We now know that hit animated sci-fi sitcom comedy Rick and Morty will be coming back for a fifth season in just a few months. But maybe that’s not soon enough for you. Maybe you need more Rick and Morty right now. Perhaps you just unsealed your very last packet of coveted szechuan sauce and yet you find yourself still unfulfilled! Your Funko POP! Rick sitting on a toilet just isn’t doing it for you anymore!...

If you’re lucky enough to live near Islay, Scotland, you may have heard the tale of the Islay Dragon, a myth that has inspired a new limited edition whisky from the legendary Scotch whisky distillery, Ardbeg. Ardbeg Scorch is distilled in heavily-charred American oak casks for a super-smoky flavour, and will be released on this year’s Ardbeg Day— an online celebration which forms part of Islay’s annual Fèis Ìle festival of whisky and music....

Fox had the X-Men and the Fantastic Four, Sony had Spider-Man, Paramount owned Iron Man, Universal had the Hulk, and Lionsgate had the rights to Russian spy and Avengers member Natasha Romanoff, i.e. Black Widow. All of these were in partnership with the then-fledgling Marvel Studios, headed by Avi Arad, but it was up to the individual studios to greenlight the projects. Enter screenwriter David Hayter, who had scored a breakout success by being one of the main writers on X-Men (for which he received sole credit) and its 2003 sequel, X2....

But perhaps none are more pronounced in the popular imagination than Wednesday Addams, Gomez and Morticia’s only daughter and a very, very woeful child. Originally conceived of as a “solemn” youth whose personality was defined by a gloomy yet deceptively sweet disposition, Wednesday evolved into a Goth icon by the end of the 20th century–a feat in large part thanks to The Addams Family movies directed by Barry Sonnenfeld and which starred Christina Ricci as a ruthless and possibly homicidal antihero....

We’ve all gone through that, and we’ve also experienced another curious, organic side effect of watching movies: if the film is generally firing on all cylinders, the occasional minor (or even not-so-minor) hole or inconsistency in the plot will kind of just sidle past us, like a late employee slinking past the boss’s office and hoping they don’t notice. On the other hand, if a movie fails us on some other level, those gaps or errors of logic become even more glaring....

An Americanized remake of the 2002 Hong Kong thriller Infernal Affairs, The Departed was the first remake of a foreign film to win the Best Picture Academy Award. It was also Scorsese’s first Best Picture win. He didn’t film it in New York, however, where so many of his most signature pieces are set. William Monahan’s screenplay for The Departed was loosely based on Boston’s real-life Winter Hill Gang. Frank Costello is based on Irish-American gangster Whitey Bulger, who was later played by Johnny Depp in Black Mass (2015)....

Meanwhile, somewhere, sometime, Lucy is in a room with strange old man Gideon (Peter Capaldi). She has bruises all over her face, and he is handcuffed to the table. “What’s the worst thing that you have ever experienced?” he asks. The answer to that question and many, many more are not revealed until the final episode. It’s a blessing and a curse. For a high profile and genuinely creepy mystery it keeps the audience guessing right til the end, making The Devil’s Hour extremely compulsive viewing....

The Exorcist Season 2 Episode 4 The Exorcist Season 2 Episode 4 “One For Sorrow,” finally brings all the major players to one location. Last week, former priest and perennial exorcist Marcus Keane (Ben Daniels) held his younger, more impassioned partner Father Tomas (Alfonso Herrera), from performing the rite of exorcism on a young girl. While the episode followed most of the rules of television storytelling based on available materials, it asked questions and pursued a direction that was both new, and expected....

The Expanse Season 5 Episode 7 There may be some division among The Expanse fans as to the effectiveness of this episode, particularly in its decision to focus mostly on the drama between Naomi, Marco, and Filip. Perhaps some were struck by the surprising relevance to current events of the dangers presented by a charismatic demagogue, while others found themselves wishing for more action like the battle between the Rocinante and the Zmeya or more Amos on Earth....

That all changed with the bombshell report late Thursday night that Kit Harington has signed onto what is essentially a Game of Thrones sequel where we will follow his character Jon Snow on further adventures. The Hollywood Reporter broke the story before HBO or Harington could officially announce the project—or notably provide any context, including a logline. Nonetheless, the news has left fans reeling. Another Game of Thrones spinoff is in development before the first actual greenlit series, House of the Dragon, has even hit television screens?...

The Little Things can be seen as a tainted police procedural with its murky ambiguity and troubling ending. But it’s also the story of a man for whom the allure of a charismatic serial killer goes too far. After all, serial killers make up less than one percent of homicides but they average a double-digit percentage of Hollywood crime films, and probably a majority of prison fan mail. What is it about these one-percenters we love so much?...

So that was something, huh? To those who have not yet seen The Nevers episode 6 “True” yet, the above headline may seem fairly overwrought. Really? The most surprising? Wasn’t the Invincible finale just like two weeks ago? To those who have seen the episode in question, however, that designation probably rings true. How else are we supposed to describe an hour that begins, not in 19th century Victorian era London like the show’s first five episodes, but rather in a far flung future in which 5 billion people are dead and Earth’s atmosphere is toxic?...

“Scenario: Your target has just severed the femoral artery of a woman you have been intimate with. What do you do?” Brosnan’s not-so-super spy bellows right before slicing a young woman across the thigh. He all but sneers as he leaves the rookie to clean up his mess. This is just one of several anti-Bond set-pieces in The November Man, which is an even uglier piece of work now than when it premiered seven years ago....

The Orville Season 1 Episode 5 While the latest episode of The Orville entitled “Pria” benefited from featuring the talents of the incomparable Charlize Theron, a clunky romance plot interfered with what was otherwise a series of enjoyable interactions between secondary characters. Practical jokes, adventures in engineering, innovative special effects, and even a bit of time travel (this writer’s weakness) provided wonderful moments for viewers to enjoy, but whenever Captain Mercer is the weak spot of the show, as he is all too often, it taints even the best of episodes....

Rick and Morty is fighting a losing battle with its own canon. The show has demonstrated time and time again that it prefers crafting episodic, self-contained stories to fully realize the potential of playing in a massive sci-fi sandbox. Like Rick Sanchez himself, the writers of the show understand that infinite universes (and a hefty 70-episode order from Adult Swim) means that a concept as earthbound as “story” will soon become pointless....

The first image is of the sandman himself, Morpheus the Dream King, Lord of the Dreaming, played by the hypnotically raspy-voiced Tom Sturridge (Sweetbitter). In this poster, Dream looks out at the viewer with his trademark shadowed brow and spiky hair. Across his face falls the shadow of a raven, a symbol of this incarnation of dreaming. The bird also reminds us of Dream’s messenger raven, Matthew, who will be voiced by Patton Oswalt in The Sandman....

The Simpsons Season 32 Episode 16 The Simpsons Season 32, episode 16, ” Manger Things,” is the 700th installment of the series. That’s more episodes than Rocky and Bullwinkle and Gunsmoke put together. To celebrate, they are gifting us with a second holiday episode. This one is a Christmas story of failing and redemption, like every other yuletide tale. It stars the Simpsons’ neighborinos, Ned and Maude Flanders. As Bart says, Christmas is no time to think about your neighbors, but “Manger Things” repays the indulgence....

The Simpsons Season 32 Episode 3 While it may not be a masterpiece, The Simpsons season 32, episode 3, “Now Museum, Now You Don’t” can hang in most galleries. Beyond the humor, the visuals are quite impressive, and varied. This is another story-time episode for The Simpsons, repopulating pages from history with Springfield residents. Lisa is home sick, so delirious she thinks she’s in school. Marge, ever the enabler, encourages her in her fantasia....

The Simpsons Season 33 Episode 5 With “Lisa’s Belly, The Simpsons presents something the series used to avoid, a very special episode. The Simpsons family has had their share of issues, therapeutic and otherwise, and while they always come together as a family, it is usually from a skewed angle. When Bart and Lisa overcame sibling rivalry on a hockey field, Homer’s takeaway was “they’re both losers.” Marge once commented how the Fox Network became a soft porn channel so slowly no one realized it was happening....

It’s also likely he never could have guessed his vengeful demonic metaphor would evolve into a goofy cartoon for a while, become a defender of Japan, would have a couple kids, and would become a symbol of everything from environmental responsibility to the Cold War to the economy. And I bet he also couldn’t imagine his deeply tragic film turning into an action series or a string of hi-tech military thrillers....