Unfortunately, Man of Steel was critically divisive, and “only” took in $668 million at the worldwide box office. A more than respectable blockbuster figure, but Warner Bros. execs had visions of the magic billion dollar number dancing in their heads after Marvel’s Avengers success the previous summer, and whatever initial plans there were for Man of Steel 2 were quickly scuttled in favor of a more aggressive team-building strategy that would fast track a Justice League movie....

Paramount announced a rather auspicious acquisition in director Antoine Fuqua’s Infinite, which stars a reliable headliner in Mark Wahlberg, joined by an ensemble consisting of Dylan O’Brien, Toby Jones, Rupert Friend, Jason Mantzoukas, Kingsman: The Secret Service standout Sophie Cookson and, notably, 12 Years a Slave Oscar nominee Chiwetel Ejiofor as the villain. The film, which originally had Marvel’s Captain America, Chris Evans, tapped as its star, was shot back in 2019, and, interestingly enough, was originally scheduled to hit theaters on May 28, 2021....

“Peter Parker uncovers AIM’s new plan to acquire technology that could make their Synthoid army unstoppable and total domination inevitable,” reads of a synopsis of the game’s Spidey DLC. “He must partner with the Avengers to stop this looming threat, and forms a tentative friendship with Ms. Marvel and Black Widow while keeping his identity hidden. As a Hero accustomed to working solo, he struggles with the new dynamics of working with a team....

Marvel’s Loki episode 3 is a big one. It’s the first episode of the series to spend the entirety of its runtime outside of the TVA offices, the first where we get to spend a substantial amount of time with the mysterious Sylvie, and the coolest visit to an extraterrestrial location we’ve had in the MCU since Avengers: Endgame. It’s a big one, and there’s lots of cool MCU things you might have missed, or might not know about from the pages of Marvel Comics…and more!...

The strength of the Marvel Ultimate Alliance games, as well as their X-Men Legends predecessors, is that they capture the pure fun of arcade beat em ups while also using light RPG elements and a cadre of unlockables to make the experience feel substantial and full of features. The latest, Switch-exclusive entry in the series, Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3: The Black Order, essentially boasts all of the strengths and weaknesses of its predecessors, but with updated rosters and nods to Marvel’s recent big-screen outings....

Brooks—the composer, lyricist, writer, and actual producer of The Producers—was in the theater that night, and as one who never ignores a confrontation, he happily came out. The 75-year-old filmmaker and lifelong funnyman asked the stranger what was the problem. “This show is a disgrace!” cried the patron. “How could you sing about Hitler?! I was a soldier. I fought in World War II!” At which point, Brooks fired back, “I also fought in World War II....

Sony has released Morbius in theaters, and we, as a society, have to live with it. Taking place in the same universe as the two Venom movies, Morbius is about Dr. Michael Morbius (Jared Leto) searching for a cure for his blood disease and accidentally turning himself into a “living” vampire. He’s a vampire in the sense that he thirsts for blood and has fangs, but sunlight and other weaknesses don’t appear to be part of his lore....

While this might be a disappointing reality for those who hoped that HBO Max would be the home for all things DC-related — after all Warner Bros. has owned DC Comics since 1969 — the third-party approach might be the saving grace for some highly anticipated series. We already know that the animated series Batman: The Caped Crusader, from Batman: The Animated Series creator Bruce Timm, The Batman director Matt Reeves, and producer J....

That being said, we are starting to get box office numbers back from the few international markets where Mulan did open in over the weekend. According to Deadline, Mulan has made just under $6 million theatrically in the few global markets it has been released in, which represented only 6% of the normal international market. The movie came in first at the box office in the UAE, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand, and had the best opening weekend of 2020 (not a super competitive category in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, but still worth noting) in both Singapore and Thailand, despite the #BoycottMulan campaign that gained some support online....

Black girls and young women are underrepresented in fantasy and science fiction. In the amorphous genre we’ll call “superhero” television (and film), there are very few, if any, major characters who are young, Black girls. We didn’t really see a Black girl superhero in live-action on TV until Jennifer Pierce gets powers and becomes Lightning in Black Lightning. And while that character is important, she’s the only one. It’s not that Black girls don’t exist in these worlds, but that they are largely relegated to supporting characters whose stories serve to further the development of a white and/or male lead—if they’re even given stories of their own....

Now, it’s Netflix’s turn. As the third rebooted “direct sequel” to the original 1974 classic inside of a decade, Netflix’s Texas Chainsaw Massacre ignores all the previous continuations and remakes in favor of offering the true follow-up to the Hooper film. Yet right down to its unimaginative title, which just repeats the name of the original movie, this inert legacy sequel from director David Blue Garcia and screenwriter Chris Thomas Devlin—who are working from a story by Fede Alvarez and Rode Sayagues—fails to do anything interesting or original with the material beyond an undercooked setup about blue states versus red states....

In Netflix, Gaiman seems to have finally found the perfect home for Sandman. In a Den of Geek interview with showrunner Allan Heinberg he says “… Neil allowed us not only to imagine what happens between panels or off-page, but he was contributing, from the very beginning, just pitching, ‘What if? What if? What if?’ There was never a defensive pose with Neil in any way,” showing that while Neil was heavily involved in the creative process, he didn’t totally dominate the writer’s room....

Campbell confirmed the news herself on Instagram when she shared the below video of the iconic Ghostface killer mask, along with the message of “Hello again, Sidney… #ImBack.” And if you click on the video, you see text of Ghostface himself welcoming Sidney back to the franchise with the ominous words of “remember me?” Campbell of course played Sidney Prescott in all four previous Scream movies beginning with the 1996 original and culminating with the severely underrated 2011 effort, Scream 4....

The gross was in line with MGM’s estimates—if on the lower side of the industry’s, which put the floor at $55 million—and the fifth highest domestic opening of 2021 thus far. However, it comes one week after Venom: Let There Be Carnage over-performed at the box office, earning $90 million in its first three days and outpacing its predecessor by about $10 million. It caused many in the media to wonder if the more “respected” Bond franchise could surpass that in just a week’s time, especially since the media embraced Daniel Craig’s swan song as 007 more readily in its reviews....

As first reported by Collider, the Obi-Wan Kenobi series starring Ewan McGregor has been placed on hold for the time being at Disney+ and the cast and crew has been sent home as the studio begins the process of retooling the project. According to reports, Luscasfilm president and Obi-Wan producer Kathleen Kennedy was unhappy with the first two scripts written for the project and now Disney+ will be seeking out new scripts....

Perhaps in an effort to increase fledgling ratings, the three women will also have a prime platform to entertain audiences both inside of the Dolby Theatre and at home by showcasing their distinctive comedy chops. While the Oscars routinely go back to the well with multi-time hosts like Billy Crystal and Jimmy Kimmel, this will be the first opportunity for all three women, and it will be exciting to see how the multi-tiered, fresh approach works....

But then there’s Paul Thomas Anderson. The celebrated director of Boogie Nights and Phantom Thread, whose 1999 ensemble film Magnolia was once heralded by the iconic Ingmar Bergman as an example of “the strength of American cinema” and who was later referred to as “a true auteur” by American Beauty director Sam Mendes, leans in the opposite direction. It’s not a new revelation, but the internet at large was once again surprised to hear that PTA is a Marvel geek this week, thanks to a fresh interview with Variety where he discussed his highly anticipated upcoming film Licorice Pizza, and the general state of cinema as it slowly recovers from the pandemic....

Arceus does a fairly good job of letting you know when and how to evolve many of the game’s 242 Pokémon (and you’ll always be able to choose whether or not you want to evolve one at all), but there are a surprising number of Pokémon in the game without immediately clear evolutionary paths. It’s certainly possible to “solve” their evolution methods through the course of natural play, but it helps to have a little better idea of what you need to do so that you can better plan your path through this massive adventure just a little better....

Quantum Leap Episode 3 Quantum Leap episode 3 has a funny title. In the opening scenes of this installment, our leaper, Dr. Ben Song (Raymond Lee), says the exact opposite line, “somebody up there must hate me,” when he lands in the body of a middle-weight boxing champ on the eve of his world championship match. Ben is quickly knocked out cold by his sparring partner, a fate which may be justly due to him as the Quantum Leap Project’s team learns more about Ben’s covert activities in the six months leading up to his unauthorized leap into history....

Quantum Leap Episode 5 Leaping through spacetime is not solely the domain of quantum physicists Ben Song (Raymond Lee) and Sam Beckett (Scott Bakula). In this week’s installment of Quantum Leap, episode five “Salvation or Bust,” an unknown leaper appears just as Ben and Addison (Caitlin Bassett) are celebrating their success at putting things right in Salvation, a diverse Old Western town built for outcasts circa 1879. The revelation that there are other leapers doesn’t require any suspension of disbelief since “other leapers,” specifically evil ones, were a part of the Quantum Leap universe thirty years ago when Sam was bounding through history....