Jared Leto’s latest character has a thirst for blood. Of course, we’re not referring to the serial killer he portrays in his brand new Netflix film, The Little Things. We’re talking about Morbius, the character he plays in the film of the same name, who he says was a difficult character to portray in a new interview in Variety’s Actors on Actors series.
“It’s a big, fun movie filled with action. It’s a brilliant doctor, a researcher, who starts off trying to find a cure for a disease that he has and about 1,000 other people in the world have. I was interested in the role because he goes on this journey from dying to finding a cure for this disease and becoming incredibly healthy, and then having things change in a way that he becomes monstrous. So it’s a bit of a Jekyll and Hyde, which is of course a classic role.”
Leto is best known for his character roles, like the transgender character Rayon from 2013’s Dallas Buyer’s Club, who became a flashpoint for questions about transgender representation in Hollywood. In an interview with actor John David Washington, Leto explained the challenges unique to the character and to starring in a Marvel film.
“[Morbius] was hard for me in some way, because I’m not used to playing roles that are a bit closer to who I am, day in and day out. Dr. Michael Morbius is a little closer to the way that I talk and the way that I behave,” Leto explained.
Leto called acting in a Marvel movie “a pressure cooker,” as well. “You have a clock ticking. They’re expensive films. And so all the decisions and the time to make those decisions are a little bit more heated and so it can be a little more stressful. I think it’s common with these big movies, you don’t really start with a gem of a script,” said the actor, who played the Joker in 2016’s Suicide Squad. “You start with a hope and a dream and an idea of something, and you all try to work as hard as you can, in this given amount of time, to make it as good as it can be. And I think it’s the first time I’ve ever starred in a big movie like this in my entire career, so it was new territory. I generally hide out in the shadows.”
In the film, Leto plays biochemist Michael Morbius, a scientist with a rare blood disease. Morbius gives himself an experimental treatment that combines his DNA with that of a bat, and in the process gives himself a horrifying new look and many of the same powers and weaknesses as a classic vampire. Morbius the Living Vampire began life as a Spider-Man villain, but has transitioned to an anti-hero in the manner of Venom. The film is part of Sony’s growing “Sony Pictures Universe of Marvel Characters.” After multiple delays, Morbius is currently scheduled to hit theaters on January 21, 2022.
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Activision Blizzard reached out to provide a response to today’s report claiming Vice “mischaracterized” the SEC filing made by the company’s attorneys. In this new statement, Activision Blizzard says its objections were “rooted in the fact that the AFL-CIO proposal failed to adequately consider how to apply these practices in all of the countries we operate in.”
The AFL-CIO is a federation of labor unions and is based in the United States. The organization is affiliated with the International Trade Union Confederation, and several affiliated unions do cross borders into Canada. IGN has asked Activision Blizzard to clarify whether the AFL-CIO specifically requested these hiring rules to be applied across all of Activision Blizzard’s international businesses, or just ones based in the United States.
Here’s Activision Blizzard’s full statement below:
Activision Blizzard is committed to inclusive hiring practices and to creating a diverse workforce; it is essential to our mission. Vice completely mischaracterized the SEC filing made by our outside attorneys. In fact, our hiring practices are rooted in ensuring diversity for all roles. We engage in this aggressively and successfully. Our objection was rooted in the fact that the AFL-CIO proposal failed to adequately consider how to apply these practices in all of the countries we operate in.
Our games have uniquely influenced popular culture and have helped to increase tolerance and inclusion through their connectivity as well as the heroes we portray and our stories that celebrate diversity, equity and inclusion in so many powerful ways.
In order to ensure that our games stay true to our mission–to connect and engage the world through epic entertainment–we require that all candidates of all backgrounds, ethnicities, genders, races and sexual orientations are considered for each and every open role. We aggressively recruit diverse candidates so the workforce provides the inspired creativity required to meet the expectations of our diverse 400 million players across 190 countries. We remain committed to increasing diversity at all levels throughout Activision Blizzard worldwide.
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Original Story: A new report has found that Activision Blizzard is resisting the adoption of a hiring practice that would require the company to interview at least one candidate who is a qualified woman or minority candidate. Activision Blizzard, via its attorneys have called this practice “unworkable.”
In a new report from VICE, the AFL-CIO, the largest labor federation in the United States, submitted a shareholder proposal to Activision Blizzard and Electronic Arts (EA) requesting it adopt a hiring policy that would require each company to include women and people of color in its initial pool of potential candidates.
The AFL-CIO is a shareholder in both Activision Blizzard and EA, and the letter request was sent to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
The proposal is modeled after the Rooney Rule in the National Football League. Adopted in 2003, the rule required NFL teams to interview at least one non-white candidate for a coaching job. VICE reports that the rule was later expanded to include women and other marginalized candidates.
Activision, a company of over 9,000 employees and the makers of some of the biggest games like Call of Duty Black Ops: Cold War and World of Warcraft: Shadowlands, has reportedly chafed at this proposal. It has taken measures to exempt itself by claiming that these guidelines are excluded from the SEC’s guidelines for shareholder proposals.
Furthermore, a letter by Activision, obtained by Motherboard claims, “While the Company has implemented a Rooney Rule policy as envisioned [for director and CEO nominees], implementing a policy that would extend such an approach to all hiring decisions amounts to an unworkable encroachment on the Company’s ability to run its business and compete for talent in a highly competitive, fast-moving market.”
Activision claims that this proposal violates SEC guidance as a way for a shareholder to “micromanage” the company. In a statement to VICE, EA says it will “consider the stockholder proposal” with its Board of Directors.
It should be noted that these proposals are legally non-binding. What they end up doing, however, is to highlight issues and pave a way forward for a company to address them. But Activision appears to get ahead of having these discussions altogether.
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Matt T.M. Kim is a reporter for IGN. You can reach him on Twitter @LawofTD.
An animated Game of Thrones series is in very early stages of production at HBO Max, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
No deal has been inked as of yet, so it’s entirely possible the series will never materialize, but THR reports that HBO is meeting with writers for the potential project. The animated series will reportedly follow in the same mature tone of the original TV franchise.
Representatives for HBO Max declined to comment. It’s unclear if the animated series would follow the events of the original series or follow different events in the Thrones universe.
Chalk it up to the growing list of Game of Thrones spinoffs that HBO is eagerly pursuing following the end of the original series. There’s the adaptation of the “Tales of Dunk and Egg” novellas that explores the adventures of Ser Duncan the Tall and Aegon Targaryen. House of the Dragon, a prequel series focused on the Targaryen family, has recently hired on Doctor Who’s Matt Smith and The Witcher series director Geeta Patel and expected to premier in 2022.
This won’t be HBO Max’s first original animated series. Close Enough, the next series from Regular Show creator J.G. Quintel, premiered in 2020. IGN gave it a seven out of 10, calling it a “effective and entertaining.” HBO Max has also produced a number of original animated miniseries based on properties like Looney Tunes and Adventure Time.
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Joseph Knoop is a writer/producer/animated fella for IGN.
In what promises to be the biggest cinematic throwdown since Batman v Superman, Godzilla and King Kong are finally rekindling their age-old rivalry in the upcoming Godzilla vs. Kong. When a gigantic lizard monster and an oversized monkey get into an old-fashioned donnybrook, there can be only one victor.
Or can there? If we’ve learned anything from Batman v Superman and the many other hero vs. hero crossovers in pop culture, it’s that these stories usually culminate with the two combatants putting aside their differences to battle a common foe. In this case, will Godzilla and King Kong team up to take on Mechagodzilla or Mecha-King Ghidorah? That’s a popular theory among fans, and there’s plenty of evidence to support it, including a tantalizing couple of moments in the trailer for Godzilla vs. Kong. Here’s why Godzilla and King Kong’s big brawl may be just an appetizer for the true fight to come.
Could this red-eyed monstrosity in the Godzilla vs. Kong trailer actually be Mechagodzilla?
Legendary’s Godzilla MonsterVerse: The Story So Far
Godzilla vs. Kong is actually the fourth film in a shared cinematic universe that began with 2014’s Godzilla reboot. Dubbed “The MonsterVerse,” this series also includes 2017’s Kong: Skull Island and 2019’s Godzilla: King of the Monsters. In this universe, humanity is under constant threat from gigantic monsters called Titans or MUTOs (Massive Unidentified Terrestrial Organisms), who are attracted to humanity’s nuclear technology. Godzilla himself is basically nature’s immune system. He wakes up every so often to fight off these Titans and prevent the world from being completely overrun.
While there are a handful of characters who appear in multiple movies (Millie Bobby Brown’s Madison Russell, Kyle Chandler’s Mark Russell, Ken Watanabe’s Dr. Ishirō Serizawa), it’s really the scientific organization Monarch which ties the larger universe together. Monarch is formed after World War II to study the Titans and attempt to hide their existence from the general public. It’s this group that sets the events of Kong: Skull Island in motion, and they’re the ones tasked with dealing with a new wave of Titans in Godzilla and Godzilla: King of the Monsters. The organization will continue to play a major role in Godzilla vs. Kong and, in fact, they may be the ones responsible for setting the final battle in motion.
The post-credits scene in King of the Monsters certainly hints at this outcome. That movie ends with a glimpse of Charles Dance’s character, ecoterrorist Alan Jonah, approaching the slain corpse of King Ghidorah, heavily implying his group has plans to study and even weaponize the remains of Godzilla’s powerful nemesis. That certainly seems like a seed that’ll bear fruit in Godzilla vs. Kong.
The Godzilla franchise has seen many incarnations over the years, but one thing is constant. Inevitably, the king of the monsters starts battling giant robots. Godzilla’s feud with Mechagodzilla dates all the way back to 1974’s Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla. In that movie, Mechagodzilla is portrayed as an alien weapon constructed of “space titanium” (which is clearly far superior to regular titanium) sent to conquer Earth for its creators. However, in most of its later appearances, Mechagodzilla is instead depicted as a terrestrial robot charged with protecting humanity from Godzilla. Ironic, considering Godzilla is just trying to save us from ourselves.
Whatever its current origin story, with its vast armory and armored shell, Mechagodzilla usually puts up a pretty good fight. But in the end, it’s only ever a matter of time before Mechagodzilla winds up decapitated and explodes.
Similarly, Mecha-King Ghidorah has a long history duking it out with Godzilla, starting with 1991’s Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah. In that movie, humans from the future use their technology to revive King Ghidorah and give him a technological upgrade. For once, Godzilla’s nemesis is shown fighting in defense of humanity rather than trying to destroy it.
Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla vs. Kong?
As much as we’re all pumped to see Godzilla and King Kong pummel each other, we highly doubt the new movie will show them at each other’s throats the entire time. Both characters are really the heroes, at the end of the day, even if Kong’s story tends to end in tragedy. Kong only cares about protecting whatever comely human lass has caught his eye lately, while Godzilla is basically the MonsterVerse’s version of Galactus – a great destroyer who maintains balance in the universe.
Eventually, these two monsters will realize they shouldn’t be fighting each other. That’s probably where the movie’s true villain comes in. As we covered already, the post-credits teaser in King of the Monsters hints that Monarch is using the remains of King Ghidorah to build a terrible new weapon. And we might even see a glimpse of that weapon in the first trailer for Godzilla vs. Kong. If you pause at the three- to four-second mark, those glowing red eyes sure seem like they’d belong to a mecha-giant monster of some kind, don’t they?
The old-school Mechagodzilla.
The trailer also shows a computer screen that seems to display the schematics for a mechanized Titan. Heck, it could even be that Mechagodzilla is running around wrecking cities in a Godzilla skin suit, and that’s why everyone is so mad at Godzilla!
Or maybe it’s just that, having endured several giant monster rampages in the last few years, Monarch’s scientists are obsessed with building a weapon that can stop Godzilla and all other Titans in their tracks. Using a combination of King Ghidorah’s carcass and the finest tech 2021 has to offer, Monarch will unleash a greater threat than anything it’s been trying to stop. Whether that threat turns out to be Mechagodzilla or Mecha-King Ghidorah (or both), the end result is the same.
It’s an understandable, if misguided, mission. Nobody wants to live n constant fear of an enormous reptile stomping through their apartment complex. But as is so often the case in science fiction, mankind may be guilty of underestimating its own creation. We know from King of the Monsters that Ghidorah is an ancient alien trying to terraform the planet. What if Mecha-King Ghidorah retains its memories, causing what should be a defensive measure for humanity to become a greater threat than Godzilla or King Kong could ever be? Godzilla and King’s wrestling match could be the least of our problems.
And then there’s also these Funko POP figures for the film, which feature variations on Godzilla and Kong… including a Kong with RED eyes. Maybe he just needs some visine… or could we be looking at a Mecha Kong as well here? There is a precedent for that, and he’s called… Mechani-Kong!
On this week’s episode of IGN’s PlayStation show, Podcast Beyond!, host Jonathon Dornbush is joined by Brian Altano, Lucy O’Brien, and Max Scoville to discuss the Resident Evil Village Maiden demo, exclusively available on PS5, as well as why we’re loving Hitman 3, Cyber Shadow, and more.
Plus, we miss the PlayStation Plus games announcements but make our guess for the lineup, answers some listener questions, and more!
This is a spoiler-free review for Alan Tudyk’s Resident Alien, which premiered Jan. 27 on Syfy.
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While it’s already drawing obvious comparisons to Northern Exposure, Syfy’s new sci-fi dramedy Resident Alien reminds me a little of Dexter, the Michael C. Hall-starring show about a Miami serial killer hiding in plain sight. Stay with me here: That series was a divisive one given the inconsistency of its quality and the heavy-lifting that Hall did to carry the show’s appeal squarely on his back, with most of the supporting cast left as a bit of an afterthought. That lack of balance seems to be the case with Resident Alien too, at least in the early going.
Based on the Dark Horse comic series by Peter Hogan and artist Steve Parkhouse, the show centers around an alien disguised as a small-town doctor, played by the infinitely talented and likable Alan Tudyk. The show does well by its lead – giving him ample opportunity to explore our resident alien’s (aka Dr. Harry Vanderspeigle) many strange habits and overall confusion with humanity’s own peculiarities – but it doesn’t quite know how to utilize the rest of its eccentric ensemble.
There’s a fair amount of potential that gets set up in the series pilot – a quirky hour of familiar but amusing fluff – only to be undercut by its more baffling narrative choices. For one: why is this show an hour long when it clearly wants to be a half-hour comedy? Like… Alan Tudyk playing an alien trapped on Earth pretending to be a doctor, whose only knowledge of actual doctoring comes from TV? Yes please, give me all that physical comedy – no other contrivances or plot twists needed.
Unfortunately, Resident Alien doesn’t give Tudyk much room to run with the insanity of the concept, since he’s too busy dealing with mounting narrative wrinkles and side missions, including a quest for his lost spaceship; a murder mystery in town; his need to stay ahead of some shadowy government types; and his scheme to murder the only person in town who can see through his disguise (who happens to be a kid, not that Harry cares) – and that’s barely scratching the surface. The show has more plot than it knows what to do with, but is at its best when it focuses on the characters.
Syfy has advertised the series as “the sci-fi, murder mystery, doctor dramedy Earth needs now” and that blend of genres, tones, and ideas is definitely on display – to the point where it doesn’t seem to know what it actually is or how best to deploy the considerable talents of its cast – it’s an everything and the kitchen sink approach that leaves Resident Alien feeling torn in too many directions.
But the generic, slapdash way in which the series’ world is fleshed out may be its biggest problem. While the supporting cast members often steal their scenes with moments of dark, odball humor, the character archetypes themselves – the inexperienced town mayor and his bland wife, suspicious sheriff and his downtrodden deputy, flirty bartender, ominous government agents – feel copy and pasted from some worn-out “supporting parts” handbook that can’t hold a candle to Tudyk’s deranged central performance.
There’s also something oddly dated about the show’s setup – right down to Harry’s love of Law and Order: SVU. Though I could arguably watch Alan Tudyk do pretty much anything, his charm and relentless physical comedy skills can only take the series so far. Resident Alien is amusing enough, if half-baked science-fiction storytelling is your thing, but you can’t help but wish they’d settled on one idea rather than five.
Update 3 (1/27/21) – The subreddit r/WallStreetBets is no longer private, and the mods have posted a message explaining the ever-changing situation they are dealing with how they plan to move forward and address its issues.
“We have grown to the kind of size we only dreamed of in the time it takes to get a bad nights sleep,” u/zjz wrote. “We’ve got so many comments and submissions that we can’t possibly even read them all, let alone act on them as moderators. We wrote software to do most of the moderation for us but that software isn’t allowed to read the Reddit new feed fast enough and submit responses, and the admins haven’t given us special access despite asking for it.
“We’re suffering from success and our Discord was the first casualty. You know as well as I do that if you gather 250k people in one spot someone is going to say something that makes you look bad. That room was golden and the people that run it are awesome. We blocked all bad words with a bot, which should be enough, but apparently if someone can say a bad word with weird unicode icelandic characters and someone can screenshot it you don’t get to hang out with your friends anymore. Discord did us dirty and I am not impressed with them destroying our community instead of stepping in with the wrench we may have needed to fix things, especially after we got over 1,000 server boosts. That is pretty unethical.
“To add to this, people are co-opting our name on twitter. I won’t mention their accounts, but lots of handles with “wsb” and “wallstreetbets” in them are pretending to speak for us. They’re saying things that we don’t agree with, driving traffic to derivative communities and shitty pixelated merch stores, and generally making it harder for us to define who we are. There’s also too much political bullshit in a community that was never ever political. The only way I want to occupy Wall St is in a suit myself or rent-free in the mind of a blown up short.
“That is why I’m throwing my support behind the Twitter handle in general. We need a way to PUBLICLY reach out to the staff of the infrastructure that is failing us so the world can see that we aren’t doing anything wrong here if they don’t respond. We need to be able to respond directly to a reporter that is lying to the world about our clubhouse. We can’t be expected to meet any expectations when we aren’t given the tools we need.
“That’s not to say I approve of every message or will even be in the loop for all of them, but it’s clear to me we can’t do nothing and we need a megaphone.
“http://twitter.com/wsbmod aka @wsbmod is the only Twitter handle whose statements are directly from some part of the team.
“We’ll do our best not to pretend to speak for you, but to try to speak with the volume our name now seems to command to get shit done for us.”
Update 2 (1/27/21) – The WallStreetBets Discord server has been banned, not because of “financial fraud related to GameStop of other stocks,” but because it has continued to allow “hateful and discriminatory content after repeated warnings.”
The subreddit r/WallStreetBets has also gone private, but it does not appear to be banned as of this writing.
Discord’s statement on WallStreetBets, as given to IGN, is as follows;
“The WallStreetBets server has been on our Trust & Safety team’s radar for some time due to occasional content that violates our Community Guidelines, including hate speech, glorifying violence, and spreading misinformation. Over the past few months, we have issued multiple warnings to the server admin.
“Today, we decided to remove the server and its owner from Discord for continuing to allow hateful and discriminatory content after repeated warnings.
“To be clear, we did not ban this server due to financial fraud related to GameStop or other stocks. Discord welcomes a broad variety of personal finance discussions, from investment clubs and day traders to college students and professional financial advisors. We are monitoring this situation and in the event there are allegations of illegal activities, we will cooperate with authorities as appropriate.”
As of this writing, GameStop stock is currently trading at an all-time high stock price of around $350, but it isn’t due to a miraculous turnaround by the company, but a battle between short-sellers like Citron Research and others like the subreddit r/WallStreetBets.
Short selling is more or less a strategy in which investors can borrow stock in exchange for an IOU. For example, an investor can borrow a stock from a broker for $100, in hopes that the stocks price goes down. If that price does go down to $80, they can buy back that stock, but at the price of $80, therefore netting a $20 profit. It is basically betting against a particular stock.
Thanks to Capcom’s recent Resident Evil showcase, we learned lots of juicy details about the upcoming Resident Evil 8, known as Resident Evil Village. We got our first look at gameplay and have a clearer picture of the game’s plot as well as some of its villains.
In this video, Jean-Luc breaks down all the important details you need to know about Village. When is it coming out? How does this tie into Resident Evil 7? And what’s the deal with that tall vampire lady that keeps showing up on my social media feed? All of these questions and more are answered.
Capcom also released the PS5 exclusive Maiden demo, which acts as a visual showcase for Village. If you don’t own a PS5 and would like to see the demo for yourself, we captured the whole thing and you can watch it right here on our YouTube channel. Make sure to come back to GameSpot for more Resident Evil Village coverage as we get closer to the game’s May 7th release for PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PC as well as PS4 and Xbox One.
After briefly going private, subreddit r/wallstreetbets is back up. Moderator user zjz posted a response to why the subreddit was briefly taken private alongside the account’s Discord server being banned.
“We wrote software to do most of the moderation for us but that software isn’t allowed to read the Reddit new feed fast enough and submit responses, and the admins haven’t given us special access despite asking for it,” zjz writes. “We’re suffering from success and our Discord was the first casualty. You know as well as I do that if you gather 250k people in one spot someone is going to say something that makes you look bad.”
They continue: “We blocked all bad words with a bot, which should be enough, but apparently if someone can say a bad word with weird unicode icelandic characters and someone can screenshot it you don’t get to hang out with your friends anymore. Discord did us dirty and I am not impressed with them destroying our community instead of stepping in with the wrench we may have needed to fix things, especially after we got over 1,000 server boosts. That is pretty unethical.”
According to The Verge, Discord banned the WallStreetBets server for “hateful and discriminatory content after repeated warnings.”
HBO Max is releasing two Warner Bros. theatrical films on its streaming platform for February 2021.
To kick things off, the streamer is debuting Judas and the Black Messiah on February 12. This historical drama centers on “Bill O’Neal (LaKeith Stanfield), who infiltrates the Black Panthers per FBI Agent Mitchell (Jesse Plemons) and J. Edgar Hoover (Martin Sheen). As Black Panther Chairman Fred Hampton (Daniel Kaluuya) ascends, falling for a fellow revolutionary (Dominique Fishback) en route, a battle wages for O’Neal’s soul,” according to the synopsis from Warner Bros.
HBO Max will also be home to the new Tom & Jerry film, which premieres on February 26. In this adventure, the dynamic animated duo are in New York City “on the eve of the wedding of the century, forcing the event’s desperate planner to hire Tom to get rid of him.” Tom & Jerry is directed by Fantastic Four and Ride Along’s Tim Story.
In terms of some DC classics, HBO Max is releasing Tim Burton’s 1989 Batman film, as well as the Justice League Unlimited animated series on February 1.
Check out the slideshow gallery below for the highlights of HBO Max’s February offerings, followed by the full list:
