How Minions Went From Facebook Slop to Hollywood’s Box Office Heroes

The newest addition to the Despicable Me cinematic universe, Minions and Monsters, is set to open a record-breaking Annecy Film Festival on Sunday. More than 18,000 festival attendees will have the opportunity to begin their week-long film screening spree with some of big-screen animation’s most recognizable characters: the Minions.

Minions, the bright yellow pill-shaped comedic relief sidekicks who made their on-screen debut in 2010’s Despicable Me, are now the heart of a seemingly never-ending multimillion dollar franchise. So how did Illumination’s poster children make it to the top spot? The answer is far more nuanced than the Minions’ crowd-pleasing antics and inoffensive art design; they are vessels for some of the studio’s best storytelling.

For most of their early years, Minions were mostly recognizable from their abundance in trenches of Facebook meme culture. Images of a mischievous Minion smiling and posing innocently under phrases like “Exercise? I thought you said extra fries!” were the peak of Minion iconography following the release of the first Despicable Me.

After 2013’s Despicable Me 2, a film where the Minions were much more central to the plot, the brightly colored creatures began to move toward the driver’s seat of the Despicable Me franchise. They got their own movie, simply titled Minions, just two years later, which explored the origins of the Minions (who are millions of years old, according to the film).

Minions made over $1.1 billion at the global box office, and earned more than both Despicable Me and Despicable Me 2 in its opening weekend ($115 million compared to $56 million and $83 million, respectively). The Minions sequel, Minions: Rise of Gru, although not crossing the $1 billion mark at the global box office, made the most domestically of any film in the Despicable Me franchise at over $370 million.

Despite neither Minions movie achieving the same positive critical reception of the first two Despicable Me films, they have scored higher than both Despicable Me 3 and 4 on IMDb, Metacritic, and Letterboxd. Additionally, their huge numbers at the box office hint at more than just success for a kids movie.

Gen Z fans have rallied behind the Minions, joining ranks with parents who don’t know what to do with their kids over the summer. Both Despicable Me 1 and 2 are some of the first movies many Gen Z fans saw in theaters when they were young, and the Minions movies have capitalized on that nostalgia factor. The Rise of Gru is the best example of this; it took Gru, the central protagonist who kicked off Despicable Me’s success, and crossed his villain origin story with the globe-trotting journeys of the Minions. The central intersection, while providing an engaging narrative to unite Gru with his iconic sidekicks, also jumps on all the things Gen Z fans who remember the first film in the franchise fondly want to see on the big screen. Gru’s character arc, which focuses on his outsider status and frequent victim of both bullying and emotional neglect, are things many Gen Zers can empathize with.

Some Gen Z support for the franchise is most certainly intended to be ironic or humorous. A quick scroll through the Minions Instagram account will showcase many users commenting internet slang familiar to younger fans and jokes attempting to feign eagerness to see the next Minions film. Even the Facebook memes that serve as the origin of Minion cultural hegemony have evolved into the strange online humor characteristic of Gen Z content creators; instead of “Exercise? I thought you said extra fries!”, Minion memes now are just a grainy photo where a less-than-happy looking Minion stares blankly at the camera, or even a Minion being crucified (“Grucified,” according to TikTok users).

Even if it’s ironic, however, the support for the Minions ultimately maintains their position as a centerpiece in Hollywood’s collection of crown jewel animated franchises. A film with Minions in it guarantees success, and their proliferation both online and in theaters cements one truth: Minions won’t stop being summer blockbuster kingmakers any time soon.

Antoni Porowski On Why Food Is the Ultimate Human Connection

I’m an Englishman in New York, and last month I slipped across New York Harbor to Governors Island, less focused on its strategic position as a command post but more interested in cocktail making, award-winning pizza, and meeting Antoni Porowski to discuss his new series, National Geographic’s Best of the World with Antoni Porowski.

For Antoni, the best meal in the world isn’t necessarily served at a Michelin-starred restaurant — it might come from a grandmother’s kitchen, a tiny London pub, or a chef preserving generations of tradition. That philosophy drives the new National Geographic series blending celebrity travel, food culture, and deeply personal storytelling.

Den of Geek: What was it that interested you about weaving a more personal angle into the celebrity-meets-culinary world format?

Antoni Porowski: It was the pause I experienced internally when we started discussing the “best of the world.” lists. It’s such a huge statement to make because it’s so subjective. The best for one person could be a grandmother making tortellini she learned from her ancestors. For someone else, the best is a five-star hotel with butler service.

Where I found comfort was leaning into the human stories behind it. National Geographic and Two Four were incredibly supportive of that, and for me it’s the most interesting part — the people. That’s what I remember from trips.

If I try something delicious, I immediately want to know: “Who made this? What inspired them?” There’s always a deeper story there.

Whether it was meeting a young woman in Paris weaving a carpet that takes 10 years to complete, or chefs obsessing over perfecting roti in London, I’m fascinated by people who dedicate themselves completely to something. That kind of passion is relatable and inspiring.

Behind-the-scenes as Antoni Porowski helps to feed the Giant waterlily at Kew Gardens near London, UK, as seen in National Geographic’s Best of the World with Antoni Porowski. (National Geographic/John Wendle)

Have you always had that obsession with food?

Deep obsession. To quote my therapist, “If it’s hysterical, it’s historical.”

It comes from my parents. We’d be eating breakfast and already talking about lunch and dinner. If we went to a restaurant, we’d critique the dishes and talk about how to make them healthier, better, or more decadent.

Food was the equalizer in my family. It was our common ground.

Was there a particular experience during filming that surprised you or changed your perspective?

Absolutely. One of the places we visited in London was Tamil Crown, this amazing pub started by two friends — one British and one an Indian immigrant.

They asked themselves: what’s the most iconic British meal? The Sunday Roast. And then they reimagined it through Indian flavors. Yorkshire pudding with roti. Gobi 65 instead of cauliflower cheese.

At first it feels like, “You don’t mess with the Sunday roast,” right? But when you think about the history of the spice trade in England and Indian cuisine’s place in British culture, it actually makes perfect sense.

That was such a fun conversation to have because it shows how food traditions evolve naturally through history and migration.

England gets a lot of criticism internationally for its food. After filming there, what’s your verdict?

People need to stop with this idea that England doesn’t have good food because I genuinely don’t remember having a bad meal there.

You have brown sauce. Branston pickle. And the Sunday roast is perfect. It checks every box.

And honestly, the diversity of food in London is incredible. Some people have told me the best Indian food outside of India is in London, and I totally believe that. Also, you have Nando’s. What’s not to love?

National Geographic has a legacy tied to exploration and discovery. What does partnering with them mean to you?

It feels like a responsibility in the best way possible.

We had a National Geographic subscription growing up, and it was probably the only thing my parents never had to force me to read. I loved learning about archaeology, animal species, ecosystems — things I never would’ve encountered otherwise.

So it feels like a tremendous privilege. But at the same time, I want to stay authentic to myself. I’m basically a golden retriever or a kid at heart. I get genuinely excited by people and by diversity in all its forms.

I’m constantly trying to balance being myself while respecting the incredible legacy that is National Geographic.

In a fantasy world who would you love to travel with for an episode?

One of my favorite artists is Louise Nevelson, who was born in what is now Ukraine. She created these incredible wood installations using discarded materials from around New York’s Meatpacking District, and she inspired so many designers and artists I love.

I’d love to go to Budapest with her — not just for the food, but for the art and culture — to learn about her origin story and what inspired her creatively.

Pizza provided by – https://cutsandslicesnyc.com/
Cocktails provided by – https://doublechickenplease.com/

Best of the World with Antoni Porowski is available to stream on Disney+ and Hulu now.

Tomb Raider: Legacy of Atlantis Takes a “No Laras Left Behind” Approach

There hasn’t been a new Tomb Raider game since 2018’s Shadow of the Tomb Raider, closing out the action-adventure franchise’s Survivor Trilogy, providing the iconic protagonist Lara Croft with a more hardened origin story. The wait is finally over early next year with Tomb Raider: Legacy of Atlantis, a reimagining of the 1996 original game albeit completely revamped for modern gaming platforms and audiences. At Summer Game Fest 2026, we not only got the chance to play an early build of Legacy of Atlantis but talk to the creative team and Alix Wilton Regan, who stars as the new Lara Croft.

Like the 1996 classic, Legacy of Atlantis has Lara searching for a valuable relic in the ruins of a lost civilization deep within the Peruvian rainforest, with these tropical environments gorgeously realized in the build that we played. This includes plenty of puzzle-solving and acrobatic platforming as we climbed cliffsides and swung across ravines and rivers to advance deeper into the civilization. Though the premise and narrative are certainly familiar, Legacy of Atlantis is not just a high-definition reskin of the 1996 game or its previous remake in 2007’s Tomb Raider: Anniversary.

“We’re providing something that feels like an echo from the past but that we don’t feel handcuffed by,” explains Crystal Dynamics experience director Jeff Adams, observing that the game also has to take into account players who never witnessed the original title. “We’re able to make creative choices that enhance the experience because we do want to make something fresh. We want to make something that feels like it’s your first time playing it.”

Compared to the Survivor Trilogy, this is a much more visibly confident Lara Croft, bringing a wisdom and swagger to the proceedings, magnificently brought to life by Regan. This heightened expertise and competence is immediately apparent in the game’s combat mechanics, with Lara not only back to using her signature dual pistols but a pronounced acrobatic fighting style. Using something called “focus,” Lara can trigger a mechanic while in mid-somersault to temporarily slow down time and rapidly blast incoming enemies. This reflects the more seasoned adventurer that Lara has become since the Survivor Trilogy.

“We wanted combat to have a more deliberate place in the franchise,” notes Crystal Dynamics game director Raul Siqueira. “The Survivor Trilogy pushed combat in a certain direction which was very cool for what those types of games were. When we look at the personality for our game and the acrobatic Lara, where everything flows with what she does and she’s at the top of her game, we wanted that to not just be for show but have some meaning to it.”

Though Regan has portrayed plenty of action-oriented video game characters in beloved titles like Assassin’s Creed Origins and Dragon Age: Inquisition, the role of Lara Croft is a particularly special one for her. Adopting a “no Laras left behind” approach, Regan notes that her depiction is “a unified Lara” while also evoking the classic iteration from the original trilogy and Angelina Jolie’s two-movie take on the character.

“My Lara Croft is a highly experienced archaeologist and tomb raider with a wealth of knowledge and an entire history behind her,” Regan observes about her portrayal of the video game icon. “She’s very firmly rooted in her present and in her power as a highly intelligent, highly capable, and fiercely independent woman.”

With Legacy of Atlantis a reimagining of the original game, Regan similarly looked to the 1996 title for inspiration in her own performance. Struck by the line “I only play for sport,” Regan found the bit of dialogue “highly informative” in clueing her into who Lara Croft is at this point in her life and that she truly enjoys what she does. While respecting the more vulnerable Survivor Trilogy Lara, Regan approached the role taking into account that experience and confidence Lara now possesses, also looking to the Tomb Raider movies’ influence.

“It was a really interesting process because, when I auditioned, I actually auditioned with a lot of Angelina Jolie’s scripts from the movies, which told me a lot about which direction the creative team were going in,” Regan recalls. “They really did want to capture that sassy, confident character for Lara from the films – classic Lara.”

The game is the best-looking Tomb Raider in years, with everything from detailed environments and character models to pristine water effects and sweeping landscapes. For Flying Wild Hog art director Arek Tomaszewski, Legacy of Atlantis recognizes that everyone has their own memories of the franchise and its original game, including the creative team, and tries to reinvent them with modern sensibilities. That includes everything from puzzle-solving in Peruvian temples to harrowing showdowns with ravenous dinosaurs.

“Whatever we’re building, we need to build them in a way that they’re logically believable,” explains Tomaszewski. “We want you to feel like this is a place you’re discovering that’s believable. We’re trying to push our artists as much as we can so you can just look around and see how awesome it is.”

At the end of the day, Tomb Raider: Legacy of Atlantis doesn’t just feel like a slightly more balletic follow-up to Shadow of the Tomb Raider but both a celebration of the series’ roots and fresh jumping-on point for newcomers. The title is the first in two Tomb Raider games slated for a 2027 release, coming out ahead of Tomb Raider: Catalyst. If Legacy of Atlantis is any indicator, the franchise is in great hands for a bright future, instantly recognizable to longtime fans while reinvigorating its roots.

“We’re coming up on the 30th anniversary of the original game. We love that and want to celebrate that. This is the perfect time to bring this into the light,” declares Adams. “There is such a great opportunity here to take this, make it feel familiar for those who have played it before, but make it feel fresh for those who haven’t had a chance to love it yet. That’s the driving thing behind this. It’s the right time to make this come to life.”

Developed by Crystal Dynamics and Flying Wild Hog and published by Amazon Game Studios, Tomb Raider: Legacy of Atlantis releases February 12, 2027 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, Nintendo Switch 2, and PC.

Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival Is Real and It’s Fantastic

If you’re a fan of horror games, you’ve probably seen targeted ads for Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival since its official announcement in July 2025. The first video game adapting the Hellraiser horror movie series, not counting the franchise’s guest appearance in Dead by Daylight, Revival has kept its cards close to the chest since the project was publicly confirmed. Fortunately, we are happy to confirm that not only does the game exist but that we got to play an early build of it for ourselves at Summer Game Fest 2026.

This nightmarish vision of Clive Barker’s visceral horror story is brought to life by Saber Interactive, with the game’s protagonist, Aidan Lynch, trying to find his girlfriend after she’s taken by the extra-dimensional Cenobites, including their garish figurehead Pinhead. This quest unfolds from a first-person perspective as Aidan tries to find a way to follow the Cenobites into their hellish realm. The build of the game that we experienced unfolds in three distinctly different environments, each with their own aesthetics, tone, and gameplay mechanics while distinctly taking place within the familiar confines of a Hellraiser story.

The opening sequence within the SGF build for Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival takes place in what appears to be a penthouse apartment run by a sado-masochist cult, which is right on-brand for Hellraiser. This segment was the weakest of the demo, not because of the gameplay or presentation, which were both fine, but because it played out like any number of horror-themed first-person shooters as we killed cultists while looking for a way to progress. The big innovation here was that we had something referred to as the Genesis Configuration in our possession, letting us telekinetically control blades and fire to dispatch enemies in addition to our conventional weapons.

Where the early build really took off was in its second segment, as Aidan enters the hellish dimension where the Cenobites hail from. Using the Genesis Configuration, we altered the layout of this world, rotating walls and playing with the physics of this otherworldly realm like a sinister version of Portal. The Hellraiser aesthetics were in full swing here, providing an unsettling environment that really made all this puzzle-solving and light platforming stand out for fans of the franchise.

This all led to the most horrific sequence in the entire demo, which saw Aidan venture into a facsimile of his home with his missing girlfriend Sunny. As we looped through this domestic setting, we not only witnessed increasingly disturbing visions and messages but learned more about the unhappy dynamic between the game’s core couple. There’s no way that this sequence was at least partially influenced by Hideo Kojima’s ill-fated horror game P.T. and its similar nightmarishly repeating corridor but Hellraiser: Revival makes the experience its twisted own with a hell of a punchline.

And that’s the big thing that I appreciated about Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival, that throughout the diversity in gameplay and presentation it stays visibly and tonally true to Barker’s scary story. We didn’t get to have an extended meeting with Pinhead or other Cenobites like the Chatterer, and we can’t wait to see how they figure into the game itself, but they would definitely fit within the aesthetics of Hellraiser: Revival. No matter how action-driven or surreal the game gets, this is Hellraiser through and through, leaning into the gory violence and sado-masochistic erotica that the franchise is known for.

As for the gameplay, it handles well, even in the first-person combat sequences that started off this demo. Mechanically within its combat, the game feels closer to something like Half-Life or Deus Ex without coming off as dated as those early PC first-person shooters. The puzzle-solving and psychological sequences retain those broader gameplay sensibilities but within a much different tone and type of intensity that informs the experience; the urgency is there but not from readily facing a tangible enemy so much as an existential one.

Taking less than an hour to complete this demo, Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival not only felt like a worthy video game adaptation of its fan-favorite property but a breath of fresh air for modern movie tie-in horror games. It feels like so many movie-inspired horror titles are overly derivative of Dead by Daylight, with games like The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and Evil Dead: The Game leaning into asymmetrical multiplayer experiences. By contrast, Hellraiser: Revival is a single-player experience that blends action and horror while taking full advantage of its source material visually and narratively.

For anyone who’s had Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival preordered for months, we’re happy to confirm that the game is very much real and on track for its October release date, just in time for Halloween. And for any fan who’s worried that the game will be an echo of any number of asymmetrical horror games, we’re even happier to report that it’s very much its own franchise-appropriate experience. Doing its source material proud, Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival is shaping up to become one of the standout horror games of the year.

Developed and published by Saber Interactive, Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival will be released October 8, 2026 on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC.

The One Mystery Widow’s Bay Season 2 Should Refuse to Solve

This article contains spoilers for Widow’s Bay episode 10, “We Hope You Enjoyed Your Time!”

In the first ten minutes of Widow’s Bay, Mayor Tom Loftis (Matthew Rhys) is on a mission to get a positive article about the show’s titular island town into the New York Times travel section. Discussing the potential timing of the article’s publication, Loftis pulls his calendar down from the wall and flips through its monthly pages, which depict wolves in various settings. One howls at the sky, while another month, June, shows a group of wolves staring at something off camera.

But when Loftis gets to July, there are no wolves to be found. Instead, July’s image is of a white vehicle overturned at the edge of a desolate road. Loftis pauses, checking that the calendar really is just supposed to be a fun one about wolves (it is). Still, he has far too much on his plate to overthink it, and quickly moves on with his day.

Later in the series, when Loftis is back in his office and under pressure to shut down the island thanks to a looming storm, he returns to the calendar and once again stares at its pages. After his assistant Patricia (Kate O’Flynn) reminds him that people have died, he flies into a rage. He tries to rip up the calendar and fails. Either Loftis doesn’t have the strength to rip through a calendar that must be all of 14 pages, or the calendar itself is indestructible for some mysterious reason. Either way, I don’t care. I do not want to know. It’s much funnier not knowing.

Like Demolition Man’s peaceful utopia, which replaces toilet paper with three seashells and never explains how they work, the Wolves calendar is more hilarious if we don’t know why July’s page is so haunting. Our imaginations can do all the heavy lifting, and the writers of Widow’s Bay can concentrate on all the lingering mysteries left to solve on the island, like what happened at the old hospital and why it’s safe to drive by there but not to stop. Or why various members of the town have much younger biological ages. Or why the island’s evils seem to be so drawn to Patricia. Or whether the Shaman survived being swept up in the storm.

Of course, there are already theories about the calendar, since the July car-wreck mystery wasn’t fully solved in the show’s first season. The strongest one sprang from Loftis’ visit to his elderly neighbor’s house in the season finale. Poor Ruth had no idea what Loftis had in store for her, poring through her photo albums and pointing out every notable man (and woman) of the town who had made a pass at her over the years. But to begin, Ruth lingers on a picture of an old boyfriend, Alfred, whom she says she loved so much. “But he got bit by an animal and became that animal,” she reveals. Our minds immediately jump to Alfred now being Widow’s Bay’s resident werewolf. Could it have been Alfred’s car overturned on that haunting road? Maybe, but I maintain it would be funnier if he became a different animal, like a spider or a deer, and the Wolves calendar had nothing to do with it.

Instead of making a definitive link, I say leave the Wolves calendar to be picked apart online forever by those compelled by it. Much like the series it often gets compared to, Twin Peaks, Widow’s Bay can confidently leave things unsaid and unexplained, though Apple TV’s sleeper hit might want to avoid killing one of its main characters and turning them into a ghostly drawer knob. That could be a bit too far.

All episodes of Widow’s Bay are now streaming on Apple TV.

How X-Men: The Animated Series Revolutionized Superhero Adaptations

It’s not necessarily a surprise when we catch up with some of the original minds behind the game-changing X-Men: The Animated Series that none of them saw a major film festival premiere in the series’ future. A film festival premiere for a revival, or companion series, nearly 35 years after X-Men’s debut on Fox Kids in 1992, to put a finer point on it.

Yet folks like Eric and Julia Lewald, the husband and wife duo who primarily ran the writers’ room on the now iconic superhero cartoon, and Larry Houston, the lead storyboard artist on the series, were there at the Tribeca Film Festival this past weekend to celebrate the legacy and lore of their original show, as well as to help usher in season 2 of X-Men ’97, the Disney+ sequel series that took fandom by storm in 2024, and for which they’re all consulting producers on.

It’s quite a turnaround from a series that began, at least in Eric’s mind, as an epic struggle to put out something compelling, transformative, and honestly far more sophisticated than any superhero cartoon—or for that matter most caped movie adaptations—had been up to that point.

“[Back then], it was ‘Alright, we’ve got six months of work and diapers and mortgage,’” Eric tells us at the X-Men ’97 press line. “Then it was successful after it took off, and we all realized it was something special, but it was a real struggle until it premiered. All sorts of people wanted it to be a different show. It’s so much different from the Saturday morning animation that came before it, people were very nervous: TV affiliates, advertisers, said, ‘Are you sure you don’t want to dumb this down and make it younger, or give them a silly sidekick?’”

Originally, the series began for the Lewlands as a call on Sunday night about the prospect of pitching the following day an X-Men animated series, something that had never really made it past the pilot stage (supporting bits in the Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends fiasco notwithstanding).

Remembers Eric, “On Monday morning we’re meeting with Stan Lee, saying, ‘Okay, what are you going to do with the show?’ And I didn’t really know the books at all. So I looked, and there had been 29 X-Men from 1963 to 1992. We needed to get that down to six or seven, with also Xavier. And the only agenda that I and my head writer Mark Edens had was to try and make the most dramatic television animation that we could. We had both been working in the field for seven or eight years, and we said this was the great equivalent of making an hour drama in kids animation. So we just made decisions pulling from the X-Men lore that fit.”

Wife Julia also gives special credit to the support they had from crucial corners at the then-emerging kids division of Fox. It provided the runway to make something as sophisticated as X-Men (or for that matter Batman: The Animated Series).

“I want to give a shout-out to Margaret Loesch,” Julia tells us. “She was the new president of Fox Kids, which was a brand new network, and she loved the X-Men books. She had worked with Marvel and with Stan Lee, and when she decided, ‘We’re going to do an X-Men show for Saturday morning,’ she got tremendous pushback from the folks above her. But she understood the books deeply and that just gave us the opportunities to tell the stories that the books were telling. So that protected all of us.”

While Eric learned to be a fan as the series came together, Houston was a lifelong fan before X-Men came his way.

“My impression was that there had not been an accurate adaptation back in 1992, and what I wanted to do was make the show as close to a comic book as I could,” says Houston. That meant character designs that looked like they were ripped straight from Jim Lee’s sketchbook on X-Men #1 (1991), but stories that just as earnestly filled in the cracks of the source material. For instance, Eric points out that fan favorite Rogue seeking a cure in the first season of The Animated Series was not based on any single comic book, but rather just a natural development for a character whose powers deny her the ability to touch another human being or mutant.

And foritiously for going into X-Men ’97 season 2, the writers and animators essentially took one of the X-Men’s many less popular villains in Apocalypse and turned him into one of the most iconic existential threats in all of comicdom.

“When we did him in 1992, all those details didn’t exist,” Houston points out about Apocalypse. The character was still relatively mysterious on the page, which allowed the cartoon creators to only hint at his Ancient Egyptian heritage while going their own way with it. “But in the 26 years since my series started and X-Men ‘97, all of that backstory is there. So they’re exploring the future, the past, so you’re getting a chance to see how Apocalypse came to be, and how he became such a badass and have the attitude that he has.”

Still, a lot of that badass attitude comes down to the original series Houston worked on, as well as the voice actor who was cast in the part.

“He’s so different and from everyone and everything in that world,” Julia explains. “[We had] tremendous fun in creating the line ‘I am the rocks of the eternal shore. Crash against me and be broken!’ Writing for him is the fun of being able to not just go over the top, but write something that Apocalypse would say, because Apocalypse is so much bigger than everyone else. And shout out to the original voice talent, our first Apocalypse, and that was John Colicos, who was the first Klingon to first appear in the original Star Trek series, and we didn’t know that when we were doing our show!”

Says Eric, “One of my five favorite lines out of the tens of thousands in the original series, was when Apocalypse suddenly pauses and says, ‘Wait a minute, am I like Sisyphus? Is this just futile and I’m going to live forever and never die, never change, never accomplish anything?’ So the good lines are he is this immortal creature who knows he is this immortal creature… and we were writing him before we knew the voice, but one episode in [with Colicos] we were like, ‘Oh God, we gotta write more for this guy!’”

As the writer explains it, Apocalypse might’ve only been in six or seven episodes of the original show without Colicos’ vocal choices and inflections. Instead he’s in 17 episodes. “There lots of villains we never got around to using, but we kept coming back around to him because he was just such a joy to write for,” Eric explains.

And in X-Men ’97, the character Colicos helped define is about to get a whole timey-wimey season where the X-Men will have to face him in the future, past, and 1997 present.

“Apocalypse is an exciting character, [and I’m] so happy to bring him back to the screen,” says Brad Winderbaum, an executive producer on X-Men ’97 and the current head of streaming, television, and animation at Marvel Studios. “He represents, I think, a horrible future and destiny for the X-Men that they’re always trying to avoid. So he serves a very specific, and very awesome purpose.”

Winderbaum also gives us a few teases for the upcoming season, including how the new season will explore the characters of Cyclops and Jean Grey as they attempt to become parents to their son Nathan, who they have discovered in a far-flung dystopian future (it’s comic book levels of complicated).

Says the exec producer, “For Scott and Jean, that idea of wanting to be parents, of wanting to be together and have a family drives them, and the world is always in their way. Circumstances are always in their way. Destiny is always in their way. Bigger problems are always in their way. So the fact that they get to spend this time with Nathan and get to raise him for a short period, is a beautiful reward for them.”

Among the characters who will be experiencing a lot of the give-and-take of destiny and personal needs, however, is Rogue, who has been voiced since 1992 by Lenore Zann. Rogue experienced the most heartache in the first season following the death of Remy LeBeau, aka Gambit, and that turmoil will continue in the second season.

“Rogue is on a mission, she still wants to get revenge for what happened to all of the other mutants in season 1, the Genosha genocide, but she’d also really love to get Remy back,” Zann teases. “And I mean true love, when you feel that feeling for somebody and you’ve lost somebody, it takes a long time to get over, so she’s still on an emotional roller coaster… anybody who’s lost someone knows there are many stages to the grief, including rage. So she’s going to be through a lot of emotions again this season, and she’s going to have to make some tough decisions.”

Zann also has been a long roller coaster with Rogue, a character she gave that now iconic Southern twang to, and whom she knows so personally that she was able to rewrite lines for in X-Men ’97, specifically a crucial bit in the episode preceding Gambit’s death.

“Let’s put it this way, I have definitely added some lines here and there,” says Zann. “When I’m in the booth, [I’d ask the producers] could I try saying this instead of that line? And I would do both. I would do their line and then I would do my own line, and sometimes those are the ones that stayed. So in the first season, when I’m dancing with Magneto in the ceiling in the sky, and we kiss, and then I pull away, and you think I’m going to say ‘I love you’ or something, instead of the line that was written, I say, ‘Thanks for the dance sugah, but Remy was right. Some things are deeper than skin,’ and they kept that line.”

Keeping true to the roots and the core of who the X-Men are might be the greatest legacy of this series. More than three decades after the original series, Houston marvels that Freddie Prinze Jr. once sought him out to chat with him about the series as a fan of it growing up. Meanwhile Julia reminds that while still Prime Minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau had the voice talent of X-Men ’97 visit his office.

‘Justin Trudeau knows the X-Men how is this possible?!” Julia laughs. “Are we influencing policy up here in Canada?”

But it’s the pull the series has had with fans, which keeps its legacy vital.

“We had no clue that it would go worldwide like it has, but it really has,” Eric considers. “If I wear an X-Men hat in Singapore, someone’s going to say ‘I watched your show growing up!’ It’s weirdly, amazingly gratifyingly well-received.”

X-Men ’97 premieres on Disney+ on July 1.

Actors Who Earned Their Reputation in the Horror Genre

The horror genre can be considered one among many others, but people tend to see it as a lesser cousin of thrillers and dramas. But many popular actors today trace their roots to it, a genre that has its doors open far wider than many others, often being the stepping stone to greater heights.

And it’s not like many of these performers got stuck in horror, since they’ve shined in things like comedies, dramas, family movies and even voicing animated characters. We will always remember them, however, as the horror icons they once started as.

Jamie Lee Curtis

Jamie Lee Curtis became Hollywood’s most famous “scream queen” thanks to Halloween. Her performance as Laurie Strode helped define the slasher genre and established a horror legacy that continues decades later.

Robert Englund

Robert Englund earned genre immortality by portraying Freddy Krueger in the A Nightmare on Elm Street franchise. Few actors are as closely associated with a single horror character.

Bela Lugosi

Bela Lugosi’s portrayal of Dracula in 1931 helped shape the image of cinematic vampires for generations. His performance made him one of the foundational stars of horror cinema.

Boris Karloff

Boris Karloff became a horror icon through films like Frankenstein and The Mummy. His performances established many of the genre’s earliest and most enduring screen monsters.

Vincent Price

Vincent Price’s voice, presence, and performances made him synonymous with horror throughout the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s. He remains one of the genre’s most beloved figures.

Christopher Lee

Christopher Lee spent decades terrifying audiences, most notably as Dracula in numerous Hammer Horror productions. His towering presence made him one of horror’s defining stars.

Barbara Steele

Barbara Steele became a cult horror legend through gothic classics like Black Sunday. Her striking appearance and willingness to embrace dark material made her a genre favorite.

Peter Cushing

Peter Cushing built an extraordinary horror résumé through Hammer Films, frequently appearing as Van Helsing, Baron Frankenstein, and other memorable characters that defined British horror.

Tony Todd

Tony Todd’s portrayal of Candyman created one of the most recognizable horror villains of the modern era. His commanding presence elevated every horror project he joined.

Kane Hodder

Kane Hodder became a fan favorite by playing Jason Voorhees in multiple Friday the 13th films. Many fans still consider him the definitive version of the character.

Brad Dourif

Brad Dourif gave life to Chucky through his unforgettable vocal performance in the Child’s Play franchise. His work transformed a killer doll into a horror icon.

Lin Shaye

Lin Shaye spent years appearing in genre films before becoming a horror star through the Insidious series. She has since become one of modern horror’s most recognizable faces.

Sid Haig

Sid Haig achieved cult status through Rob Zombie’s horror films, particularly as Captain Spaulding. The character became one of the most memorable horror villains of the 2000s.

Danielle Harris

Danielle Harris built her reputation through Halloween sequels and numerous independent horror productions. Her long relationship with the genre made her a modern scream queen favorite.

14 Action Heroes Who Were Clearly Too Old for This

In Lethal Weapon, Dany Glover’s character has a catchphrase that expresses how old he is for a given situation. Well, while played for laughs on that movie series, it’s quite true for certain action heroes that should’ve retired long ago, at least when it comes to action scenes.

Elderly actors still have a place in the cinematic world, but clearly they can’t do the action scenes they once did; asking them to do it would be irresponsible. There are camera tricks, CGI, and other ways to make them look believable, but all in all, we much preferred if they accepted their age and took other roles.

Harrison Ford

By the time Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny arrived, Harrison Ford was 80 years old. The film openly addressed Indy’s age, but many viewers still struggled to accept an octogenarian performing globe-trotting action heroics.

Robert De Niro

The Irishman used extensive de-aging technology to make Robert De Niro appear decades younger. Unfortunately, one infamous fight scene became a frequent target of criticism because his movements still reflected his real age.

Sylvester Stallone

Sylvester Stallone kept returning as both Rocky Balboa and John Rambo well into his sixties and seventies. While fans admired his dedication, many critics questioned whether the physical demands still suited the aging action icon.

Arnold Schwarzenegger

Arnold Schwarzenegger’s later Terminator appearances leaned heavily into the character’s age. Even so, seeing the former bodybuilding legend engage in large-scale action sequences in his seventies often stretched credibility.

Liam Neeson

Liam Neeson reinvented himself as an action star with Taken at 56. As he continued headlining thrillers into his late sixties and seventies, audiences increasingly joked about the veteran actor still playing unstoppable fighters.

Clint Eastwood

At 91, Clint Eastwood starred in Cry Macho, a film that still required him to handle physical confrontations and dangerous situations. Many reviewers felt the movie pushed the limits of the aging-action-hero formula.

Roger Moore

Roger Moore himself later admitted he felt too old for some of his final James Bond appearances. By A View to a Kill, even fans noticed that 57-year-old Bond looked considerably older than his romantic interests.

Sean Connery

Sean Connery returned as Bond in Never Say Never Again at age 53. His charisma remained intact, but the film often felt like it was asking an aging spy to perform feats designed for a younger man.

Bruce Willis

Before his retirement, Bruce Willis appeared in numerous low-budget action films that relied heavily on his established tough-guy reputation. The productions often seemed designed to minimize the physical demands placed on the aging star.

Steven Seagal

Steven Seagal’s later action movies became notorious online. As the actor aged, productions increasingly relied on seated fight scenes, minimal movement, and creative camera work to avoid showcasing his physical limitations.

Chuck Norris

Chuck Norris remained an action hero far longer than most of his contemporaries. While fans loved seeing him return in projects like The Expendables 2, his advancing age inevitably became part of the conversation.

Jean-Claude Van Damme

Jean-Claude Van Damme continued performing action roles deep into his fifties and sixties. Although still impressively flexible, later films often highlighted the contrast between his legendary athletic past and advancing age.

Dolph Lundgren

Dolph Lundgren remained physically imposing longer than most action stars, but his later appearances in franchises like The Expendables and Creed II inevitably raised questions about how much punishment an aging hero can realistically endure.

John Travolta

John Travolta spent much of the 2000s and 2010s headlining action thrillers despite being well past the age when most actors transition out of the genre. Films like Killing Season and I Am Wrath often asked audiences to believe he was still an elite fighter and pursuer.

Widow’s Bay Ending Explained: For Whom the Bell Tolls

This article contains spoilers for Widow’s Bay episode 10, “We Hope You Enjoyed Your Time!”

Apple TV’s sleeper hit Widow’s Bay has now concluded its first season on the streamer, and everyone who has become obsessed with the show’s strange island and its eccentric townsfolk will now be waiting for the second season to arrive.

In the final episode of Katie Dippold’s delightful horror-comedy series, the residents of Widow’s Bay and a gaggle of tourists—encouraged to visit the cursed island by Mayor Tom Loftis—hunker down in an emergency shelter as a violent storm hits. The island, which continues to suffer under a cursed pact made by its founder, has recently been struck by a fresh string of creepy and sometimes diabolically brutal incidents, so Tom has been working with allies Patricia and Wyck to lift the curse from the island forever.

Let’s look at how all that played out for Tom in the season finale of Widow’s Bay by examining the Warren bloodline, the island’s malevolent entity, and what that ominous church bell means for the future.

The Warren Bloodline

After Rosemary tells Tom that his elderly assistant, Ruth Livingston, is the last known living descendant of Widow’s Bay founder Richard Warren, Tom thinks he may be able to put a stop to the ongoing horrors on the island by killing her. After all, Warren told him that although he signed a pact with the island’s demonic entity to protect his colony during its first winter, we know that this curse may still be broken if the last surviving member of his bloodline dies.

Tom does not want to kill Ruth, but he does want to save the remaining residents of Widow’s Bay from further catastrophe. Spiking her tea with a cocktail of drugs he knows she mustn’t take together, Tom waits for the 84-year-old Ruth to slip peacefully into unconsciousness and death. He reveals that he understands his culpability in bringing tourists to Widow’s Bay because he knew his wife was telling the truth about the island’s natives being unable to leave without dire consequences.

Tom also notes that Ruth has a family heirloom: the brooch Sarah Westcott Warren gave little Frances. It’s clear that Rosemary got Frances’ genealogy right …until she didn’t. When Ruth was 40, she had an affair with a married man and got pregnant. She hid the pregnancy because she was “not in a good place”, then gave the baby to her lover and his wife, who raised Ruth’s daughter as their own.

That baby was Lauren, Tom’s dead wife, and Tom suddenly understands that this revelation makes his son Evan the last descendant in Richard Warren’s bloodline. Evan can never leave the island or terrible things will happen to him. And since Tom can’t kill his own son, even to save the others, he keeps this knowledge to himself, because only when Ruth and Evan are dead will the entity’s curse be lifted and the pact broken.

The Entity

Bored and reckless during the biblical storm hitting Widow’s Bay, Evan and his friends decide to go down into the creepy basement under the emergency shelter, where they discover a room with an electric chair and a rusted metal hatch. We’ve seen this room before in a tease at the end of episode one, but the room’s purpose wasn’t clear at the time.

Meanwhile, eccentric town hall employee Dale (Jeff Hiller) finds an archive containing reels showing what appears to be the last time the island’s residents fed its demonic entity. It seems that they were rather organized about the sacrifice. A first reel even details what to do if you’re one of the town’s “offerings”, having been selected by peers in a “rigorous” process. Reasons for being selected as an offering to the entity vary from a criminal past to just being found “wanting in some way”.

“The bad times will not end until the covenant is honored, and honored fully,” a cheery gentleman explains, as we see hooded human sacrifices chained up and ready. Dale realizes that the island’s latest deadly storm has been rounding people up for slaughter, forcing them inside the emergency shelter toward the hungry entity. As Evan and his buddies mess around with the electric chair, the shelter’s loudspeaker suddenly announces to the crowd that “it’s time” and that they shouldn’t beg; simply move forward.

Kenny the Custodian, dutifully checking that everyone is okay, finally finds Evan and his friends in the entity’s kill room before anything happens to them. He orders them out, but the door suddenly slams shut behind him, and the storm ceases. When the door unlocks itself, Kenny is gone, save for his flashlight, but the metal doors to the entity’s hiding place are ajar. It seems the entity waited until Evan left because it could not kill him, fearing it would sever its ties with Warren’s remaining bloodline for good.

The Church Bell

In the second episode of Widow’s Bay, Tom informs the late Reverend Bryce (Toby Huss) that the town’s church bell woke him up in the middle of the night, ringing nine times. The pastor of Widow’s Bay is confused and unsettled by Tom’s words because the church bell has been chained up for a long time. It couldn’t have possibly rung. But Bryce then finds an old letter that tells him what to do if the bell ever does ring.

Bryce never shares exactly what happens next, but he is extremely overwhelmed and distressed by his investigation. He leaves a chaotic voicemail for Tom and burns historical documents in his rectory. Tom, Wyck, and Patricia then discover that Bryce has hanged himself.

Later, during the storm, Dale watches an old reel that details exactly what needs to happen when the church bell rings. The man in the footage explains that “The bad times will not end until the covenant is honored, and honored fully,” adding, “The island will make its needs known. One soul for each bell toll.”

After Tom surveys the still water surrounding Widow’s Bay the morning after the storm, he once again hears the impossible church bell toll. On this occasion, it rings eight times. The entity has feasted on one soul, Kenny’s, but eight sacrifices still need to be made to honor the pact. More people must die to satisfy the entity’s hunger and guide it back into its slumber.

Of course, the island’s residents won’t know how long the entity will sleep for, but until it does, the horrors will continue.

All episodes of Widow’s Bay are now streaming on Apple TV.

Stranger Things’ Duffer Brothers Have a Mysterious New Movie in the Works with Paramount

With the series finale of Stranger Things and the endless fan conspiracies of an alternate ending now passed, the Duffer Brothers (Matt and Ross) have wasted no time working on everything but Stranger Things in their new deal with Paramount, a notable change of platform following the brothers’ production company Upside Down Pictures’ long relationship with Netflix. The pair signed an exclusive four-year deal with Paramount that they announced last August, expressing (via Variety) that a theatrical release is very important to them and that an original film is what they “wanted to do next.” Their deal with Paramount also includes the potential of more original series alongside films.

Now The Hollywood Reporter has broken the news that the Duffer Brothers are starting production on their new original film with Paramount and it is projected for a Fall 2028 release. Ross Duffer confirmed with a post of the article on Instagram. The Duffer Brothers are being particularly secretive as to this movie’s contents so far and there have been no hints at a proposed plot or genre but the duo has expressed gratitude for their opportunity to work “with such a storied Hollywood legacy [Paramount]” to produce their theatrical release.

The two-hour long series finale of Stranger Things was screened in select theaters during its release and according to Deadline made more than $25 million for movie theaters. Although this project is likely detached from their hit series, the anticipation for a new Duffer movie will likely bring audiences to theaters.

While the plot details of the movie have yet to be announced, it’s safe to assume that the film will possess similar sci-fi and thriller elements that the majority of the Duffers’ stories usually pursue. These themes stay present in their titles previous to Stranger Things like their post-apocalyptic thriller Hidden in 2015 and their participation in the production of Fox series Wayward Pines.

Recently The Duffer Brothers lent their names as executive producers for two Netflix projects; The Boroughs, that follows a retirement community of “unlikely heroes”that work together to stop a threat before they run out of time, and the limited series Something Very Bad Is Going To Happen, about a newly-engaged couple preparing for their wedding with the groom’s mysterious family in their remote cabin.Both projects were well received by fans with a 97% on Rotten Tomatoes for The Boroughs and an 85% for Something Very Bad Is Going To Happen.

The Duffers will likely keep expanding their successful take on the sci-fi and thriller genre through this new film and bring die-hard fans of their projects to the theaters in 2028 and anticipate further TV series through their Paramount deal.

Only Murders in the Building Season 6’s Cast Is Now Overwhelmingly Huge

This article contains spoilers for Only Murders in the Building season 5.

Only Murders in the Building announced multiple additions to its season 6 cast on Instagram this week in a series of three posts. Among the new names are: David Tennant (Doctor Who), Nicola Coughlan (Bridgerton), Jodie Whittaker (Doctor Who), Jim Broadbent (Bridget Jones’s Diary), Richard Ayoade (The IT Crowd), Adrian Lukis (Pride and Prejudice), and Kathryn Hunter (Poor Things).

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Only Murders in The Building is projected to have another successful season following main characters Charles (Steve Martin), Oliver (Martin Short), and Mabel (Selena Gomez) through their endless endeavor of solving murders in their apartment building and around New York City while documenting their journey through their true-crime podcast. But season 6 of the show finds the OMITB team packing their bags and moving their crime-solving expertise to London to solve the murder of recurring character and fellow podcaster Cinda Canning (Tina Fey).

As the show has grown in popularity and the crew’s credibility for solving homicide cases has increased, many major Hollywood talents have guest-starred in past seasons. Meryl Streep (which sparked a romantic relationship between her and Martin Short), Cara Delevingne, Melissa McCarthy, Mel Brooks and many more have participated being a featured family member, neighbor, business owners, and other lingering characters that are relevant to the crime plot.

Although every season of Only Murders In The Building is known for adding multiple guest stars, season 6 is overwhelmingly stacked with stars, begging the question of how these many characters will actually fit into this new season’s plot? Along with the new names, 14 more stars were previously announced to be joining the cast; Geri Halliwell Horner, Martin Freeman, Jamie Demetriou, Anjana Vasan, Jane Horrocks, Derek Jacobi, Lesley Nicol, in the second announcement and Jennifer Saunders, Sean Teale, Simone Ashley, Amar Chadha-Patel, Rhea Norwood, Matthew Beard, and Sharon Horgan were featured in the very first batch.

It’s no question that this season is absolutely stacked with characters and production has a lot of work on their hands, not only managing these appearances, but also a whole new setting. Steve Martin posted a photo with his co-stars on instagram reaffirming the set change with the caption “OMITB hits London!”

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How all the guests will fit into the plot is unknown, but it is likely that the opportunity for so many appearances on this season is because Charles, Olivier, and Mabel are leaving the Big Apple to solve this new season’s mystery. The official release date of season 6 is yet to be announced but is officially in production via the Only Murders in The Building Instagram.

Weird DC Fans Rejoice As James Gunn Confirms Gorilla Co-Star for Jimmy Olsen Show

For most fans of DC Comics and its various media spinoffs, it’s just about superheroes being cool. They want watch Batman skulk from the shadows, Wonder Woman deflect bullets with her bracelets, and Superman lift planets. But there are other DC Comics fans; fans who thrill to the musings of Brother Power the Geek, fans who have a favorite member of the Metal Men, fans who think no Doom Patrol story is complete without Danny the Street. These fans don’t care about the Justice League fighting Darkseid. They just want to see a cub reporter match wits with a telepathic criminal from a hidden city of intelligent gorillas.

And those fans are thrilled right now, because James Gunn and Peter Safran are making a show just for them. We’ve known for a while now that Skyler Gisondo would reprise his role as Jimmy Olsen for a Superman spinoff show about the Daily Planet reporter. And we’ve known that the Flash villain Gorilla Grodd would be involved somehow. But Gunn has taken to Threads to confirm that Grodd and Jimmy would be the co-leads of the series, answering the prayers of DC weirdos everywhere.

The decision might come as a surprise to people who only know Jimmy from various movies and TV shows. The affable guy played by Marc McClure in the Christopher Reeve movies, the handsome cool guy played by Mehcad Brooks in Supergirl, the dude who gets shot in the face in Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice—all of these Jimmies were more or less normal guys, who simply had to deal with super stuff going on around them.

However, the excitable nerd played by Ishmel Sahid in My Adventures With Superman comes closer to the character from the comics, a good-hearted dork who throws himself into oddities and his own absurd escapades. In the ongoing series Superman’s Pal, Jimmy Olsen, which ran from 1954 to 1974, the reporter found himself gaining rubber powers, turning into a werewolf, becoming a turtle boy, and marrying a chimpanzee—sometimes on Superman’s orders. Jimmy was even the first to come into contact with the New Gods, discovering Jack Kirby‘s Fourth World via space hippies and cosmic bikers.

Gorilla Grodd, however, has the opposite reputation. Grodd came from the goofiest part of the Silver Age, debuting in 1959’s The Flash #106 by John Broome and Carmine Infantino. A super-intelligent gorilla with psychic powers from a crashed spaceship, Grodd is one of the Flash’s greatest villains. As such, Grodd has often appeared outside of the comics, including a memorable run in Justice League Unlimited and especially a story on Legends of Tomorrow, when he went back in time to kill a young Barack Obama.

If the HBO series treats Jimmy as a more or less normal guy, as he’s been portrayed in most non-comic appearances, then the show will surely fail to realize its potential. But if we get the wacky Jimmy from the comics, if the show can give us something akin to a psychic gorilla killing a future president, then the series will be something special—at least to the DC weirdos who love this crazy stuff.

Toy Story 5 Review: Jessie Rides Again in Classic Pixar Adventure

Making a sequel to a classic is a bit like gambling. You’re taking the capital created by reputation and goodwill, not to mention years of hard work, and betting you can creatively do it again without harming your legacy–or at least get in the ballpark of what came before. If that’s the case, then Pixar might be on the hottest winning streak in Hollywood history. For more than 30 years, the Bay Area company has bet the house and doubled down again by making one Toy Story movie after another, roughly every seven to 10 years, and more often than not they’ve come out with another stone-cold animated masterpiece. And even when they haven’t, the results were still pretty great.

So those waiting with bated breath can now rest easy. Toy Story 5 is another winning hand. While the overall story of Woody, Buzz, Jessie, and all the rest probably could’ve ended with the perfect sendoff of Toy Story 3—though Toy Story 4 also could’ve been a worthwhile epilogue for Woody, the ragdoll cowboy—Toy Story 5 still justifies its existence by providing a thoughtful expansion on the plights of parenting in the 21st century’s brave new world of tech and screens. And it does this by revisiting what I believe to be the best and most poignant chapter in the plastic saga: Toy Story 2 and the cowgirl who got left behind.

If Toy Story 4 was Woody’s movie, Toy Story 5 belongs to Jessie, the high-energy rough and tumblin’ tomboy given vocal life by Joan Cusack. Something of a sidekick to Tom Hanks’ Woody over the last several films, there was a time in 1999 where the tragedy of a doll abandoned by her teenage owner, plus the musical stylings of Sarah McLachlan, broke enough hearts to get an Oscar nomination. Hence Toy Story 5 choosing in traditional Pixar fashion to telescope right into the emotional turmoil by opening on a few bars of “When She Loved Me” during a flashback of Emily and Jessie playing by a fateful tire swing.

It’s a painful memory for Jessie, the only doll in the Toy Story movies to watch their kid grow up and leave. Twice. It also gives her something amounting to PTSD when, as the top dog sheriff in the bedroom of wee little Bonnie (Scarlett Spears), she gets an anxiety attack as the parents introduce Lilypad, a grotesque training wheels version of the iPad for the elementary school set.

There is a certain bit of irony in a studio co-founded by Steve Jobs now attempting to, even mildly, consider the psychological, emotional, and developmental downsides to screen technology. One senses the film pulls its punches, too, while emphasizing with parents who view Lilypad (voiced here by Greta Lee as a chipper Siri clone) as the best way for their slightly shy and introverted child to make new friends at dance class. All the other girls are doing it, so we can’t have her left behind.

Still, the movie does offer a fairly evenhanded consideration about the advantages and many pitfalls of putting the first device within a child’s reach. Bonnie is immediately glued to the new blue light, barely even noticing her beloved Jessie and Bullseye toys. Yet it’s hard to say the eight-year-old is much happier as Lilypad introduces Bonnie to her first social network of friends—and her first taste of mean-girl bullying when those friends discover Bonnie plays with toys.

The trick of the Toy Story movies, particularly the later ones, is that they’re both a metaphor for childhood and the challenges of raising a child. Especially as Andy got older, and Woody and Buzz started thinking about a life after college, these films have leaned evermore on the adult point-of-view via the metaphor of a toy’s purpose. Despite this relative heaviness, they are still a child’s fantasy, and in the case of Toy Story 5, the misplaced existential fear of being replaced in the original movie takes on hilarious modern context as Jessie, Buzz Lightyear (Tim Allen), Rex (Wallace Shawn), and all the rest recognize they are about to be neglected in favor of a screen. Many of the castoffs Woody and Bo Peep (Annie Potts) run into out on the road now are ronin figurines lamenting that “the age of toys is over!” Tech is here.

As with the best Pixar movies, co-writers and co-directors Andrew Stanton and McKenna Harris (the former of whom has been writing these characters since the ‘90s) know how to balance the meta commentary with sincere, affectionate characterization. Jessie and Buzz’s arguments with Lilypad’s smooth, PR-clipped promises of not being their doom are genuinely funny, even as Lilypad seems to be using the internet messenger to make decisions for Bonnie and her parents, as opposed to the other way around.

The film is too sophisticated to have an outright villain—or perhaps too sympathetic for technology—but it knows how to twist the knife and build on a sturdy foundation of characters who have raised children and, at this point, the children of that first crop of fans.

The film also delicately tickles the nostalgia buttons. This is much more Jessie’s story, with the cowgirl and her trusty horse ending up on an odyssey when they are accidentally left behind by Bonnie during a disastrous sleepover, but Woody and Buzz feature just enough to rekindle memories of halcyon Pixar days. The film also has some fun at really underscoring the age of the franchise, with Woody getting a sun spot on his scalp that looks suspiciously like baldness, matching the inexplicable new stuffing in his tummy.

Yet age might be one of the series’ few sore spots as well. Other than a few winking gags at Woody’s expense, the animation does not age. In fact, the surrounding world looks more photorealistic with each passing installment in the series. But the voices are starting to show their wear and tear. It will be interesting to learn if younger audiences will notice or care about the difference, but it is hard not to catch the creep of age in the cadences of Jessie, Buzz, and especially Woody. Two of them might be called cowboy and cowgirl, but they increasingly sound more like grandparents worrying about the youths these days than sprightly, immortal toys.

Toy Story 5 might get away with it, if only just, but a potential Toy Story 6 could risk the cognitive dissonance that occurred in the last Indiana Jones movie where a 40-year-old looking Indy spoke with an 80-year-old man’s vocal inflections.

The passage of time also slips into the margins of Toy Story 5 in a fairly middling subplot involving a squadron of Buzz Lightyear action figures—now updated for the 21st century with wi-fi hotspots!—surviving a crash like the Wild Robot and then journeying into the world, each convinced he is the Buzz Lightyear. In effect it adds some visual sight gags as they get up to preschool-aimed hijinks, but it feels somewhat beneath Pixar and this serjes. It’s more in line with what modern kids might expect from animated movies where the Minions serve up shenanigans for the viewers too young or distracted to follow the main narrative.

It feels like a concession to the times, which as Toy Story 5 admits about technology, is ultimately inevitable. In many ways, though, Toy Story 5 is another successful triumph over the clock. The years may pass, but the studio’s jealous cultivation and curation of the garden Buzz and Woody built remains immaculate.

Toy Story 5 is not necessarily the best of its franchise, nor does it even feel like another ending to a series that’s already closed the book twice on its characters. But it has all the heart and affection that made plastic dolls designed by ones and zeroes feel oh, so alive 31 years ago. The handcrafted love is there, no matter how dazzling the technological accoutrements become. Also it’s a film that will hopefully inspire another generation of viewers to put down the screens, if only for a moment, and pick up the real toys like Jessie, who deserve all the playtime in the world.

Toy Story 5 opens in theaters on Friday, June 19.

Strange New Worlds Season 4 Trailer Calls Back to Classic Star Trek Tradition

Star Trek is one of the peaks of Paramount‘s mountain of properties. Just look at the dazzling visuals in the first trailer for season 4 of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, full of cutting-edge CGI and incredible costumes. The trailer promises high tension as it heads toward its fifth and final season, including more exploration, the resolution of Captain Pike’s arc, and, of course, more bonding between future shipmates/slash fiction originators, Kirk and Spock.

Yet, for old school Trek fans, the most incongruous moments in the trailer invoke the most nostalgia. Shots of a T-Rex bearing down on the crew, a dragon breathing fire onto the Enterprise‘s saucer section, and La’an in a sword fight with a couple of Game of Thrones types. These genre-blending scenes recall a time when Star Trek was broke, and Gene Roddenberry had to make whole episodes by borrowing sets and costumes from other shows.

As most pop culture aficionados know, Star Trek came into being in part, of course, because TV executives were compelled by Roddenberry’s pitch (“Wagon Train to the stars”), because Lucille Ball advocated for the show, and because Roddenberry course-corrected after the network passed on his first pilot. Yet, for all the Original Series had going for it, the show had a minuscule budget, especially for a series intended to take viewers into unexplored parts of the galaxy.

To make ends meet, Roddenberry and his co-creators would send the Enterprise to planets that looked a lot like Earth at various points in history, or resembled aspects of Earth’s mythologies. Thus, we get “A Piece of the Action,” in which Kirk and Spock deal with 1930s gangsters, the haunted house adventure “Catspaw,” or the confrontation with Greek gods in “Who Mourns for Adonis?”.

The Next Generation had a moderately more stable budget, but it carried on the tradition with its holodeck episodes. When Picard became hard-boiled PI Dixon Hill or Data became Sherlock Holmes, the show paid homage to the TOS genre-busters. Later ’90s series continued the tradition, with Doctor Bashir channeling 007 on Deep Space Nine and Voyager‘s Janeway creating her own bodice ripper in an idyllic Irish town.

As a prequel to TOS, Strange New Worlds doesn’t have a holodeck to play with (outside the uneven self-parody/murder mystery “A Space Adventure Hour” from last season). Yet, they’ve found ways to play with other genres, most obviously in the delightful fantasy episode from season one, “The Elysian Kingdom.”

The genre-mashup is just one of the many nods to classic Trek in the season 4 trailer, which not only has cheeky winks toward Kirk and Spock’s relationships, but also has Andorians, an SOS that turns out to be a trap (Kobayashi Maru?), and… is that Scotty and Uhura kissing, a la Star Trek V?

It remains to be seen if all of those things will come to fruition before Kirk starts his five-year mission as Captain. But at least we’ll know Strange New Worlds will be making its new lives and new civilizations the old school way, big budget be damned.

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds season four premieres on Paramount Plus on July 23, 2026.

15 Actors Only Your Boomer Dad Could Name

Every generation has its movie stars. While younger audiences can instantly recognize today’s biggest celebrities, there was a time when entirely different names dominated theater marquees, television screens, and magazine covers. Many of these actors were household names throughout the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s, yet have gradually faded from mainstream conversation.

Ask a boomer movie fan about them, however, and you’ll probably get an enthusiastic history lesson. These performers headlined major hits, won awards, and built loyal followings long before the internet existed. Today, they’re the kind of stars your dad remembers immediately while younger viewers draw a blank.

Robert Urich

Robert Urich was a familiar face throughout the 1970s and 1980s thanks to shows like Vega$ and Spenser: For Hire. Older viewers remember him instantly, while many younger audiences barely recognize the name.

James Garner

James Garner combined charm and toughness in projects like Maverick and The Rockford Files. He was one of television’s most dependable leading men, though his fame has faded somewhat with younger generations.

Lee Majors

As the star of The Six Million Dollar Man and The Fall Guy, Lee Majors was once everywhere. For many boomers, he remains an icon of 1970s television action.

Richard Chamberlain

Richard Chamberlain became famous through Dr. Kildare before dominating television miniseries like Shōgun and The Thorn Birds. He was once a major star whose name younger audiences rarely hear today.

Robert Conrad

Robert Conrad built a devoted following through The Wild Wild West and Baa Baa Black Sheep. His tough-guy image made him a television fixture for decades.

James Arness

Best known as Marshal Matt Dillon on Gunsmoke, James Arness spent twenty years starring in one of television’s biggest westerns. Many younger viewers know the show more than the actor.

Michael Landon

Michael Landon starred in Bonanza, Little House on the Prairie, and Highway to Heaven. Few actors dominated family television for as long as he did.

Pernell Roberts

Though overshadowed by some co-stars today, Pernell Roberts became famous through Bonanza and later Trapper John, M.D.. He was once a very recognizable television leading man.

Efrem Zimbalist Jr.

Efrem Zimbalist Jr. was a major television star through series like 77 Sunset Strip and The F.B.I.. Modern audiences are more likely to know him through voice acting work.

David Janssen

David Janssen became television royalty thanks to The Fugitive. The show’s success made him one of the most recognizable faces of the 1960s, though his fame has diminished over time.

Chad Everett

Chad Everett found success as the star of Medical Center. During the late 1960s and 1970s, he was one of television’s most prominent leading men.

Barry Sullivan

Barry Sullivan appeared in numerous westerns, crime dramas, and adventure films. He enjoyed a lengthy career but is now largely remembered by classic movie enthusiasts.

Doug McClure

Doug McClure starred in westerns like The Virginian and became a familiar television presence. He’s also remembered as the inspiration behind several affectionate movie industry jokes.

Darren McGavin

Darren McGavin starred in Kolchak: The Night Stalker and numerous television productions. While some know him from A Christmas Story, his earlier fame was much larger.

Robert Culp

Robert Culp was a television staple thanks to I Spy and later The Greatest American Hero. He enjoyed decades of success but is far less discussed today than during his peak years.

14 Video Games that are Virtually Impossible to Play All the Way Through

Playing video games is meant to be a relaxing, joyful experience. People get home after work and get ready to unwind in a virtual world. Completing every achievement, requirement and difficulty setting in a game, though, can feel like getting home from work to start your second job.

These following games in particular have a reputation of being grueling, grindy, or just miserable experiences to try and do everything in. Some can get to be outright impossible, either due to multiplayer requirements or simple lack of time. If you pick up any of these games, explore them with a casual mindset.

Yakuza Series

Finishing the story is one thing. Achieving true completion in a Yakuza game means mastering minigames like Mahjong, shogi, gambling activities, and dozens of side objectives that many players never fully understand.

Silent Hill 3

Silent Hill 3 predates the achievement era, but completing everything is brutal. Unlocking every costume, weapon, ending, and bonus feature requires multiple playthroughs and highly specific performance requirements.

Dark Souls III

Several achievements require collecting covenant rewards originally designed around online multiplayer. For players tackling the game years later, the grind can become far more difficult than defeating any boss.

Call of Duty: World at War

The campaign’s Veteran difficulty is legendary for a reason. Endless grenade spam, pinpoint enemy accuracy, and brutal checkpoints make simply finishing the game a challenge, let alone earning every achievement.

Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain

The zoo collection sounds simple until players realize how many animals must be captured. Some species are rare, region-specific, or easily overlooked during an already massive open-world adventure.

Halo: The Master Chief Collection

With more than 700 achievements, Halo MCC is a completionist nightmare. Players must conquer speedruns, multiplayer challenges, LASO campaigns, collectibles, Easter eggs, and some of the hardest tasks in gaming.

Super Meat Boy

Many players finish Super Meat Boy and feel accomplished. Then they discover achievements requiring entire worlds to be completed without dying, transforming an already difficult platformer into a test of near-superhuman precision.

Crash Bandicoot 4: It’s About Time

Crash 4 is notorious for demanding perfect relic runs, hidden collectibles, and brutally precise platforming. Many fans consider earning full completion more difficult than finishing most modern action games.

Batman: Arkham City

The Riddler trophies alone are enough to break some players. Add combat challenges, campaigns, and difficult training objectives, and Arkham City becomes a much larger commitment than its story suggests.

Lost Ark

Lost Ark overwhelms completionists with collectibles, achievements, islands, rapport systems, cards, and progression mechanics. Reaching true completion requires an extraordinary investment of both time and patience.

Assassin’s Creed Series

Many modern Assassin’s Creed games are technically easy to complete, but the sheer volume of collectibles, repetitive side activities, and map-clearing objectives turns 100 percent completion into an endurance challenge.

Celeste

Simply reaching the ending is only the beginning. Completionists must tackle B-Sides, C-Sides, golden strawberries, and some of the most demanding precision-platforming challenges ever designed.

The Binding of Isaac: Repentance

Unlocking every character, item, ending, and achievement requires hundreds of hours and countless successful runs. Randomness ensures that even highly skilled players cannot guarantee steady progress.

Diablo II

The legendary Holy Grail challenge asks players to collect every unique item in the game. Given the rarity of certain drops, many players spend years farming without ever completing the collection.

13 of the Craziest Fan Celebrations After a World Cup or Soccer Win

Following your country’s performance during a soccer match can be thrilling, and if your team wins, you want to share that excitement with others. Since the team represents your country, and in all likelihood you’re living in said country, sharing that thrill is as easy as walking out the door.

Soccer has a contagious effect, with crowds gathering on the street and turning a regular day into an impromptu holiday, with celebrations going all throughout the night. These celebrations can sometimes be dangerous, but all is fair when the pride of the country is on the line.

Argentina’s 2022 World Cup Street Takeover

After Argentina defeated France in one of the greatest finals ever, millions flooded the streets of Buenos Aires. The crowds became so massive that the team’s planned victory parade had to be altered for safety reasons.

Italy’s Euro 2020 Celebration

Italy’s victory over England sparked enormous celebrations across the country. Fans packed city squares, climbed monuments, waved flags from balconies, and transformed major streets into all-night parties.

France Wins the 1998 World Cup

When France won its first World Cup on home soil, millions gathered on the Champs-Élysées. The celebrations became one of the largest public parties in modern French history.

Spain’s First World Cup Triumph

Spain’s 2010 World Cup victory unleashed celebrations that lasted for days. Streets across Madrid filled with supporters as fans celebrated a championship many had spent generations waiting to see.

Argentina’s 1986 Maradona Mania

After Diego Maradona led Argentina to World Cup glory, celebrations erupted nationwide. His status as a national hero reached legendary levels as fans treated the victory as a defining national moment.

Senegal’s 2002 World Cup Run

Senegal’s stunning run to the quarterfinals sparked celebrations that felt like a tournament victory. Fans flooded Dakar’s streets after each upset as the team exceeded every expectation.

South Korea’s Red Tide

South Korea’s remarkable 2002 World Cup performance inspired enormous public gatherings. Millions of supporters wearing red packed city centers, creating some of the largest fan crowds ever seen.

Morocco’s Historic 2022 Run

Morocco became the first African nation to reach a World Cup semifinal. Celebrations spread far beyond Morocco itself, with huge gatherings across North Africa, Europe, and the Middle East.

Leicester City’s Premier League Miracle

While not a World Cup moment, Leicester City’s 2016 title celebration deserves mention. Fans celebrated one of sports’ greatest underdog stories by filling streets and turning the city into a giant party.

Germany’s 2014 World Cup Victory

Hundreds of thousands gathered at Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate after Germany defeated Argentina. The celebrations became even bigger because fans had also witnessed the historic 7-1 semifinal victory over Brazil.

Brazil Wins the 2002 World Cup

Brazil’s fifth World Cup title triggered celebrations from Rio de Janeiro to São Paulo. Streets filled with music, dancing, fireworks, and fans wearing the nation’s iconic yellow jerseys.

Greece Wins Euro 2004

Greece’s improbable victory at Euro 2004 produced celebrations that stunned Europe almost as much as the tournament itself. Fans poured into Athens and other cities, celebrating one of the greatest underdog triumphs in soccer history.

Argentina’s Welcome Home Parade

The most chaotic part of Argentina’s 2022 celebrations came days later. Millions packed roads and highways to greet the returning team, creating crowds so large that helicopters were eventually used.

15 Movies We Don’t Think Anyone Actually Remembers

We like to think that we are knowledgeable in movie history, that not many details escape our eagle eyes when it comes to the history of the medium. But as decades pass and we grow distant from the movies of old, our memory can get somewhat fuzzy. Do we really remember all the movies that were released in the past?

No, of course not, we don’t have unlimited memory. That brain space is better used for remembering loved ones, or future projects. As such, we doubt anyone can remember the following movies, at least not off the top of their heads. These are the films forgotten by time.

The Last Chase

Released in 1981, The Last Chase imagined a future where private automobiles were banned. Despite starring Lee Majors and Christopher Makepeace, the film has largely disappeared from popular movie conversations.

The Legend of Billie Jean

This 1985 teen drama developed a cult following but rarely gets mentioned today. Helen Slater stars as a runaway teenager who unexpectedly becomes a symbol of rebellion.

Split Second

Rutger Hauer battled a monstrous creature in flooded future London in this 1992 sci-fi horror film. Despite its unusual premise and memorable atmosphere, it remains largely forgotten outside genre circles.

Runaway

Long before modern fears about artificial intelligence, Runaway featured killer robots and high-tech crime. The 1984 thriller starred Tom Selleck but never achieved lasting mainstream recognition.

Night of the Comet

A comet wipes out most of humanity in this quirky 1984 science-fiction comedy. While beloved by cult movie fans, it remains surprisingly obscure compared to other post-apocalyptic classics.

Cherry 2000

Set in a strange future, Cherry 2000 follows a man searching for a replacement android companion. The 1987 film mixes science fiction, romance, and adventure in ways few remember today.

Brainstorm

This 1983 science-fiction film stars Christopher Walken and Natalie Wood. It explored technology capable of recording human experiences, but its troubled production often overshadows discussion of the movie itself.

The Final Countdown

A modern aircraft carrier is mysteriously transported back to 1941 in this 1980 science-fiction film. Despite an intriguing premise and a devoted fanbase, it rarely appears in mainstream discussions.

Solarbabies

Roller-skating teenagers battle an oppressive regime in this unusual 1986 science-fiction adventure. Despite featuring several future stars, the movie remains one of the decade’s strangest forgotten curiosities.

The Black Hole

Disney’s ambitious 1979 science-fiction epic arrived between the success of Star Wars and the explosion of 1980s sci-fi films. Today, it is often overlooked despite its impressive visuals.

Enemy Mine

This 1985 science-fiction drama tells the story of two enemy soldiers stranded together on an alien world. Critics have reassessed it positively, but many modern audiences have never heard of it.

The Manhattan Project

Released in 1986, this thriller follows a teenager who steals plutonium to build a nuclear bomb for a science fair. The premise alone deserves more attention than it receives.

Ice Pirates

Part comedy, part science fiction adventure, Ice Pirates offered a deliberately goofy take on space opera storytelling. It has developed a cult audience but remains largely forgotten by mainstream viewers.

My Science Project

A mysterious device from a military base unleashes chaos in this 1985 teen science-fiction comedy. Once a frequent cable television staple, it has largely faded from public memory.

The Philadelphia Experiment

Based loosely on a famous conspiracy theory, this 1984 science-fiction film follows sailors accidentally transported through time. It enjoyed modest success but is rarely discussed today outside cult-film communities.

15 Actors Who Looked Middle-Aged at 25

As we grow and mature, our body changes like the seasons, although we never go back to the beautiful spring days of youth. Well, actors need to be able to mold themselves to play multiple roles, with some of them looking like teens when well over their thirties.

The opposite effect does happen to some performers, them looking far older than you’d expect. This lets them get more mature roles at an earlier age, or even play the same character in an ongoing franchise for several years. If you look a certain way at 25, you can count on that look to work for several years to come.

Wilford Brimley

Wilford Brimley became the poster child for looking older than his years. During the filming of Cocoon, he was only in his early fifties, yet many viewers assumed he was already a retiree decades older.

Steve Martin

Even in his twenties, Steve Martin’s prematurely gray hair gave him the appearance of someone much older. It eventually became part of his signature look and helped define his on-screen persona.

Patrick Stewart

Patrick Stewart began losing his hair as a teenager and often looked significantly older than his actual age. By his mid-twenties, he already projected the authority of a seasoned veteran.

Larry David

Old photographs of Larry David are legendary online because he appeared middle-aged even as a young comedian. His receding hairline and serious expression made him seem decades ahead of his peers.

R. Lee Ermey

Before becoming famous for military roles, R. Lee Ermey already looked like a career drill instructor. His stern features and commanding presence often made him seem older than he actually was.

Gene Hackman

Gene Hackman entered Hollywood later than many actors, but even his early performances carried the look of a seasoned professional. He rarely appeared youthful, even during his breakout years.

Dabney Coleman

Dabney Coleman seemed born to play authority figures. Thanks to his mustache, hairstyle, and demeanor, he often looked like a middle-aged executive long before reaching middle age.

Walter Matthau

Walter Matthau’s distinctive face made him appear older almost from the beginning of his film career. Audiences frequently assumed he was older than he really was during his early successes.

James Gandolfini

Even before The Sopranos, James Gandolfini had the appearance of a man carrying decades of life experience. His rugged features made him seem older than many actors his age.

Philip Seymour Hoffman

Philip Seymour Hoffman possessed a maturity and gravitas that often made him appear older than his years. Even in early roles, he rarely came across as a typical young actor.

John C. Reilly

John C. Reilly looked remarkably similar throughout much of his career. Looking back at his early films, many viewers are surprised to discover how young he actually was at the time.

Brian Dennehy

Brian Dennehy’s large frame, mustache, and authoritative presence helped him land older roles throughout his career. He often appeared more like a veteran father figure than a young performer.

Stacy Keach

Stacy Keach’s strong features and deep voice gave him an older-screen presence from an early age. Even when young, he projected the image of an experienced and worldly character.

Fred Dalton Thompson

Before politics and television fame, Fred Dalton Thompson already looked like a veteran statesman. His appearance and demeanor frequently led audiences to assume he was older than reality.

Dennis Farina

Dennis Farina’s years as a police officer translated into a naturally mature screen presence. Even in relatively early acting roles, he looked more like a seasoned detective than a newcomer.

15 Actors Who Really Can’t Play Sports

We’ve seen sports stars try to act in the past, and it’s clear why they didn’t choose that career path: it wasn’t for them. The same is true for actors when trying to play a sport, most of them are simply not cut out for it. But we judge them more harshly because it’s part of their job to convince us otherwise.

You’d think that part of the casting process in any given movie is making sure that your actor can at least look the part. Well, sometimes a certain actor just needs to be in a film, either due to contractual constraints or marketing strategies. This is how you end up with lists like this one, where we point at their performances and laugh.

Keanu Reeves

Keanu Reeves is beloved as an action star, but his quarterback performance in The Replacements has often drawn criticism. Some football fans felt his throwing mechanics looked awkward compared to what they’d expect from a professional player.

Dennis Quaid

Despite being athletic in real life, some baseball fans have pointed to Dennis Quaid’s pitching scenes in The Rookie as occasionally looking more like an actor performing baseball than an actual major-league pitcher.

Mark Wahlberg

Mark Wahlberg played Vince Papale in Invincible, but some viewers felt his age and movement made it difficult to fully buy him as a professional football player competing at the highest level.

Charlie Sheen

Charlie Sheen’s performance in Major League remains entertaining, but baseball fans have long noticed that his pitching delivery occasionally lacks the fluidity expected from an elite professional pitcher.

Wesley Snipes

Wesley Snipes starred in Major League, but several baseball observers have noted that his batting and fielding scenes sometimes reveal a performer acting athletic rather than a naturally gifted ballplayer.

Matt LeBlanc

Matt LeBlanc starred as a baseball player in the family comedy Ed. While the movie is remembered more for its chimpanzee co-star than athletic realism, LeBlanc never quite looked like a convincing professional ballplayer.

Tom Cruise

Tom Cruise excels at action sequences, yet his baseball scenes in War of the Worlds are occasionally cited online by fans who feel his throwing motion looks surprisingly unnatural.

Michael J. Fox

Michael J. Fox’s basketball scenes in Teen Wolf became iconic, but even supporters of the film admit the athletic action was never the movie’s strongest or most convincing element.

Freddie Prinze Jr.

In Summer Catch, Freddie Prinze Jr. played as an elite baseball prospect. While charming in the role, some viewers felt his mechanics occasionally looked more Hollywood than professional sports.

Tobey Maguire

Tobey Maguire portrayed jockey Red Pollard in Seabiscuit. Although praised for the performance, some racing fans felt he never entirely shed the appearance of an actor playing an athlete.

Robert Redford

Robert Redford’s baseball drama The Natural is beloved, but some critics have noted that his age during filming occasionally made the supposedly elite athlete seem less convincing physically.

Brendan Fraser

Brendan Fraser starred in The Scout as a baseball phenom with impossible talent. While charismatic, some sports fans felt the athletic sequences struggled to match the extraordinary abilities described by the script.

Dean Cain

Before acting, Dean Cain actually played sports at a high level, yet his baseball scenes in The Broken Hearts Club have still been criticized by viewers who expected greater athletic realism.

Woody Harrelson

Despite starring in the basketball comedy White Men Can’t Jump, Woody Harrelson’s athletic credibility was frequently part of the joke itself, with much of the film built around the assumption that people would underestimate him on the court.

Chris Pratt

Chris Pratt starred in the baseball drama Moneyball as real-life first baseman Scott Hatteberg. While the performance worked dramatically, some baseball fans felt his swing and overall on-field movement looked more actorly than genuinely professional-athlete level.

Every Game Release Is Avoiding GTA 6 Except Two Pop Culture Giants

Grand Theft Auto VI has the presence of one of those cliché high school bullies that, when they walk down the hall, you quickly get out of their way in fear of being shoved into a locker.

As hyperbolic as that may seem, it’s clear game studios have felt the looming presence of Rockstar Games’ GTA 6. Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy producer, Eric Chort, even went as far to say “GTA is like the ogre, it’s the biggest one” in an interview with Eurogamer. According to Chort, that presence has led “all the studios in the world” to adjust their release plans and avoid going anywhere near the game’s November 19 launch window.

As a result, a batch of games is set to release in a crowded six week period during late September through late October. At first, it’s almost laughable to think some of these games are at risk. Marvel’s Wolverine? A new Silent Hill? Call of Duty 4? But if you know anything about the wait for GTA 6 and the fans that have been doing the waiting, it all makes sense.

One notable moment that could shed some light on that…devotion…for those unfamiliar is a post from r/GTA user Remarkable_Bag3785. Back when fans were expecting a May 12 trailer launch date, the user posted: “I can’t stop thinking about May 12th. Flashes of Jason and Lucia constantly pop into my head. It’s almost like I can feel and talk to them. ‘We’re coming tomorrow, don’t worry buddy.’ Tomorrow is the day we’ve all been waiting for. Be ready guys cause it’s gonna be a fricking movie.”

That “fricking movie” trailer never came and still hasn’t. One can only hope that Remarkable_Bag3785 got some well-deserved sleep that night.

Upcoming promotional content and info about the game aside, who is it then that decided to take GTA 6 head on? Who could possibly dare to rival such a behemoth of a release with their own?

Barbzilla.

That’s Atari’s Godzilla: Destroy All Monsters Melee Remastered and Barbie: Rewind, to be clear. Both remakes are currently set to launch on Nov. 3 and 12, respectively, and appear to be the only releases daring to share a window with GTA 6.

Now, if there’s anything to be said about the success of a certain Barbie and destructive force collab in the past, this bold move from Atari may very well give GTA 6 a run for its money. Well, sort of. While it’s obvious to anyone that Rockstar’s long-awaited release will be earth-shattering upon release, Atari is looking to tap into pure nostalgia, which always snags the interest of gamers if done well.

That said, Atari’s confidence raises an interesting question about whether launching alongside a juggernaut like GTA 6 is a guaranteed losing move. While most studios are standing clear, and understandably so, there could be a chance for nostalgia-driven or even indi e titles to carve their own spaces by simply appealing to players looking for something different or less mainstream.

How Barbzilla will fare against the mighty ogre in November remains to be seen. As of now, it’s shaping up to be one of the more entertaining clashes of the release calendar, even if the outcomes feel fairly predictable.

Jason Momoa Has One Non-Negotiable Demand for a Lobo Movie

The big-screen debut of Lobo in DC Studios’ upcoming Supergirl is one that has been long-awaited (seriously it’s about fragging time). But this version sees the cigar-smoking alien space-biker in a more tempered state than usual. Fortunately for fans, Jason Momoa has promised that any solo movie for The Main Man himself will be strictly rated R.

In a Collider interview, Momoa confirmed he had discussed a possible spinoff with DC Studios heads James Gunn and Peter Safran saying, “It’s all I want, and I promise—I’m just going to put this out there right now—I do not have any interest in making a Lobo PG-13 movie.”

When asked about whether Lobo would still appear in other DC projects, Momoa kept things open-ended but firm about his own priorities for the character, adding that “If they want me, I’ll be there. But if I make a solo movie, I’m not doing it unless it’s rated R.”

Momoa’s insistence on an R-rating makes clear that he cares about the character, which makes sense considering it’s the actor’s dream role. It also fits pretty naturally with how Lobo has always been portrayed on the page.

Since his creation in 1983, Lobo has established himself as one of DC’s most iconic and chaotic characters. Created by Roger Slifer and Keith Giffen, he hails from the planet Czarnia, a world he infamously wiped out himself for the hell of it. Lobo is no villain, though, acting more as antihero. He is a freelance motorcycle-riding bounty hunter who takes jobs for cash and helps out if it suits him to be precise.

Power-wise, Lobo is just as extreme as his personality. He has superhuman strength, is incredibly hard to kill thanks to his regenerative healing factor, and has genius-level intellect (in matters of destruction and violence, that is) to boot.

It’s really no wonder why Momoa would want to handle such a larger-than-life character so carefully and, more importantly, so faithfully. It also makes financial sense considering the success of other comic characters getting R-rated movies that allowed them to truly shine, like Wolverine, Deadpool, and the Joker in their respective 2024 movies.

DC’s upcoming Clayface is also reportedly being developed as a more mature, grisly take on the character, with an R-rated approach that leans into body horror and psychological tension rather than traditional superhero spectacles. It’s another clear sign that DC is increasingly open to letting certain stories live in darker spaces when the character calls for it, which allows for Momoa’s condition for Lobo to be easily met.

If DC is willing to take risks with characters like Clayface, there is real room for the Scourge o’ the Cosmos to be seen in his full, unrestrained glory in the future.

With all that in mind, Lobo fans around the world can breathe easy knowing that DC’s arguably (but not really) most unhinged and unruly character will be able to swear, rip people apart, and be generally strange and off-putting to his heart’s content in the hands of Momoa.

But for now, we’ll have some fun seeing The Last Czarnian on his best PG-13 approved behavior…whatever that looks like…on June 26.

Doctor Who Will Survive its Return to the Wilderness (And Be Better For It)

The death of Doctor Who has been greatly exaggerated. Yes, the show’s been put on a hiatus of indeterminate length, showrunner Russell T. Davies and his production company Bad Wolf have been removed (or stepped down, depending on how descriptively kind you’re feeling), and we have no idea when it will return. The previously promised Christmas special has been canceled — and may have never existed in the first place? — and it feels increasingly unlikely we’ll ever find out the answer to that Billie Piper cliffhanger that closed season 15. Things definitely aren’t great right now, and it’s fair to be upset about that. But, despite the rampant catastrophizing that it feels like almost every entertainment and industry outlet appears eager to engage in, there’s also every reason to still feel optimistic about the show’s future.

Granted, that’s not necessarily easy right now, given, well… everything. After all, Doctor Who fans have been going through it for the past year, as the BBC and Disney hedged their bets about the show’s future, Ncuti Gatwa departed the TARDIS much earlier than anyone expected, and one of the worst season finales in recent memory ended with an awkwardly plotted surprise regeneration/Hail Mary twist that was clearly never meant as its original conclusion. The much-ballyhooed Disney deal collapsed, and months passed with no word on the forthcoming holiday special we were all assured was coming. Heck, American viewers still haven’t even gotten to see The War Between the Land and the Sea! It’s been a whole lot, and Christmas literally getting canceled is just the icing on top of a particularly horrid cake.

But things aren’t as bad as they seem — or as some seemingly want them to be. First of all, the show hasn’t been canceled. It’s been put out to “competitive tender,” the fancy name for the BBC business process that will see various interested production companies bid to take over the making of the franchise, hopefully bringing new voices and new perspectives along with them. For what it’s worth, the corporation still seems remarkably firm in its commitment to the show and its audience, and has been since the post-Disney meltdown started. It seems… let’s just say, unlikely that that commitment has suddenly drastically changed, or that this restructuring is a secret, nefarious plot meant to sink the show rather than to find a way to stabilize it.

But Whovians, in general, are a melodramatic bunch (and I say that with all love, as I also spent some fairly significant time last week staring into the void in despair). It’s human nature to assume the worst when something you love is threatened, particularly after a year’s worth of speculation, frustration, anger, and repeated disappointment. It’s also true that no one involved in this mess has exactly covered themselves in glory, and outgoing showrunner Russell T. Davies now insisting that the Christmas episode he literally spent months teasing somehow never actually existed isn’t helping matters either. (Dude, just take the L! It happens!) But at the end of the day, maybe this is all just so much evidence that a completely fresh start is exactly what this franchise needs.

The fear there, of course, is that any brief pause to course correct will somehow once again spin out into the same kind of extended wilderness period that followed Sylvester MCoy’s Seventh Doctor run, a genuine cancellation in all but name. But, that’s probably a lot less likely than many think. Today’s television landscape is vastly different than the one that the show faced back in the 1980s, and Doctor Who is no longer a niche little British children’s show that could. It’s now a genuine global product, and a brand that goes well beyond a simple television program, with international distribution deals, extensive licensing agreements, and an endless stream of merchandise. (How many TARDIS-themed items are in your home?) A CBeebies animated series is still in development and Big Finish seems to be releasing more Doctor Who audio dramas than ever. In light of all this, there’s almost no way that the flagship series stays off the air for more than a few years, tops. But it can and probably should look quite a bit different when it does return.

Doctor Who, after all, is a series that is predicated on change. Doctors regenerate, companions leave, and enemies are vanquished only to reappear in occasionally upgraded or more colorful forms in the space of less than a season. It’s only right that the show itself does too from time to time, in ways that go beyond actors and title treatments. Let’s hope the show can find a way to take this opportunity to embrace this opportunity for a fresh start — thoroughly.

Look, the franchise owes a massive debt to Davies: he’s the man who brought the show back in 2005, returned to shepherd it through its 60th anniversary, and (unfortunately, rather disastrously) tried to turn the Disney partnership into a Marvel-style shared universe when everyone feared the BBC itself might collapse. But he’s also been taking it on the chin for months for a string of developments that aren’t entirely his fault. Recency bias seems to have convinced many that the Gatwa era was a complete failure, despite the fact that many of the same people bemoaning the (admittedly terrible!) “Wish World”/“The Reality War” two-parter had been hailing some of its episodes as among the best of modern Who. (See also “The Story & the Engine”, “73 Yards,” “Dot and Bubble,” “The Well,” and “Boom”.) But at this point, we’re all beating the same dead horse into the ground, which is perhaps the clearest sign possible that what Doctor Who needs most is an infusion of new blood.

After all, not only has Davies himself been showrunner twice, both Steven Moffat and Chris Chibnall, who helmed the show from 2010 to 2017 and 2018 to 2022 respectively, penned episodes during his run. (Chibnall, of course, wrote for Moffat’s Who as well.) Granted, those men have very different styles as writers and storytellers — both from Davies and each other — but they’re all essentially members of the same extended family, and have been part of the fabric of modern Who to varying degrees pretty much since the revival started.

In light of that, maybe it’s not really all surprising the show got a bit stagnant and overly wrapped up in its own mythology, and has struggled to find a way to appeal to audiences who weren’t already fully caught up on and invested in the franchise. Let a new team take over, one that owes no loyalty to what’s come before. Shake things up. Bring in writers who’ve never written for Doctor Who. (Maybe even some who grew up watching the revival.) Create new enemies and put fresh spins on old ones. Acknowledge the Doctor’s past without allowing the show to be paralyzed by it. (Something the RTD 2.0 era promised but never fully managed to do.) Embrace the idea of a true franchise regeneration, which gets the show back to the basics: A weirdo two-hearted alien exploring the stars in a blue police box, and reminding us all that being human is stil the greatest adventure of all.

It’s undeniable that this sudden hiatus sucks, and a world with the promise of no new Doctor Who in development is certainly a darker and less magical place than the one we all inhabited last week. But this isn’t the end. Like the Doctor himself, this franchise is a survivor, and it will bounce back as it always has. We’ll see each other again, and likely sooner than anyone expects. Don’t believe me? Trust the Doctor instead: “Everything ends, and it’s always sad, but everything begins again, too. And that’s always happy. Be happy.”

Spielberg and Ford Fought George Lucas on the Worst Indiana Jones Sequel (and Lost)

It’s no secret that Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull faced resistance from star Harrison Ford and director Steven Spielberg on the long road to its 2008 release, and that George Lucas’ insistence that aliens could be a viable plot device in the movie was a big part of that resistance.

Lucas had been pitching Indy vs aliens since the 1990s, and after various writers had worked on scripts for the belated fourquel, David Koepp’s screenplay about Indy reuniting with Marion Ravenwood from Raiders of the Lost Ark and discovering he has a son while searching for an alien skull in Peru finally took Lucas’ idea from seed to fruit. But even Koepp admits he took the job with “some trepidation,” and a new oral history of Spielberg’s movies reveals more of the behind-the-scenes battle among the director, Lucas, and Ford.

Noting that Crystal Skull was a “tough production” for cinematographer Janusz Kamiński, Lucasfilm’s former president Kathleen Kennedy recently told Vulture that “Steven was struggling with that movie. Harrison was struggling with the movie. They didn’t want to do a Raiders movie that involved aliens, and they kind of got into a fight with George about it.”

Lucas noted that he had wanted Crystal Skull to be “kind of a War of the Worlds sort of thing,” but that Ford and Spielberg both said they weren’t going to do another sci-fi film, with Spielberg already having dabbled with alien shenanigans in 1977’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind and 1982’s E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, and Ford having already done Lucas’ Star Wars trilogy and Blade Runner. Still, Lucas was convinced that a fourth film in the franchise would be the perfect opportunity for everyone’s favorite fedora-wearing archaeologist to do something different. “I said, ‘Steven, this is perfect because it’s the 1950s, when flying saucers were a whole thing,’ but he said ‘no.'”

Eventually, the pair compromised, with Lucas suggesting that the aliens might be from another dimension instead, though that aspect of the movie was somewhat lost in the execution. “Steven put that last shot in, where they get into a flying saucer and take off,” Lucas explained. “He was rationalizing it by saying, ‘Well, they’re going to another dimension. They have to get there somehow.’ I said, ‘It looks like a flying saucer.’”

It’s hard to argue with him there. Crystal Skull’s interdimensional beings both look like traditional grey-faced aliens and set off on their journey in a saucer-shaped ship through a portal. Lucas got his way in the end, which ultimately convinced Ford that a fifth movie in the franchise was necessary.

“They ended up all of them doing what George wanted to do, which was probably the right thing,” Kennedy added. “But Harrison and Steven were not 100 per cent on board. That’s why the movie, out of the four that Steven made, is the weakest. And that’s why Harrison was so deeply committed to [Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny]. He didn’t want [Crystal Skull] to be the end.”