Geek Culture
May’s Most Anticipated New Releases
As the merry month of May dawns again, blockbuster season and televisions second run premieres are upon us. These are a few highlights bursting forth from the genre world via Hollywood, Canada and points beyond this month.
“Avengers: Age of Ultron” (In theaters May 1st)
After a well needed rest from trouncing Loki and the forces of evil, Marvel’s team of uber-heroes return for their next round of clobbering. This time they face off against Ultron, the self-fulfilling android prophecy originally created from adamantium by Hank Pym. Differing from the comics, this new incarnation of Ultron comes to life as a byproduct of Tony Stark’s (Ironman—played by the ever affable Robert Downey Jr.) defensive program designed to bring about world peace. Never saw that twist coming, did we. Will the Avengers be able to defeat this highly adaptive villain in time for the 2018 sequel? Only time will tell. Either way, it will be one of the most exciting new releases of the 2015 blockbuster season.
“Defiance” Season 2 (On Netflix/Amazon Prime May 19th)
Need to catch up on your “Defiance” backstory before season 3 premieres on June 12th? Check out Netflix and Amazon Prime on May 19th (currently available on Hulu Plus). Keep up to date on the happenings in the independent colony of Defiance and all the Voton-human integration difficulties and the challenges of recolonizing our now alien world.
“Tomorrowland” (In theaters May 22nd)
If you’ve ever set foot inside a Disney theme park, you’re likely familiar with Tomorrowland. Somewhat of a misnomer, this world of tomorrow features the flying cars and robot servants from a future dramatically divergent from our own. The premise for this flick has George Clooney strapping on his sci-fi boots as a would-be inventor who knows a little more than he’s saying about the magical pin which proffers visions of a tomorrow land to a young woman–hence, the film’s namesake. Of course, in the film as in life, many of our ideal tomorrows have, like good intentions, paved the road to a figurative or literal hell.
“Penny Dreadful” Season 2 Premiere (On Showtime May 3rd)
Showtime’s potpourri of gothic supernatural delight begins its second season with the predators becoming the prey. After being forced to destroy his daughter Mina to save Vanessa, the vampires are none-too-pleased with Sir Malcom. As a result, they retaliate against their would-be destroyers. Meanwhile, Dr. Frankenstein continues his diabolical quest to reanimate Brona while under the thumb of his psychotically driven creation.
“San Andreas” (In theaters May 29th)
This action thriller should keep disaster film fans on clutching their seats. It should also be a little bit of revenge for anyone who’s dealt with rush hour traffic in LA. Likely filled with scads of CGI devastation, this little sleeper of a film follows chopper pilot Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson as he tries to rescue his family after The Big One hits California. Expect lots of rubble—and not just the popcorn remnants beneath your feet.
“Extraterrestrial” on Netflix (On Netflix May 12th)
If you missed it before, this 2014 sci-fi/horror film arrives on Netflix this month for your streaming pleasure. Starting from a unique premise, a group of young friends isolated in a wooded cabin are assailed by alien baddies—rather than a man with a mask and a machete. Slasher film tropes may abound, though. Will the jock die in some unseemly fashion while trying to bone the cheerleader? Will the stoner be probed while trying to hook up with the snooty preppy girl who loathes him? There’s only one way to find out: kick back and load up this B-grade fare popcorn fare.
“Mad Max: Fury Road” (In theaters May 15th)
Since taking a breather from the post-apocalypse to make a saccharine pig movie or two (not that there’s anything wrong with that), George Miller returns to the wild and wooly post-apocalyptic Outback. This time he does so without an inebriated, curmudgeonly anti-Semite—at least not as its titular lead (although we may catch a glimpse of the original Max). And this sequel promises to be one of the most action-packed new releases of the season. Miller reputedly shot the film based primarily on storyboards instead of a script. As a result, audiences can expect less dialogue and more dynamic set pieces as a new generation struggles in a world short on oil but long on bondage gear.
“Between” Series Premiere (On Netflix May 21st)
After an enigmatic outbreak decimates everyone over 21 in the burg of Pretty Lake, a pregnant minister’s daughter (played by Jennette McCurdy) struggles to deal with life minus the geriatric set. With six episodes of this Canadian-penned Sci-Fi drama slated for release, as well as a web series featuring yearbook interviews with different high-schoolers, there are plenty of ways to get exposed to the televisual contagion. Just make sure to quarantine yourself with enough beverages and snacks.
As Assassin’s Creed Shadows is about to sneak up on people in November, Ubisoft says that the time between developing games needs to be longer to find the “right balance.” Shadows has been in development for four years, longer than any other game in the series up to this point. That includes the huge open-world epics Assassin’s Creed Odyssey and Assassin’s Creed Valhalla.
Shadows lead producer Karl Onnée (thanks, GamesIndustry.biz) says that the latest AC game took 25% longer to make than Valhalla. He says this is necessary to keep the quality of the series that it is known for: “It’s always a balance between time and costs, but the more time you have, the more you can iterate.” You can speed up a project by adding more people to it, but that doesn’t give you more time to make changes.
Onnée says this has as much to do with immersion and aesthetics as it does with fixing bugs and smoothing out pixels. This is because the development team needs time to learn about each new historical setting: “We are trying to make a game that is as real as possible.” We’re proud of it, and the process took a long time. In feudal Japan, building a house is very different from building a house in France or England in the Middle Ages. As an artist, you need to learn where to put things in a feudal Japanese home. For example, food might not belong there. Get all the information you need and learn it. That process takes a long time.”
You’ll have to wait a little longer for Ubisoft to work on each game. Are you okay with that? In what part of Shadows are you now? Is it interesting to you? Leave a comment below and let us know.
You can now pre-order Lollipop Chainsaw RePOP, a remaster that Dragami Games and Capcom both created. You can now pre-order the PS5 game on the PS Store for $44.99 or £39.99. If you have PS Plus, you can get an extra 10% off the price.
The company put out a new trailer with about three minutes of gameplay to mark the start of the pre-order period. Lollipop Chainsaw RePOP is a remaster of Grasshopper Manufacture’s crazy action game from 2012. You play as Juliet, a high school student who fights off waves of zombies.
The remaster adds RePOP mode, an alternative mode that swaps out the blood and gore for fun visual effects. It also adds a bunch of other features and improvements that make the game better overall. You can expect the graphics and sound to be better as well.
The game will now come out on September 12, 2024, instead of September 12, 2024. Are you excited to get back to this? Please cheer us on in the section below.
Is there really anyone who is following the story of Call of Duty’s zombie mode? We’ve known about the story in a vague way for a while, but we couldn’t tell you anything about it. It looks like the “Dark Aether” story will continue in Black Ops 6, but we don’t really know what that means.
For those of you who care, here is the official blurb with some background: “Requiem, led by the CIA, finally closed the last-dimensional portal, sending its inhabitants back to the nightmare world known as the Dark Aether, after two years of fighting zombie outbreaks around the world during the Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War timeline.”
Wait, there’s more! “Agent Samantha Maxis gave her life to seal this weird dimension from the inside out.” Even worse things were to come: senior staff members of Requiem were arrested without a reason by the Project Director, who turned out to be Edward Richtofen.
Black Ops 6 will take place about five years later, and it looks like it will show more about Richtofen’s goals and motivations. The most important thing is that you will probably be shooting an unimaginable number of zombies in the head. This week, on August 8, there will be a full reveal of the gameplay, so keep an eye out for that.
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