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02 Apr

The Best Donnie Yen Movies to Watch Now

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John Wick: Chapter 4 is marking yet another chance for the West to get to know Donnie Yen, one of Asia’s top leading men. He has already been in several other major Hollywood franchises. He played the scene-stealing Force-sensitive blind master Chirrut Îmwe in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, the lure for the Asian market role in XXX: Return of Xander Cage, and Commander Tung in the Disney live-action flop, Mulan. However, in that same period when these Hollywood films came out, Yen made 10 of his own Asian-produced films where he was the leading man.  Action films are…

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02 Apr

The Super Mario Bros. Movie First Reactions Are In

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Back in the early ’90s, nerdy kids across the world thrilled at the sight of Bob Hoskins and John Leguizamo wearing robot boots and standing in front of a giant metal “M.” No, we did not understand how, exactly, those blue and gray images correlated to our favorite red and green plumbers on our Nintendo systems. But we could accept some deviation in the adaptation. After all, as the tagline promised, “This ain’t no game.” Three decades later, we’ve learned to process our collective trauma of seeing our favorite video game turned into a cyberpunk dystopian tale that made us…

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01 Apr

How Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves Brought Its World to Life

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This article is presented by Paramount Pictures. Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves features many beautiful sets, from a prison in Icewind Dale to the fiery Underdark to the splendid city of Neverwinter. Den of Geek magazine welcomed production designer Ray Chan to take us through how he brought all these beloved settings to the big screen. This was a real fun set that I’d designed where our heroes had to first navigate through the silent army of gnomes in an area in the gnomish city of Dolblunde that is filled with terracotta-style statues before climbing the steep Hill of Bones.…

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01 Apr

Why Tetris’ Cold War Origin Story Is More Relevant Than Ever

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Millions have played some version of Tetris, but nobody plays the game for its story. After all, the addictive puzzler has captivated generations of gamers with its neatly easy-to-learn, but tough-to-master, gameplay rather than its total lack of narrative. It’s not The Last of Us.  Yet Tetris does have an incredible story. It’s a tale about how a software designer named Henk Rogers and Tetris creator Alexey Pajitnov helped get the game fully out of the Soviet Union and into the hands of many of those millions of fans via the game’s legendary Game Boy port. You won’t find that…

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01 Apr

Hulu New Releases: April 2023

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Hulu’s list of new releases for April 2023 don’t feature many blockbusters, but if we dig a little, I’m sure we can find some gems. Perhaps the most promising items are on the TV side of things. Tiny Beautiful Things premieres on April 7 and stars Kathryn Hahn as “a floundering writer who becomes a revered advice columnist while her own life is falling apart.” That will be followed by comedy Am I Being Unreasonable? on April 11 and two documentaries: high school football story Algiers, America (April 19) and Tupac Shakur piece Dear Mama (April 22). The best TV…

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01 Apr

Quentin Tarantino Soundtracks Ranked from Worst to Best

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When motion pictures first transitioned to the sound era, film studios were divided about how to use music in the cinema. Should it only be diegetic (as in emanating from a source onscreen that the characters can hear)? Would non-diegetic music distract from the dialogue and characters? Universal mogul Carl Laemmle famously decreed that movies like 1931’s Frankenstein and Dracula should have no background whatsoever after their opening titles. Of course it didn’t take long for producers, and more importantly composers, to figure out that was nonsense. Musical compositions, leitmotifs, and even well-known songs can be a shorthand to heighten…

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01 Apr

Amazon Prime Video New Releases: April 2023

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As befitting its status as one of the world’s biggest companies, every now and then Amazon likes to take a big swing with its Prime Video originals. With its list of new releases for April 2023, the streamer is taking one of its biggest swings yet. Though it’s not quite as vast or expensive as fellow Prime Video series The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, Citadel (premiering April 28) is a massive, massive undertaking. Starring Richard Madden and Priyanka Chopra Jonas, this spy series is described as “an expansive and groundbreaking global event comprising a mothership series…

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01 Apr

Netflix New Releases: April 2023

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With its list of new releases for April 2023, Netflix is is hosting a 30th anniversary special for a very important pop culture franchise. April 19 sees the arrival of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Once & Always, a special that will celebrate 30 years of Power Rangers. This won’t just be your standard reunion show, however, but a full blown story in itself. Netflix’s description reads: “When Rita Repulsa returns, the Power Rangers are the only ones who can stop her! But after 30 years, can the team still be the heroes the world needs?” Ai yi yi, indeed! Other…

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01 Apr

Disney+ New Releases: April 2023

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April showers might bring May flowers but on Disney+, April brings us all a heaping dose of Jeremy Renner. That’s right, friends, Disney+’s list of new releases for April 2023 includes the event we’ve all been waiting for: Rennervations. A balm for those missing the Jeremy Renner app, Rennervations will make use of Marvel star Jeremy Renner’s last name and interest in renovation. Will the show be good? Who knows! But it sounds goofily fun enough and was a great excuse to use that photo of Hawkeye (Renner) and Captain America (Anthony Mackie) enjoying each other’s company. Elsewhere on Disney+…

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01 Apr

HBO Max New Releases: April 2023

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With its list of new releases for April 2023, HBO Max is premiering the final episodes of two major shows. First up is the continuation of Titans season 4 on April 13. Returning after a four month hiatus, these next six episodes will be the last go around for HBO Max’s gritty live-action DC series. Arriving three days later on HBO proper is the fourth and final season of Barry. Bill Hader and the rest of the Barry team wrote themselves into a fascinating corner with the conclusion of season 3. And judging by the first teasers for season 4,…

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31 Mar

Why Tetris’ Creator Never Made Tetris 2

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With over 500 million copies sold, Tetris is one of the most successful and beloved video game franchises ever. The game was even recently adapted into a seemingly unlikely movie that tells the equally unlikely story of its origins. Of course, Tetris’ lifetime sales numbers are bolstered by the numerous spin-offs and reimaginings of the original game that are still being made and enjoyed today. 2018’s Tetris Effect even managed to grab a few Game of the Year awards en route to becoming a best-seller, which is really a testament to both the creative power and sales success of this…

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31 Mar

Exploring the Dragged Across Concrete Director’s Hard-Hitting Action Movies

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Dragged Across Concrete is currently the number two streaming movie on Netflix, meaning that an entire potential new audience is discovering writer-director S. Craig Zahler’s rough, take-no-prisoners 2019 crime epic. The film’s two problematic leads, Vince Vaughn and Mel Gibson, play longtime friends turned cops Anthony Lurasetti and Brett Ridgeman, who get involved in robbing a professional thief after being suspended from duty for viciously beating a drug dealer. Desperate for money after their suspension, the two cops are soon in the midst of a disastrously escalating battle with the thief and his henchmen, with allegiances switching throughout. Through it…

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31 Mar

The Monsters of Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves – Gelatinous Cube, Owlbear, Mimic, and More!

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This article is presented by Paramount Pictures. Bringing the world of Dungeons & Dragons from the tabletop to the big screen was no simple task, with hundreds of artists, animators, sculptors, and designers from different studios working in concert to make the film’s beasts, creatures, and curiosities look as ferocious and fantastical as they deserve to. Den of Geek spoke with Shane Mahan and Lindsay Macgowan, co-owners of special effects studio Legacy Effects, and Todd Vaziri, Compositing Supervisor at ILM, who gave insight into the practical and digital effects that make Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves’ monsters and magic…

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31 Mar

Malum: A Horror Movie Remake With a Difference

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Remakes are nothing new in Hollywood, and horror movie remakes have long been a thriving part of the industry. Directors will turn their creepy, viral short films into larger studio features, like David F. Sandberg did with Lights Out, and surprise foreign genre hits will sometimes get a makeover for U.S. audiences with the original director at the helm. But you’d be hard pressed to find a modern American director who’s interested in remaking their own feature film. Enter Clive Barker protégé Anthony DiBlasi, who was certainly up for the challenge when he was approached by new genre studio Welcome…

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31 Mar

New Joker 2 Set Footage Leak Seems to Confirm Musical Rumors

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Joker: Folie a Deux, the highly anticipated sequel to the gritty DC-themed psychological thriller from 2019, is shooting in New York City and parts of New Jersey at the moment after spending some time in Los Angeles earlier this month. It’s in the Big Apple where we got our first glimpses at Lady Gaga’s take on Harley Quinn, as she led a protest outside the courthouse where Joaquin Phoenix’s Arthur Fleck is presumably being tried for his crimes in the first film. We’ve also learned that one Harvey Dent is involved in the case — we’re going to assume as…

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31 Mar

When the Batman Forever Soundtrack Conquered the World

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There are a number of reasons why Joel Schumacher’s Batman Forever is not held in higher regard by fans of the Caped Crusader’s cinematic outings. Bat nipples, swapping Billy Dee Williams out for a scenery-chewing Tommy Lee Jones as Two-Face, and a sequence in which Chris O’Donnell’s Dick Grayson demonstrates his suitability for the role of Robin via some laundry-based karate all rank pretty highly. Yet if there is one element of the movie that has stood the test of time more than anything, it’s the soundtrack. Batman Forever arrived at multiplexes in 1995, and it was a time when…

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31 Mar

Murder Mystery 2 Cast: Where Have You Seen This Lot Before?

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2019’s Murder Mystery was an international romp which saw Jennifer Aniston’s crime novel-obsessed hairdresser and Adam Sandler’s cop take a European trip and get swept up in a whodunit. It was a hit for Netflix becoming one of the streamer’s most watched movies and a sequel was greenlit which is now upon us. Aniston and Sandler are back as husband and wife Audrey and Nick but who else has returned and who has joined the cast? Where have you seen these actors before? Mystery solved! Adeel Aktar as The Maharajar British actor, Aktar is back as the Maharajar. He’s been…

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30 Mar

Star Wars Just Pulled off a Surprise Rogue One Reunion on Disney+

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This Star Wars article contains spoilers for The Bad Batch. The two-part season 2 finale of Star Wars: The Bad Batch not only serves as an emotional closer for the titular clone force’s season-long arc, it also features an unexpected Rogue One reunion. As much as Clone Force 99 has tried to avoid getting involved in the small rebellions that are starting to form across the galaxy, they keep getting into situations where they have to fight against the Empire to protect themselves and others. In the penultimate season 2 episode “The Summit,” Clone Force 99’s story once again intersects…

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30 Mar

Donnie Yen’s John Wick 4 Mission Was to ‘Be the Coolest Motherf**ker’ in the Movie

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Every great hero needs great villains, so Director Chad Stahelski stacked the deck with the world’s leading action stars when it came time to check back in to action cinema’s Continental. John Wick (Keanu Reeves) demands opponents that can match the badassery of his franchise; and real life martial artists that can act. No other director today has such a keen eye for stunts and fight choreography as Stahelski. Assembling a cast of the heaviest hitters in Hollywood is the only way John Wick: Chapter 4 could level up. For any fan of the action genre, the names of Donnie…

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30 Mar

Behind the Wild Stunts of Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves

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This article is presented by Paramount Pictures. If you’ve ever played Dungeons &. Dragons, you know it’s all about the melee combat. Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves rolled a 20 by enlisting veteran stuntman Brad Martin to oversee the stunts and fights. Martin has worked on some of the biggest action franchises in cinema, including The Expendables, Underworld, xXx, The Matrix, and more. He was George Clooney’s stunt double for Batman & Robin, along with five other films. A comrade in arms with noted stuntmen-turned-directors Chad Stahelski and David Leitch, Martin is forging his own path as one of…

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