Amazon’s Lord of the Rings Prequel: The Second Age Explained

As the streaming wars heat up, Amazon is betting big on The Lord of the Rings. The company is spending hundreds of millions of dollars developing a prequel series set long before the events of the movies. This as-yet-untitled series will be set in the Second Age of Middle-earth, an important time that literally reshaped the face of the planet.

If you’re not familiar with the extensive backstory behind The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit, don’t worry. Here’s everything you need to know about Middle-earth’s Second Age and what it could mean for the plot of the prequel series.

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Alienware Goes Full Sci-Fi with its Newly Redesigned Aurora Gaming Desktop

Alienware is upgrading it compact Aurora gaming desktop with a new look and cutting-edge internals at Gamescom 2019.

On the outside, the Alienware Aurora is finally getting the same Legend industrial design that the Alienware Area 51m gaming laptop debuted. With the new design, the Alienware’s compact gaming PC looks more like a space pod form a future NASA space program rather than one from another planet. It comes sporting new hexagonal-shaped cutouts on the left side for ventilation, a sort of wind tunnel opening on the front, and alien-inspired characters etched onto the left side.

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Alienware’s 55-inch 4K OLED Gaming Monitor Costs $4K

We’ve gotten our second look at Alienware’s 55-inch OLED gaming monitor at Gamescom 2019 and it looks just as gorgeous as it did last time, but now we can actually tell you it’ll arrive on September 30th for $3,999.

That’s very, very expensive, but it’s pretty much the only gaming monitor of its kind and size. There really aren’t any other OLED gaming monitors out there right now, so we don’t have much of a benchmark for what they should cost—but OLED 4K TVs do start at $1,599. With the Alienware 55 OLED technical being classified as a big-screen gaming monitor, the only display that’s close in size is the $4,999 HP Omen X Emperium 65.

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Arrow’s Stephen Amell Will Play Pro Wrestler In New TV Drama

Stephen Amell says he’s done moonlighting as a professional wrestler, but he’s not quite finished with the wrestling industry. With The CW’s Arrow currently filming its eighth and final season, the star has already lined up his next project. He will play a small town wrestler in an upcoming Starz drama.

The news comes from TVLine, which reports Amell has signed on to star in Heels, an eight-episode series about a small-town wrestling persona. The current Green Arrow will play Jack, who is the main villain of a regional wrestling group in Georgia known as the Duffy Wrestling Association. When he’s not in the ring, Jack is the owner of the company, as well as a husband and father trying to make ends meet while keeping the DWA alive–and build it into a wrestling empire.

There are few other details about the project at this point. However, TVLine reveals the show will revolve around Jack and his brother, who are at war over the family-owned wrestling company and the legacy left by their late father.

Amell’s first foray into the wrestling industry came with a match at WWE SummerSlam in 2015. He followed that with a bout in Ring of Honor in 2017 and his final match at 2018’s All Out. The actor recently told GameSpot that chances of him getting back in the ring were incredibly slim. He’s still clearly interested in the industry though–and the friends he’s made in it. Already, Amell has asked All Elite Wrestling’s Cody Rhodes to join him on the series via Twitter. Rhodes previously appeared in multiple episodes of Arrow.

A premiere for Heels has not been announced at this point. Amell is currently filming the final episodes of Arrow, as well as the upcoming Crisis on Infinite Earths crossover event.

Save Big on Nerf Blasters Today Only: Star Wars, Avengers, and More

Amazon’s Deal of the Day is on Nerf weapons of all kinds, including toys from the Fortnite, Marvel, and Star Wars lines, as well as N-Strike, Zombie Strike, and more. If you could use foam firepower in your life, this is an excellent time to take advantage of the deals. You can save up to 50% off Nerf blasters of all kinds, whether you’re interested in bombarding friends with heavy firepower or tiny ultra-portable blasters. Either way, the deals go away tonight, so let’s take a look.

Nerf Fortnite AR-L Elite Dart Blaster is 40% Off

Nintendo Highlights 29 Games in Indie World Showcase

Nintendo’s Indie World showcase, held just as Gamescom 2019 kicks off, featured over two dozen indie games, confirming release dates, revealing new games coming to the Nintendo Switch, and more.

Here’s the full list of games highlighted during the showcase, as well as their respective release windows or dates (seasons are based on North American release windows):

  • Risk of Rain 2 – Summer 2019
  • Eastward – 2020
  • Freedom Finger – Fall 2019
  • Röki – Winter 2019
  • Torchlight II – September 3
  • Skater XL – 2020
  • Youropa – Winter 2019
  • Superhot – Available today
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Ori and the Blind Forest Confirmed for Nintendo Switch

The Microsoft Studios-published platformer Ori and the Blind Forest is coming to the Nintendo Switch in its definitive edition.

As revealed during the Aug. 19 Indie World Nintendo Showcase of upcoming Nintendo Switch games, Nintendo revealed Ori and the Blind Forest: Definitive Edition will debut on the system on September 27. The Definitive Edition includes additional areas, abilities, story elements, music, and more on top of the original adventure.

Developed by Moon Studios, Ori originally debuted on the Xbox One in 2015, and rumors of Ori and the Blind Forest coming to Switch have persisted for months.

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Corsair Harpoon RGB Wireless Gaming Mouse

Take the Corsair Harpoon RGB and snip the cord, jettison 2,000 DPI, and add $20 to the bill and you get the Corsair Harpoon RGB Wireless Gaming Mouse (See it at Amazon). It is nearly identical to Corsair’s wired Harpoon RGB Pro mouse, but the wireless version uses an optical sensor with lower total DPI and costs $20 more for wireless freedom. The Harpoon RGB Wireless is also a few grams heavier because of the battery it must carry onboard. Otherwise, it’s an exact replica of the Harpoon RGB Pro. It’s a six-button, right-handed mouse with a single zone of RGB lighting.

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Avengers: Endgame’s Hayley Atwell Praises Peggy Carter’s ‘Fitting End’

Hayley Atwell has discussed Peggy Carter’s character arc within the Marvel Cinematic Universe, saying that she thinks her story with Steve Rogers had a “fitting end” in Avengers: Endgame.

In a recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter, the actress shared her feelings on Peggy Carter’s prospective final scene to “end the whole franchise”, as she revealed her character’s concluding sequence was secretly filmed over the course of a single afternoon back in 2017.

“I think we shot that maybe two years ago,” she told the outlet, adding, “I thought it was a fitting end to a story that has affected so many people. I thought it was very endearing, innocent and wholesome in the way that it keeps those characters in their time.”

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