biteho.com

Sony has announced another State of Play livestream event this week, with a few announcements planned. The brief presentation will only last about 10 minutes, and that time will give more details on the PS4 remake of MediEvil and an unannounced new game. You can watch it right here as it happens.

This is the second State of Play, and Sony’s approach to these announcement streams has been very similar to Nintendo Direct presentations. The first State of Play in March was a good deal longer, and included announcements or new glimpses of eight games. That included several PSVR reveals, including the announcement of Iron Man VR and No Man Sky‘s upcoming VR update.

Sony State of Play Stream Start Times

• 3 PM PT
• 6 PM ET
• 11 PM BST
• 8 AM (Friday, May 10) AEST

In giving word about this presentation, Sony also took a moment to announce something that won’t be shown. It won’t house any new information about the next PlayStation–presumably to be named the PlayStation 5.

These individual State of Play streams may be where we hear most of Sony’s announcements this year, as the company has dropped out of E3. SIE Worldwide Studios head Shawn Layden explained that the company feels the event hasn’t necessarily kept up with the changing needs of the industry.

Though it won’t be at E3, though, it has already started sharing its plans for the next generation, making it the first company to the starting gate. Those plans include backwards compatibility with PS4 games and a re-commitment to support PSVR. Read up on everything we know about PS5.

You need a javascript enabled browser to watch videos.

Please use a html5 video capable browser to watch videos.

This video has an invalid file format.

Sorry, but you can’t access this content!

Ubisoft appears to be preparing for a big Ghost Recon reveal, with a world premiere event being streamed on Thursday, May 9. If you want to see what’s next, you can watch it all go down right here.

The event teaser was light on details, but it doesn’t appear to be tied to Ghost Recon Wildlands. That game launched in 2017, and it has been supported with a steady stream of downloadable content and live events ever since. In fact, Wildlands just received another dose of content last week. The distinction from Wildlands suggests the event will focus on something new for the Ghost Recon series, possibly a full sequel.

The timing of this event is conspicuously close to E3, where Ubisoft has a press conference scheduled for Monday, June 10. Scheduling a reveal event now could either set the stage for a more in-depth look at E3, or just give the company more time to focus on other parts of its lineup.

Wildlands received a mixed reception at launch but has fostered a devoted following through continued support. Ubisoft has shifted toward long-term support for many of its games, including multiplayer titles like Rainbow Six Siege and For Honor along with single-player games like Assassin’s Creed Odyssey.

“As only the second open world game in the Clancyverse, Ghost Recon: Wildlands is a middlingly safe tactical shooter and a slightly wasted opportunity given the ambitious scope of its seemingly boundless map,” Miguel Concepcion wrote in GameSpot’s review. “While its main strength is its mission diversity, it doesn’t take long to lose the motivation after reaching El Sueno’s doorstep. Even with a foursome of highly trained friends, Wildlands eventually reveals its diminishing returns. The feeling of positive immediacy and dopamine hits begin to wane sooner than you expected from a game with such a large and diverse world.”

Ghost Recon World Premiere Start Times

• 11:30 AM PT
• 2:30 PM ET
• 7:30 PM BST
• 4:30 AM (Friday May 10) AET

There’s something about playing a real-life killer that is a magnet for actors when they want to be taken seriously. Charlize Theron’s Oscar-winning portrayal of Aileen Wuornos in the 2002 movie Monster elevated her to the ranks of Hollywood’s most in-demand stars, while Steve Carell went from lovable comedian to intense character actor when he took on the role of sociop John du Pont in Foxcatcher. Now, Zac Efron is the latest star to attempt to shed his former teen idol image, by playing Ted Bundy, one of America’s most notorious serial killers.

While Theron famously underwent a physical transformation to play Wuornos, Efron was cast for his looks. Bundy was known for being a smart, handsome, charismatic mass murderer whose trials were attended by college girls eager to get close to him, and Efron’s casting makes perfect sense. Unfortunately, his compelling performance is stranded in a movie that makes some serious missteps in its attempts to present a new spin on the serial killer film.

Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile takes its title from the description leveled at Bundy by the judge in his 1979 sentencing. It’s a provocative title and suggests a dark plunge into the depraved mind of a relentless kidnapper, rapist, necrophile, and killer who admitted to murdering 30 women between 1974 and 1978, but whose victim count could potentially be far higher. Director Joe Berlinger wanted to do something different, though. His movie focuses less on the crimes itself, and more on the cult of personality around Bundy, and most specifically his relationship with two women in his life–long-time girlfriend Elizabeth Kendall (Lily Collins), and Carole Ann Boone (Kaya Scodelario), the woman he married while awaiting trial.

The film has a flashback structure, starting with Kendall visiting him on death row, and then moving back to the start of their relationship. Bundy was first arrested in 1974 from an anonymous tip-off, and the bulk of the film sees him either on bail or in jail, awaiting trial. Throughout this time Kendall stands by him, refusing to believe the terrible crimes that Bundy has been accused of and that he consistently denies, despite the evidence and trail of victims strewn across several states. As their relationship slowly breaks down, old flame Boone re-enters his life.

It would be a mistake to think that a serial killer movie has to wallow in violent imagery to be effective. The decision to not show any of Bundy’s murders–with the exception of one brief moment toward the end–was a very deliberate one, and it could be argued that, like Kendall and Boone, as an audience we are removed from the true horror of his crimes. The difference is that we know what Bundy did, but Efron’s easy charm and the movie’s insistence on almost never portraying him in a negative light ultimately cheapens the subject matter and lessens the dramatic impact.

Much of the film is spent with Bundy proclaiming his innocence while getting moved from state to state, jailhouse to courthouse, and occasionally planning an escape. It simply doesn’t make for very interesting viewing, and little effort is spent to get inside Bundy’s head. The movie is not a thriller, as the outcome is well known, but neither is it a horror movie or effective psychological drama; instead we’re left with a recreation of already well-documented events (Bundy’s trial was the first televised in the US) and a very shallow portrayal of real-life characters. No time is spent on the victims of his crimes either, and after a while it’s easy to forget that this is a movie about a serial killer at all.

In their attempts to desensationalize the material, Berlinger and screenwriter Michael Werwie omit some of the more interesting aspects of Bundy’s life. Bundy made two separate escapes–once from a courthouse, after which he nearly died after spending six days in the mountains of Colorado, the other from jail in a meticulously planned escape–but both are dealt with very quickly before he’s back in prison. The other curious aspect is that Bundy–a law student before his arrest–represented himself in court. But again, while we see Bundy doing this, it bears no resemblance to the manic figure he actually was while appearing in court, and little time is spent on the insane media circus that built up around his appearances. Any of these aspects could’ve made for a more interesting movie than the one we’re ultimately presented with.

Despite the often underwritten characters, the performances are good. Even though she is sidelined in the movie’s last third, Collins evokes sympathy as Kendall, who utterly falls under Bundy’s manipulative spell, while Scodelario cuts a tragic figure as Boone, who marries him as he awaits sentencing. Even the smaller roles are filled with famous faces–John Malkovich, Haley Joel Osment, and Big Bang Theory’s Jim Parsons all appear at various stages (as does Metallica’s James Hetfield in a fleeting cameo).

Berlinger is best known for his documentary work, including the brilliant, devastating Paradise Lost movies. He had already tackled Bundy in the Netflix true crime series The Bundy Tapes, and while this series is not his best work, it does offer more insight than the movie version. In a way, Bundy is a hard subject to understand–he only confessed to his killings at the end of his life, and much of what is known about him has already been documented various times over the years. But given Berlinger’s familiarity with the subject, it’s disappointing that Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile avoids exploring the true horror of his crimes, while offering little else in its place.

You need a javascript enabled browser to watch videos.

Please use a html5 video capable browser to watch videos.

This video has an invalid file format.

Sorry, but you can’t access this content!

You need a javascript enabled browser to watch videos.

Please use a html5 video capable browser to watch videos.

This video has an invalid file format.

Sorry, but you can’t access this content!