (for the data track) is a simple ‘dd’ command from a Linux command line to copy the string of raw sectors. However, it turned out to be unusually difficult to open the resulting ISO. A few of the the options I know of worked but most didn’t. What’s the difference?

Methods that work:

• Mounting the file with the Linux iso9660 kernel module, i.e.,

  mount -t iso9660 /dev/optical-drive /mnt

  or

  mount -t iso9660 -o loop /path/to/Power-Drive.iso /mnt

• Directory Opus
• Windows 10 can read the filesystem when reading the physical disc
• Windows 10 can burn the ISO image to a new CD (“right click” -> “Burn disc image”); this method does not modify any of the existing sectors but did append 149 additional empty sectors

Methods that don’t work:

• fuseiso
• Dosbox
• Winrar
• 7zip
• Daemon Tools
• Imgburn
• Internet Archive’s ISO lister (“View contents” on the ISO file)

Understanding The Difference

I think I might have a handle on why some tools are able to process this disc while most can’t. There appears to be 2 sets of data structures to describe the base of the filesystem: A root directory, and a path table. These both occur in the first substantive sector of the ISO-9660 filesystem, usually sector 16.

A compact disc can be abstractly visualized as a long string of sectors, each one 2,352 bytes long. (See my Grand Unified Theory of Compact Disc post for deeper discussion.) A CD-ROM data track will contain 2048 bytes of data. Thus, sector 16 appears at 0x8000 of an ISO filesystem. I like the clarity of this description of the ISO-9660 spec. It shows that the path table is defined at byte 140 (little-endian; big comes later) and location of the root directory is at byte 158. Thus, these locations generally occur at 0x808c and 0x809e.

Primary Volume Descriptor

The path table is highlighted in green and the root directory record is highlighted in red. These absolute locations are specified in sectors. So the path table is located at sector 0x12 = offset 0x9000 in the image, while the root directory record is supposed to be at sector 0x62 = 0x31000. Checking into those sectors, it turns out that the path table is valid while the root directory record is invalid. Thus, any tool that relies on the path table will be successful in interpreting the disc, while tools that attempt to recursively traverse starting from root directory record are gonna have a bad time.

Since I was able to view the filesystem with a few different tools, I know what the root directory contains. Searching for those filenames reveals that the root directory was supposed to point to the next sector, number 0x63. So this was a bizarre off-by-1 error on the part of the ISO creation tool. Maybe. I manually corrected 0x62 -> 0x63 and that fixed the interaction with fuseiso, but not with other tools. So there may have been some other errors. Note that a quick spot-check of another, functional ISO revealed that this root directory sector is supposed to be exact, not 1-indexed.

Upon further inspection, I noticed that, while fuseiso appeared to work with that one patch, none of the files returned correct data, and none of the directories contained anything. That’s when I noticed that ALL of the sector locations described in the various directory and file records are off by 1!

Further Investigation

I have occasionally run across ISO images on the Internet Archive that return the error about not being able to read the contents when trying to “View contents” (error text: “failed to obtain file list from xyz.iso”, as seen with this ISO). Too bad I didn’t make a record of them because I would be interested to see if they have the same corruption.

Eventually, I’ll probably be able to compile an archive of deviant ISO-9660 images. A few months ago, I was processing a large collection from IA and found a corrupted ISO which had a cycle, i.e., the subdirectory pointed to a parent directory, which caused various ISO tools to loop forever. Just one of those things that is “never supposed to happen”, so why write code to deal with it gracefully?

See Also

• The disc archived at The Internet Archive
• MobyGames Entry
• Wikipedia Entry

The post ISO-9660 Compromise, Part 2: Finding Root first appeared on Breaking Eggs And Making Omelettes.

Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy drops tomorrow (October 26), but ahead of its imminent arrival the reviews have begun pouring in, giving us a good idea of what's in store - and whether it'll be worth your hard-earned pennies. So, let's take a look at what the critics have made of the brand-new action-adventure game, shall we?

Si far, it looks like Guardians of the Galaxy - which takes Star-Lord and the gang across the universe in a narrative-driven adventure full of "twists and turns" - has fared well with the critics across the board. As of writing, the upcoming PC game's sitting at a very healthy aggregate score of 82 on Opencritic, and at 72, 81, and 82 on Metacritic for PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X, respectively.

In PCGamesN's own Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy game review, Dave calls it a "marvellous adventure" and scores it a seven-out-of-ten. "Guardians of the Galaxy mostly nails the quirky tone and characters that Marvel fans will be hoping for," he notes, adding, "Otherwise strong presentation is marred by a few too many visual glitches, but if you can tolerate these and some repetitive combat, it's worth a look." You can read our write-up in full at the above link.

RELATED LINKS: Guardians of the Galaxy review, Upcoming PC Games, The best adventure games on PC

The new Project Mojave mod for Fallout 4 is out now, and what it does is bring the world of Obsidian's Fallout: New Vegas to the more updated engine - featuring a remake of roughly a quarter of the game's map, including the New Vegas strip and "three functional casinos".

Of course, we've seen mods that attempt to put previous series titles into more modern engines before - most notably the likes of Skyblivion and Skywind, which are both probably still years away, despite reports to the contrary. However, the only real attempt to put Fallout: New Vegas into Fallout 4 seems to have fallen by the wayside.

Fallout 4: Project Mojave, however, is out now and can be downloaded at Nexus Mods (thanks, DSOGaming). It's only "an early access look" that includes the lower half of the Mojave Wasteland map, but does feature the iconic Vegas Strip - as well as the ability to build three functional casino games to play on the strip.

RELATED LINKS: Fallout 4 console commands, Fallout 4 mods, Play Fallout 4

Intel is set to reveal its upcoming 12th generation gaming CPU lineup this week at Intel Innovation, built on its new hybrid microarchitecture Alder Lake. Despite the imminent nature of the event, leakers haven’t stopped sharing information on team blue’s new chips and have given us some indication of the Core i5-12600K’s level of performance. Suffice to say, AMD may have a real challenge on its hands.

Twitter users 9550pro and TUM-APISAK, as highlighted by Wccftech, have shared performance metrics from CPU-Z benchmarks. The i5 scored 746 and 6,563 points in single-threaded and multi-threaded tests, respectively. Compared to the Ryzen 5 5600X, its presumed main competitor, it outperforms the AMD chip by as much as 50% and is also faster than the Ryzen 7 5800X.

As with all leaks, we’ll have to wait until we get our hands on the new Intel CPU before we can come to any clear conclusions on how it fares versus team red’s offerings. It’s looking increasingly likely, however, that marrying your gaming PC with an Alder Lake chip could be a great option.

RELATED LINKS: Intel Core i9 9900K review, Intel Core i7 9700K review, Best CPU for gaming

Julia Ducournau's erotic body-horror thriller "Titane" is a cinematic explosion of genres, themes, and gorgeous visuals. The less you know about "Titane" before seeing it, the better, so stop here if you haven't checked out this shocking film for yourself just yet. Seriously, this is one where you want to go in blind.

So, you've seen "Titane" and now you want more. I don't blame you; controversial and exploitation cinema is my favorite flavor of film. The only problem is that there's nothing exactly like "Titane," because it's so wholly fresh and original, but there are a handful of movies with similar themes, tones, and visuals. Whether it's body horror, mechanical fetishization, or feminine violence, the films listed here all share something in their DNA with "Titane," and they're all guaranteed to knock your socks off.

Tetsuo: The Iron Man

"Tetsuo: The Iron Man" rules. There's a reason it made our Top 15 Japanese Horror Movies of All Time list. The hyper-violent black-and-white 1989 cyberpunk body horror film is a masterpiece of human transformation. "Tetsuo: The Iron Man" was written, produced, directed, and edited by Shinya Tsukamoto. He also stars as the unnamed "metal fetishist." 

The metal fetishist is accidentally killed by a businessman, who begins having visions of industrial machinery. Parts of his body begin transforming into metal, starting with a metal spike that protrudes from his cheek and spurts blood. Before long he's half-metal, half-man, and he's having bizarre sexual fantasies about his girlfriend. The psycho-sexual component only amplifies when the businessman's penis turns into a spinning metal drill and he loses control, attacking his girlfriend. 

"Tetsuo: The Iron Man" is a bold, shocking film that's earned its place as a classic midnight movie. Like "Titane," the movie focuses on a character who feels more connected to machines than people. Both also have violent transformations, though "Tetsuo" is a bit more fantastical in its approach. 

Climax

Just about every entry in the filmography of French-Argentinian director Gaspar Noé has some kind of tie to Ducournau's wild ride, but the two that share the most thematically and visually are "I Stand Alone" and "Climax." While "I Stand Alone" is a challenging father-daughter story that shares threads with the relationship between Alexia (Agathe Rousselle) and Vincent (Vincent Lindon) in "Titane," 2019's "Climax" shares more visual elements and is just more entertaining overall. 

There are a number of energetic, throbbing dance scenes in "Titane," starting with the opening car show complete with femme bodies undulating on top of chromed-out hot rods and moving to homoerotic raves among firefighters. "Climax" is one long party sequence that takes place at a dance studio when someone spikes the punch and things get wildly out of control. In addition to a uniquely urban French aesthetic, "Titane" and "Climax" share a violent sexuality punctuated by pulse-pounding musical beats. 

Crash

David Cronenberg's "Crash" is a movie about people who fetishize car crashes. Much like Alexia in "Titane," who fetishizes cars so much that she kisses one even though it almost killed her, the protagonists in "Crash" get really horny about automobile accidents. The 1996 film was controversial when it was released, but has gone on to be appreciated more since. In 2019, the NC-17 cut of "Crash" finally got its due with a 4K restoration that debuted at the Venice Film Festival. 

In "Crash," James Ballard (James Spader) causes an accident with a car carrying Dr. Helen Remington (Holly Hunter). Dr. Remington's husband is killed, while she and James are severely injured. He discovers that she is sexually aroused by the danger of car accidents and soon starts hanging out with a cult of car-crash fetishists. His wife joins in, and they all spiral into a world of twisted limbs and twisted metal. 

Cronenberg's "Videodrome" also shares DNA with "Titane," as the main character Max Renn (James Woods) has a physical transformation similar to Tetsuo or Alexia, but "Crash" is ostensibly a movie about people who get horny for car crashes, and "Titane" is about a violent woman who gets horny for cars. They're both violent, disturbing, and very, very horny. 

Possessor

David Cronenberg isn't the only one in his family who makes killer psychosexual body horror. His son, Brandon, dropped onto the scene with his 2012 contagion horror "Antiviral," but he really blew minds with his 2020 body-hopping sci-fi thriller, "Possessor." Andrea Riseborough stars as Tasya Vos, an assassin who uses special technology to inhabit another person's body and complete her missions. Her latest mission has her inhabiting the body of Colin (Christopher Abbott), who is about to marry into a rich and powerful family. Tasya starts to find herself slipping further into her new identity, perhaps feeling more comfort in a male body. There's a twisting narrative about gender and dysphoria at the heart of "Possessor." Tasya and Alexia from "Titane" are two sides of the same coin, representing people with female reproductive organs who don't feel at home in their own bodies.

Like "Titane," "Possessor" is full of burning sexuality, body horror, explosive violence, and surreal, dreamlike visuals. Both are intense experiences from start to finish that feature a female serial killer as the protagonist, but "Titane" does have the advantage of a femme gaze.

Christine

One of the most memorable scenes in "Titane" involves Alexia having passionate, violent sex with a Cadillac. After having a titanium plate put in her head as a child, she has had no real connection to any other humans. Cars, however, she treats with a kind of reverence. Alexia is an outcast, a loner, but with cars, she's powerful. 

The 1983 John Carpenter horror film "Christine" is also a love story between a human and a car. Based on the novel by Stephen King, "Christine" stars Keith Gordon as Arnie, a teenage loner who becomes obsessed with a 1958 Plymouth Fury that he names Christine. As Arnie and Christine's relationship grows, Arnie becomes more confident and Christine becomes more bloodthirsty. By the time she's driving herself down the road aflame to Carpenter's killer score, it's already too late. 

"Christine" is a silly Stephen King story taken to surprisingly scary places by Carpenter. It's hard to believe a movie about a killer car could be anything other than corny, but "Christine" is a seriously twisted meditation on loneliness, love, and vehicles. Make sure to check it out before Bryan Fuller's reboot!

Baise-Moi

"Baise-moi" is the fiercest expression of femme violence I've ever seen. The 2000 French crime thriller written and directed by Virginie Despentes and Coralie Trinh Thi is basically "Thelma & Louise" taken to its most extreme. Based on the 1993 novel by Despentes, "Baise-Moi" follows Nadine (Karen Lancaume) and Manu (Raffaëla Anderson), two part-time sex workers who feel that they have been completely marginalized by society. After both of them are raped by different men, they decide to team up on a rampage of revenge. The film is considered a part of the "New French Extremity" due to its graphic violence and explicit, sometimes unsimulated sex scenes. 

The women's rampage starts stacking up quite the body count, including a random woman at an ATM, some police who stopped their car, and all of the patrons of a swinger's club. When one of the men in the club makes a racist comment to Manu, she uses a gun on him in a horrifyingly sexual way before killing him outright. 

"Baise-moi" is vicious and nihilistic and follows two protagonists who are challenging to root for. There's a shared bloodline between the women of "Baise-moi" and Alexia in "Titane," because all of them are sadistic killers with almost no sense of empathy. 

Dogtooth

Yorgos Lanthimos' 2009 Greek drama "Dogtooth" is like a cinematic punch to the gut. The film follows a family that lives on a compound in rural Greece. The children are kept ignorant of the outside world, and any words they discover from books are given alternative meanings. They aren't even allowed to watch TV or movies, and they believe that if they misbehave, they will be forced out into the world to die. 

In order to help relieve his son's sexual urges, the father begins paying a female employee to have sex with him. She starts bringing contraband into the house, including copies of "Flashdance" and "Jaws" on VHS tape. She engages in a sexual relationship with the oldest sister, played by Angeliki Papoulia, and the sister begins questioning everything. Her father told her that she can only leave home when her incisor tooth (or dogtooth) falls out, so she makes that happen with a pair of pliers in a scene that's hauntingly reminiscent of Alexia breaking her own nose. 

"Dogtooth" is a bizarre story of love, isolation, and identity that shares some of its most heart-wrenching concepts about how we treat one another with "Titane."

Excision

Written and directed by Richard Bates, Jr., "Excision" is a 2012 horror film about a teenage girl with violent sexual urges. Pauline (AnnaLynne McCord) doesn't fit in with her family. She fights constantly with her mom (Traci Lords), and her younger sister (Ariel Winter) is chronically ill with cystic fibrosis. No one knows how to help Pauline, who is foul-mouthed, unkempt, and increasingly aggressive. 

Much like "Titane," "Excision" is chock-full of gorgeous, rainbow-colored gore. Pauline isn't nearly as violent as Alexia, but she has a clear hatred for polite society. When she's forced to attend a cotillion ball at school, she kisses the boy dancing with her because she has a cold sore and wants to transmit the virus to him. She's willing to take down everyone around her, using whatever means necessary. The only person she truly cares for is her sister, but even that love is twisted in its own way.

"Titane" and "Excision" share an MTV-inspired visual language that's as candy-colored as it is horrific, and both tell stories of women whose desires become deadly.

Read this next: The 20 Best Dystopian Movies Of All Time

The post 8 Movies to Watch After Titane appeared first on /Film.

Last week, Apple had unveiled their new generation MacBook Pro laptop series, a new range of flagship devices that bring with them significant updates to the company’s professional and power-user oriented user-base. The new devices particularly differentiate themselves in that they’re now powered by two new additional entries in Apple’s own silicon line-up, the M1 Pro and the M1 Max. We’ve covered the initial reveal in last week’s overview article of the two new chips, and today we’re getting the first glimpses of the performance we’re expected to see off the new silicon.

We all know that Ubisoft is a company that is well known for its unoptimized PC games. Assassin’s Creed Valhalla had performance issues, the latest Far Cry games have been mainly relying on one CPU core/thread, most of its games use VMProtect and Denuvo which bring an additional CPU/memory overhead, and the list goes on. … Continue reading Ubisoft blames Skype, MSI Afterburner, Discord and more for possibly causing performance issues in its games →

The post Ubisoft blames Skype, MSI Afterburner, Discord and more for possibly causing performance issues in its games appeared first on DSOGaming.

Two years ago, Apple threatened to pull Facebook and Instagram from its app store over concerns about the platform being used as a tool to trade and sell maids in the Mideast. From a report: After publicly promising to crack down, Facebook acknowledged in internal documents obtained by The Associated Press that it was "under-enforcing on confirmed abusive activity" that saw Filipina maids complaining on the social media site of being abused. Apple relented and Facebook and Instagram remained in the app store. But Facebook's crackdown seems to have had a limited effect. Even today, a quick search for "khadima," or "maids" in Arabic, will bring up accounts featuring posed photographs of Africans and South Asians with ages and prices listed next to their images. That's even as the Philippines government has a team of workers that do nothing but scour Facebook posts each day to try and protect desperate job seekers from criminal gangs and unscrupulous recruiters using the site.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The latest version of macOS, Monterey, is now available to download, according to Apple. The software has been available in public beta for several months, but today's release means Apple thinks the software is ready for everyday use. From a report: As is tradition, Apple announced its latest version of macOS at WWDC in June. New features include the ability to set Macs as an AirPlay target to play content from iPhones and iPads, as well as Shortcuts, Apple's iOS automation software. There have also been improvements made to FaceTime, as well as a new Quick Note feature. For a full rundown of what's on the way, check out our preview from July, as well as Apple's own feature list. Unfortunately, some of Monterey's biggest new additions, Universal Control and SharePlay, don't seem to be available at launch. Apple notes that both features will be available "later this fall." Universal Control allows files to be dragged and dropped between several different machines, as Apple's Craig Federighi demonstrated at WWDC. It also will let you control multiple Apple devices including Macs, MacBooks, and iPads, with the same mouse and keyboard. SharePlay will enable shared experiences of music, TV shows, movies, and more while connected over FaceTime. Once it's available, Apple says you can use the feature with Apple Music, Apple TV+ and unnamed "popular third-party services." It's better news when it comes to Safari's redesign, which by default now uses a more traditional interface rather than the controversial new tab design introduced at WWDC.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Tech billionaire Peter Thiel "believes that people should be more worried about 'surveillance AI' rather than artificial general intelligences," reports CNBC: The venture capitalist, who co-founded big data firm Palantir, said at an event in Miami on Wednesday that on the path to AGI, you get surveillance AI, which he described as a "communist totalitarian technology." Those that are worried about AGI aren't actually "paying attention to the thing that really matters," Thiel said, adding that governments will use AI-powered facial recognition technology to control people. His comments come three years after Bloomberg reported that "Palantir knows everything about you." Thiel has also invested in facial recognition company Clearview AI and surveillance start-up Anduril. Palantir, which has a market value of $48 billion, has developed data trawling technology that intelligence agencies and governments use for surveillance and to spot suspicious patterns in public and private databases. Customers reportedly include the CIA, FBI, and the U.S. Army.... Thiel, a well-known libertarian who also co-founded PayPal and holds a board seat at Facebook, said Silicon Valley isn't talking about AGI as much today as it was six or seven years ago... In the same talk, Thiel pitted AI against cryptocurrencies, saying that he'd prefer to see the latter one succeed. "If we say crypto is libertarian and that it is fundamentally a force for decentralization, then I think we should also be willing to say that AI, especially in the low-tech surveillance form, is essentially communist." "If you want to frame it as a technological race ... I want the crypto decentralized world to work," he said.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Throughout the long runtime of Marvel's "Eternals," I weirdly could not stop thinking about a random phrase from a season 2 sketch of "I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson." In that sketch, Santa Claus retires from delivering presents to children for the more lucrative job of starring in action movie cash grabs, which he enthusiastically promotes with the nonsense descriptor: "It's kind of a cosmic gumbo."

The phrase intentionally pokes fun at the movie biz practice of combining colorful adjectives in a way that sounds sophisticated, but actually means nothing. And that's the phrase that kept echoing through my head as I watched "Eternals," Marvel's most ambitious and majestic film yet. Now it sounds like I'm trashing "Eternals" — not at all. At best, I think it's the work of a singular director who brings with her a grand, awe-inspiring vision of austere science-fiction the likes of which has never been seen in Marvel before. At worst, I think it's a mixed bag. But "Eternals" does feel like a strange combination of a truly inspired filmmaker and a meticulously focus group-tested pitch, with director Chloé Zhao given all the tools at the studio's disposal to bring her vision to life. It's impressive and mythic and wild and dazzling, yet it also feels strangely diluted. So ... you might say it's a cosmic gumbo.

'In The Beginning...'

"Eternals" follows the titular group of immortal beings who were sent to Earth by a group of all-powerful cosmic entities known as the Celestials, some of the first lifeforms created in the universe. The Eternals are sent to defend the Earth from the Deviants, monstrous aliens that mindlessly devour any lifeform in its path. Led by the wise Ajak (a beatific Salma Hayek), the Eternals include the compassionate but naïve Sersi (Gemma Chan, practically the definition of "doe-eyed"), the group's pseudo-Superman member Ikaris (a deliciously dubious Richard Madden), the aggressive warrior Thena (Angelina Jolie, fragile and fierce in equal measure), and the finger gun-wielding Kingo (Kumail Nanjiani, having a blast).

Filling out the rest of this unlikely family are the youthful Sprite (Lia McHugh), who has the power to create illusions; Phastos (Brian Tyree Henry, injecting a deep sensitivity into his role), inventor extraordinaire; Makkari (Lauren Ridloff), a deaf speedster; Gilgamesh (Don Lee, an indomitable presence in and of itself), the strongest and kindest of the group; and finally, Druig (Barry Keoghan, playing with his inherently threatening energy), the member with the ability to manipulate the minds of others.

The group arrive on Earth in the prehistoric era, 7,000 years before the Avengers existed, with a simple mission: to eliminate all the Deviants. They're told not to interfere in human conflict, but are not discouraged from nudging along human progress, with Phastos introducing many an innovation to the humans, Sprite weaving some myths for the adoring humans, and Sersi aiding in the cultivation of crops. The film skips back and forth in time, as we pick up with Sersi in modern day, living amongst mortals and happy in a relationship with a fellow professor, Dane Whitman (Kit Harington, reveling in a lighter role for once). But her normal life is interrupted by an attack from a Deviant — the last of which the Eternals thought they had eliminated thousands of years ago — and the return of her longtime ex-lover, Ikaris. Terrified at the prospect of the Deviants returning, Sersi rallies Ikaris and Sprite to find the rest of the Eternals, who have scattered around the globe and have long abandoned humanity to their feckless ways.

A Shaky Start

From the beginning, "Eternals" was a big gamble for Marvel. The Jack Kirby-created comics upon which the movie is based are some of the trippiest things to come out of Marvel Comics — so eye-popping and visually dense that you'd think drugs were involved in its creation (for the record, Jack Kirby is very anti-drug). They're also quite niche, even for Marvel Studios. But Marvel was able to turn the formerly obscure Guardians of the Galaxy into its biggest superstars, so why not another group of cosmic superbeings? 

To do that, they needed a strong creative hand, and they found that in Chloé Zhao. Zhao is possibly the biggest get for Marvel yet — a historic Oscar winner and a beloved auteur for her exquisite double bill neo-Westerns "The Rider" and "Nomadland." But her naturalistic style seemed at odds with the gonzo acid trip of Kirby's "Eternals." So how does it all shake out? With a movie that does eventually manage to find the perfect median between the mythic weirdness of Kirby's comics and Zhao's meditative naturalism. The only problem is that it takes a long time to get there.

The first half is, to put it mildly, rough. As Sersi, Ikaris, and Sprite travel the globe to find their fellow Eternals, the film weaves in flashbacks to the early days of their arrival, building to the group eventually fracturing. There's a dissonance in those flashbacks, which are filmed largely on-location in various fields and rock formations and are shot in that dusky magic hour which lovingly drapes so much of Zhao's films. The scenery is beautiful and the landscapes breathtaking, but it's inhabited awkwardly by the Eternals, who placidly stroll around the vistas in their stiff supersuits and spend half of the flashbacks lining up to pose in "superhero team" formation (I counted at least three times). There's probably some intent to the distance with which this insanely talented ensemble play the characters in this early half — they're told not to interfere with humans, but they come to care for them anyways — but it only undercuts the humanistic streak that Zhao brings to the film.

Marvel's Bleakest Film

It's only when the film's meditative tone (or attempt at doing so) gives way to the grand, brazenly weird mythos that "Eternals" starts to kick into gear. But even so, the most interesting seeds of "Eternals" are only hinted at, and only come to the surface toward the end of the film — and by then, it feels like the film has only just gotten started. Zhao employs a Villeneuve-inspired (i.e. sleek obelisk-style spaceships) aesthetic to convey the austere, incomprehensible vastness of space, and then brings out the indomitable Celestials — hulking, mammoth figures who loom over all creation and hint at a kind of cosmic horror.

The most intriguing part of "Eternals" is its subtext. "Eternals" is by far Marvel's bleakest film, essentially consigning humanity to inevitable destruction. It's not hard to see the climate change allegory in that worldview, but it's the kind of gutting revelation that basically gets breezed past by the film in favor of more people in spandex punching "World of Warcraft" monsters.

With "Eternals," Marvel turns a risky gamble into another piece of the puzzle. Its cosmic ambitions, its prevailing humanism amid a nihilistic outlook, and its gestures at maturity — the (real!) sex scene, the depth and warmth that they give to Henry's LGBTQ relationship — are not enough to make "Eternals" more than just another film to fit neatly in the Marvel Studios mold. But even so, Zhao brings an elegance to the film and the cast bring a vulnerability and care to their characters that leave a lingering impression, even as the last super-punch fades.

/Film Rating: 6.5 out of 10

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

The post Eternals Review: A Wildly Ambitious But Tonally Uneven Cosmic Epic appeared first on /Film.

You might have noticed the roguelike video game genre growing in popularity. But like a lot of genres, roguelikes can be difficult to define clearly, especially when they mix with a lot of other gameplay styles. This is why spin-off categories like "roguelite" exist.

Click here for all the Needles of Halloween!

 

Virtualization-Based Security has been a feature on Windows 10 for years. It flew under the radar for many people because Microsoft wasn’t enforcing it; however, this is going to change with Windows 11.

"Having a superpower doesn't necessarily make you a superhero." That's the premise behind "Super Crooks," a new Netflix animated series based on the graphic novel of the same name by Mark Millar and Leinil Yu.

The live-action TV adaptation of Millar and Frank Quitely's comic "Jupiter's Legacy" may have faced impromptu cancelation early this summer, but Netflix is still in the market for more Millar — and more anime. "Super Crooks" is the latest Millar property to leap from page to screen, and it's got Bones, the Japanese animation studio that brought you "Cowboy Bebop: The Movie" and "Godzilla Singular Point," behind it.

"Super Crooks" is directed by Motonobu Hori and written and story edited by Dai Sato, with Yu himself supervising the character designs by Takashi Mitani. Its story will unfold over the course of thirteen 30-minute episodes, and it's set to premiere on the streaming service late next month. In the meantime, Netflix has released a trailer to whet your appetite. 

Check out the trailer for "Super Crooks" below.

Super Crooks Trailer

With its suitcases full of (foldable?) super-villains, "Super Crooks" is merely the latest Netflix series to give a Western IP the anime treatment. Whereas English was the original language for "Pacific Rim: The Black," however, the trailer for "Super Crooks" is in Japanese with English subtitles. An English dub of the series will also be available.

Riding motorcycles and pulling off risky gold heists is just Johnny Bolt's way of life. In "Super Crooks," he's voiced by Kenjiro Tsuda in Japanese and Jonah Scott in English. The biggest obstacle to his next heist appears to be a baddie with 200 superpowers named The Praetorian, voiced by Wataru Hatano in Japanese and DC Douglas in English.

Other forthcoming Millar adaptations include "The King's Man" and "King of Spies," the latter of which functions as Millar's own reverse "graphic novel translation of [an] original Netflix property."

Here's the official plot synopsis for "Super Crooks," courtesy of Netflix:

"Luck's never been on their side, but this crew of small-time crooks with super powers recruited by none other than Johnny Bolt are rolling the dice on one last heist. Their target: A ruthless super-powered crime boss.... What can go wrong? Super Crooks is based on the graphic novel of the same name by comic book legend Mark Millar and artist Leinil Yu, directed by Motonobu Hori (Carole & Tuesday) and told in 13x 30-minute episodes produced by renowned Japanese anime studio Bones."

"Super Crooks" comes to Netflix on November 25, 2021.

Read this next: 11 Marvel Comics Villains We Really Want To See In The MCU

The post Super Crooks Trailer: The Mark Millar Comic Becomes a Netflix Anime appeared first on /Film.

It's the most wonderful time of the year. The leaves are changing colors, there's a crispness in the air, and horror movies are just everywhere. One of the fringe benefits of the Halloween season is that for one month a year the whole world gets to be as obsessed with horror movies as I am, which is probably why this has always been my favorite holiday.

Edgar Wright has a new movie coming out, "Last Night in Soho," which just so happens to be a Focus Features film, and Focus is one of Universal's distributors. Wright is a cinephile of the highest degree, cut from the same cloth as Quentin Tarantino in that his love of cinema encompasses all forms, not just whatever happens to be out on Criterion at the moment.

So, when Edgar Wright comes up with a list of fun spooky stuff to watch on Peacock, it'll behove you to listen up.

Edgar's List

Peacock's library is fairly eclectic, at least compared to other major streamers. One big benefit of Universal having its own streaming service is that the studio's massive library of films, which stretches back to the golden era of Hollywood. Yes, I'm talking about (gasp!) black and white movies, many of which are included in Wright's spooky time picks.

Let's take a look at the full list:

• DRACULA (1931)
• BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1935)
• CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON (1954)
• THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING MAN (1957)
• THE BRIDES OF DRACULA (1960)
• THE EVIL OF FRANKENSTEIN (1964)
• NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD (1968)
• FRENZY (1972)
• THE SENTINEL (1977)
• AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON (1981)
• VIDEODROME (1983)
• GREMLINS (1984)
• DEAD RINGERS (1988)
• THE COOK THE THIEF HIS WIFE & HER LOVER (1989)
• PEOPLE UNDER THE STAIRS (1991)
• RAISING CAIN (1992)
• SERIAL MOM (1994)
• THE SIXTH SENSE (1999)
• IT FOLLOWS (2014)
• TRAIN TO BUSAN (2016)

Classics And Underseen Genre Gems

My favorite thing about this list, and I guess about Wright as a movie geek, is how he'll mix in popular titles still in the public consciousness with some bona fide classics AND some underrated genre gems. For example, "The Sixth Sense" is a movie everyone knows and loves. Of course it ends up on this Halloween-time list. What isn't so guaranteed is something like Wes Craven's "The People Under the Stairs," a movie about class and race that also happens to be a goofy horror comedy. 

Also gotta love him including Alfred Hitchcock's "Frenzy," which isn't usually the go-to Hitchcock film on these kinds of lists. "Psycho" or "The Birds" tend to eat up all the oxygen, but "Frenzy" is a nasty piece of work from Hitch's later career. It's an English serial killer story that is told with Hitchcock's trademark quirky humor, but leans more extreme than the typical film from The Master of Suspense. Not for nothing, but this is also a good one to watch to get in the mood for Wright's own London-based horror flick coming out next Friday.

Props for the inclusion of "Serial Mom," "It Follows," "Dead Ringers," "Bride of Frankenstein," and "Creature from the Black Lagoon" as well. When it comes to Universal Monster movies those are two of the best.

Anyway, hell of a list from Edgar Wright. You've got 9 days to watch them all and report back. The clock is ticking.

Read this next: The 15 Best Japanese Horror Movies Of All Time

The post Edgar Wright Curated a List of 'Dark Delights' To Watch This Month on Peacock appeared first on /Film.