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08 Mar

Wonka Is Wonderful But Part of His Backstory Makes Absolutely No Sense

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Although conversation may have momentarily shifted away from Paul King’s wonderful musical Wonka and over to the short-lived waking nightmare that was Glasgow’s Willy Wonka Experience, this prequel to Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory has now come to streaming, so we can enjoy the taste all over again. As we mentioned at the time in our review, and our chats with director Paul King and producer David Heyman, it’s a good hearted, funny, and joyful romp. Timothée Chalamet is charming and captivating; Olivia Colman is wonderfully larger than life; Hugh Grant is grouchy and funny; and Sally Hawkins as…

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08 Mar

Furiosa Will Skip One Aspect of the Charlize Theron Version of the Mad Max Character

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George Miller knows a thing or two about iconic looks. After all, the Australian filmmaker defined the post-apocalypse on the big screen with his 1979 movie Mad Max and even more so with his 1981 follow-up The Road Warrior. The ragged black leather aesthetic continues to be shorthand for a bleak future, even today. (Just look at the upcoming Fallout TV series.) Miller added to his repertoire of amazing looks with 2015’s Mad Max: Fury Road. Charlize Theron’s scene-stealing Furiosa drew attention from Tom Hardy’s Max, with her mechanical arm, her greasepainted brow, and her shaved head. For the prequel…

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08 Mar

The Rarest and Weirdest Star Trek Collectibles of All Time

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This article is part of Collector’s Digest, an editorial series powered by: As one of the longest-running sci-fi franchises of all time, Star Trek has generated more than its fair share of merchandise. Before Star Wars and before the MCU, the ruler of geeky ephemera is easily Star Trek. In 2024, Star Trek is bigger than ever. Not only is it celebrating the 60th anniversary of the filming of the first episode ever — “The Cage” in 1964 — but this year is the 40th anniversary of one of the most pivotal films in the franchise ever, Star Trek III:…

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08 Mar

How Timestalker Reinvents the Rom-Com as Existential Sci-Fi

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This article appears in the SXSW 2024 issue of Den of Geek magazine. Check out all of our SXSW coverage here. Seven years in the making, spanning centuries in the telling, Alice Lowe’s latest feature, Timestalker, is a strange beast. A dark comedy, a romance through the ages, a violent sci-fi, and an existential musing on the self, it’s an ambitious romp dressed in spandex and crinoline.  “When you make an independent film, you know there’s a chance you may never make one again,” says Lowe. “Any time one happens, it’s like a miracle. And I really just thought, God, if this was…

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08 Mar

Oddity: The Haunted Wooden Mannequin Isn’t Even the Scariest Part of the Movie

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This article appears in the SXSW 2024 issue of Den of Geek magazine. Check out all of our SXSW coverage here. “A revenge ghost story with elements of a monster movie” is how Irish helmer Damian McCarthy describes his latest chiller, which is set to bring “plenty of scares and a few a few laughs” to SXSW’s late-night line-up. A supernatural horror centered around spooky trinkets, Oddity follows a blind medium (You Are Not My Mother’s Carolyn Bracken) as she uncovers the truth behind her twin sister’s death with the help of a terrifying wooden mannequin.  “She collects a lot of haunted items—she…

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08 Mar

Damsel Review: Millie Bobby Brown’s Girl Power Princess Story Isn’t Anything New

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Damsel is the kind of Netflix movie that would feel right at home in the 2010s. It may be an original fairy tale of sorts, but it pulls from the same kind of girl power feminism that drove the “edgy” retellings of popular fairy tales like Snow White and the Huntsmen and Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters 10 years ago. On the surface, Damsel might seem like a fresh and exciting take on a centuries old story. A young woman (Elodie) marries a prince to help her kingdom, but instead of living happily ever after, she gets sacrificed to a…

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07 Mar

Oscar Movies Are Horny Again and That’s a Great Thing

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Before praising the 2024 Oscars and their approach to sex, we need to acknowledge one truth. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences completely ignored one of the best movies of the year, and a movie that features one of the most frank and vulnerable sexual scenes committed to film. It, of course, involves a bathtub, where one man’s desire for another becomes clear in a way that not even he had heretofore acknowledged. What? No, not Saltburn. I said a good movie, not a loud nothing that approaches sex like a 12-year-old who just learned a few rude…

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07 Mar

Waiting for Dune 3? 21 Years Ago, James McAvoy Made a Perfect TV Version

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This Dune article contains spoilers. If the shocking ending of Dune: Part Two left you wanting more, you can actually watch Dune: Part Three right now. Kind of. Although Denis Villeneuve hasn’t fully committed to a movie adaptation of Dune Messiah, there is an often overlooked filmed version of this Dune sequel out there right now. This isn’t a bootleg or a fan film either, but The Sci-Fi Channel’s excellent Frank Herbert’s Children of Dune miniseries. This very real adaptation of Dune Messiah even stars several major Hollywood stars, including James McAvoy and Susan Sarandon, as well as Star Trek…

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07 Mar

James Bond: Everything Right and Wrong About 007 Is in Thunderball

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The biggest, most audacious James Bond movie during Sean Connery’s celebrated run as the British superspy is 1965’s Thunderball, a spectacular adaptation of the Ian Fleming novel of the same name. Thunderball sees the insidious terrorist syndicate SPECTRE steal two nuclear warheads from NATO and hold the world governments hostage for ￡100 million. After a run-in with SPECTRE operatives at a local clinic while recuperating from a recent mission, Bond suspects the warheads are hidden in the Bahamas and convinces M to investigate further. Upon arriving, Bond matches wits with high-ranking SPECTRE figure Emilio Largo (Adolfo Celi) and assassin Fiona…

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06 Mar

Star Wars: The Bad Batch Just Delivered a Dune Homage in the Best Way

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This Star Wars: The Bad Batch article contains spoilers. The squad’s back together in the latest episode of Star Wars: The Bad Batch, suitably titled “The Return.” Well, most of Clone Force 99 is back. While Echo is back with the Batch, and Hunter is begrudgingly letting Crosshair back into the fold, they’ve still lost Tech. There are already plenty of theories out there suggesting Tech’s still out there, but for the moment, his apparent death has left a hole in the fabric of the team. At its best, this Star Wars series is about family and this one’s close…

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06 Mar

The Fall Guy Is Ryan Gosling, Emily Blunt, & David Leitch’s Love Letter to Action Moviemaking

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This article appears in the SXSW 2024 issue of Den of Geek magazine. Check out all of our SXSW coverage here. The Fall Guy wasn’t supposed to be a romance. Or at least it didn’t start out that way. But when Ryan Gosling came on board to collaborate on the script, the shape of the wildly ambitious action film changed. Director David Leitch was reminded of what his cinematographer Jonathan Sela would always say: “I want to do a sweeping romance. All we do is punch people in the face. Stop punching and start kissing!” That was ringing in Leitch’s head when Gosling…

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06 Mar

In a New Aliens Comic, Paul Reiser Insists Burke Isn’t the Villain You Think He Is

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“Don’t presume you know everything.” For decades, that was actor Paul Reiser’s response whenever people would ask him about playing Burke, the Weyland-Yutani middle-manager who tried to kill the heroes of Aliens to please his bosses. Since the release of the James Cameron classic in 1986, viewers have taken Ripley’s summation of the situation to heart. “You know, Burke, I don’t know which species is worse,” she tells him after escaping from a trap he set to infect her and the child Newt with a Xenomorph. “You don’t see them fucking each other over for a goddamn percentage.” And yet,…

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06 Mar

The Underrated Steve Martin Comedy That Is Basically a Sequel to Goodfellas

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For Henry Hill, the appeal of becoming a mobster is simple. “They weren’t like anybody else. They did whatever they wanted,” he explains in the famous monologue at the start of Goodfellas. “They parked in front of hydrants and never got a ticket. When they played cards all night nobody ever called the cops.” Hank might also add to the list that they get the best deals at the grocery store, something that happens to wiseguy Vinnie Antonelli in the comedy My Blue Heaven. Noticing an unattended pricing gun, Vinnie gives himself a huge markdown on a bunch of steaks.…

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06 Mar

Netflix Made a Huge Mistake Scrapping This Rick Riordan Series

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Percy Jackson and the Olympians has been doing phenomenal numbers for Disney+ with 110 million hours streamed as of Feb. 7, according to a press release. Fans of this beloved Rick Riordan book series have been waiting nearly two decades for a worthwhile adaptation, and thanks to Riordan’s involvement and an immense amount of care from the cast and crew, Disney+ seems to have struck gold with this franchise. However, Percy Jackson and the Olympians isn’t the only mythology-based middle grade book series that Rick Riordan has written. The Kane Chronicles may not be as well-known as its Greek predecessor,…

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05 Mar

Dakota Johnson Addresses Madame Web Failure With Brutally Honest Words

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If you’ve spent any time online over the last few months, it’s really no surprise that Madame Web didn’t pull in huge box office numbers. From the “He was in the Amazon with my mom when she was researching spiders right before she died” meme that sprouted from the first trailer to Dakota Johnson’s brutally honest press tour promoting the movie, it’s been hard to take any part of this film seriously. Nearly a month after Madame Web’s release, the verdict is in, both critically and financially: it’s not very good, currently holding a 13% Rotten score on Rotten Tomatoes.…

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05 Mar

Why the Edge of Tomorrow Director Hated the Title (And How It Changed for DVD)

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It was almost 10 years ago when Warner Bros. Pictures released Edge of Tomorrow, a sci-fi thriller from director Doug Liman (The Bourne Identity) that starred Tom Cruise and Emily Blunt. Edge of Tomorrow was acclaimed at the time of its release as a more intelligent than usual, character-driven and kinetic sci-fi action movie. Yet the studio, producers, and director ended up fighting over the movie’s title before it was even released, a classic Hollywood marketing conundrum that may have hurt the film’s chances. Cruise plays Maj. William Cage, a public relations officer for the military in a future where…

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05 Mar

Like Netflix’s Spaceman? Watch This Classic ’70s Sci-Fi Movie Next

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People starting the movie Spaceman would be forgiven for thinking that their Netflix had glitched. Yes, we do see Adam Sandler’s character Jakub dressed in a space suit. But he’s not floating through the cosmos. He’s walking through a wooded stream, the greenery of the trees and bushes reflecting off his mask. What the heck does this have to do with being a space man, one might ask? By the end of the movie, directed by Johan Renck and written by Colby Day (adapting the novel Spaceman of Bohemia by Jaroslav Kalfař), Spaceman answers all your questions. Or rather, Jakub’s…

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04 Mar

Dune 3: What Happens Next in Frank Herbert’s Dune Messiah

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This Dune article contains big spoilers. Does Paul Atreides seem okay to you? He’s the unequivocal winner of Dune: Part Two. He gets revenge on the Harkonnens for killing his father, he takes over as Emperor, he marries Princess Irulan, and even gets cool superpowers from drinking the Water of Life. So why is Paul so… angry? Readers of the book Dune don’t recall Paul being such a jerk at the end of the story, and the David Lynch version ended on an inspirational note. Is Denis Villeneuve taking liberties with the Frank Herbert novel again? Yes… but also no.…

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04 Mar

Forget Doctor Doom, This Fantastic Four Villain Would Be Even Better for the Movie

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Marvel’s First Family is finally on its way to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, with Matt Shakman’s Fantastic Four hitting screens in 2025. From the ashes of Tim Story’s two noughties movies and Josh Trank’s maligned Fantastic Four, here’s hoping it’s third time lucky for Reed Richards, Sue and Johnny Storm, and Ben Grimm. Boasting an all-star cast of Pedro Pascal, Vanessa Kirby, Joseph Quinn, and Ebon Moss-Bachrach, the team is up there with the arrival of the X-Men in terms of MCU hype. While recent MCU entries have faltered at the box office, Fantastic Four has the potential to go…

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04 Mar

Why Star Wars Movies Wouldn’t Exist Without Dune

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This article contains Star Wars and Dune spoilers. When Frank Herbert published “Dune World,” the first part of what would become the novel Dune in Analog Science Fiction and Fact in 1963, it was a moment that would reverberate through science fiction for decades to come, especially on the big screen, where the story’s influence can still be felt to this day. In fact, you can easily track how Herbert’s creation led to some of the biggest blockbuster franchises of all time. If you’ve watched the excellent documentary Jodorowsky’s Dune, you know how the story goes. Alejandro Jodorowsky, the avant-garde…

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