Martin bought an island in a tropical paradise, and turned it into a sonic Shangri-La. In 1979, he built AIR Studios Montserrat, a recording studio equipped with more than just state-of-the-art technology and the most pristine equipment. The studio had an atmosphere, and Under the Volcano does a fantastic job airing it. The documentary does it primarily through the music. We hear the difference in tone when someone goes through the trouble of allowing space between notes....

It’s easy to judge someone even as they sit right next to you. Young Jason Wilson (Evan Alex) is tempted to do just that in the final seconds of Jordan Peele’s Us. By his side in a car headed south is his mother Adelaide (a ferocious Lupita Nyong’o), who went into the bowels of hell to retrieve him like a maternal Orpheus with the good sense to not look back....

Vikings Season 5 Episode 13 “We are all at the mercy of circumstances beyond our control.” It’s time for something momentous to happen on Vikings, and tonight’s episode carefully arranges its character pieces, setting into motion potential game changing scenarios in Wessex, Kattegat, and Iceland. And in the aftermath of last week’s brutal murders of Cuthred and Margrethe, “A New God” presents one ruler making the best of a difficult situation while another begins a further descent into darkness....

Walker Episode 3 Walker’s “Duke” takes too long to get to the point of the episode, aka that his undercover flame is in town. That leaves us believing that Walker is just being overdramatic for about 10 minutes before the realization hits that he’s doing it to protect his family. All of it is to protect his family. And the fact that no one trusts him is infuriating but realistic at the same time....

Luckily, Welcome to Chippendales is a more satisfying meal for the most part. Following up his success with Pam & Tommy on Hulu, creator Robert Siegel is back at it on the streamer with a new tale of greed and strife based on the book Deadly Dance: The Chippendales Murders by K. Scot Macdonald and Patrick MontesDeOca, and he brings together yet another stellar cast for this fresh-but-murky American crime story following the rise and fall of Chippendales creator Banerjee, who struck gold with the male stripping club sensation before letting his own paranoia, envy, and egotism ruin everything....

Welcome to the Blumhouse Trailers With their announcement of the Welcome to the Blumhouse collection, the studios wasted no time whetting appetites with a teaser trailer. Watch it, along with the newly-released individual trailers for the first four films, just below. On another note, fans of 1990s MTV-rotated alternative rock (and a certain Masters of the Universe-mocking meme video,) undoubtedly did a double-take at the song featured in the trailer. That’s because said song happens to be a dark re-imagining of 4 Non Blondes’ 1993 hit, “What’s Up,” by genre-transcendent Canadian artist FJØRA....

Westworld Season 2 Episode 8 Last week, I drew some pushback for asserting that old William should have been retired to that great arcade in the sky after he took a bullet to the stomach. While modern medicine (never mind medicine of the future) could treat the wound, there aren’t exactly any 21st century doctors running to his aid. Rather he was left for the crows and should have provided them with a fine feast in the George R....

But when news hit that Dakota Johnson is set to star in a movie about Madame Web? That’s the kind of news that has you pause for a moment before asking, “Really? Are you sure?” Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe somebody out there did a backflip over this news. The rest of us are just scratching our heads, because…what in the world? To rewind, this all stems back from the time in-between Marvel’s Avengers doing crazy good box office and Sony’s Amazing Spider-Man 2 doing mediocre box office....

That tradition continues with the new Disney+ animated series The Bad Batch, which explores the lives of clone troopers in the aftermath of the Clone Wars. This dark period of transition from Republic to Empire was previously chronicled in the now non-canon Legends continuity, but now we have a canon interpretation of it that lines up with The Clone Wars (mostly). The Bad Batch follows a group of clone outcasts who get a first-hand look at what the Clone Army has become during the rise of the Empire....

The synopsis continues, “Beginning in a time of relative peace, the series follows an ensemble cast of characters, both familiar and new, as they confront the long-feared re-emergence of evil to Middle-earth. From the darkest depths of the Misty Mountains, to the majestic forests of the elf-capital of Lindon, to the breathtaking island kingdom of Númenor, to the furthest reaches of the map, these kingdoms and characters will carve out legacies that live on long after they are gone....

The reaction that Latcham saw then, before going on to help produce much of Marvel’s first and second phases, looks very little like the reception Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves received in 2022. With SDCC finally back to in-person gatherings, Hollywood’s first seriously budgeted attempt at a Dungeons and Dragons movie brought the big guns: stars like Chris Pine (Star Trek, Wonder Woman), Michelle Rodriguez (Fast and Furious), Regé-Jean Page (Bridgerton), Sophia Lillis (It), and Hugh Grant (every one of your favorite rom-coms from the ‘90s, and probably the 2000s too) were on hand to join the producer and writers-directors John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein in revealing Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves to the world....

For detractors of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the franchise’s interconnectedness can be a burden. Case in point: Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, which builds directly off the resolution to WandaVision. But it’s somewhat surprising that Multiverse of Madness did not at all connect to another Disney+. Loki was not only the installment that first unleashed the multiverse on the MCU but also shared a head writer in Michael Waldron....

One of his best genre outings was 1999’s Stir of Echoes, an old-fashioned ghost story set in a haunted Chicago home that Bacon made with writer-director David Koepp, based on a novel by the famed horror and sci-fi author, Richard Matheson. While Koepp has directed other films and written screenplays for some of Hollywood’s biggest blockbusters (including Jurassic Park, Mission: Impossible, the first Spider-Man and War of the Worlds), the smaller, more intimate Stir of Echoes remains a cult hit on its own....

“It’s become a lot more nuanced,” Ryan says of console sales figures. “For example, one reference point, we sold a lot of PS2s, but many of them were at $99, on a format that was very, very heavily pirated. Right now the metric is engagement, and that obviously can be judged across two axis: the number of people who engage with you, and the amount of time that each of those people spend engaging with you....

Each of these shows all took place in the same universe, with the kids all attending Degrassi Junior High or High School. Many characters carried over from one series to another and references to past episodes and storylines would make their way into stories upwards of 20 years after they first debuted. It’s part of what earned the franchise such a devoted fan base. The press release for the HBO Max Degrassi series doesn’t make it clear whether this new series will function as a reboot or continue the continuity....

This taut, suspenseful tale of vengeance is deathly serious and features one of the more stoic performances of Statham’s career. While the script certainly robs Statham of one of his trademark charms, his ability to be equal parts fun and fierce, that doesn’t mean Wrath of Man is a total drag; it’s a fairly traditional heist flick buoyed by unnerving intensity from Statham. If only Ritchie could have infused more of his typical bombast behind the camera....

“The Dark Phoenix Saga,” the classic Marvel Comics story arc written by Chris Claremont and drawn by John Byrne, is one of the most iconic Marvel tales of all time. It focuses on Jean Grey, one of the original X-Men (and Professor Charles Xavier’s prize pupil), whose exposure to a solar flare amps up her already considerable telepathic and telekinetic powers to an unforeseen degree, driving her to the brink of madness and turning her into one of the most powerful, destructive beings in the universe, while various alien races and enemies of the X-Men either seek to destroy or corrupt her....

Recently, Sony shook the gaming world by announcing that the price of the PlayStation 5 is going up in select major markets. While Sony cited current global economic struggles and supply issues as the biggest contributing factors to that difficult decision, even these tough times don’t entirely explain such an unprecedented decision. Naturally, many gamers found themselves wondering whether other video game companies facing similar economic obstacles will also be raising the price of their products....

At about 5.9 inches wide and 11.8 inches tall, and weighing in at 9.8 pounds, the console definitely has a commanding presence. Not quite PC tower (or fridge) height when in its natural vertical position, the Xbox Series X is just slightly taller than the Xbox One X if you were to stand it on its side but is nowhere near as tall as the PlayStation 5, which towers over the competition at 15....

It’s unlikely, though, that Santa Claus Conquers The Martians is anywhere on that particular festive list. Shot in the 1960s, this infamously poverty-stricken production regularly appears on “worst films ever” lists, and is generally regarded as the Plan 9 From Outer Space of seasonal pictures. But as things like mulled wine, grumpy relatives and Russ Abbott Christmas specials prove, the festive season is a time of enduring things we wouldn’t normally tolerate....