Backrooms Review: A24 Expansion of YouTube Series Goes in Circles

I never liked fluorescent lighting. Often aggressively bright, the hum of the once ubiquitous mercury-vapor tube always felt like threatened cheerfulness. It’s a forced smile stretched across a pained face. Wunderkind YouTuber and now bonafide big-screen director Kane Parsons would seem to agree. For his feature-film debut at A24, Backrooms, the 20-year-old content creator returns to a late 20th century setting and variety of corporate luminescence that he’s probably too young to remember firsthand. And it is undeniably eerie, if intermittently so.

The labyrinthine hell of Backrooms’ title exists in a liminal space of endless corridors and winding atriums which appear to carry on into oblivion. Occupying a nether-realm that borders between Office Space and a magical realist Brazil, the titular purgatory offers up vacant mindscapes beneath that deceitful, fluorescent glow. As someone who until a few weeks ago was unfamiliar with Parsons’ YouTube series of the same name, it’s easy to see why Backrooms became a viral sensation. The unnerving blankness of the compositions suggest a queasy counterpoint to the pull toward nostalgia in so much modern media. What are the backrooms of the title if not the detritus of a decayed American culture from ye olden days that’s been left to rot?

Yet the cold emptiness of Backrooms’ imagery, which was so compelling for YouTube subscribers in nine-minute, CG-enhanced bit sizes, becomes something of an albatross around the wholly live-action feature. Parsons and screenwriter Will Soodik tease out a few intriguing ideas about what the backrooms could really be, but that’s all they are. Teases. When tasked with creating something that approaches a cohesive narrative—and a story that confirms tangible internal logic if not necessarily clear-cut explanations for the creepy imagery—Backrooms can only double down on a vague aloofness. The oppressive nature of this seems intentional. The exhaustion and faint tedium less so.

The gist of how we end up in this realm is simple enough, however. Clark (Chiwetel Ejiofor) is an unhappy, middle-aged divorcée living in the 1990s suburbs. About once a week he goes to therapy simply so someone other than an employee will listen to his complaints. Still, psychologist Mary (Renate Reinsve) seems to be putting in an effort to remain blandly reassuring as Clark continues to vent about his ex-wife.

The rest of the week, Clark seems to live day and night at his warehouse furniture store, Cap’n Clark’s, which also happens to have a rat and circuit-breaker problem in the basement. It’s likewise on that sub-level that Clark discovers he can walk through a single spot in a wall. It proves to be a portal to… somewhere. The bad place. What’s curious is that after his initial shock upon this discovery, Clark seems to kind of like it down there. Even after being seemingly chased by the only other living soul in these cavernous hallways—a mysterious, unseen force—he cannot wait to lure staffers Bobby (Finn Bennett) and Kat (Lukita Maxwell) into the backrooms. And like the YouTube series, they decide to bring a VHS camera with them for the trip.

When viewed as a metaphor for the quirks, mysteries, and even monstrosities of a human subconscious, a hideous id, there is something potent about Clark’s descent down the rabbit hole of Backrooms. Like Alice, here is a fella who cannot help but dig deeper into skewed hallways of canted angles, forced perspectives, and grotesque interior design choices. One passageway narrows into little more than a coffin in a sequence that overtly echoes Lewis Carroll.

And as couched in therapy-speak about the loops and tunnels of the human mind, courtesy of Norwegian treasure Reinsve, Backrooms more than once seems on the verge of discovering a thesis for what is ultimately one of the most polished exercises in a found footage haunted house I’ve ever seen. Unfortunately more often, the picture seems content to simply run in circles, mixing its metaphors and stumbling over what I’ve been assured is a complex, mysterious mythology in the web series.

In its own odd way, the cumulative effect reminds me of more than one recent video game movie adaptation. It is so determined to preserve and recreate the lore and iconography of its source material that the narratives and characters become secondary and ultimately obligatory.

This is not to say they’re poorly performed. Ejiofor has always been a somewhat underrated actor and brings a self-pitying neediness to Clark that’s understated but unmistakable. Reinsve, so dynamic in The Worst Person in the World and Sentimental Value, is given a less fully formed character, unfortunately. Mary seems to exist primarily to have an extra perspective to walk through the looking glass after Clark decides he likes it just fine down in Wonderland.

The final movements of the film, in particular, which make the classic mistake of showing the impossible Lovecraftian monster and seemingly setting up a sequel or franchise, feel especially rote for a horror film released in the same month as Obsession and Hokum.

Parsons shows a lot of promise in Backrooms, revealing a keen eye and ear for conjuring an oppressive atmosphere and visually arresting gloom. His first feature just feels strangely like an awkward attempt at IP-extension as opposed to a fully fleshed out idea; a concept that could have been a short. In fact, it already is several of them.

Backrooms opens on Friday, May 29.

Paddington 4’s Writer Selection Hints at Political Satire for England’s Most Famous Bear

As the world heads toward unprecedented corruption, governmental collapse, and extreme polarization, at least we have Paddington, an adorable protagonist and a shining light of optimistic apolitical escapism to turn to. Even that, however, may be changing with the arrival of his latest sequel, Paddington 4.

Armando Iannucci, the cynical genius behind the hit show Veep and dark comedy The Death of Stalin, has been tapped to write the fourth installment of the critical darling Paddington series alongside his writing partner Simon Blackwell.

Satire has defined Iannucci’s career. His early time in radio and broadcast television established him as “the hardman of political satire,” according to the Daily Telegraph, and led to his position at the head of the British comedy series The Thick of It and movie sequel In the Loop.

Government dysfunction is a staple throughout most of Iannucci’s work — The Thick of It spins nightmarishly incompetent yet entertaining tales of the bureaucratic British government, while Veep takes on the often sociopathic psyche of American politicians working within a poorly-constructed system. The Death of Stalin fictionalizes the real actions of high-ranking officials in the Soviet Union as they desperately grasp for power after (you guessed it) the death of dictator Joseph Stalin.

Paddington is not a political satire by any means. Paddington Bear loves marmalade jam, his adoptive family the Browns, and the Queen of England. His bumbling adventures are PG at their most extreme. Given this, Iannucci’s invitation onto the production budget of Paddington 4 may seem out of place.

However, Iannucci’s sense of humor and previous experience delving into human nature will potentially give audiences a deeper understanding of Paddington the character and could provide a more insightful social critique than the previous Paddington films have. Iannucci is also familiar with screen adaptations, having written and directed the critically acclaimed The Personal History of David Copperfield.

Iannucci is no stranger to stories with absurd premises. His previous work in political satire has prepared him to tell the story of a small anthropomorphic bear, his 100-year-old anthropomorphic bear aunt, and the family that adopts him — three ridiculous premises that somehow are less ridiculous than some of the most jarring moments from Veep.

Additionally, the Paddington franchise is more ripe with political undertones than viewers may realize. Paddington 2, the most acclaimed of the three films so far, centers around Paddington’s false imprisonment and the struggles of his family as they attempt to exonerate him. It humanizes the imprisoned people who Paddington befriends, indicts the injustice of Paddington’s arrest, and criticizes the lazy policework of the London authorities. Paddington in Peru explores racial and colonial history alongside all-consuming greed through its central antagonist and plot. The first Paddington takes on the increasingly relevant themes of immigration and cultural assimilation vs. celebration.

All of these are things Iannucci’s eye for scathing political critique will easily be able to expand upon in the fourth installment of Paddington’s live action journey. At his most personal, Iannucci takes on themes of existentialism and human nature (just watch The Armando Iannucci Shows online).

Despite Paddington’s taxonomic classification as a bear, few are as human as he. Not everyone should be trusted with telling a story of human nature and political severity packaged in England’s beloved bear, but Iannucci certainly should be.

X-Men ’97 Season 2 Trailer Breakdown: Apocalypse, New Costumes, and More

This article contains details from X-Men comics that could spoil X-Men ’97 season 2.

It’s here, my X-Men! The first trailer for season 2 of X-Men ’97 has arrived, chock-full of the superhero soap opera goodies that made the first season such a sensation. Season 1 proved that X-Men ’97 wanted to be so much more than a nostalgic continuation of the original series, which ran from 1992 to 1997. More than just picking up storylines and adding elements from comics published in the intervening three decades, X-Men ’97 tackled pressing themes about oppression and genocide, portraying them through some of the most striking animation you’ll see outside of an anime.

X-Men ’97 may be more than a throwback Marvel Comics adaptation, but it’s not less than that either. And the first trailer for season 2 is bursting at the seams with plot hints and lore nods. Let’s channel our inner Caliban and hunt them all down!

Time Travel Means Time for a Costume Change

The original Animated Series kept the team in the Jim Lee-designed costumes of the era. But season 2 of X-Men ’97 finally gives our heroes reason to raid the closet.

Storm has done away with the silver outfit for the one that Lee briefly gave her in 1991, a riff on the standard Xavier Institute training uniform, while Wolverine has reverted to his pre-Lee look, returning to the brown and yellow togs he wore throughout the ’80s. Sunspot wears the costume he made after Cable and Cannonball left X-Force (thankfully skipping over the infamous graduation uniforms the New Mutants had).

The most notable costumes are the grey and yellow clothes worn by Jean Grey, Cyclops, and Rogue. Those outfits come directly from Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely’s run in the early 2000s. Partially to reject the idea that the X-Men were superheroes, and partly to bring the comics in line with the leather look of the movies, Morrison and Quitely outfitted the main team in black and grey. Rogue didn’t get one of those cool looks at the time (instead, she was running around in a horrendous red get-up), but it looks like the show will correct that error.

Apocalypse, Then

As the trailer reminds us, season 1 of X-Men ’97 ended with the destruction of Genosha—which took the life of Gambit, among others—and with half the team sent to the past and half to the future. The season two trailer shows what the team finds in each timeline: Apocalypse, first as Egyptian mutant En Sabah Nur and then, centuries from now, as the absolute ruler of Earth.

The trailer gives brief glimpses of En Sabah Nur with the Sandstormers, the tribe who recruits the future supervillain after his people exile him for having grey skin. The Sandstormers instill in En Sabah Nur a belief that only the fittest can survive, and he appears to be testing some poor victim in the trailer.

Eventually, En Sabah Nur will augment his abilities with a suit made from Celestial technology (you remember the Celestials, right? The giant purple god blowing things up in Guardians of the Galaxy? The big hand that started to come out of the Earth in Eternals?). Much later, he’ll conquer the world. And that’s where Cable comes in.

Cable Connections

The time-traveling leader of X-Force, Cable showed up in X-Men: The Animated Series, and at the end of X-Men ’97‘s first season, where we learned the character’s backstory. He was born Nathan Summers, son of Cyclops and a clone of Jean Grey. Infected with an incurable virus by Mister Sinister, Nathan was sent into the far future with Bishop, another time traveler.

The season 2 trailer finds Cyclops and Jean Grey reuniting with their young son in the far future. There, Nathan will train to fight Apocalypse across time, gaining help from the Clan Aksani. Led by Mother Aksani (actually, an aged Rachel Summers, the daughter of Cyclops and Jean Grey from an alternate reality), Cable learns how to control the virus that turns his body into organic steel and gathers the arsenal he’ll use against Apocalypse.

The teenage version of Cable seen in the trailer sometimes resembles Nate Grey, an alternate reality version of Cable who once crossed time to make out with his mother, Marty McFly style, and another time became a Christ figure for the mutants. But that might be a little too weird for X-Men ’97.

The Death of Magik

If all of the Marvel Rivals servers have been shut down today, it’s because of something the players saw in the season 2 trailer: Colossus, cradling the body of his dead sister Illyana, a.ka. Magik. Before canceling your Disney+ subscription, remember that X-Men ’97 is still largely adapting storylines from the ’90s, and Magik wasn’t the major character then that she was now. In fact, she was dead, a casualty of the Legacy Virus.

A clunky AIDS metaphor, the Legacy Virus infected mutants throughout the ’90s, eventually ending when Beast invented a cure, which Colossus tested on himself. The cure worked, but did not end his sorrow over Magik’s death, and so Colossus briefly became a villain, joining the Acolytes. Given that Colossus has only had a few appearances in the Animated Series, he may be more of an antagonist in season 2—at least until his sister resurrects, like she always does.

Psylocke, Deadpool, and… the Draco?

Colossus isn’t the only big cameo in the trailer. Shapeshifter Morph takes the form of Deadpool and we see Rama-Tut, the Ancient Egyptian ruler who (stop me if you’ve heard this one) gets a time travel machine and becomes the Avengers villain Kang the Conquerer. Psylocke returns to the Animated Series, and will probably follow the current comic storylines, in which she’s no longer a white English woman in the body of an Asian woman (Google “Kwannon” and marvel at how long it took to reverse this plotline).

Two more notable additions are Exodus and Danger. Danger, a robot lady with a scary face, comes from the Joss Whedon run that followed Grant Morrison in 2004. The living embodiment of the Danger Room, the VR facility Xavier uses to train his students, Danger can adapt to any challenge and also is a pretty lady who wants others to validate her existence because she was created by Joss Whedon.

The caped swordsman Exodus is more complicated. Once a knight in 12th century France, the mutant known as Exodus was transformed into an undying warrior by Apocalypse, who then left him in captivity for refusing to obey him. Centuries later, Magneto freed Exodus, who has since worshiped the Master of Magnetism as a mutant savior.

But for longtime comics fans, the most compelling part of the trailer may be the depiction of Nightcrawler as a Catholic priest. Nightcrawler’s faith has long been a key part of his character, an ironic turn on his demonic appearance. He eventually became ordained as a priest, and started wearing a clerical collar with his costume, as seen in the trailer.

But in The Draco, a 2003 storyline by Chuck Austen and Takeshi Miyazawa, we learn that Nightcrawler looks like the devil because his dad is the devil. Or, more accurately, his father Azazel (you might remember him played by Jason Flemyng in X-Men: First Class), an ageless mutant on whom stories about Satan are based.

The Draco sucks for so many reasons, not least of all because it means that Nightcrawler is actually a monster and everyone was right to fear him. It would be daring for X-Men ’97 to take it on, but season one managed to redeem some bad storylines, so maybe they can do the same with The Draco.

Polaris, X-Factor, and Generation X

Judging by the marketing thus far, the most important new character in the season 2 trailer is Polaris, the green-haired lady seen looking at some photos. A longtime associate and sometime member of the X-Men, Polaris has the ability to control magnetism, just like Magneto—whom she learned late in life was her father.

Polaris also served on X-Factor, a mutant team sponsored by the U.S. government and led by Cyclops’s brother Havok. X-Factor has gone through many lineups, and marketing materials tend to show Polaris and Havok with the main team from the ’90s, alongside Strong Guy, Multiple Man, Quicksilver, and Wolfsbane. However, X-Factor eventually gains Forge and Shard, the sister of Bishop, as members.

Given that Forge and Bishop team up to find the time-displaced X-Men, Polaris could very well join them to form a different take on X-Factor. However, the trailer shows Polaris alongside Chamber, Monet, and Synch, all of whom were on the more youthful team Generation X, serving alongside Jubilee and under Emma Frost, who also appear in the trailer.

Whatever the line-ups in X-Men ’97, it’s clear that season 2 will draw inspiration from the comics, while going in its own unique direction.

X-Men ’97 season 2 debuts on Disney+ on July 1, 2026.

I Love Boosters Marketing Campaign? Boots Riley Tweets at You

“Gimme your address, I’ll look up the nearest showtime for you and find the best transit route to see I Love Boosters.”

“You have to go see I Love Boosters ASAP. What are you waiting for? How can I move the needle for you?”

“What the fuck Kansas City theaters??? How is no theater playing I Love Boosters???”

These are just some of the posts on X, formerly Twitter, promoting writer-director Boots Riley’s newest film I Love Boosters. Instead of being posted by eager fans, however, these were all posted by Riley himself.

A quick scroll through Riley’s personal X feed will reveal several days worth of these posts, alongside retweets of praise for his sophomore feature and fans holding tickets to the film, excitedly proclaiming they’ve been “marked safe” from Riley’s online admonishments.

Starring Keke Palmer, Naomi Ackie, Taylour Paige, and LaKeith Stanfield, I Love Boosters follows a group of women who steal clothes from an expensive retailer owned by a wicked fashion mogul (Demi Moore) and sell them for much cheaper prices. Riley’s vibrant visual and thematic style lends itself perfectly to this Vogue-ready, NEON-produced comedic crime thriller.

Riley’s most recent outing hit theaters May 22, and was met with rave reviews but hasn’t made a huge dent at the box office. Its earnings have been largely propelled by word-of-mouth marketing, a charge led by the director himself. The traditional marketing for I Love Boosters has been minimal at best, making these posts not only stand out but necessary for the film’s success.

NEON posted a seven-minute video of Riley describing how I Love Boosters came to be and why you need to see it in a theater. All of Riley’s personal social media feeds — not just his X account — have been dedicated to promoting his full-length fashion feature for several days. His tireless fervor to promote his film has spread to other internet users, creating a mass network of I Love Boosters fans attracted to the director’s personal and cinematic brand.

Despite the entertainment value of Riley’s posts and the overall online engagement with the film, it is not necessarily a good thing that one of the freshest voices in film today has to rely on social media to promote his newest production. Marketing a movie in the digital age has proven difficult; fractured between seemingly infinite streaming services, a superabundance of social media platforms, and shortening attention spans. Crafting a promotional strategy that consistently works and is also cost efficient has proven to be next-to-impossible in that environment.

Additionally, massive mergers and political censorship have put more provocative stories in a hot seat in Hollywood, and promoting them online often drives more vitriolic engagement than positive. For Riley, whose body of work is chock-full of extravagantly surreal stories lambasting the racist exploitation of labor under capitalism, these trends do not bode well for his creations. While he is lucky to have NEON in his corner for I Love Boosters, a studio that has created and supported some of the most daring, critically successful films in recent memory, the barebones promotion of I Love Boosters remains a troubling sign for current film marketing practices.

It’s no wonder Riley would post with a relentlessness eclipsed only by the sun’s rising every morning — commercial success may not guarantee another theatrical release, but it certainly helps. Riley’s first full-length film similarly benefited from word-of-mouth marketing; Sorry to Bother You sextupled its $3 million budget, grossing $18 million. That release earned Riley access to budgets for Prime Video series I’m a Virgo and Boosters.

Boosters is currently sitting at a $5.2 million haul against a $20 million budget. Despite the critical acclaim lauded onto his films, Riley needs his tweets to work in order to secure his extremely deserved blockbuster-making future.

Spider-Noir Is the Ultimate Nicolas Cage Highlight Reel

This article contains light spoilers for Spider-Noir.

As its name implies, the MGM+/Prime Video series Spider-Noir is many things. It is a story about Spider-Man, albeit as middle-aged private investigator Ben Reilly, who used to fight crime under the codename “the Spider.” It’s also a noir series, thanks to its postwar setting, its gangster baddies, and its nods toward classic films like Gilda.

But most of all, Spider-Noir is the ultimate highlight reel for its star, Nicolas Cage. As private dick Ben Reilly, Cage gets to take on all sorts of personas, little bits that his character adopts to sneak into a building or get past a secretary. These plot devices give Cage, an actor famous for his strong choices, the opportunity to try out different personalities, personalities that might not work for an entire movie, but are incredible in Spider-Noir‘s bitesize doses.

One of the best occurs in episode five, when a doctor finds Ben Reilly sneaking around her office. Without missing a beat, Cage slips into an impression of Peter Lorre, wrapping his hand around the back of his head to rub his scalp and speaking in smooth, unnerving tones. When the doctor informs him that the person he claims to be looking for is on the second floor, Ben casts a skeptical gaze, starts waving his hands, and demands, in a faux-Hungarian accent, “The second floor? The second floor!”

Lorre is hardly the only old-timey movie star that Cage mimics for Reilly’s shenanigans. The most obvious example occurs when Ben has to retrieve his Spider suit from his former apartment, now remodeled and rented to others. Spying a maintenance closet, Ben grabs a mop and a tool box, flips up his hat brim and dons a pair of thick glasses (a la Humphrey Bogart in The Big Sleep), and introduces himself to the occupants as maintenance man Pete. Pitching up his voice and taking on a slight tremble, Cage as Reilly plays Pete like a sweet old man who’s a bit too comfortable sticking his nose into other peoples’ business, a slightly annoying Jimmy Stewart charcter.

In the very next episode, Ben has to get past a nurse to question some injured cops, so he takes on the identity of Officer Batnick of the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association, who took “a slug 10 years ago” and was saved by the caretakers at the hospital. Here, Cage becomes a tall, dark Edward G. Robinson, replacing his natural drawl with a clipped accent and punctuating his statements with the word, “See?” Sometimes, he’s charming and clever, mirroring Robinson’s insurance investigator from Double Indemnity. Other times, he’s imperious and threatening, just like Robinson in Little Caesar.

Spider-Noir provides an in-universe explanation for Reilly’s impressions. Late in the series, we learn that he felt like he lost his humanity after gaining his spider-powers, and found his way back by watching the movies. The show even gives an example, with Ben going to the theater to see the James Cagney flick Great Guy, mimicking Jimmy’s delivery of the words, “Red hot!”

However, each of these bits feels like part of Cage’s Saturday Night Live reel. Or, more likely, they feel like moments that the director let Cage do whatever he wanted, knowing that the individual scenes could be clipped and shared online, turning the actor’s endless memeability into free advertising for the show.

Thus, the show frequently stops to let Cage just be weird. A late episode reveals that Ben’s secretary Janet (Karen Rodriguez) has always known that he was the Spider because she walked in on him wearing the costume when he was drunk. Cut to a short montage of Cage playing a drunken gumshoe in a superhero suit, babbling with the mask half over his face or giggling while playing with his goggles.

A more earned, but no less weird, scene occurs shortly after the aging Ben has a battle as the Spider, and returns home to rest for a moment. Before collapsing in his chair, Ben has to stretch and crack his joints, giving Cage an excuse to flail his hands and move his body in a staccato shudder.

To some, these scenes suggest poor direction on the part of showrunners Oren Uziel and Steve Lightfoot, or extreme cynicism on the part of Prime Video and MGM+. One could argue that, instead of providing guidance for their star, the directors simply let Cage do whatever ridiculousness he wanted, running the risk of getting a big, sloppy performance like Joaquin Phoenix‘s nonsense in Joker. One could also argue that Nicolas Cage memes cannot be manufactured, and the attempt to do so is hack.

But, by this point, anyone who puts Nicolas Cage in a project knows that he’s going to get weird. That’s part of the deal when you watch him work. Moreover, Spider-Noir gives reasons for Cage to act these ways, whether it’s Ben’s recovered humanity via the movies or his need to put on a disguise.

Whatever the reason, Cage delights every time he gets a wacky new idea. And they’re short enough that they don’t distract from the show’s central mystery, making Spider-Noir a Spidey story, a hard-boiled detective story, and a Nicolas Cage highlight reel, all in equal measure.

Spider-Noir is now streaming on Amazon Prime and MGM+.

The Future of Horror is Low-Budget, Young, and Very Online

There is no feeling comparable to leaving a theater after a good horror movie. A slight chill hangs in the air while you walk to your car, even in the summer heat. A dreadful thought lingers in the back of your mind that what you watched on screen — no matter how fantastical the scares seem or how stupid the characters’ actions are — could happen to you too. The thrill is terrifying yet intoxicating, beckoning you to the theater every time a new film piques your morbid interest.

In recent years, that feeling of fear has been propped up by a new generation of filmmakers who share a few common denominators on their resumes. These storytellers are young, have backgrounds in online content creation, and are all working on relatively shoestring budgets. So far, that combination of youth, new media experience, and thriftiness has been exactly what horror needs to reclaim its status as cinema’s most consistent genre.

YouTube sketch comedy short extraordinaire Curry Barker directed the terrifying Obsession, which hit theaters on May 15 and immediately made an impact with audiences, projecting to make over $100 million on just a $750,000 budget. Mark Fischbach, a.k.a. the extremely popular video game YouTuber Markiplier wrote, directed, and starred in the winter box office’s surprise smash hit Iron Lung on a budget of around $4 million. The incoming A24 Backrooms film, directed by YouTuber Kane Pixels (real name Kane Parsons), will invite theater-goers to traverse stark yellow hallways with just a $10 million budget and is already tracking to triple that at the box office on its opening weekend.

Each of these filmmakers have sizable followings online in their respective circles, but they are also all relatively green. Fischbach is the oldest at 36 years old, while Parsons is only 20. Despite their nontraditional backgrounds in filmmaking and media production, what they’re doing is working. Obsession has earned rave reviews alongside high-demand in theaters, and Iron Lung exceeded both commercial and critical expectations. Backrooms’ official trailer reached nearly 30 million views in under a month.

The YouTube-to-horror-director pipeline is not confined to the back half of the 2020s either. Earlier this decade, YouTube comedy duo RackaRacka (Danny and Michael Philippou) directed Talk to Me, summer 2023’s high-octane supernatural thriller. The duo’s directorial followup in 2025, Bring Her Back, upped the disturbing factor without losing the incredible narrative talents developed in their first film. The Phillipous paved the way for the sudden surge in online creators becoming booked-and-busy horror directors, giving viewers a wave of recent horror gems.

Additionally, these films’ modest budgets have demonstrated a more affordable and repeatable model than other recent horror projects including Lee Cronin’s The Mummy ($22 million budget) and The Exorcist: Believer ($30 million budget). Although Cronin’s take on the Mummy concept made back its budget, its reviews were mixed. The Exorcist: Believer similarly turned a profit, but was even more critically derided. Obsession and other small-budget, highly-praised recent productions, such as the Aleshea Harris-directed Southern gothic thriller Is God Is, provide a strong filmmaking formula for the horror genre — trust young creatives to execute their horrifying visions on screen… all on the cheap.

Instead of expensive nostalgia-oriented reinterpretations of the same stories horror filmmakers have been telling for decades, filmmakers like Barker and Fischbach are bringing new films with authentic perspectives to marquee signs across the world. Many of the pioneers of our current macabre renaissance in horror creativity cut their teeth on the internet, not on a Hollywood set. It’s similar to how the previous generation of ascendant auteurs emerged from the comedy scene like Zach Cregger and Jordan Peele. Indeed, many millennial horror filmmakers have now graduated onto bigger budget horror fare (Cregger’s Weapons, Peele’s Nope, Ryan Coogler’s Sinners) after proving their mettle in the low-budget space (Barbarian, Get Out, Fruitvale Station).

In an industry like Hollywood, where insider connections matter and “making it” is about as hard as climbing Mount Everest, there’s something to be said for inviting people who just want to create in any way possible into the filmmaking sphere. Barker, Parsons, and many more have been uploading videos for years; they’ve found their voices and established themselves as storytellers who can meet audiences where they’re at.

Being in tune with viewers is something the movie industry desperately needs. Studios are increasingly cutti n g both production volume and jobs while major film figures are turning to generative AI as a crutch, despite ongoing environmental and creative copyright concerns. Fresh voices who, for better or worse, can make profitable movies with less money without sacrificing production value or narrative quality are a potent cure for medium’s greatest contemporary ailments.

There are a number of future projects led by YouTubers and content creators for people to look forward to. Parson’s Backrooms releases Friday, and by the looks of it, will deliver the liminal terror Parson has been making on his YouTube channel for years now. Dylan Clark, the filmmaker behind a number of popular horror shorts uploaded to YouTube including Portrait of God is set to bring a new take on the cult classic The Blair Witch Project. Barker, similarly, is planning an original ghost story and a Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake. Fischbach also plans on making more films in the coming years, which are certain to draw both his fans and horror fans to the theater.

With the demographics making horror films and the demographics watching them now lined up, the future of horror is now in good hands, even if those hands are more used to grasping a video game controller than a camera.

Will X-Men ‘97 Season 2 Follow Through on the Queer Love Story Hidden in Plain Sight?

With only crumbs of X-Men ‘97 season 2 news to gnaw on, many fans are revisiting the X-Men: The Animated Series revival to refresh memories and, more importantly, take note of any plotlines we may see return in the upcoming season.

With Pride Month around the corner, one can’t help but wonder if one of the series’ more tender, quietly groundbreaking moments will survive the journey into season 2 or quietly disappear, the way queer storylines sometimes are, unfortunately, destined to do.

The moment in question is the one shared between Morph and Wolverine in the season finale episode, “Tolerance is Extinction, Part 3.”

Lying in near-death after Magneto yanked all the adamantium from his skeleton, Wolverine clings to life while Morph watches helplessly by his side. In a last desperate attempt to pull Logan back from the edge, Morph does the only thing they can think of; transforming into Jean Grey, the woman Wolverine has always loved, and confesses “I love you, Logan.”

On the surface, it reads as a simple act of comfort, one that could have been easily written off if not for the former showrunner and head writer, Beau DeMayo, confirming on X that this scene was romantic for the shapeshifting hero. As a queer individual himself, DeMayo insisted that Morph’s confession was always intended to be romantic and later compared it to being secretly in love with a close friend and finally finding a way to say it, even if not as yourself.

But with DeMayo having been fired before the series even premiered, the future of this storyline he planted is now uncertain. He may be gone, but the confession isn’t—it’s canon, it’s onscreen, and season 2 is going to have to reckon with it one way or another seeing that it’s one of (if not the most) intriguing plots for Morph’s character.

With the series having faced backlash for Morph being canonically non-binary, using they/they pronouns, and confessing their love to Wolverine, the question becomes whether the new creative team treats it as a thread worth pulling or simply lets it fray quietly away, hoping nobody notices or remembers. The irony here is that potentially forgetting would go against everything the X-Men have ever stood for.

To understand why that would be such a loss, it helps to remember what the X-Men have always been. Ever since Stan Lee and Jack Kirby launched the comics in 1963, Xavier’s Mutants have served as allegory for a wide array of marginalized groups and topics; the Civil Rights movement, religious persecution, the AIDS crisis. As the decades progressed, the queer metaphor became increasingly fitting too.

Mutants are born different in a world that fears and hates the identities they never chose. They constantly have to hide who they are from their families and friends, in fear of being judged or taken away by Bastion’s “Zero Tolerance” operation first seen in episode 7.

Thankfully, many find community among themselves, comforted by the fact that those who get it, get it. But even with the comfort of each other, X-Men who, for years, have fought not just for survival against Sentinels, Mister Sinister, or the literal physical manifestation of the apocalypse, but also for the right to exist.

If that all sounds familiar, it should because the allegories, no matter in what context, have rarely been subtle.

And while the Morph confession does fall somewhere between the implicitness of Bobby Drake (Iceman) “coming out” to his parents as a mutant in the 2003 film X2: X-Men United and the explicitness of Mystique and Destiny getting married in Marvel Comics 2024 Marvel Voices: Pride one-shot: X-men: The Wedding Special #1, it serves as another opportunity for the queer X-Men allegory to be done right.

Which is what makes Morph’s romantic storyline in X-Men ‘97 so significant and worth protecting. The character’s status exists in an interesting middle ground in terms of representation. Their non-binary status, while stated as canon by DeMayo, isn’t actually never directly referred to in the series, a likely deliberate choice seeing that Morph is explicitly referred to as a man in the ‘92 show.

As for where Morph is currently, the season 2 trailer offered a glimpse of the shapeshifter alongside Wolverine, Sabertooth, and Lady Deathstrike according to The Direct’s early viewing of the trailer at New York Comic Con. The group is seen in a room together, with Morph pondering over “digital video discs” to which Lady Deathstrike scoffs and says that she refers laser discs, possibly clues to what periods of time they are in or from (or both?).

The update doesn’t offer much in terms of what is to be seen but Morph being with Wolverine offers a glimmer of hope that the love story plot DeMayo planted may be continued, a choice that feels deliberate seeing that the rest of the X-Men were scattered somewhat randomly across time.

If season 2 picks up the thread and Morph’s feelings are acknowledged, explored, or even just made more explicit by having the hero confess their feelings as themself, then X-Men ‘97 would become something increasingly rare: a mainstream animated superhero series with a canon, developing queer love story for a core cast member. And if Disney is willing to put in the herculean effort of letting the “Wolverine wants Jean Grey but can’t have her” storyline go in favor of exploring his own queerness then that would mean even more progress.

If it’s dropped, well, that too is a statement and one that is all too familiar. A queer storyline being introduced with intention, abandoned without ceremony, and subsequently mourned in favor of keeping things ambiguous at best or queer-baiting at worst.

Where the confession will lead and end is yet to be seen and, though some may disagree or agree, it is admittedly not the most important thread for the show to pick up. With Apocalypse in the picture now and the X-Men split-up in several ways (or dead. We all miss you, Gambit), there is a lot on everyone’s plate.

Still, Morph’s romance storyline is a significant and timely one, and one that may be embedded in the series already as DeMayo had previously finished writing season 2 before current head-writer and showrunner Matthew Chauncy stepped into the role.

But for now, all fans can do is wait, rewatch the series, and continue to worry about the fates of our beloved mutants.

Long Gaps, Big Hype: The Strange New Math of TV Release Strategy

If it seems like your favourite show is taking longer and longer breaks between seasons, you’re not imagining it. A new report from Ampere Analysis (via Deadline) has broken down modern TV’s current release strategy and found that larger gaps between seasons of popular shows like Wednesday and Severance are a real trend—and that they seem to be benefiting streamers.

This trend, referred to as “the Stranger Things effect”, was named after Netflix’s popular sci-fi series, which was known for taking its time releasing new seasons as its child actors aged beyond their characters, but the Duffer Brothers’ show isn’t entirely to blame. A decade ago, TV seasons were released every 10 months on average, but the COVID-19 pandemic saw those gaps widen sharply to 16 months, followed by U.S. strikes that pushed the average gap to 21 months. Yet, 2025 saw no change in the average gap, which lingered at 21 months and showed no trend back toward the days of TV’s old annual release model.

Edging viewers with longer release gaps probably seems like a bad idea on the surface, especially when attention spans are arguably shorter, and there’s a constant demand for more, more, more, often fueled by an endless social media scroll that’s happy to deliver. But it turns out that longer gaps between TV seasons are working out pretty well for the streamers making them. Ampere noted that shows with 30+ month gaps had the highest engagement when they finally returned to the small screen.

Figuring out why is pretty easy. The hype simply has more time to build between seasons, and then the pre-release marketing strategy is huge, reminding audiences that the must-watch thing they love is finally coming back. Not only does this catch the interest of people who have been putting off checking out the previous season or the entire series to date, but it prompts people who have forgotten what the hell was going on in the show’s plot to rewatch it ahead of new episodes dropping. You can see the appeal for streamers.

People also stay loyal to these big shows, it seems, no matter how long the gap and how cross they get while waiting for them to return. At least, usually. This strategy does appear to depend on the show’s genre. Sci-fi and fantasy projects need lengthy effects work, and audiences tend to understand that. Comedy shows are less fortunate: the longer the gap, the less willing people are to wait. Meanwhile, crime and thriller shows seem to do okay, no matter how long the gap between seasons, which would explain why there seem to be so many new crime and thriller shows shooting their shot every month on streaming.

Of course, this new release gap strategy has risks. The longer a big show goes without a new season, the more people ask themselves whether it’s worth maintaining their subscription while they wait. A U.S. Q1 2026 survey found that over half of respondents were likely to cancel a subscription if they weren’t using it much, which Ampere wants content providers to be mindful of.

“Many Original shows build highly dedicated audiences that remain loyal despite increasingly long waits between seasons,” Christen Tamisin, Senior Analyst at Ampere Analysis, said in a statement. “However, streamers need to balance blockbuster production timelines against a steady flow of content.”

Spider-Noir Cleans Up an Infamous Spider-Man Debacle

This post contains spoilers for Spider-Noir, and also 30-year-old comic books.

Every part of Spider-Noir has the senses of every viewer tingling, with its gangster movie take on Spider-Man‘s adventures. But the most shocking moment may come when our hero Ben Reilly (Nicolas Cage) meets an elderly stranger. When the stranger (Andrew Robinson) reveals that he’s actually much younger than Ben, that he went by the nickname “Freckles” when they were both in the military, we learn a compelling secret: Ben Reilly isn’t Ben Reilly. Instead, he was born under a different name, a name he changed to Ben Reilly after the war.

Freckles doesn’t tell us Ben’s real name, but the reveal is enough to warn any reader of Spider-Man comics that danger is coming. Any mention of Ben Reilly and mistaken identity brings to mind the first time Ben Reilly appeared in the comics, an infamous debacle known today as The Clone Saga.

The Death of Gwen, The Birth of Ben

The Clone Saga actually dates back to the mid-1970s, shortly after the death of Gwen Stacy in Amazing Spider-Man #121–122 (1973). In the next year’s Amazing Spider-Man #129, by Gerry Conway and Ross Andru, we meet a new supervillain called the Jackal, a mysterious guy in green fur (who has just won over a guy called the Punisher, also making his first appearance). Soon, we learn that the Jackal is biology professor Miles Warren, who long harbored feelings for his student Gwen. Blaming Spider-Man for her death, the Jackal sought revenge by creating a clone to destroy the Wall-Crawler.

That story seemed more or less finished in 1975’s Amazing Spider-Man #149, with the clone apparently dying in an explosion. Flash-forward two decades to 1994, when a mystery man said to look exactly like Peter Parker begins appearing. Although the stories left open the possibility that the mystery man was Peter, who was suffering from a nervous breakdown that made him think of Spider-Man as a separate identity, the Power and Responsibility arc that ran across the four series published at the time—Web of Spider-Man, Amazing Spider-Man, Spider-Man, and Spectacular Spider-Man—established that the clone made by Miles Warren had lived.

After some hero-on-hero fighting, Peter and the clone come to an arrangement. The clone takes the name Ben Reilly, after the first name of his uncle and the surname of his Aunt May, and begins fighting crime as the Scarlet Spider. At the same time, more clones appear, including another copy of Peter called Kaine and a clone of Miles Warren, once again masquerading as the Jackal.

So far, so good, right? Yes, there are a few too many clones, but nothing that out of the ordinary for a superhero comic. Plus, Marvel gets a few new Spider-people to play with, just as the novelty of Venom has worn off.

What A Tangled Web We Weave…

But that’s when Marvel editorial gets an idea. The brass had long worried that Spider-Man comics had lost the plot. Peter Parker began as a teenager, and his stories from the ’70s portrayed him as a young adult who had to balance dates, money troubles, and freelance jobs with his superheroing. By the mid-’90s, Peter had grown up, married super-model and actress Mary Jane, and the two were expecting a baby.

They saw the emergence of Ben Reilly as their ticket out. Thus, the stories began to retcon the original Clone story from 1975. The comics revealed that the explosion in Amazing Spider-Man #149 gave Peter amnesia, and it was the clone who walked away from the wreckage. The man we knew as Ben Reilly was in fact the true Peter Parker. The man we’ve been following as Peter, the man who married Mary Jane and was expecting a child, was in fact the clone.

So Marvel attempted a great switcharoo. The Peter we’ve been following dyed his hair blonde and moved to the West Coast with Mary Jane, taking on the identity of Ben Reilly. The guy we thought was a clone took up his rightful name of Peter Parker, and stayed in New York City as Spider-Man.

At least, that’s what Marvel started to do. When word of the company’s plans got out, fans revolted, not buying the simple solution that Marvel pitched. And so, several issues later, it turns out that Ben Reilly was the clone, and our Peter was the real Peter all along. And also his hair was going to stay brown. And also, he’s staying in New York.

If this summary sounds messy, the execution was even worse. Not only did editorial take what began as a slightly ambitious and ridiculous sci-fi story and spiral it into a spaghetti mess that changed on the fly, but they also stuffed their resolution with the return of Norman Osborn, who had been dead since he accidentally impaled himself after killing Gwen Stacy back in 1974, and the disappearance of Peter and MJ’s baby. Oh, and also Aunt May seemed to die again, but it turns out she’s alive.

A Simple Saga

To this day, The Clone Saga stands as the ultimate example of editorial run amuck. And yet, Marvel keeps returning to it again and again. The Clone Saga was adapted into The Animated Series, remade in the Ultimate Universe, and given sequels. Even poor Miles Morales got his own Clone Saga in recent years.

Spider-Noir does have a mad scientist, so it’s not entirely out of the realm of possibility that some clone shenanigans could be afoot. But going by Freckles’s intimation, Spider-Noir may give us the best possible version of the story, with Peter changing his name to Ben Reilly after the war, to get a fresh start from the horrors he experienced. At least, this version of the story won’t give comics fans terrifying flashbacks.

Spider-Noir is now streaming on MGM+ and Prime Video.

Strange New Worlds Nearly Pulled Off a Big Original Series Twist

It’s a different life, Jim, not as we know it, and it almost happened in Strange New Worlds. The creative minds behind the Star Trek show have revealed that their biggest regret has been not getting the chance to do an episode that would have explored what might have happened if William Shatner’s Captain James T. Kirk had decided to remain in New York with Edith Keeler (Joan Collins) in The Original Series installment “The City on the Edge of Forever”—and they planned to bring back Shatner for it, too.

In conversation with Polygon, Strange New Worlds showrunners Akiva Goldsman and Alex Kurtzman confirmed they’d been working to make Shatner’s return possible for that alternate-universe story since the show began, and even penned a few scripts for it.

“I think if you get to the end and there’s nothing left for you to want to do, then that’s more of a disappointment,” Kurtzman explained about his and Goldsman’s lingering Strange New Worlds regrets. “I’m proud of every episode we’ve done, but I feel like the best dinners you come to don’t leave you feeling stuffed. They leave you wanting more.”

In the acclaimed episode of The Original Series, Dr. McCoy accidentally overdosed on a powerful drug and traveled through a time portal called the Guardian of Forever. In doing so, he drastically altered history, and the Enterprise ceased to exist. Kirk and Spock tracked him to 1930s New York City, where Kirk fell in love with Keeler, only to discover that her survival would delay America’s entry into WWII and allow the Nazis to win. Heartbroken, Kirk let Edith die to restore the timeline.

Since such a pivotal moment in Earth’s history hinged on Edith’s demise, it would have been fascinating to find out what might have happened if she hadn’t bought the farm; kind of like Star Trek’s version of Man in the High Castle.

Instead, Strange New Worlds will boldly go ahead with its final seasons Shatner-less but with a lot of fun stuff in the offing, including an episode where Captain Christopher Pike (Anson Mount) gets turned into a puppet during a transporter accident. Kurtzman and Goldsman also noted that the season 3 mind-meld between Kirk (Paul Wesley) and Spock (Ethan Peck) would have a significant impact on both characters over the remaining episodes.

“We know what they’re like in The Original Series, but we don’t know how they got there,” Kurtzman said. “You don’t want to just come in and give people exactly what they expect at the end. It would get really boring. We wanted to give each of them something to strive for as a character, something to learn about each other, something to be surprised by. That continues this season in a big way.”

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds season 4 will stream on Paramount+ starting July 23.

Spider-Noir: 5 Classic Film Noirs That Shaped the Spider-Man Adventure

For a show about a guy whose radioactive blood allows him to shoot webs and crawl walls, Spider-Noir has surprisingly little to do with the superhero that inspired it. Not only does it star Nicolas Cage as Ben Reilly instead of Peter Parker, and not only does it eschew contentions like Uncle Ben and a blue and red suit, but Spider-Noir doesn’t even have that much in common with the 2009 Marvel Comics series Spider-Man: Noir or the movie Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse.

This isn’t to say that Spider-Noir has no antecedent. Rather, its touchstones are found on the screen, not the comics page. Showrunners Oren Uziel and Steve Lightfoot used the superhero show as an opportunity to pay tribute to some of their favorite crime movies of the 1930s and ’40s. For audiences drawn in by the lure of Spider-Man, Spider-Noir also serves as a primer, pointing them towards some of the greatest entries in the film noir genre, including these five classics.

Great Guy (1936)

Early in the fourth episode of Spider-Noir, Ben Reilly flaunts his noir fan creds by going to a theater to watch Great Guy, one of the lesser known crime outings for James Cagney. Although a song and dance man at heart, Cagney made his name in crime pictures like The Public Enemy, The Big Heat, and the J. Edgar Hoover-approved G-Men, in which Cagney brings his tough guy persona to law, wearing a badge as a member of the FBI.

Great Guy veers closer to G-Men than it does his more famous crime films, as he plays former boxer Johnny Cave, now an agent of the Department of Weights and Measures, assigned to investigate corrupt politician Marty Cavanaugh. Perhaps because Eliot Ness caught Al Capone on tax evasion charges, pencil pushers like Cave were frequent heroes in 1930s movies, provided that they still got off a few gun shots and got in a few gut punches. It’s easy to see why the morally-conflicted Ben Reilly would be interested in Great Guy, with its tale of a bad man trying to do good in a world filled with untrustworthy leaders.

The Maltese Falcon (1941)

Cage has made no secret about his admiration for Humphrey Bogart, and several of Bogie’s best parts inform his performance. We’ll talk about one in particular shortly, but the power dynamics between Reilly and his nemesis Silvermane (Brendan Gleeson) recall the relationship between Bogart’s private investigator Sam Spade and Kasper Gutman, the domineering rich man played by Sydney Greenstreet, in The Maltese Falcon.

Based on the novel by Dashiell Hammett and written and directed by John Huston, The Maltese Falcon follows the amoral Spade, who initially takes a job to track down the missing sister for a client (Mary Astor), which results in the murder of his partner and in a new task, to find a statue of the titular bird for Gutman. On the page and on the screen, The Maltese Falcon establishes the genre’s reputation for over-plotting. Ben Reilly can understand Spade’s frustration as a simple arson case balloons into a conspiracy that goes far beyond New York City.

Gilda (1946)

No noir is complete without a femme fatale, a beautiful woman who lures the hero deeper into trouble, against his better judgment. Charles Vidor’s Gilda gave the genre one of its all-time greats with Rita Hayworth as lounge singer Gilda Mundson. Gilda is the wife of Ballin Mudson (George Macready), a gangster living in Buenos Aires, who chooses not to punish American Johnny Farrell (Glenn Ford) for counting cards in his casino. Instead, Mudson hires Farrell to watch over Gilda, a job made easier by the affection she shows him.

But is it true love? Or does Gilda want to pit the hard-luck Farrell against her powerful husband? The answer isn’t as clean as you’d think, which might be why a movie-watcher like Ben Reilly doesn’t pick up on the similarities between his situation and that of Farrell. When lounge singer Cat Hardy (Li Jun Li) walks into his office and makes romantic overtures, Reilly’s cynical defenses melt. And when Hardy performs a big musical number in the first episode, Reilly’s just as dumbstruck as Johnny Farrell watching Gilda Mundson sing “Put the Blame on Mame.”

The Big Sleep (1946)

Speaking with Den of Geek, Cage identified playfulness as one of his favorite elements about Bogie. That might come as a surprise to those who only know the actor by reputation, assuming he always plays a stoic tough. But when Reilly puts on a silly hat and thick glasses to impersonate a janitor, Cage is borrowing from Bogie as well. Namely, he’s mimicking a moment in The Big Sleep, in which Bogart’s Philip Marlowe dons a pair of nerdy glasses and an upturned hat to question a bookseller.

In The Big Sleep, directed by Howard Hawks and based on the novel by Raymond Chandler, Marlowe becomes a nerd (and then returns to his normal self for a much steamier interrogation with the clerk across the street) on behalf of his client General Sternwood (Charles Waldron), who hired the PI to look into the actions of his daughters (Lauren Bacall and Martha Vickers). The search leads him through bookstores and into the world of lowlifes and gangsters, with a plot so convoluted that not even Chandler could follow it. But what The Big Sleep lacks in clarity, it makes up for with thrilling performances, performances that inspire Cage’s take on Ben Reilly.

The Lady From Shanghai (1947)

It would be a spoiler to get into too much detail about how and when Spider-Noir borrows from The Lady From Shanghai. Suffice it to say, Uziel and Lightfoot love Orson Welles movies, and paid homage to one of the most dazzling sequences from the auteur’s 1947 picture, which co-starred Rita Hayworth in another sizzling femme fatale performance.

Welles plays Michael O’Hara, an Irish sailor who falls for Elsa Bannister (Hayworth), wife of disabled attorney Arthur (Everett Sloane). Smitten by Elsa, Michael agrees to serve on Bannister’s yacht, where he agrees to help the attorney’s partner Grisby (Glenn Anders) fake his own death, hoping that the reward will finance a future with Elsa. Instead, Michael finds himself caught in an ever-evolving plot, filled with deception and dissemblances, which Welles visualizes with a still-impressive sequence in a house of mirrors. The sequence sets a standard that even modern shows like Spider-Noir, with all their special effects, aspire to match.

Spider-Noir is available to stream on MGM+ and Prime Video now.

15 Good Movies That Shoehorned in a Romance for No Reason

Romance has its place in plenty of movie genres, making us care for the different characters on screen and their goals. Now, unless you are watching an actual romance film, the feelings one character feels for another might be taking up space, stealing it for what you’re actually here to see. More often than not, that’s action.

But summer blockbusters need the emotional glue that ties a story together, even when done half-heartedly. As such, movies that didn’t really need the emotional anchor beat audiences over their heads with it, making us wish it wasn’t so. These are the films with some of the worst romances in movie history.

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

Peter Jackson’s fantasy sequel added a love triangle between Tauriel, Kíli, and Legolas, despite Tauriel not existing in Tolkien’s novel. It was an unnecessary romance layered onto an already crowded adventure.

Pearl Harbor

Michael Bay’s war drama centers heavily on a romantic triangle between Rafe, Evelyn, and Danny, often overshadowing the historical tragedy itself. Critics frequently argued the romance felt forced into a much stronger wartime story.

Jurassic World

The relationship between Owen Grady and Claire Dearing becomes a recurring emotional thread, but much of the film’s appeal comes from dinosaur chaos and survival. Their romance often felt secondary and oddly obligatory.

King Kong (2005)

While emotional attachment between Ann Darrow and Kong is central, the added romantic tension between Ann and Jack Driscoll often felt underdeveloped compared to the much larger spectacle and tragedy around them.

Top Gun

Pete “Maverick” Mitchell’s romance with Charlie is iconic to some, but it has been long argued the love story feels wedged between aerial combat, rivalry, and military drama that already carried the film.

I Am Legend

The late-film emotional bond implied between Robert Neville and Anna feels unnecessary. Much of the story already worked as isolation horror and survival drama without leaning toward human romantic tension.

Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides

The romance between missionary Philip Swift and mermaid Syrena takes up surprising screen time in a pirate adventure already packed with Blackbeard, Jack Sparrow, and the Fountain of Youth storyline.

The Matrix Reloaded

Neo and Trinity were already established, but the sequel leans harder into romantic urgency, especially around prophecy and sacrifice. The emotional focus occasionally interrupted the larger philosophical and action-heavy plot.

The Mummy Returns

Rick and Evie were already established, but the sequel adds a flirtation between Ardeth Bay and Nefertiri through reincarnation mythology that never becomes emotionally important. It bogs down things with extra romantic layering in an already overloaded supernatural adventure.

Dawn of the Dead (2004)

Zack Snyder’s zombie remake is mostly survival horror, but the hinted emotional connection between Ana and Kenneth often feels lightly inserted rather than essential. The film’s strongest focus stays on siege tension and collapse.

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

Sam and Mikaela’s relationship returns as emotional glue, but much of it feels overshadowed by giant robot warfare, mythology, and spectacle. Their romantic beats often came across as routine blockbuster obligation.

The Last Samurai

Nathan Algren’s implied romantic tension with Taka adds an unnecessary emotional thread to a story already centered on war, grief, and cultural conflict. It remains understated but noticeably shoehorned.

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

Indy’s reunion with Marion revives an old romance, but much of it feels inserted between alien mythology, chase scenes, and family revelations. Their chemistry matters less than the larger adventure surrounding them.

War of the Worlds (2005)

Steven Spielberg’s alien invasion thriller is driven by survival and family panic, but the brief rekindled emotional tension between Ray Ferrier and his ex-wife Mary Ann adds little beyond background motivation.

Independence Day

Romantic subplots involving David Levinson and Constance, along with Steven Hiller and Jasmine, feel forced. Many viewers remember the alien invasion spectacle far more than the love stories surrounding it.

15 Times James Bond Drove a Car That Wasn’t an Aston

While 007 will be forever linked to Aston Martin, he has spent plenty of time behind the wheel of other memorable cars. Across the franchise, Bond has driven everything from practical sedans and muscle cars to Lotus sports cars, BMWs, and even surprisingly humble vehicles during escapes, chases, and undercover missions.

Many of these vehicles were sleek gadgets built for espionage, with others being rentals, stolen rides, or whatever got him out alive. While the DB5 became the icon, Bond’s garage is far more varied than many fans remember. These are some of the best times James Bond drove a car that was definitely not an Aston Martin.

Dr. No (1962)

Bond’s first major on-screen car was not an Aston at all. Sean Connery drives a blue Sunbeam Alpine during the mountain road chase, making it the first true Bond car in franchise history.

From Russia with Love (1963)

Before Aston Martin fully became Bond shorthand, he drove a Bentley Mark IV. It matched Ian Fleming’s literary Bond and reinforced the spy’s early association with classic British luxury.

Thunderball (1965)

In the Bahamas, Bond uses a large Lincoln Continental. It stood out because it was bulkier and less sporty than his usual sleek vehicles, but still fit the film’s stylish travel-heavy setting.

You Only Live Twice (1967)

Bond’s Japanese mission included one of the franchise’s coolest non-Astons. The Toyota 2000GT became a standout symbol of stylish 1960s engineering during the film’s Tokyo-set action.

Diamonds Are Forever (1971)

During a memorable Las Vegas chase, Bond drives a Ford Mustang Mach 1 through narrow streets and famously squeezes through an alley on two wheels. It became one of the film’s signature stunts.

Live and Let Die (1973)

Roger Moore’s first Bond outing gave him a Chevrolet Impala Convertible. It lacked gadget glamour, but fit the grounded travel and espionage tone of the early investigation.

The Man with the Golden Gun (1974)

Bond steals an AMC Hornet during a Bangkok pursuit. The car is best remembered for the famous corkscrew jump, one of the franchise’s most recognizable practical driving stunts.

The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)

Possibly the most famous non-Aston Bond car, the Lotus Esprit transformed into a submarine. It was absurd, stylish, and instantly became one of the franchise’s defining vehicles.

For Your Eyes Only (1981)

Bond escaping danger in a tiny Citroën 2CV felt intentionally unconventional. The humble French car became unforgettable because of how wildly different it was from his usual high-performance rides.

Octopuss (1983)

Roger Moore’s Bond gets behind the wheel of an Alfa Romeo GTV6, giving the film a stylish European sports-car moment that broke from the British-first identity.

The Living Daylights (1987)

Though the film includes an Aston Martin V8, Bond also drives an Audi 200 Quattro. It showed the colder, more grounded Timothy Dalton era leaning into practical espionage vehicles.

GoldenEye (1995)

Pierce Brosnan’s Bond drives a Ferrari F355 in the film’s opening sequence. It helped define his smoother, more luxury-focused era before BMW became more strongly tied to his version.

Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)

This remote-controlled BMW 750iL became one of Bond’s most gadget-heavy cars. The parking-garage escape remains one of the most inventive driving sequences in the series.

The World Is Not Enough (1999)

Bond’s BMW Z8 had sleek design and missile-equipped flair. Though its screen time was short, it remains one of the most remembered cars of Brosnan’s run.

Casino Royale (2006)

Daniel Craig’s Bond briefly driving a Ford Mondeo was unusually ordinary by Bond standards. That contrast fit Casino Royale’s grounded reboot, emphasizing a rougher and more practical 007.

15 Characters Who Survived Purely Because the Plot Needed Them To

When watching a piece of entertainment, be it a movie or a show, we know that the main character will survive. And, in a lot of cases, we know the main character will win. We don’t need strange surprises, we just need for the plot to make sense, and we can easily suspend our disbelief.

However, when the plot doesn’t make sense, we start to wonder why we are even here. We want the hero to struggle and to win, yes, but if the path to victory is too contrived, nothing really feels achieved. These are the characters that only made it as far as they did because, in all honesty, the plot needed them to.

Sarah Connor

By the climax of Terminator 2, Sarah Connor deals with gunfire, explosions, and close-range attacks from the nearly unstoppable T-1000. Her resilience fits the story, but several escapes felt possible only because the future still depended on her.

Glenn Rhee

Glenn appeared to be devoured by walkers in a notorious fake-out, only to survive by hiding beneath a dumpster. The reveal became one of television’s most debated examples of survival because the story still needed him.

John McClane

Across Die Hard, McClane survives explosions, falls, glass injuries, and shootouts that would likely kill most people. His toughness is iconic, but his endurance often felt possible only because he had to finish the movie.

Indiana Jones

Hiding inside a lead-lined refrigerator to survive a nuclear blast remains one of cinema’s most mocked survival scenes. Indiana Jones escaping that explosion felt far less like luck and far more like plot necessity.

Ethan Hunt

Whether hanging from aircraft, surviving brutal crashes, or escaping collapsing structures, Ethan Hunt repeatedly walks away from impossible scenarios. His franchise thrives on spectacle, but his survival often depends on being the only one who can continue the mission.

Arya Stark

After being stabbed multiple times and falling into filthy water, Arya somehow recovered quickly enough to continue her arc. Many viewers questioned how she survived injuries that looked immediately fatal.

Dominic Toretto

As the franchise escalated, Dom survived fiery crashes, collapsing roads, and physics-defying stunts that increasingly ignored realism. By later films, his durability felt tied less to logic and more to his central role.

Jack Sparrow

Jack Sparrow gets involved in naval battles, sword fights, hangings, and impossible escapes that would kill most people. His luck is part of the joke, but many survival moments clearly rely on keeping him central to the franchise.

James Bond

For decades, Bond survived impossible escapes involving collapsing bases, explosions, and absurd combat odds. Long before his final fate in No Time to Die, his survival often relied on classic spy-thriller plot armor.

Katniss Everdeen

Katniss is somehow able to survive arrows, explosions, and battlefield chaos while remaining the rebellion’s symbol. Her skills explain part of it, but several near-death escapes clearly depended on preserving the story’s central figure.

Walter White

Walter White navigates through cartel threats, shootouts, poison plots, and increasingly reckless decisions while enemies around him fall. His intelligence explains some of it, but much of his longevity felt tied to the story needing Heisenberg alive.

Jack Bauer

Across 24, Jack Bauer survives torture, explosions, assassination attempts, and extreme physical punishment while still saving the day. The show built tension well, but his survival often stretched credibility because the clock needed him.

Tommy Shelby

Across gang wars, assassination attempts, and political betrayals, Tommy Shelby escapes death while allies and rivals do not. His strategy matters, but the frequency of near-impossible survival made him a clear example of protagonist plot armor.

Lori Strode

In later Halloween films, Laurie goes through brutal attacks, falls, and seemingly fatal wounds while continuing to confront Michael Myers. Her resilience became part of the mythology, but often looked like obvious slasher-era plot armor.

Peter Quill

Star-Lord survives explosions, alien combat, and dangerous space scenarios, including near-fatal exposure in space. Some rescues are explained, but his repeated survival often reflected how central he remained to the team’s story.

Obsession’s Mega Success Speaks to the Exhaustion with ‘Lonely Male Epidemic’ Online Culture

This article contains Obsession spoilers.

In its second weekend at the American box office, Curry Barker’s absolutely sinister Obsession went up in its grosses. By 26 percent. That does not happen often with a wide release, particularly one that overperformed like this Focus Features release. Indeed, the movie blew past industry expectations when it debuted at $17.2 million last week, ahead of its now astonishing $27 million across Memorial Day weekend.

This is rarefied air for an extremely indie horror movie that cost less than $1 million to produce (Focus acquired Obsession after a TIFF bidding war last year), putting it in the company of zeitgeist-defining chillers like The Blair Witch Project in 1999 and the Paranormal Activity phenom of 2007. It also speaks to how much Barker is communing with the increasingly online moment his film’s released in.

Barker of course knows a thing or two about the digital world these days. About the same age as the twentysomething stars of his movie, the 26-year-old filmmaker made his big screen debut when Obsession went to Toronto. His previous film, Milk & Serial, released straight to YouTube, the website where Barker began learning his craft.

Beyond being among the first generation of directors who grew up on the video-sharing app, and with the interesting perspective that invites—as he told Den of Geek magazine in March, he got the idea for a “Monkey’s Paw” story from watching The Simpsons TV parody—Barker and stars Inde Navarrette and Michael Johnston grew up in a world that’s terminally online. Which goes a long way to explaining Johnston’s central and absolutely irredeemable protagonist in the film, Bear.

When Johnston’s Bear is introduced at the top of Obsession, the actor and the film appear eager to use the shorthand of an endless sea of movies, from Hollywood comedies to Sundance coming-age-dramas, while defining Bear as the prototypical “nice guy.” He sweetly dotes on and admires his best friend Nikki (Navarrette) from afar. Like everyone from Michael Cera to Michael J. Fox protags before him, Bear just has a crush on the girl next door, allegedly as much due to her personality as her appearance.

What is genuinely unsettling about the film is how thoroughly it deconstructs the nice guy fantasy, as well as the other delusions of those who entertain it, particularly in its modern online manifestation as the “lonely male.” As the original “Monkey’s Paw” short story warned, one should be careful what you wish for, which Bear finds out when he innocently wishes Nikki would “love me more than anything in the whole world” while breaking a novelty toy called “One Wish Willow.” That is an incredibly relatable mistake to any gender or orientation. What makes Obsession so mercilessly cruel to both Bear and Nikki is that Bear will spend the rest of the movie immediately recognizing the unintended evil of his wish… and choosing to do nothing to make it right.

Even in the fateful sequence of “the wish,” Barker’s screenplay makes the contrast immediate, with Nikki sitting in the dim glow of the cabin lights in Bear’s car, crystal clear about the door she’s leaving open: she asks Bear if he has feelings for her or not. Like so many introverted, shy people, Bear hems and haws, and only can articulate what he claims to want when she leaves the vehicle. Yet afterward, and after his wish, Nikki returns as a shadow of her former self, literally submerged in darkness when she begins stalking Bear’s steps.

While the full nature of the horror at play is not instantly traceable, it is abundantly clear this is not the same woman Bear purports to love. And by the time he takes her to bed, she seems like a wholly different person. Bear isn’t making love to the girl of his dreams; he is just possessing a fantasy, even as it seems self-evident something otherworldly has possessed her.

Before the film’s halfway point, the full context becomes unavoidable. The dark, magical logic of Obsession reveals where the real Nikki is in the absence of her soul. When an eventually creeped out Bear calls the company behind One Wish Willow to ascertain if he can “amend” his wish—not revoke it, at first, but just make his new doll act more like his idea of Nikki—he is told by a voice on the other end of the phone that he can hear from the real Nikki right now.

It’s unclear where the “sunken place” at the heart of Obsession’s allegorical tale is located, but when Nikki picks up the line, it sounds an awful lot like fire and brimstone Hell. She is screaming.

… And Bear does nothing afterward but feel bad about it.

To be clear, Obsession confronts its protagonist with a similarly Old Testament sense of action and consequence. Like Job, his suffering and doom seems far greater than any mistake he could have made. The horror, then, of Obsession is not just the unintended consequences, but how Bear decides to react to the revelation. He is told the only way to free Nikki from the torments of Hell is to kill himself. It might not be fair for Bear, but it’s a lot less fair for the woman he purports to love to be hollowed out into a Stepford Wife sex doll.

Nevertheless, Bear attempts to carry on the charade that he is dating Nikki and might be able to find some pittance of happiness with this shell of a facade in his life and in his bed—even after the real Nikki seemingly reaches out to him through the sleeping doppelgänger’s visage to plea with him to kill her.

Not until the fantasy becomes too unbearable—too costly for the rest of his life with Shadow Nikki eventually resorting to murder—does Bear even begin to entertain doing the right thing, and all the while lamenting to anyone who will listen that it’s not fair.

Bear could be an avatar of “nice guy” tropes from the history of cinema, but his particular brand of needy, relentless self-justification strikes a different chord in 2026. He’s the bland self-pitying manifestation of an entire online culture, on YouTube and elsewhere, that would attempt to excuse bad behavior by pointing to the plight of isolated ne’er-do-wells.

The digital age has demonstrably increased a sense of isolation across all classes and genders, but recent academic studies have specifically pinpointed a gender gap, which has been classified online as “the lonely male epidemic.” According to Gallup, the past 20 years has seen the number of men feeling lonely, isolated, and abandoned rise to 25 percent among males aged 15-34 (above 18 percent of women who reported feeling lonely in the same demographics).

That increasing sense of despondency and social isolation might be on the rise, but so is the phenomenon’s use as a justification for the growing “manosphere” subculture. This is the sizable corner of the internet that not only seeks to rekindle “traditional masculine values” but also casts suspicion if not outright misogyny toward women in general, and feminism in particular. This is the corner of the internet that has seen an increase in interest in “thought leaders” who want to repeal the 19th Amendment and women’s right to vote in the U.S. They believe “household voting” is preferable where a man makes the decision for the woman. She, in turn, stays home barefoot in the kitchen to cook and raise children.

A bit like Nikki after Bear goes to work.

Shadow Nikki is in fact the ideal trad wife. She does not see friends or family, has no thoughts about herself, and lives to serve and please Bear. She just takes it to such a naked extreme that Bear cannot stand it. She is so incapable of self-autonomy that when he leaves for the day, she urinates on herself while standing haplessly in place, waiting for his return.

Navarrette gives one of the most unsettling and fearless performances the horror genre has seen this side of Toni Colette in Hereditary. She is clingy, possessive, and paranoid to a degree well past discomfort. In an interview with Rotten Tomatoes, Navarrette said she wanted to be “unfiltered and raw with the way that there’s ugly emotions that we never want to show people.”

But those aren’t truly Nikki’s emotions. They’re a construct of what Bear thought he wanted: a body and an emotional foil that would adore him and fuck him. In fact, we only truly hear Nikki’s side of things at the very end of the movie. It is there that Bear almost does the right, hard thing. He tries to kill himself in order to save Nikki… until he gets second thoughts.

Until his last breath, Bear refuses to do the right thing. He refuses redemption and dies trying to save himself. While he takes a lot of pills in the bathroom, he immediately attempts to throw them all up. He’s a nice guy who is a coward until the bitter, bitter end.

The only reason Nikki is freed is because her shadow, possessed self ironically inflicts on Bear the same curse that he placed on her. She forces him to love her more than anything in the whole world. So it is that Bear’s mind, soul, or wherever else his conscience might live is condemned to Hell long before the rest of him gets there. What’s left is another empty shell; a pale reflection of a pale reflection of actual love.

When the possessed Bear dies in possessed Nikki’s arms, finally the real woman is set free and all she can do is scream. Her life is ruined. Her friends are dead. And she has seen the absolute bottom of a nice guy who has no bottom for his selfishness and callow excuses.

It’s absolutely revolting and the most nightmarish ending I’ve seen in a horror movie this decade. It is leaving moviegoers shaken, talking, and perhaps glad disgust at a worldwide online pity party is being given voice. And it’s screaming bloody, visceral murder.

Obsession is in theaters now.

15 People Share the Celebrity Who Was Nothing Like They Were Expecting in Person

Internet delvers love to share all kinds of stories on the internet, particularly when prompted. Some time ago, Hollywood fans got together on Reddit to discuss their encounters, pleasant or otherwise, with various celebrities. It ended up being surprising how many of these anecdotes were positive.

This might be more a case of choosing what to remember, because for every celebrity hero there has to be a villain. But that wasn’t what the redditors decided to share, keeping their tales almost completely positive. It’s a breath of fresh air to hear about famous people being nice, kind, and mindful of others.

Terry Crews Was Far Kinder Than His Size Suggested

A former college resident assistant expected Terry Crews to be intimidating, especially when knocking on his dorm room to enforce a noise complaint. The actor and athlete immediately apologized, turned the music down, and even invited him back later for snacks and company.

Elvis Presley Came Across as Surprisingly Grounded

One fan who saw Elvis Presley perform in Las Vegas in 1972 was stunned when the singer later invited him backstage. Rather than rushing through the meeting, Elvis reportedly spent time asking about his military service, family, and life, leaving a lasting impression of warmth.

John Cusack Was Reserved Until He Opened Up

A passenger seated next to John Cusack on a flight initially gave him space as he tried to remain low-key. Once conversation started, Cusack reportedly became enthusiastic, discussed training for film scenes, posed for a photo, and even remembered to send greetings.

Chad Kroeger Took Time to Talk Music

One fan met Chad Kroeger backstage when Nickelback was at its commercial peak and expected a quick interaction. Instead, the singer reportedly had a guitar tuned, listened to the fan play one of the band’s songs, then offered tips and encouragement.

Nick Offerman Turned an Accident Into a Friendly Moment

During a college book tour stop, Nick Offerman accidentally walked into an a cappella rehearsal and could have easily moved on. He stayed to listen, complimented the group, chatted casually, and signed items, reinforcing his reputation for humor and sincerity.

Brian Cranston Showed Quiet Appreciation

After recognizing Brian Cranston in public, one fan deliberately chose not to interrupt him. Later that day, they crossed paths again at a nearby bar, where Cranston reportedly paid for drinks before leaving, suggesting he appreciated respectful fans who gave him space.

Mr. T Turned a Casual Greeting Into Lunch

A group of teens working near Mr. T’s home expected little more than a wave when they spotted him outside his gated property. Instead, he invited them in for lunch, sharing grilled chicken and stories about hardship, family, and hard work.

Mads Mikkelsen Left a Strong Impression Behind the Scenes

Someone who worked with Mads Mikkelsen described him as the complete opposite of an ego-driven star. Despite his intense screen presence, he was remembered as approachable, kind, and easy to collaborate with, making him unexpectedly pleasant in a professional setting.

Ryan Gosling Quietly Helped Without Making a Scene

After one fan helped some of Ryan Gosling’s friends at a party, an awkward flat tire delayed their ride home. Gosling later arrived, thanked the person directly, and reportedly covered the tow truck and replacement tire, then disappeared without fanfare.

Adam Sandler Was Friendly but Protective of Family

A worker at the Reagan Library said Adam Sandler was notably warm and accommodating with visitors while touring with his children. His only request was that people avoid photographing or bothering his kids, showing a balance between friendliness and privacy.

Jack Black Stayed Long After the Show Ended

At a smaller concert in Kuala Lumpur, fans did not expect much beyond the performance itself. Jack Black reportedly returned to the stage afterward, joked with the crowd for nearly an hour, and even turned a playful shouted compliment into a memorable shirt exchange.

Penn and Teller Were More Relaxed Than Expected

A fan who met Penn and Teller during a New York event expected a brief, intimidating encounter. Unexpectedly, both performers were described as approachable and patient, with the most surprising detail being simply hearing the famously quiet Teller casually speak.

Mark Hamill Was Remembered for Simple Kindness

During a comic book store appearance in Maryland in the 1990s, one fan found Mark Hamill far more approachable than expected. Rather than seeming rushed or distant, he was remembered as genuinely friendly, reinforcing the warm reputation many fans associate with him.

Brad Pitt Took Time for Everyone Around Him

While filming Troy in Malta, Brad Pitt reportedly stopped for photos with an entire student group after leaving a café. Rather than brushing them off, he was described as patient and kind, especially with excited teenagers who were overwhelmed meeting him.

Renée Zellweger Showed Up to Work, Not Be Seen

During Hurricane Harvey relief efforts in Texas, workers at an animal shelter were surprised when Renée Zellweger quietly arrived to volunteer. Rather than making it public, she reportedly spent days cleaning crates, doing laundry, and transporting rescued animals alongside staff.

15 Uncomfortable Facts from Hollywood’s History

We know Hollywood for its image on glamour, fame, and larger-than-life storytelling, even when its history is also filled with darker moments that exposed the risks, scandals, and failures behind the camera. Fatal on-set accidents and unsafe stunt work led to criminal cases, industry cover-ups, and productions that ended in tragedy.

Many of these incidents changed laws, careers, or public perception forever. Some happened during the silent era, yet others unfolded in modern blockbuster filmmaking. Together, they reveal a harsher side of an industry built on illusion, where behind some of cinema’s biggest names were stories of controversy, danger, and real-world consequences.

Vic Morrow’s Death Led to Child Labor Charges (1982)

After the Twilight Zone: The Movie helicopter crash killed Vic Morrow and two child actors, investigators found the children had been hired illegally for a dangerous nighttime shoot without proper permits.

Uma Thurman Was Injured During Kill Bill Filming (2003)

Uma Thurman later revealed she was pressured to drive a damaged car herself during Kill Bill filming. She crashed into a tree, suffering lasting injuries and reigniting debate about stunt safety and trust.

David Holmes Was Paralyzed on Harry Potter (2009)

Stunt performer David Holmes, Daniel Radcliffe’s longtime double, was left paralyzed after a rehearsal accident during Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. The injury became one of modern filmmaking’s most tragic stunt incidents.

Fatty Arbuckle’s Career Collapsed After a Scandalous Trial (1921)

Silent comedy star Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle was accused after actress Virginia Rappe died following a party. Though acquitted, the scandal wrecked his career and became one of Hollywood’s earliest moral panics.

A Camera Assistant Was Killed on Top Gun (1985)

Art Scholl, an acclaimed aerial cameraman, died while filming Top Gun after his stunt plane entered a spin over the Pacific Ocean. His body and aircraft were never recovered.

A Train Killed Crew Member Sarah Jones on Midnight Rider (2014)

Camera assistant Sarah Jones died after a train struck crew members filming on a trestle for Midnight Rider. The case led to criminal consequences and became a rallying cry for crew safety reform.

A Stuntwoman Died on Deadpool 2 (2017)

Stunt performer Joi Harris died during a motorcycle stunt on Deadpool 2 after crashing into a building in Vancouver. The accident raised questions about stunt preparation and safety protocols on major productions.

The Wizard of Oz Injured Multiple Performers (1939)

Margaret Hamilton suffered severe burns during a fire effect, while Buddy Ebsen had a dangerous reaction to aluminum makeup and left production. Hollywood’s beloved classic had a far rougher production than its image suggests.

Noah’s Ark Triggered a Massive Silent-Era Disaster (1928)

A huge flood sequence on Noah’s Ark went disastrously wrong, reportedly killing crew members and injuring many extras. The accident became one of the incidents that pushed Hollywood toward formal safety standards.

Gone in 60 Seconds 2 Killed Its Own Creator (1989)

Producer and stunt filmmaker H.B. “Toby” Halicki died during production when a falling water tower struck him on the set of Gone in 60 Seconds 2. It was a grim ending for a man famous for dangerous car stunts.

Delta Force 2 Had a Fatal Helicopter Crash (1989)

Five people died in the Philippines when a helicopter crashed during production of Delta Force 2. It became another reminder of how dangerous large-scale action filmmaking could become.

The Bodyguard Had a Fatal Crew Accident (1992)

A worker on The Bodyguard was crushed between lighting cranes during production. It was a lesser-known tragedy that underscored how danger on film sets is not limited to stunt scenes.

Roman Polanski Fled the U.S. After Criminal Charges (1978)

After pleading guilty to unlawful relations with a minor, Roman Polanski fled the United States before sentencing and remained a fugitive for decades, creating one of Hollywood’s most controversial ongoing scandals.

The Hollywood Blacklist Destroyed Careers Overnight (1940s–50s)

The House Un-American Activities Committee investigations led to writers, directors, and actors being blacklisted over alleged communist ties, ending careers and creating a chilling culture of fear across the industry.

Harvey Weinstein’s Fall Exposed a Long-Known Secret (2017)

Decades of allegations against Harvey Weinstein exploded into public view, helping trigger the #MeToo movement and exposing how much abuse had been tolerated or ignored inside Hollywood power circles.

10 Times an Actor Never Had to Say a Line

Great acting is not always about memorable dialogue or dramatic monologues. Sometimes a performance becomes unforgettable through body language, facial expressions, physical presence, or pure emotional intensity without needing a single spoken word. A silent character can completely dominate scenes simply through movement, reactions, or the atmosphere they create around everyone else. In many cases, the lack of dialogue actually makes the performance more powerful because audiences focus entirely on visual storytelling instead of conversation. Horror, comedy, action, and even drama have all produced iconic characters who barely spoke or never spoke at all. These performances proved that an actor can leave a massive impression without ever needing to deliver a traditional line of dialogue.

Doug Jones — Pan’s Labyrinth

Doug Jones created terrifying physical performances as the Pale Man and Faun, almost entirely through movement and posture.

Harpo Marx — Duck Soup

Harpo Marx built entire comedic scenes through silent chaos, physical comedy, and his signature horn routines.

Kane Hodder — Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood

Kane Hodder turned Jason Voorhees into an intimidating presence using only physical performance and body language.

Lupita Nyong’o — A Quiet Place: Day One

Much of the tension and emotional storytelling depended on silent reactions and physical expression.

Nick Castle — Halloween

Michael Myers became horrifying largely because of his slow movement and silent physical presence.

Ray Park — Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace

Darth Maul became one of Star Wars’ most iconic villains despite barely speaking throughout the film.

Richard Brake — Game of Thrones

The Night King became memorable through his eerie presence and expression without needing extended dialogue.

Robert Duvall — To Kill a Mockingbird

Robert Duvall’s debut as Boo Radley became memorable entirely through silence and physical presence.

Boris Karloff — Frankenstein

Karloff created horror history through grunts, movement, and expression without delivering spoken dialogue.

Crispin Glover — Charlie’s Angels

Crispin Glover intentionally removed all of his dialogue to make the Thin Man feel stranger and far more unsettling.

Florence Pugh’s Newest Project Is a BookTok Phenomenon That Could Be the Next Big Thing

An original BookTok relic The Midnight Library is being revived nearly six years after its film rights were sold. Florence Pugh will produce and star as the novel’s main character, Nora Seed, a woman who finds herself in a library between life and death and who reads alternative realities of her own life in the library’s vast catalog.

The Midnight Library was published August 13, 2020 and was a part of the first wave of #BookTok favorites alongside titles like The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, Song of Achilles, and It Ends With Us. #BookTok is a TikTok hashtag that became a trend and then a community in 2020, largely due to the pandemic and people trying to find ways to pass the time. Reading became an extremely popular pastime and discussions about novels on the app helped launch many books to commercial success.

Today, The Midnight Library has over 2 million ratings on Goodreads and has prompted author, Matt Haig, to release another “Midnight World” novel published May 26 titled The Midnight Train. That novel is set in the same world as The Midnight Library and follows main character Wilbur on his honeymoon with his love interest Maggie but then he “gives it all away” and “wishes he could go back and live differently.” Goodreads describes it as “a magical time-traveling love story.”

The Midnight Library was predicted to be one of the biggest deals to come out of the Cannes film festival and producers were approached by multiple studios, but where the movie will end up and for how much is still unknown.

Florence Pugh’s previously praised performances in Little Women and Midsommar have made her an actress that audiences show up to the theaters to see no matter the project. With her loyal audience and the BookTok readers in place there is potential high anticipation for The Midnight Library’s release.

Previous BookTok-to-movie adaptations that have seen high anticipation from audiences are Colleen Hoover’s novels It Ends With Us and Regretting You. But the reviews for the movies themselves were mixed and the everlasting drama and backlash between Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni lawsuit about It Ends With Us has shadowed the movies overall success.

The Midnight Library will leverage TikTok anticipation in marketing for the movie, similar to Baldoni’s heavy presence on the app when developing It Ends With Us. It is likely Pugh or other crew members of The Midnight Library will increase their activity on TikTok or even hire movie and book influencers to promote the movie in pursuit of connecting with the original audience that made the novel a successful BookTok staple. This is undoubtedly great news for fans of Pugh’s occasional series of Instagram masterpieces, Cooking With Flo.

Should The Midnight Library movie prove to be as big a success as its bidding war indicates, then new adaptations of Haig’s “Midnight World” novels could follow and create an ongoing franchise of interconnected stories based in this universe. Granted, there is no indication of there being a third “Midnight World” novel yet, but if the movie adaptation is successful Midnight Library adaptation could go a long way towards making “Midnight World” the ultimate BookTok success story.

The Success of Obsession’s Ending Came Down to Two Last-Minute Takes

This article contains spoilers for Obsession.

Original horror movie Obsession has become a massive success at the box office, generating $60.7 million in North America. But director Curry Barker has now revealed that the film’s largely-praised ending was not what he originally had in store. In fact, Obsession’s conclusion shot not one, but two major last-minute takes that changed the impact of the final moments entirely.

In Obsession, protagonist Bear (Michael Johnston) uses a $6.99 toy called a “One Wish Willow” to wish that his coworker Nikki (Inde Navarrette) would “love him more than anyone else in the world.” Upon Bear’s snapping of the Willow (which turns out to be an actual magical artifact), Nikki becomes possessed by an overwhelming obsession to keep Bear all to herself, and she goes to great lengths to do so.

The film’s conclusion is dark, but fair. Bear takes his own life in an attempt to end the consequences of his wish on Nikki. Once he dies, Nikki is free from the wish’s possession, and she gains back her free will.

But Barker told The Hollywood Reporter that he was originally set on having a “Romeo and Juliet ending” in which both Bear and Nikki die within moments of the other. Ultimately, Barker’s dad and other people around him convinced him to change it to the conclusion now seen in theaters. In the original ending, Nikki would end her life as well after regaining her free will and seeing all of the damage and trauma around her.

Barker ultimately decided to shoot both endings, but he only shot what would become the official ending in one take, thinking he wasn’t going to use it. Navarrette’s performance in that one take was “so raw,” however, it became another contributing factor in his decision to use it. Navarette said in an interview with MovieWeb that it was her “favorite thing” they filmed. “I could do that for the rest of my life.”

Narvarette further discussed the alternate ending, describing Nikki as a “final girl” who “wouldn’t do that [end her life].” She said Barker decided the audience needed to “sit” with her in that grief. Barker said to Variety, “We just decided that it would be more brutal if she stays alive.”

Barker explained his reason for the “Romeo and Juliet ending” wasn’t entirely about what Nikki sees around her, but about the trauma of losing control of her bodily autonomy to the curse. He says that ending was intriguing to him because “she was taking control for the first time in a while.”

Another slight change that was improvised by an actor and that made it into the official ending was Bear’s immediate regret after swallowing the bottle of pills to end his own life. In the script Barker said Bear “accepts his fate” but Johnston proposed the idea of Bear “still not being able to do it [end his life].” He then depicted Bear sticking his fingers in his throat trying to throw the pills back up in an ultimately futile attempt to survive.

The official ending is compelling and was ultimately the correct decision on Barker and company’s part. Nikki is released from the wish’s purgatory to see Bear dead in her arms and another friend of hers shot dead by her moments before. Instead of letting that trauma take Nikki’s life, the film has her live in it and makes the audience wonder, “What now?”

Barker has slightly teased a director’s cut featuring his original alternative ending, which would make the movie “20 minutes longer” and give the audience a glimpse of Nikki regaining control of her autonomy and Bear being less of a coward… but he’s still a pretty big coward.

Obsession is in theaters now.

House of the Dragon Star Finds Season 3 Inspiration in Gritty a Scorsese Classic

Even by Game of Thrones standards, House of the Dragon is old. Based on George R. R. Martin‘s 2018 history of Westeros, Fire & Blood, House of the Dragon takes place two full centuries before the events of Game of Thrones, pushing it even further away from our current time and place (though admittedly technology and culture seems pretty stagnant in Westeros).

Yet, no matter how far and away into a fictional Medieval-style past the series goes, House of the Dragon is still made by modern actors, trying to appeal to modern audiences. So it shouldn’t be too much of a surprise to hear House of the Dragon star Ewan Mitchell compare his character to one of the icons of 20th century cinema. Still, we can’t help but raise an eyebrow when he told Entertainment Weekly that he found inspiration for playing one-eyed sadist Aemond Targaryen in Martin Scorsese‘s New Hollywood classic, Taxi Driver.

In particular, Mitchell admires the way protagonist Travis Bickle (Robert De Niro) “deceives you as a viewer” through the movie. “How on earth could I ever think that I understood that character in the first place?” he asks of Bickle. “You barely recognize him.”

It’s hard to find too many other points of comparison between Aemond and Bickle. The son of King Viserys I Targaryen and Queen Alicent Hightower, portrayed in the show by Paddy Considine and Olivia Cooke, Aemond lives in the shadow of his older brother Prince Aegon, and the two stand together against their half-sister Rhaenyra Targaryen to claim the Iron Throne. Instead of banding together against a common enemy under the leadership of their mother Alicent, who once was best friends with Rhaenyra, Viserys’ two sons have a rivalry against one another.

Part of the animosity stems from childhood jealousies, when Aegon joined Rhaenyra’s children Luke and Jace in mocking Aemond for not bonding with a dragon. The young Aemond rectified the problem by bonding with Vhagar, the Queen of All Dragons, the largest living dragon in the show’s present. Emboldened by the bonding, Aemond stands up to Rhaenyra’s children when they demand Vhagar, resulting in a battle that costs him his eye.

As Aemond One-Eye, he acts like a dangerous loose cannon in the world, even using Vhagar to attack his brother. But Mitchell’s Scorsese comparison suggests that there’s something more to the imposing warrior. Directed by Scorsese and written by Paul Schrader, Taxi Driver focuses upon a nondescript man completely out of touch with society. Bickle has recognizable human desires for love and admiration, but they manifest in odd behaviors, like taking a date to an adult theater or the vigilante violence he enacts at the end.

Taxi Driver has a famously ambiguous ending, in which Bickle’s rampage to rescue an underage sex worker (Jodie Foster) is lauded in the press and results in her safe return to her home. However, the extreme reaction to Bickle’s reaction, combined with his attempts to harm himself at the end of the movie, have led many to believe that it’s all a fantasy. The possibility of fantasy only further separates Bickle from society, proving that even his moral behavior looks frightening from the outside.

More than just film bro pretensions, Mitchell’s allusion helps him advance the themes of the show. “I feel like it is a horror TV show, but the monsters are the human beings in it,” he says of House of the Dragon. And monstrous humans can be found everywhere, in the fantasy world of Westeros and in the gritty streets of New York.

House of the Dragon season 3 premieres at 9 p.m. ET on HBO on June 21, 2026.

X-Men ’97 Prequel Comic Puts Two of the Most X-Treme Characters in the Spotlight

The X-Men debuted in the early 1960s, and the comic achieved its creative peaks throughout the late 1970s and the 1980s. But for most people, the X-Men are the ultimate ’90s comic book. During the ’90s they became the premier superhero franchise, expanding to not just several spinoff comics with teams such as X-Force and X-Factor, but also to television, with the hit animated series that ran from 1992 to 1997. The cartoon solidified the lineup with some characters forever associated with the 1990s, including Jubilee and Gambit.

The first season of the sequel series X-Men ’97 brought these characters back, frozen in their radical form from decades ago. While that season took one of these ’90s characters off the board, another will get more development, starting with the comic that bridges the gap between seasons 1 and 2. “There’s so much discussion about whether Jubilee is ‘stuck’ in the ’90s because of her association with the show, but [X-Men ’97] has shown the ability for her to mature within the original framework of her character,” said Steve Foxe, writer of the Marvel Comics miniseries, X-Men ’97: Season Two.

Although she debuted (appropriately enough) in a mall-based story in 1989’s Uncanny X-Men #244, written by Chris Claremont and penciled by Marc Silvestri, Jubilee came to the forefront when Jim Lee took over penciling duties. Outfitting her with the yellow/green/red color scheme of Batman‘s ward Robin, Jubilee became Wolverine‘s sidekick, a spunky counter to his grim demeanor. When X-Men: The Animated Series went into production, the teenage Jubilee made for the natural audience surrogate, forever cementing her legacy with the line, “Does a mall babe eat chili fries?”

Since the ’90s, Jubilee has certainly gone through some changes, getting depowered by the Scarlet Witch and getting a supersuit to become Wondra of the New Warriors, being transformed into a vampire, and becoming the adoptive mother to a son, Shogo. However, Jubilee always seems to return to her original roots, as a smart-mouthed kid with the ability to shoot fireworks.

In X-Men ’97, Jubilee was paired with Sunspot, the reluctant mutant who hoped his family’s riches would shield him from bigotry. He quickly learned that wasn’t the case, and eventually bonded with Jubilee and the X-Men—just in time for the main team to be scattered across time. “As she faces down a world without the X-Men, she’s going to have to step up like never before,” teased Foxe.

The time-travel adventure that will be the prime story of X-Men ’97‘s second season gives Foxe the opportunity to play with another character forever tied to the decade. Foxe calls Cable “a character I’ve ALWAYS wanted to write more of,” because “he’s got the weight of a time-spanning destiny on his broad shoulders, and that can make a man very dangerous.”

Few mutant characters represent the ’90s better than Cable, who first appeared in 1990’s New Mutants #87, by Louise Simonson and Rob Liefeld. Initially a silver-haired time-traveller with a smattering of ’90s accoutrements—including giant guns, robot parts, and so many pouches—Cable was soon revealed to be Nathan Summers, the son of Cyclops and Madelyne Pryor (a clone of Jean Grey), sent to the future as an infant.

Because he’s most associated with X-Force, Cable only made guest appearances in the original X-Men cartoon. And, like Jubilee, he has gone through his own evolution, becoming the surrogate father to the young mutant Hope and even being killed and replaced by his teenaged self. But every time, Cable returns to his status quo, all gargantuan guns and ostentatious pouches.

As Foxe notes, that suits X-Men ’97 just fine. The series allows writers to explore aspects of the characters without removing them from the time frame in which they work best. Now if Foxe could only do something with the most ’90s mutant of all, Adam X, the X-Treme…

X-Men ’97 season 2 streams on Disney+ in 2026.

Spider-Man: Alfred Molina Could Return as Doctor Octopus, But He Really Shouldn’t

Poor Peter Parker, he can never get rid of his worst enemies. Take Doctor Otto Octavius, a.k.a. Doc Ock. Since the green-clad baddie debuted in Amazing Spider-Man #3 way back in 1963, he has died a few times, once to be replaced by a young woman and again to swap bodies with Spider-Man. And yet, every time, Doc Ock comes roaring back—silver tentacles, green jumpsuit, and bowl haircut all intact.

Given that history, it makes sense that the greatest actor to ever portray Otto would follow his character’s lead for an unlikely encore. “If they came knocking on my door and said we’d love you to do it again, I would do it again, no doubt,” Alfred Molina told Variety. Molina’s performance as Doctor Octopus in 2004’s Spider-Man 2 may be one of the greatest villain showcases put to screen, and Spider-Man movies do continue to happen. But another helping of Molina as Doc Ock would be a pain to everyone, not just Peter Parker.

Doctor Octopus belongs among comics’ greatest antagonists precisely because of his simplicity. He’s a mad scientist who thinks that no one respects his genius. His name is Otto Octavius, and he gets four sets of tentacles fused to his back. He makes grand pronouncements about how everyone else is a fool, and how he possesses true might. Over the years, writers have added depth and pathos to the character, blossoming a plot to marry Aunt May for her fortune into something like a proper romance and turning his multi-year run as the Superior Spider-Man into a referendum on Peter Parker’s heroism.

But the best stories add that depth without undermining that essential simplicity, as demonstrated in Spider-Man 2. Molina played Octavius as a romantic and a visionary, someone who believed that his inventions could put the power of the sun in the palm of his hand, someone who shared a love of poetry with his wife. But he’s also a guy who put on a fedora and a trench coat to steal giant bags of money and who scaled the sides of buildings like he was King Kong.

Like director Sam Raimi, Molina balanced the two parts of Octavius to make Spider-Man 2 into one of the greatest superhero movies of all time. So it’s no surprise that Marvel and Sony would ask him to return for Spider-Man: No Way Home, which Molina describes as “great fun.”

But a character who has lasted over six decades has to be reinterpreted often, and Doc Ock is no different. As much as Molina’s take had aspects of an old-school supervillain, it would be fun to see someone else go further, tossing aside the romance and kindness to just be a bad guy who wants to make crazy inventions. A different actor could portray the post-Superior Spider-Man version of Doctor Octopus, the one who has seen what it’s like to be a hero and, after being bested by Peter, wants to outdo him as a good guy as well. Heck, it would be great to see a live-action version of Liv Octavius from Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (although not played by Kathryn Hahn, sadly, who already has a Marvel assignment), or even Lady Octopus, who took Otto’s place after one of his deaths and continues to be a headache for Spider-Man.

Again, none of this is to denigrate Molina and his performance. It’s just that Doctor Octopus can go in many directions, and it would take another actor to accomplish the reinvention. To his credit, Molina seems to agree, telling Variety, “I think we might have to just leave Doc Ock in a nice prominent place in the rogue’s gallery of villains.”

Hopefully, that’s true, and his incredible work can serve as inspiration for another actor to try and outdo him—which is the perfect mindset for a Doctor Octopus to have.

Vought Rising Trailer, Release Date, Story, and Characters Explained

Following the conclusion of its popular mothership show, the world of The Boys is going back in time to the 1950s with a new prequel series called Vought Rising. Jensen Ackles will reprise the role of Soldier Boy in the upcoming Prime Video project, which will explore the charismatic Supe’s adventures long before Butcher and co. encountered him.

We’ve got everything you need to know about Vought Rising right here, minus the finer details of what Clara would have wanted, so let’s get you prepped on what to expect when the show debuts next year.

Vought Rising Story: Why Soldier Boy Is Who He Is

Revolution’s Paul Grellong serves as the showrunner for Vought Rising, which The Boys creator Eric Kripke describes as a murder-mystery. Set years after Soldier Boy’s time at the Fort Harmony WWII base, where Frederick Vought, the founder of Vought International, worked and conducted V1 serum experiments, Vought Rising will explore the origins of his powerful company and also catch up with Soldier Boy as he grows closer to Vought’s wife, Clara, a.k.a. Liberty, a.k.a. Stormfront.

“It has this sort of lovely, almost noir-like murder mystery — not Black Noir but actual noir. There are detectives and twists, and there’s a murder that then opens up into a bigger conspiracy.” Kripke told THR about the show’s vibe.

Kripke also said that the creators are aiming for “a very gritty version” of the 50s, adding, “Most people’s feeling, or sense memory, of the 50s is from movies, which are very sanitized. Even L.A. Confidential, as much as I love it, is, visually, a pretty clean movie. We wanted dirty and grimy. There would be heroin dens, gay bars, and this underbelly of popular culture at the time.”

Ackles has also spoken about how the Soldier Boy we know today will differ from the one in Vought Rising, who still wants to be a real hero. He told EW that, “In The Boys, in modern times, [Soldier Boy is] a fish out of water. He’s an analog guy who’s trapped in a digital world. So now we see him in his element. We see what made him who he was.”

Though Kripke has declined to comment on whether the events of Vought Rising will set up the re-emergence of Soldier Boy in the present day, we would note that The Boys deliberately put the character on ice rather than killing him in the finale, leading many fans to suspect that Soldier Boy may be the future of The Boys, as well as its past.

Stan Edgar, who also brought Clara out of retirement as Stormfront in season 2, also lived to take over Vought International, so we could very well see these characters together again in the future.

Aya Cash as Clara Vought in Vought Rising

Vought Rising Characters Explained: New and Old Faces

Soldier Boy will often go by his real name, Ben, in Vought Rising, and he’ll be joined by a new crew that includes Bombsight (Mason Dye), Torpedo (Will Hochman), and Private Angel (Elizabeth Posey).

We’ve already met Bombsight on The Boys and know that he’s despised Ben for a long time. It sounds like he won’t be alone in feeling that way. “Soldier Boy was the only one who bought his way into the program as a rich kid, I don’t think really understanding how dangerous it was at the time,” Kripke told EW. “So everyone hated him. Even when you meet the other heroes in Vought Rising, they’re all pretty much rolling their eyes at this rich boy.”

Little is known about the other two Supes, Torpedo and Private Angel, but the former sports a Golden Age-style aquatic-themed suit, and the latter has apparently grown wings. We’ll definitely learn much more about these early immortal V1 recipients in Vought Rising.

Following her apparent death in season 3 of The Boys, Aya Cash will also return as an earlier version of Clara Vought. She was the first successful recipient of V1, and is a fascist Supe with ties to the Nazis who often uses her powers to torture and kill minorities. Though the prequel series won’t ask viewers to sympathize with her this time around either, Ben will most likely find her rhetoric irresistible.

“In no way will I ever ask the audience to sympathize with Stormfront. She’s a Nazi, and she sucks,” Kripke assured ScreenRant. “Soldier Boy? I think, if [The Boys is] teasing anything, it’s teasing that he really had feelings for Clara more than he had originally let on, and that you’ll see a lot of that play out in Vought Rising.”

KiKi Layne (If Beale Street Could Talk) and Jorden Myrie (Sherwood) are also part of the show’s cast. We don’t know much about Layne’s character yet, but we have spotted Jorden Myrie getting injected with V1 and gaining superpowers in Vought Rising’s first trailer.

Additionally, Ethan Slater is tipped to return as Thomas Godolkin, Frederick Vought’s right-hand man and the mind-controlling founder of Godolkin University, who was originally introduced on The Boys’ cancelled spinoff, Gen V. “I think we’d be insane to not put Ethan Slater’s character in that show,” Kripke stated.

And for anyone hoping for some new Supernatural cameos in Vought Rising after so many popping up on The Boys, we can confirm that Lucifer himself, Mark Pellegrino, has also been added to the cast! His role has yet to be revealed, but he probably won’t be playing Satan. Though in the world of The Boys, who knows! He could be someone much, much worse.

Cecily Strong (Saturday Night Live), Eric Johnson (Fifty Shades), and Annie Shapero (House of the Dragon) have also been cast in recurring roles.

Vought Rising Trailer: A Brighter Future

Amazon released a first look at Vought Rising after the finale of The Boys dropped, and you can see it below. The trailer shows Soldier Boy donning his old-school mask and suit while giving us a glimpse of the show’s Supes in action. There’s also a traditional amount of blood and needle drops to keep fans happy!

Vought Rising Release Date

Vought Rising is now eyeing a 2027 release on Prime Video. When the streamer zeroes in on a more specific release date, we’ll let you know!