Month: November 2019

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iPhone company Apple is looking to expand its business into VR and AR, according to a new report. Bloomberg reports that the giant tech company might release a headset that combines virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) in 2021 or 2022. This headset would have a “focus on gaming.”

Bloomberg added that Apple currently employs a team of around 1,000 engineers who are working on the company’s various VR and AR projects. The team is said to be made up of executives who previously worked on Apple’s gaming projects, among other things. Former game developers and graphics “experts” are also on the team, as are former NASA engineers, according to the report. The team is said to be operating out of a “nondescript area” in Sunnyvale, California, which is close to Apple’s main HQ in Cupertino, California.

The new VR and AR technology will reportedly join other existing Apple wearable products such as AirPods, Beats headphones, and the Apple Watch. With iPhone sales slowing down, wearables are primed to take more of a focus at Apple going forward, it seems.

The Bloomberg report also claims that Apple is working on a new iPad for release in 2020 that would feature two camera sensors and a “small hole” for a new “3D system” that would allow people to create 3D models of objects, people, and rooms. This technology is also said to be introduced in high-end iPhones in 2020.

Apple has been a big player in gaming for a long time already. The company recently pushed further into gaming with its Apple Arcade subscription service.

Apple will be a latecomer to VR. Microsoft created a “mixed reality” headset that incorporates VR and AR called HoloLens. The headset could have interesting applications for gaming, but right now Microsoft is focusing on commercial instead of consumer use. In 2018, the US government paid Microsoft around $500 million for a contract to use HoloLens headsets to create new military equipment.

Disney’s new Star Wars TV show, The Mandalorian, is finally out in some parts of the world with the release of Disney+. One of the show’s main actors, Werner Herzog (Grizzly Man, Jack Reacher), has given Variety an interview about it, and it contains some surprising and delightful answers.

Herzog, who hasn’t seen any Star Wars movies before, told Variety is “doesn’t really matter” that he isn’t too knowledgeable about the source material. Show creator Jon Favreau helped brief Herzog on what he needed to know, and that was enough.

“You see, it was a very lively exchange, man-to-man so to speak, between Jon Favreau and myself. I was not tossed into unknown territory. I was very well briefed,” Herzog said. “I knew what was expected of me–I knew the interior landscape of the character and I knew the exterior landscape.”

Herzog added that he doesn’t watch more than four movies every year anyway, so it’s not surprising that he hasn’t seen Star Wars.

He does, however, watch some television–and the programs he called out are unexpected. He tunes in for WrestleMania and Keeping Up with the Kardashians. “As vulgar as they may be, it doesn’t matter that much, but you have to find some sort of orientation. As I always say, the poet must not close his eyes, must not avert them,” Herzog said.

Herzog said he was drawn to Keeping Up with the Kardashians, specifically, because he is passionate about experiencing new things. “I’m curious; that’s my guiding principal,” he said.

Continuing in the delightful interview, which you should read in full to completely appreciate, Herzog said he doesn’t expect to watch The Mandalorian. It’s only available on Disney+, and Herzog said he isn’t very enthusiastic about signing up. He is already a subscriber to the Criterion streaming service, and he’s enjoying that. “They have hundreds of films, and every one of them is great.”

In The Mandalorian, Herzog plays a character called the Client, a mysterious man who gives The Mandalorian (Pedro Pascal) a bounty to track someone down. GameSpot sister site CNET said Herzog’s appearance in the show is “absolutely brilliant.”

GameSpot’s review of The Mandalorian Episode 1 scored it a 7/10.

“With its first episode, The Mandalorian has made a statement about what a live-action Star Wars TV show looks like,” Chris Hayner said. “Now, with the remaining seven episodes in Season 1, it needs to make a statement about how a Star Wars plot should unfold over a longer form of storytelling.”

Unlike shows on Netflix, episodes of The Mandalorian aren’t released all at once. Future episodes will follow on a weekly basis, except for Episode 2 which premieres November 15.

The ninth Fast & Furious film, currently known simply as Fast & Furious 9, has finished filming, director Justin Lin has announced on Twitter. The upcoming blockbuster is due for a May 22, 2020 release, and will now move into post-production. Lin previously helmed multiple entries in the franchise, directing films three through six, before stepping away for Furious 7. In the tweet, he calls Fast & Furious 9 “by far the most ambitious film of the series.”

Not much is known about the plot of the ninth film yet, as no official synopsis has been revealed. As Lin’s tweet reveals, it was shot between “London, Edinburgh, Tbilisi (Georgia), Phuket & Krabi (Thailand), and Los Angeles,” which is in keeping with the series’ globetrotting nature. Judging by star Vin Diesel’s Instagram updates, the film took 20 weeks to shoot

Fast & Furious 9 will not feature Dwayne Johnson, who stepped away after very public feuds with series stars Vin Diesel and Tyrese Gibson in favor of crafting the spin-off project Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs and Shaw. But it’ll feature several other returning stars, including Charlize Theron and Helen Mirren from the eighth film in the series, as well as Michelle Rodriguez, who returns after publicly grappling with the ways the series has handled women. This installment will also add franchise newcomers John Cena (WWE) and Michael Rooker (Yondu from Guardians of the Galaxy).

The Fast & Furious movies have followed an unusual naming pattern so far, refusing to stick to a specific naming convention: The Fast and the Furious, 2 Fast 2 Furious, The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, Fast & Furious, Fast Five, Fast & Furious 6, Furious 7, The Fate of the Furious. With this in mind, it would be surprising if Fast & Furious 9 ended up being the film’s final title.

Fast & Furious 10 has already been announced for an April 2, 2021 release, and is currently in pre-production. To date, the series has made over $5 billion at the international box office. The Fate of the Furious and Furious 7 are the second and third highest grossing American films in China of all time, after Avengers: Endgame.