Month: January 2019

Warning: Full spoilers for The Punisher Season 2, Episode 9 below. If you need a refresher on where we left off, check out our review for Season 2, Episode 8.

Whatever else you can say about The Punisher Season 2, it’s not lacking in the old ultraviolence department. This episode manages to up the intensity even further, turning every two-bit criminal in the city against Frank Castle and Amy Bendix. It’s a great way to cleanse the palate after several episodes focused on Frank’s darker side.

We’re obviously never going to see this version of Frank Castle fully become like the one in the comics – the one who punishes all criminals without hesitation or discrimination. Jon Bernthal’s Frank is a soldier with a more specific war to wage. Which is fine, but sometimes you really do just want to see Frank go full John Wick on some bad guys. That’s where Episode 9 comes in. Between the very one-sided shootout outside the bar to Frank rescuing Amy from would-be kidnappers, there was an added visceral thrill to the series in this installment.

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The formidable fighter and master of ice, Sub-Zero is back and ready for kombat! Here’s a first look at some Sub-Zero gameplay. Mortal Kombat will be available April 23, 2019.

Dragon Ball Super: Broly is now in theaters in the US! Tamoor and Will give their spoiler filled review of the new Dragon Ball movie featuring the legendary Super Saiyan.

Players who have yet to pick up a copy of Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 can now try its Blackout mode for free. Treyarch’s limited-time Blackout trial has begun on PS4, Xbox One, and PC, allowing you jump into the hectic battle royale mode at no charge.

The free trial runs until 10 AM PT / 1 PM ET / 6 PM GMT on January 24. To participate, you’ll need to download the Blackout trial client from either Battle.net on PC or your console’s respective digital store. PS4 players aren’t required to have a PlayStation Plus subscription, but Xbox One owners will need an Xbox Live Gold membership, while those playing on PC will need a free Battle.net account.

The trial gives you full access to all the content in Blackout mode. You’ll also earn Echelon progression while playing and unlock Black Market Tiers and loot. If you decide to purchase the title after the trial ends, any progress you’ve made during the free period will carry over to the full game. You can read more details about the free trial on Reddit.

If you’re interested in Blackout but don’t particularly care for Black Ops 4’s other modes, Activision is selling a $40 version of the game on PC that strips out Zombies and only includes Blackout and multiplayer. Like the trial client, this is only available through Battle.net.

Coinciding with the free trial, Treyarch has kicked off a new limited-time mode in Blackout, dubbed Down But Not Out. In this quad mode, any downed players will be able to rejoin the battle with each Collapse as long as at least one member of the team remains in the game. The mode is live now on PS4 and will come to Xbox One and PC at a later date.

Halo boss Bonnie Ross, who heads up developer 343 Industries, has spoken candidly about the transition from Bungie to Microsoft and some of the stumbles along the way. Speaking to VentureBeat in an interview from December that we were recently made aware of, Ross said 343 “made some mistakes along the way,” and that overall, taking over the development reigns from Bungie has been a “very humbling experience.”

She didn’t mention any specific struggles by name, but no doubt the launch challenges for Halo: The Master Chief Collection, which 343 previously referred to as a “black eye” for the franchise, are among the “mistakes” that Ross is talking about.

Ross went on to say that 343 not only considers what’s best for the Halo franchise as a universe, but also how the studio interacts with and responds to fans. Halo as a universe belongs to the fans as much as it does to 343 itself, Ross said.

“The whole team looks at this as not just our universe. It’s the fans’ universe,” she said. “How are we doing right by the fans? How are we doing right by the franchise? It is a part of our culture, this precious, precious world, and we’re responsible for taking care of it. And we want to do it right.”

Indeed, 343 has demonstrated a willingness to do right by Halo’s fans, one example being the team’s ongoing commitment to expanding and improving upon Halo: The Master Chief Collection.

Also in the interview, Ross talked about how there are countless more storytelling opportunities within the Halo universe. As fans may know, Halo 1, 2, and 3 take place over a period of time of only three months. As such, Ross said she’s excited about how many more stories there are to tell in the Halo universe.

“The fictional universe is huge. I looked at Halo as a universe, which is the most important character,” she said. “We spent a ton of time in the early days of 343 just expanding the canvas, or framing the world in which we could tell stories and making it larger, adding more characters such that we could tell stories over the next two decades.”

“I feel like it’s such a large world and universe and there’s so much stuff we can we can do so I kind of I have my dream job,” she added. “I feel like there’s so much more work to do and super excited about all the things we’re doing going forward.”

Some of Halo’s upcoming projects include the new Xbox One and PC game, Halo Infinite, as well as the TV show. “There’s a lot more Halo stories to tell. It’s such an amazing universe,” Ross said.

Ross will be honoured as the latest inductee to the AIAS Hall of Fame at the D.I.C.E. Awards next month in Las Vegas.

The J.R.R. Tolkien biopic finally has a release date. Fox Searchlight has announced that the movie about the Lord of the Rings author will arrive in theatres on May 10, 2019. The movie stars Nicholas Hoult as a young Tolkien, with the story following the man long before he came to write his epic fantasy tome.

According to Entertainment Weekly, the film will track Tolkien as a young man who came into his own at school before serving in World War I. In the trenches of France, with death and despair surrounding him, Tolkien was said to have come up with the ideas that would become The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. A number of Tolkien’s longtime friends died in World War I; Tolkien survived, came home, and wrote his defining work.

The movie will also focus on Tolkien’s wife, Edith Bratt, who is played by Lily Collins, the actress daughter of singer Phil Collins. The relationship between Tolkien and Bratt was supposedly the inspiration for Tolkien’s Beren and Luthien story, which itself inspired the Aragorn-Arwen relationship in Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings series. Tolkien and Bratt share a gravestone, and on it they’re referred to as Beren and Luthien.

The new movie, which is simply titled Tolkien, is directed by Dome Karukoski (Heart of Finland), based on script from David Gleeson and Stephen Beresford.

In addition to this film, another one is in the works that focuses on the relationship between Tolkien and Narnia writer C.S. Lewis, and how Tolkien helped convert Lewis to Christianity.

Outside of these, Amazon is producing a Lord of the Rings prequel TV show, while a massive Lord of the Rings art exhibit is opening in New York City. A new Lord of the Rings video game is also in the work, and it’s said to have an online focus.

Activision and Bungie broke up recently, with Bungie getting the rights to Destiny and announcing it will self-publish the sci-fi series going forward. Now, for the first time Destiny’s franchise director, Luke Smith, is speaking out about the breakup and what it means. OK, so Smith did already respond with a fiery tweet, but this is his first full statement on the matter.

Speaking on behalf of the Destiny team, Smith started off his note by thanking Activision for supporting Bungie and the Destiny franchise over the years. Bungie and Activision locked down a 10-year publishing deal back in 2010 for a game that we now know is Destiny. The first game was released in 2014 with a sequel arriving in 2017, in addition to numerous expansions. Activision was behind Destiny and Bungie in a big way, even if the relationship isn’t continuing. Smith also thanked Destiny support studios High Moon and Vicarious Visions, the latter of which continues to work on a new piece of content for Destiny 2. Smith teased that Vicarious Visions is “currently readying their Destiny swan song with content that will appear in the upcoming Season of [Redacted].”

After this, however, it remains to be seen if Bungie will enlist the help of other outside studios to work on new Destiny content or if Bungie will develop everything in-house. We also don’t know what this move means for High Moon and Vicarious Visions; it’s possible that the studios, which are owned by Activision, will shift to other projects within the publisher.

On a short-term basis, Smith said Bungie is committed to releasing all of the Annual Pass content for Destiny 2 that it promised to deliver. Smith also said Destiny 2’s recent Black Armory release was a learning experience of sorts for Bungie.

“We’ve learned a lot from Black Armory that we will apply to future releases, most notably that we’d like the beginning experiences of content drops to be a better point of convergence for the playerbase,” he said. “In Black Armory, we set the Power requirement for the first forge too high, and that meant it wasn’t a great chance to jump into some new content. We want to find the line between new content that many players can play, and aspirational content for players to progress toward. We’re exploring improvements to catch-up mechanics for players in upcoming seasons.”

On a longer timeline, Smith said Destiny fans can rest assured that Bungie is “committed to Destiny.” Now that Activision is out of the picture, Bungie controls its destiny (sorry).

“We created the universe and we hold its future entirely in our hands,” Smith said. “The vast majority of the team is hard at work envisioning future experiences, enemies, and ways to play the Guardian you’ve been building since 2014. We’re going to keep doing that.”

Without the help of an established, global publishing leader like Activision, it sounds like Bungie is moving fast to determine the best way forward.

“We’re thinking about what it means to be truly independent, what it means to self-publish, and crucially, what Destiny’s future can now look like for our players,” Smith said. “It was a busy Fall, and it is going to be a busy year. When I look ahead and think about Destiny and where it could go, I see a bright future, with roots in a memorable past. Not everything has been lost in the dark corners of time. See you soon.”

On the immediate horizon for Destiny are changes to Super Abilities, and fine-tuning for weapon balance in the forthcoming 2.1.4 update. A number of changes for the Black Armory are also planned for the next update; head to Bungie’s website to see a full rundown of the changes.

Destiny 3 is expected to launch in 2020, according to an analyst, who also said Bungie likely paid Activision a fee to end its publishing arrangement. In addition to more Destiny content, Bungie recently raised $100 million from Chinese internet company NetEase for non-Destiny projects, so it seems the studio is keeping itself very busy these days.

The NFL has announced who will sing the national anthem at Super Bowl LIII next month. The “Empress of Soul,” Gladys Knight, will sing the tune, following Pink last year.

Knight won seven Grammy awards and is known for songs like “Midnight Train to Georgia” and “That’s What Friends Are For.” Knight hails from Atlanta, Georgia, the site of this year’s Super Bowl at the Mercedes-Benz stadium. The NFL interviewed Knight about her singing the anthem this year, and she says she hopes the anthem carries even more weight this year given the controversy and discussion about racial inequality and Colin Kaepernick.

Knight expanded in an interview with Variety, telling the site that she’s saddened by the current climate and how the anthem is entangled in it.

“I understand that Mr. Kaepernick is protesting two things, and they are police violence and injustice,” she said. “It is unfortunate that our National Anthem has been dragged into this debate when the distinctive senses of the National Anthem and fighting for justice should each stand alone.

“I am here today and on Sunday, Feb. 3 to give the Anthem back its voice, to stand for that historic choice of words, the way it unites us when we hear it and to free it from the same prejudices and struggles I have fought long and hard for all my life, from walking back hallways, from marching with our social leaders, from using my voice for good–I have been in the forefront of this battle longer than most of those voicing their opinions to win the right to sing our country’s Anthem on a stage as large as the Super Bowl LIII.”

She added: “I pray that this National Anthem will bring us all together in a way never before witnessed and we can move forward and untangle these truths which mean so much to all of us.”

In other Super Bowl LIII news, it was recently confirmed that Maroon 5 will headline the halftime show, with Big Boi and Travis Scott also set to appearing as supporting acts. Jay-Z, Cardi B, and Rihanna said no to performing at the Super Bowl as a show of solidarity with Kaepernick. Kaepernick made headlines when he kneeled during the National Anthem in protest of the racial inequality in the United States, and he hasn’t played professionally since 2017.

Scott told Billboard that he only agreed to performing at the Super Bowl if the football league agreed to make a donation to an organisation fighting for social justice. Scott himself donated $500,000 to Dream Corps.

Super Bowl LIII takes place on Sunday, February 3, from Atlanta, Georgia. You can watch the game on TV or stream it through CBSSports.com.

For more on Super Bowl LIII, check out CBS Sports’ Super Bowl hub. You can also stream more CBS content through the new CBS All Access streaming package.

GameSpot and CBS are sister companies.

Sam Elliott’s next movie The Man Who Killed Hitler And Then Bigfoot is coming out soon, and now it’s received a new trailer. As the title suggests, the movie stars Elliot as the man who killed Hitler during World War II but couldn’t tell anyone about it. Decades later, the governments of the United States and Canada call on him to take down another foe: Bigfoot.

In this timeline, Bigfoot carries a disease capable of wiping out humanity. Elliott’s character, Calvin Barr, is finally coming to terms with his life when he’s called back to fight the beast.

“Bigfoot has been living deep in the Canadian wilderness and carrying a deadly plague that is now threatening to spread to the general population. Relying on the same skills that he honed during the war, Calvin must set out to save the free world yet again,” reads a line from the movie’s official description.

The Man Who Killed Hitler And Then Bigfoot also stars Aiden Turner (The Hobbit trilogy), Caitlin FitzGerald (Masters of Sex), Larry Miller (10 Things I Hate About You), and Ron Livingston (Office Space). The film was written and directed by Robert Krzykowski; this is his feature debut. Douglas Trumbull, a multi-Oscar winning effects legend who worked on Blade Runner, 2001: A Space Odyssey, and Close Encounters of the Third Kind, worked on the film’s visual effects.

The film originally premiered at the Fantasia film festival in 2018. It comes to theatres and digital stores on February 8.

Elliott has been acting since the ’60s. He’s perhaps best known for his roles in the films Roadhouse and The Big Lebowski. More recently, he starred in A Star Is Born with Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper.