biteho.com

James Gunn has revealed that “there was a time” when he considered making Superman the main villain of The Suicide Squad.

On the latest episode of Script Apart, The Suicide Squad’s writer and director discussed the evolution of his script for the DCEU movie. He revealed that, at one point, he toyed with the idea of pitting Task Force X against The Man of Steel because he felt that it would make for “a very interesting story,” though he ultimately decided to make Starro the movie’s big bad.

“[Starro] is a character I love from the comics. I think he’s a perfect comic book character because he’s absolutely ludicrous but he’s also very scary in his own way,” Gunn said, explaining why he changed direction. “What he does is scary. He used to scare the crap out of me when I was a child, putting those face-huggers on Superman and Batman and stuff.”

Starro made his original debut in 1960s The Brave and the Bold #28, the issue that also introduced comic readers to the Justice League of America. The character’s creation is credited to writer Gardner Fox and artist Mike Sekowsky, though editor Julius Schwartz also contributed, and Gunn thought it was about time that he made his live-action debut.

“I thought he was one of the major, major DC villains that was probably never going to be put into another movie,” Gunn added, sharing his reasoning for putting Starro in the spotlight. “And if they did, they would do it like, the black cloud version of Starro. Not a giant walking starfish, a kaiju that is bright pink and cerulean blue, just ridiculously big, bright bad guy.”

This wasn’t the only reason Gunn crossed Kal-El off his list in favor of the intergalactic starfish. The director recognized some of the complications surrounding Superman’s place in the DCEU. “At the time, there were a lot of questions like, ‘Who is Superman in the DCEU? Is this movie outside the DCEU?'” Gunn said. “I just didn’t want to deal with it all that much.”

For those disappointed about missing out on The Suicide Squad’s Superman showdown, rest assured, Harley Quinn, Deadshot, Captain Boomerang, and co. are set to square off with members of the Justice League, including the Metropolis Marvel, in Rocksteady’s Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, which will be released in 2022 on Xbox Series X, PS5, and PC.

Adele Ankers is a freelance writer for IGN. Follow her on Twitter.

The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf will debut on Netflix on Aug. 23.

A prequel to The Witcher Season 1 that also sets up characters and events that will be important to Season 2 of the Netflix show, The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf is torn between the franchise’s future and its past. While it’s filled with lore and character building that might please dedicated fans, the split focus keeps the animated film from feeling like a story that can really stand on its own.

Nightmare of the Wolf follows Geralt of Rivia’s mentor and surrogate father Vesemir, who is voiced by Divergent’s Theo James (but will be played by Killing Eve’s Kim Bodnia in The Witcher Season 2). The young Vesemir couldn’t be more different than the White Wolf, a carefree rake who loves showing off, mixing witty banter with swordplay and then regaling ladies with tales of his adventures. James feels like he’s channeling Nathan Fillion’s swaggering Hal Jordan as he exudes a carefree charm, but there’s more than a little cruelty beneath it when he’s dealing with those he doubts have the strength or will to survive the harsh fantasy world of Andrzej Sapkowski’s books.

Vesemir’s path from a lowly servant to a professional monster slayer is told in flashbacks, and writer Beau DeMayo uses the same storytelling trick he helped employ as a writer on The Witcher Season 1, playing with expectations of how much time has passed between scenes based on how slowly Witchers age. The technique is cleverly used here, but DeMayo and director Kwang Il Han are a little too fond of misdirection in a story that tries to deliver plenty of twists but winds up being pretty predictable.

The plot sees Vesemir investigating monster attacks near Kaer Morhen, the mountain stronghold where the witchers of the School of the Wolf train. At the same time, the powerful sorceress Tetra (Sherlock’s Lara Pulver) is urging an attack on the fortress, pointing out that the witchers are magical mutants who don’t seem to be doing a particularly good job of protecting the populace.

Like many prequels, Nightmare of the Wolf suffers from a feeling of inevitability. The film is very similar to Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, with two factions that feel threatened and desperate moving closer to direct confrontation. It’s in everyone’s best interest for cooler heads to prevail, but if you know much about the series, it’s clear early on that things aren’t going to work out so smoothly.

Like in Avengers: Age of Ultron, the movie tries to stuff in too many nods to characters and conflicts that will be important later. Some plots, like a scathing indictment of the genocidal war against the elves and other Elder Races, still at least add to the narrative of the film they’re in. The name dropping of major characters appearing in Season 2 of the Netflix show adds little beyond a shallow attempt at hype building.

Where Nightmare of the Wolf does shine is the animation, which allows for storytelling that would be impractical even with the live-action show’s impressive budget. There are some excellent fight sequences that really capture the sword and sorcery roots of The Witcher. Some are riffs on things previously done in the series, like a dizzying fight with portals, but others feel like genuinely novel ways to mix spells, alchemy, and weapons that seem like they come from a deep place of affection for and knowledge of the source material.

The film takes a more is more approach to its action, which doesn’t always work. It’s exciting seeing Vesemir or his own mentor Deglan (Graham McTavish) taking on one or two fierce and wily monsters, but having multiple armies and swarms of creatures in the climax turns the affair into a ludicrous chaotic spectacle that feels more akin to an Avengers film or Lord of the Rings than The Witcher’s grittier tone. For all the carnage, the film’s nature as a prequel takes away many of the stakes if this isn’t your first experience with the Witcher.

But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have an emotional impact. Kaer Morhan is gorgeous in its full glory, but it’s also a place of nightmares. The sequence showing Vesemir and his fellow recruits undergoing the Trial of the Grasses, the alchemical process that gives the witchers who survive their superhuman abilities, is the film’s most visceral. That’s saying something, since it also includes a spider-like monster crawling out of a woman and the gory dismemberment of multiple children. It provides new lore involving the fate of Kaer Morhan and the origins of monsters, which is sure to intrigue some fans, but is also a little heavy-handed in getting across the idea that man is the greatest monster of them all.

DeMayo plays with the series’ other dominant themes to varying effect. There’s a surprisingly sweet romance that peeks out from all the bloodshed that also subverts expectations for what happens to the people a hero leaves behind when he starts his epic journey. The concept of destiny is also played with here, as various characters question how much agency they’ve had in their lives. There’s even a funny jab at the concept of the Law of Surprise — gifting someone you owe a favor with something you don’t know you have — which is so key to the plot of The Witcher. But the jokes and charm are too often weighed down by the movie’s attempts to hammer home core messages, with characters repeating lines like “a witcher never hesitates” scene after scene.

Moving into a dorm room or college apartment is a big step, even if the actual room is, well, pretty small. If you’re lucky, you’ll get a semi-private bedroom that connects to a shared living room, but odds are you’ll have to squeeze into a single 200-square-foot space that might feel more like a jail cell than your first taste of adult liberation. So while you’re getting settled into your college flat and figuring out your class schedule, don’t forget to get some dorm room essential electronics.

We’re talking about the gadgets you need to preserve your sanity. Sure, you’ll need a laptop, desk lamp, phone charger and mini-fridge. But those tech essentials are table stakes, and not especially fun. Don’t forget the stuff you’ll need to unwind after class and give you a much-needed mental health break after midterms, or you’ll have a one-way ticket to Burnout City.

We’re talking about a TV for gaming, watching movies, and streaming The Boys. Likewise, you might need a streaming media player, gaming console and some headphones so you don’t interrupt your roomie who’s still working on a term project. A VR headset wouldn’t hurt, either. We’ve rounded up 11 of the best electronic accessories to upgrade your college dorm from just tolerable to an oasis from your studies.

1. Hisense 43-inch Roku TV

Best Budget TV

Nothing is quite as essential as a TV; it’s your base of operations for all sorts of entertainment options. Thankfully, you can get an excellent television these days for only a few hundred dollars. The Hisense 43-Inch H4 Series LED Roku Smart TV is a great example; it won’t break the bank but it has a superb picture and a slew of features. This model is not a 4K television, but the 43-inch frame is a great size for the 1080p display, and you won’t have room for anything larger anyway.

The TV has the same superb Roku interface that you’ll find in any Roku streaming media player, and it can run virtually any streaming app or channel, including Disney+, HBO Now and Apple TV. You also get Alexa and Google Assistant for voice control, and Bluetooth support lets you stream music from your phone through the TV’s speakers (which include DTS TruSurround for realistic virtual surround sound, even with just the built-in speakers). It’s also a good choice for gaming, since the set’s Game Mode minimizes lag from game controllers.

2. Roku Express 4K+

Best Streaming Media Player

You can spend more on a streaming media player, but you don’t need to. This Roku Express, new for 2021, does it all: HD and 4K video as well as HDR (high dynamic range) for content that supports it. You might not need all of that, especially if you’re connecting to a 1080p HD television, but the Roku Express 4K+ future-proofs your entertainment for about the cost of a dinner out. It delivers the usual thousands of streaming apps, more than 100 free live TV channels and Roku’s own free streaming channel.

In addition, you get Roku’s superb remote control (which can probably operate your TV as well) and support for all the popular voice assistants, including Alexa, Google Assistant and Siri. Roku includes everything you need in the box, including an HDMI cable.

3. Sonos Roam

Best Portable Bluetooth Speaker

A portable Bluetooth speaker is a godsend; you can use it to play tunes around the dorm room or carry it outdoors or to a party to share your music with friends. And you don’t have to spend much to get a good Bluetooth speaker — they come in all shapes, sizes and price points. But the Sonos Roam may well be the best one you can buy. It’s pretty small — you can slip it into your jacket pocket — but has a large, powerful sound thanks to dual amplifiers and the separate tweeters and mid-woofer.

Moreover, it delivers a solid 10-hour battery life and recharges wirelessly with the included magnetic charging pad. It connects via Bluetooth to your phone, of course, and also becomes a part of a Sonos home speaker network, if you have one. Sonos’ Trueplay automatically tunes the speaker for the best sound wherever it’s playing, and the rugged IP67 design means it won’t get damaged if it gets dropped or accidentally dunked in water.

4. Google Stadia

Best Budget Gaming Console

You’re going to want to play games. That goes without saying. But odds are, you won’t have a PS5 or Xbox Series X with you — it’s still almost impossible to find one even if you have the money. And suppose your family isn’t going to let you cart the PS4 off to school with you? The affordable solution: Get a Google Stadia. This cloud-based gaming console essentially moves the GPU upstream, so you can play almost any game you like on your phone, tablet, PC or TV regardless of what kind of specs you have on the inside.

It helps to have really fast broadband, especially if you want to play in 4K. Google recommends as much as 100Mbps, but in practice you can get good results with a fraction of that internet speed. If you want to play on your TV, you’ll need to plug in Chromecast Ultra, and you might want to pick up a Stadia COntroller as well. But you can be all-in for $100, and a $10 per month subscription to Stadia Pro gets you access to free games and the ability to play games in 4K resolution.

5. Oculus Quest 2

Best VR headset

There’s almost no contest: The Oculus Quest 2 is hands-down the best VR headset money can buy right now. It’s wireless — you don’t have to tether it to a PC — and all the sensors and cameras are built into the headset, so there are no “beacons” to mount to your walls. That makes it effortless to set up and completely portable, so you can take it on the go and set up anywhere you can clear the furniture out of the way. Even better, you can use the now-wireless Oculus Link to play PC VR games, like those from Steam VR. It’s the best of every possible world.

The Quest isn’t just convenient, it’s also an excellent gaming platform. The 1832×1920-pixel resolution in each eye isn’t the best that money can buy, but it’s enough to almost obliterate any hint of the infamous “screen door” effect. The 90Hz refresh rate also helps make animation smooth and gameplay immersive. This is the future of gaming, and you can have one in your dorm right now.

6. Nintendo Switch

Best Portable Gaming Console

It’s right there in the name: The Nintendo Switch effortlessly “switches” from being a living room console to a handheld game and back again, and that’s what makes it such a beloved device. If you’ve been living under a rock since 2017, the Switch is built around a tablet-like device with a 6.2-inch, 720p display with detachable Joy-Con controllers on either side. You can play the Switch like a handheld console, or set it on a tabletop with the built-in kickstand and use the controllers in your hand. Or dock it and turn the whole contraption into a home console.

The Switch is a fan favorite — so much so that it spend most of 2020 sold out everywhere. Thankfully, you can buy it again, and take advantage of the 20-hour battery life for mobile gaming, excellent multiplayer and online gaming options, and enormous library of games.

7. Sony WH-1000XM4

Best Noise-Canceling Headphones

Even if you have great bookshelf speakers or a Bluetooth speaker, there are times when you need to take your listening private. After all, you’re going to be around other people on their own study schedule, so having your own headphones is simply the polite thing to do. You could probably get by with some decent earbuds, but nothing beats the massive drivers in full-size headphones. And the Sony WH-1000XM4 is about the best you can buy.

Thanks to generous padding and minimal clamping pressure, these headphones are comfortable to wear for hours at a time. They feature best-in-class noise cancelling and excellent audio quality, and can connect to two devices via Bluetooth at once. A sensor in the left earcup can automatically pause playback when you remove the headphones, or you can simply start talking and the headphones will take that as a cue to stop playing while you’re in conversation.

8. Anker Nebula Mars II Pro

Best Portable Projector

A portable projector gives you the freedom to take your entertainment anywhere — project it on the wall of your dorm room, cart it into the common area, or create an ad-hoc drive-in on the outside of the building. Anker’s Nebula Mars II Pro lets you do all that in a crazy-small form factor; it’s just 5.4×4.8×7 inches and weighs under 4 pounds. Even so, you get a 720p native resolution, a pair of fairly loud 10-watt speakers, 30,000 hours of lamp life and more than 3 hours of battery life between charges.

The Mars II Pro comes with a small remote, but you never need to use it — it’s easier to control the projector with the Anker Connect app on your phone. The Android OS gives you access to all the common streaming apps and you can also plug in a game console or other USB or HDMI devices.

9. Midea 3.1 Cu. Ft. Compact Refrigerator

Best Mini Fridge

Most portable refrigerators are pretty basic, giving you a single refrigerated compartment, sometimes with a tiny freezer section that can do little more than make a tray or two of ice cubes. You can do better for your dorm room: The Midea 3.1 Cu. Ft. Compact Refrigerator looks like a scale model of the one in your home kitchen. It has two separate compartments with independent doors: A fridge and freezer.

Each section has its own thermostat, so you can dial in 32-50 degrees fdoe the 2.2-cubic foot food section and minus 11 to 5 degrees for the 0.9-cubic foot freezer. There’s even a fruit and vegetable drawer plus in-door storage for beverages. It’s still a mini-fridge that stands 33 inches high, but it’s the civilized way to store meals, snacks and beverages.

10. Fluance Ai40

Best Bookshelf Speakers

No matter how good your headphones might be, you won’t want to wear them all the time. A good set of bookshelf speakers is a great solution for a small space like a dorm room or college apartment bedroom, and the Fluance Ai40 are superb speakers, able to fill the room with excellent sound.

They’re not large — each speaker is just 11 inches tall and 7.6 inches wide, but they feature 5-inch woofers and 1-inch tweeters with 70 watts of total power. The speakers sound even better than you’d think they should thanks to Fluance’s use of digital signal processing that plays with your perception of the bass and treble. And you can connect pretty much anything you own to them thanks to Bluetooth pairing and standard RCA inputs.

11. Nanoleaf Canvas

Best Hi-Tech Wallpaper

Have a little extra budget to decorate your walls? Forget about concert posters — it’s the 21st century. The Nanoleaf Canvas is a set of LED-driven, light-up tiles you can position in any arrangement on your wall. They’re fun, artistic, and make a pretty bold statement.

The coolest thing about Nanleaf’s Canvas is that they give you so many options for interacting with what is essentially high-tech wallpaper. Integrated microphones, for example, can listen for ambient sound and reinterpret it visually by changing colors rhythmically — great for playing music. They can also see what’s going on in the room and “mimic” motion with moving colors. When you set them up, you can use an AR app to preview how they’ll look in your room, and removable tape means they’re not mounted permanently — ideal for a dorm room.

Equipping your dorm room with the right tech accessories

You only go to college once — at least, that’s true for most of us — so you want to make the most of it. And if you’re far from home, it’s important to equip your place with enough comfort and convenience that you won’t be missing your bedroom that’s 1,000 miles away when you should be hunkering down for midterms week.

Of course, no one has unlimited funds, so you might need to prioritize your spending. Everyone’s needs are different, but we’d suggest starting with the TV, and building a “dorm entertainment center” around that — as budget allows, add a streaming media player (if you need it), headphones and gaming console. Bookshelf speakers can improve the sound and give you even more listening options as well.

It’;s also possible that you can make do with the streaming video options on your laptop. We think that’s a mistake. It’s hard for a group of people to crowd around a laptop to watch the game, and some streaming options may not be available on your computer. But if you opt for this route, the money you save on a TV can help you get other entertainment gear, like a VR headset or a better gaming console.

Can a portable projector like the Anker Nebula Mars II Pro take the place of a TV? Not really. Projectors work best in almost total darkness, which means you’re limited to waiting for nightfall to catch up on Rick & Morty. A projector is a good “also” accessory, not a primary gadget.

Movie studios are continuing to shuffle their release schedules as COVID-19 cases surge once again. Amazon and Sony Pictures Animation are finalizing a $100 million deal that will see Hotel Transylvania: Transformania debut globally on Amazon Prime Video, as reported by Variety. Though the fourth entry in the $1.36 billion grossing animated series was slated to hit the big screen on October 1, the film will now skip its theatrical run entirely.

The deal marks a concession for Sony as movie theaters have struggled to draw family audiences throughout the summer. Since there is no vaccine available for children under the age of 12, films targeted towards younger viewers have proved less viable box office. Following news that New York City and other cities would begin enforcing a vaccine mandate for movie theaters and other indoor venues, Sony began exploring options for a non-theatrical release for Hotel Transylvania: Transformania in early August.

Sony has sold off several films to streaming services throughout the pandemic. Earlier this year, the studio worked with Netflix to release two other animated movies, The Mitchells vs. the Machines and Vivo, on the streamer. Other movies such as Greyhound, An American Pickle, and the upcoming Cinderella also found new homes on streaming platforms.

The deal could set a precedent for studios setting alternative release plans as the fall movie season approaches. Last week, Sony pushed the release of Venom: Let There Be Carnage by a few weeks, moving the sequel from September 24 to October 15. Paramount has also delayed Clifford the Big Red Dog due to concerns over rising COVID-19 cases. Upcoming releases like MGM’s No Time to Die, Paramount’s Top Gun: Maverick, and Disney’s Eternals are still set for exclusive theatrical runs this fall.

In our review of Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation, IGN gave the animated movie a 7.6, calling it “the most fast-paced and comedically inspired entry in the series.”

J. Kim Murphy is a freelance entertainment writer.

Dragon Age: Origins was originally a game without any dragons, but then a random name generator changed the game’s setting.

This news comes by way of TheGamer, which included the tidbit as part of a larger interview with Mark Darrah about Dragon Age’s past, present, and future. As it turns out, the Dragon Age series was conceived without a name — there were some ideas, but nothing stuck, so the team decided to have a coder create a random name generator.

“They knocked something together and added a whole bunch of fantasy words to the list,” lead environmental artist Ian Stubbington said. “It was fired up and produced some names and the one that got the final vote by the team at the time was of course ‘Dragon Age.'”

It turns out the Dragon Age series and Childish Gambino have more in common than we previously knew. After all, both of their origin stories involve a random name generator.

It wasn’t until the BioWare team’s random name generator came up with “Dragon Age” that lead writer David Gaider decided that they should add some actual dragons to the story. That’s because the game originally had no dragons, as it would instead be set in a period “past its high fantasy stage.” In that stage of the game’s setting, magic would have been on the decline and dragons would have already been hunted to extinction.

“The big story in Dragon Age: Origins was not only that the darkspawn were returning, but that this was the unexpected return of a fantastical past the setting had thought it’d left behind,” Gaider said.

With “Dragon” now in the game’s title, some changes had to be made.

“So suddenly, we had dragons returning to the world, the Archdemon changed into a dragon, and — best of all — I created a calendar system with named ‘ages’ so that the current age could be, you guessed it, the Dragon Age,” Gaider said. “All to make the name of the game look very deliberate and tied into the rest, though in this case it was very much the tail wagging the dog.”

And there you have it — random name generators have created a popular RPG video games series and a popular musical artist, and only time will tell what they create next.

For more about Dragon Age, check out our thoughts on the original game in IGN’s Dragon Age: Origins review and then read about how Netflix is reportedly developing a Dragon Age series. Find out where IGN ranked Dragon Age: Origins in our list of the best RPGS of the last 15 years after that.

Wesley LeBlanc is a freelance news writer and guide maker for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @LeBlancWes.