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  • The best movies leaving Netflix, Hulu, Prime, and Max at the end of March 2024

    The best movies leaving Netflix, Hulu, Prime, and Max at the end of March 2024

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    April is nearly here and spring has sprung, which means it’s time to comb through the best movies leaving streaming services at the end of this month and plan accordingly.

    This month’s lineup is an eclectic assortment of classics, crowd-pleasers, and cerebral gems. Jonathan Glazer’s 2000 debut, Sexy Beast starring Ray Winstone and Ben Kingsley, is a top priority; you must watch that if you haven’t already. Other picks include the sci-fi horror film Underwater, starring Love Lies Bleeding’s Kristen Stewart, Kathryn Bigelow’s elusive cyberpunk thriller Strange Days, a classic martial arts action film starring the inimitable Sonny Chiba, and more.

    Whatever you’re looking for, there are options for you, with the added urgency of “you won’t be able to watch this here next month.”

    Here are the best movies you should watch before they leave streaming this March.

    Editor’s pick

    Sexy Beast

    Image: FilmFour/Fox Searchlight Pictures

    Director: Jonathan Glazer
    Cast: Ben Kingsley, Ray Winstone, Ian McShane
    Leaving Criterion Channel: March 31

    Earlier this month, Jonathan Glazer took home the Academy Award for Best International Feature Film for The Zone of Interest, his first Oscar win in his 30-plus-year career. Glazer has only directed four features in that time, each one more cerebral and astounding than the last. His first film, Sexy Beast, is arguably his most “commercial” effort to date — and even that qualifier feels like a stretch: It’s a black comedy crime drama that plays out with the nail-biting tension of a horror thriller.

    The film centers on Gary “Gal” Dove (Ray Winstone), a career criminal happily whiling away his retirement in Costa del Sol with his wife and friends. Gal is suddenly plagued by a visit from Don Logan (Ben Kingsley), a former associate who has come to recruit him for a upcoming heist. Don is a foul-mouthed, emotionally manipulative sociopath who delights in incessantly berating those around him and bending people to his whim, so when Gal refuses his offer, Don makes it his mission to make Gal’s life a living hell until the job is done.

    Glazer’s stellar direction and Ivan Bird’s dreamlike cinematography are what set Sexy Beast apart from other crime movies of its era. So does Kingsley’s scene-stealing performance as a malevolent agent of chaos, who blows in like a bad omen to wreak emotional and physical havoc on anyone and anything unfortunate enough to be close to him. That’s not even mentioning the score, which includes contributions from U.K. trip-hop outfit Unkle, who Glazer previously collaborated with on the music video for their 1998 single “Rabbit in Your Headlights.” Sexy Beast is an exhilarating, thorny, and terrifying case study in emotional manipulation that also happens to be a superb heist movie, and you should absolutely make it your priority to see it if you haven’t already. —Toussaint Egan

    Movies to watch on Netflix

    The Street Fighter

    A close-up shot of a man contorting his face while holding his right hand in a striking position.

    Image: Toei Company/New Line Home Video

    Director: Shigehiro Ozawa
    Cast: Sonny Chiba, Yutaka Nakajima, Goichi Yamada
    Leaving Netflix: March 31

    One of the most influential action movies ever made, The Street Fighter is a gloriously violent display of Sonny Chiba’s unique star power, as he rips and tears his way through a bunch of gangsters and lowlifes. Decades later, Chiba’s son Mackenyu (One Piece) is carrying that legacy forward… albeit in a slightly less violent fashion.

    The first movie to receive an X rating in the U.S. because of violence, The Street Fighter not only inspired the title of the fighting game series, it also introduced the idea of X-ray fatalities, directly influencing Mortal Kombat. If you’re a fighting game fan and you’ve never seen The Street Fighter, this is your chance to fix that. —Pete Volk

    Movies to watch on Hulu

    Underwater

    Norah (Stewart) and the Captain (Cassel) sit in their diving suits, looking contemplative, in Underwater

    Photo: Alan Markfield/20th Century Fox

    Director: William Eubank
    Cast: Kristen Stewart, Vincent Cassel, Mamoudou Athie
    Leaving Hulu: March 31

    Underwater is a lean genre project with B-movie flair and solid execution. Sometimes, that’s all you need.

    Kristen Stewart stars as the mechanical engineer of a research and drilling facility at the bottom of the Marianas Trench. When disaster strikes and part of the facility is destroyed, she joins the remaining survivors in their attempt to make it out alive. With a strong cast (with the exception of T.J. Miller, who is graciously killed very early in the movie), solid direction by William Eubank (who just directed the solid action thriller Land of Bad), and a tight script from Brian Duffield (No One Will Save You), Underwater is a fun popcorn sci-fi thriller. And with Love Lies Bleeding now out in theaters, why not check out an underrated Kristen Stewart project? —PV

    Movies to watch on Max

    Strange Days

    A disheveled man and a woman in a black dress stand in a large crowd while confetti rains down from the sky.

    Image: 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment

    Director: Kathryn Bigelow
    Cast: Ralph Fiennes, Angela Bassett, Juliette Lewis
    Leaving Max: March 31

    Strange Days is a cult classic whose reputation is defined in no small part by how difficult it has been to watch on streaming. Max added the movie to its platform in January 2023, but not all good things last.

    Set in a futuristic Los Angeles just two days before the end of the 20th century, Strange Days follows Lenny Nero (Ralph Fiennes), a black-market broker dealing in an illicit technology that allows the user to record their own memories and physical sensations and experience them after the fact. When Lenny comes across a recording that threatens to implicate the LAPD in a high-profile murder, he’s forced to turn to his old friend Lornette “Mace” Mason (Angela Bassett) in order to uncover the origins behind the recording while staying one step ahead of a mysterious killer that wants him dead.

    Conceived by producer James Cameron and inspired by the 1992 LA riots that erupted in the wake of the infamous Rodney King trial, Strange Days is a pitch-black sci-fi thriller that touches on institutional racism, voyeurism, societal collapse, and sexual violence, the latter of which is focused primarily on women and Black people. It’s a hard watch — but nevertheless a worthwhile one that rewards its audience with a trio of terrific performances and a strikingly original vision of a bygone alternate future. —TE

    Movies to watch on Prime Video

    The Swordsman

    A long-haired man stares forward while holding a forked katana blade in front of him.

    Image: Well Go USA Entertainment

    Director: Jae-Hoon Choi
    Cast: Jang Hyuk, Kim Hyeon-so
    Leaving Prime: March 31

    There’s no shortage of terrific Korean action movies. If you’re specifically looking for one that’s a stylish, emotional historical drama with fast and frenzied swordplay, I would highly recommend The Swordsman. Set in the aftermath of the Joseon dynasty, the movie follows the story of Tae-yul, the former bodyguard of King Gwanghaegun, who lives in seclusion with his daughter, Tae-ok.

    Taey-yul has been afflicted with a condition that threatens to rob him of his sight, and in order to cure it, he’ll need special herbs afforded only to the most well-connected of families. Desperate to help her father, Tae-ok accepts an offer to serve a wealthy family in exchange for the medicine, but when she is inadvertently kidnapped as part of a larger conflict, Tae-yul is forced to come out of hiding to come to her rescue.

    Joe Taslim of The Raid and Warrior fame shines as Gurutai, a sneering slave trader and Qing emissary who serves as the film’s primary antagonist. The action itself is terrific, but what really elevates The Swordsman as a whole is Tae-yul grappling with his rapidly diminishing eyesight and the unfolding tragedy of his backstory conveyed through flashbacks. At an hour and a half, it’s a perfect action film to pop on and watch over the weekend. —TE

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    Toussaint Egan

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  • Embracer has sold Gearbox — and Borderlands — to Take-Two for $460M

    Embracer has sold Gearbox — and Borderlands — to Take-Two for $460M

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    Troubled gaming conglomerate Embracer announced Thursday that it has agreed to sell Gearbox Entertainment, the studio behind the Borderlands games, to Grand Theft Auto publisher Take-Two for $460 million.

    The deal makes a lot of sense; Take-Two has been the publisher for Borderlands through its 2K Games label since long before Gearbox was acquired by Embracer in 2021. In its press release, 2K said the next Borderlands game was in active development at Gearbox.

    As part of the deal, Take-Two acquires the Borderlands franchise and its spinoff series Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands, as well as the Homeworld, Risk of Rain, Brothers in Arms, and Duke Nukem series. The studios acquired by Take-Two are the Gearbox Software mothership in Frisco, Texas, as well as Gearbox Montréal and Gearbox Studio Quebec.

    “As a significant long-term Embracer Group shareholder, I believe in the strategy for the Embracer Group going forward and am completely convinced that this transaction is the best possible scenario and an obvious net positive arrangement for Embracer Group, for Take-Two and, of course, for Gearbox Entertainment,” said Gearbox founder Randy Pitchford. “My primary interest is always Gearbox, including our talent and our customers. I want to personally ensure fans of our games that this arrangement will ensure that the experiences we have in development at Gearbox will be the best it can possibly be.”

    Embracer is hanging on to a few parts of the Gearbox empire: Gearbox Publishing San Francisco (which well be renamed), including the publishing rights to the Remnant games and Hyper Light Breaker; Cryptic Studios, the massively multiplayer specialist, with its games Neverwinter Online and Star Trek Online; and support studios Lost Boys Interactive and Captured Dimensions.

    Though Gearbox Publishing San Francisco is still under Embracer, the company confirmed to Polygon that it has laid off an unspecified number of employees “not tied to the development” of Gearbox games. The layoffs appear to impact marketing, communications, and other portions of the company.

    “The Embracer Group will continue to report on their restructuring program that impacted some parts of Gearbox today that are not tied to the development of Gearbox Software games,” a spokesperson told Polygon. “Thank you for granting us the space to remain focused on our people and in our handling of the situation with compassion and manage the process, balancing between our present duty and a commitment to our future.”

    For Embracer, the sale of Gearbox — one of its most prized assets — is the next step in a deep cost-cutting and restructuring process the company began last year after a reported $2 billion deal fell through. As part of its restructuring, Embracer laid off at least 900 people. Prior to its financial difficulties, the Swedish group, which began life as Nordic Games, had been on a wild acquisition spree that included the purchase of board game giant Asmodee, Square Enix’s Western studios and franchises including Tomb Raider, and the media rights for The Lord of the Rings.

    Embracer also announced Thursday that it had completed the sale of another of its biggest studio groups, Saber Interactive, which it acquired in 2020. Saber’s founder Matthew Karch bought back the main Saber Interactive studio and several subsidiaries for $247 million, while Embracer retained Metro developer 4A Games, Aspyr, and others. Saber has the right to acquire 4A and pinball specialist Zen Studios within a certain time period, although publishing rights for the Metro games will stay with Embracer’s subsidiary Plaion. Saber is reportedly still collaborating with Embracer on the troubled remake of Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic.

    Update: This story has been updated to include news concerning layoffs at Gearbox Publishing, along with a statement from the company.

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    Oli Welsh

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  • ‘Readvent of Calamity’ quest walkthrough in Dragon’s Dogma 2

    ‘Readvent of Calamity’ quest walkthrough in Dragon’s Dogma 2

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    “Readvent of Calamity” is a quest you’ll pick up in Dragon’s Dogma 2 the first time you return to Melve. It involves driving off a diseased drake (which is a dragon as opposed to the Dragon), helping out Ulrika, the leader of Melve, and then finding her when she has to leave town.

    Our Dragon’s Dogma 2 will show you how to start “Readvent of Calamity,” the steps you’ll have to follow to complete it, and where to find Ulrika.

    How to start ‘Readvent of Calamity’ in Dragon’s Dogma 2

    Image: Capcom via Polygon

    Once you complete at least one of Captain Brant’s quests (but before you complete “Feast of Deception”) and then head back to Melve (like for the “Oxcart Courier” quest), you’ll find the town under attack by a diseased dragon (or drake — the game is inconsistent on the name). After you deal a bit of damage by attacking the blisters on Puss the Magic Dragon, you’ll drive it off.

    When to visit Melve ‘from time to time’ in Dragon’s Dogma 2

    After the fight, you’ll get a quick cutscene where you talk to Ulrika, Lennart, and Sigurd. And then you’ll get an unhelpfully vague objective to “visit Melve from time to time.”

    You need to wait a day or three before you can continue the quest. Head out of town and take care of other quests for a bit. You can always fast travel to Melve quickly from Vernworth by using the oxcart.

    Dragon’s Dogma 2 map of Melve showing where to find Ulrika

    Graphic: Jeffrey Parkin/Polygon | Sources: Capcom via Polygon

    On your subsequent visit, check in with Ulrika at the large house in Melve. Inside, you’ll witness Ulrika and a government goon named Martin having an argument. The next day, you’ll learn that Ulrika has chosen to flee the village instead of cause problems for everyone.

    Where to find Ulrika in ‘Readvent of Calamity’

    Your next objective will be to figure out where Ulrika fled to. And you won’t have any clues. The short answer here is that Ulrika has fled to Havre Village.

    Dragon’s Dogma 2 map showing the location of Havre Village

    Graphic: Jeffrey Parkin/Polygon | Sources: Capcom via Polygon

    The longer answer is that she won’t (might not?) actually appear there until you complete a couple other quests.

    First, you’ll have to have completed “Monster Culling” for Captain Brant (which you probably already have). After that, you should poke around Harve Village to take on and complete “Scaly Invaders” which ultimately just has you driving out some saurians a few days in a row.

    Dragon’s Dogma 2 Lennart at the end of Readvent of Calamity

    Image: Capcom via Polygon

    After that, Ulrika will appear right at the town’s main crossroad. Talk to her, and she’ll send you back to Lennart in Melve. Report back to him in Melve’s big house, and you’ll get a reward of 4,500 gold and a Ring of Grit.

    For more Dragon’s Dogma 2 walkthroughs, here’s the best order for Captain Brant’s quests, plus how to rescue the caged magistrate, how to reach the Nameless Village, where to find Rodge, how to confront the Arisen’s shadow, and when to attend the coronation.

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    Jeffrey Parkin

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  • Dragon’s Dogma 2 will soon let you start a new game without deleting your save first

    Dragon’s Dogma 2 will soon let you start a new game without deleting your save first

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    Capcom has released a list of fixes and updates it will make to Dragon’s Dogma 2 “in the near future” — including the much-requested option to start a new game when save data already exists.

    Dragon’s Dogma 2 only offers a single save slot, and presently, players who want to start the game again — perhaps to try a different specialization — can only do so by manually deleting their save file at the system level first. This can be a fiddly process involving disabling cloud saving and, for Steam players, actually locating their game save on the hard drive.

    Capcom said it would add “the option to start a new game when save data already exists” as part of the first wave of updates to Dragon’s Dogma 2. This doesn’t mean it will actually add a second save slot for a new character; the update will simply make it easy to overwrite your save from within the game itself.

    Capcom also said it would add a frame rate cap of 30 frames per second to the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X versions of the game. As it is, the game runs with an uncapped frame rate, meaning it can sometimes run faster than 30 fps, but this can result in inconsistent and juddery performance (especially for players without variable refresh rate displays). A 30 fps cap should ensure a more consistent and stable feel to the game.

    Capcom also said it would add options to switch off the motion blur and ray tracing graphical effects to console versions of Dragon’s Dogma 2, but it warned that doing so “will not affect the frame rate significantly.” Frame rate improvements will come in “future updates,” it said. PC players will now get better-quality results from the DLSS.

    Another target for an early fix is the Art of Metamorphosis item that allows you to change the appearance of your character. Previously in very limited supply, the stock of this item is being increased to 99 at Pawn Guilds. This change appears to be targeted at criticism of the game’s microtransactions, which include the sale of Art of Metamorphosis at $1.99. With this change, it will only be inability to afford the in-game price that would push players toward paying real money to change the looks of their character or Main Pawn. (No changes were announced for other rare items available to buy as microtransactions, such as Wakestones or Portcrystals.)

    Other changes coming soon will make it possible to acquire your own dwelling earlier in the game, as well as various text display and bug fixes.

    Capcom said it would release the updates “as soon as they are ready for distribution on each platform.”

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    Oli Welsh

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  • ‘The Caged Magistrate’ quest walkthrough in Dragon’s Dogma 2

    ‘The Caged Magistrate’ quest walkthrough in Dragon’s Dogma 2

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    “The Caged Magistrate” is one of several quests you receive from Captain Brant in the early stages of Dragon’s Dogma 2. Brant tells you about one Magistrate Waldahr, someone who has stood his ground against Disa and refused to change the Code of Vermund to her benefit when asked, leading to him now sitting in a cell in Vernworth jail — ahem, gaol.

    So Captain Brant has one very simple request of you: set Magistrate Waldahr free. He’ll give you a gaol key so you can let yourself into his cell, but you’ll find that Waldahr needs some convincing first.

    In this Dragon’s Dogma 2 guide, we’ll walk through the entire “Caged Magistrate” quest, including where to find Magistrate Waldahr and how to set him free.

    Where to find the Magistrate in Dragon’s Dogma 2

    Image: Capcom via Polygon

    Enter the palace grounds and head to the objective marked on your map. This is the entrance to Vernworth Castle Gaol Tower. Otto will greet you and allow you through, so make your way downstairs and aside from a couple of rooms to explore and loot, the main area here is the long corridor with pillars in the middle and cells on each side, for a grand total of eight.

    Magistrate Waldahr is in the first cell on the right-hand side, as soon as you enter. Wait until the two guards are facing away from you then use the Gaol Key given to you by Captain Brant to unlock the cell.

    Head in and talk to Waldahr, then when the option arises, urge him to escape. He explains that he’s perfectly happy in the cell because he can spend his days “perusing the Code and deciphering old texts.” However, if you can find “a place with a mountain of tomes,” Waldahr will reconsider escaping. Leave the gaol and return to Captain Brant.

    Where to find ‘a place with a mountain of tomes’ in ‘The Caged Magistrate’

    A Dragon’s Dogma 2 hero talks to the magistrate in jail in “The Caged Magistrate” quest.

    Image: Capcom via Polygon

    Brant suggests talking to a chap named Kendrick, found by The Gracious Hand in the slums. He’s a balding chap wearing a blue robe, wandering around the tents and dilapidated houses on the outskirts of Vernworth. He’ll ask you for a charitable donation of gold, so pay up and he’ll explain a local boy named Malcolm has gone missing.

    This starts an entirely separate quest named “The Heel of History,” where you must find Malcolm by speaking to the children of the slums. Look for a girl called Aimee who will be somewhere nearby and she’ll tell you Malcolm went into the vaults underneath the slums. Return to Kendrick and the pair of you will enter the vaults to find the runaway kid.

    A Dragon’s Dogma 2 hero walks into a library underground in “The Caged Magistrate.”

    Image: Capcom via Polygon

    Explore the vaults in their entirety and you’ll find Malcolm, followed by a huge underground library. Kendrick makes Malcolm promise to keep his mouth shut about the discovery, but you can return to Waldahr in the gaol and tell him about this wonderful place where he can study in peace. Escort Waldahr out of his cell and to the slums, then return to Captain Brant for your reward: 7,000 gold and a ferrystone.

    Make sure you also return to Waldahr in the vaults a few days later, as he’ll have another quest for you: “A Magisterial Amenity,” which involves finding his confiscated spectacles.

    For more Dragon’s Dogma 2 walkthroughs, here’s who to give the Jadeite Orb to, if you should buy the Ornate Box, how to buy a house in Vernworth, where to find Rodge, and the best order for Captain Brant’s quests.

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    Ford James

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  • Road House, Anatomy of a Fall, Netflix’s Shirley, and every new movie to watch at home this weekend

    Road House, Anatomy of a Fall, Netflix’s Shirley, and every new movie to watch at home this weekend

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    Greetings, Polygon readers! Each week, we round up the most notable new releases to streaming and VOD, highlighting the biggest and best new movies for you to watch at home.

    This week, Doug Liman’s Road House reboot starring Jake Gyllenhaal and Conor McGregor finally premieres on Prime Video. Not looking for a suave drifter turned bouncer slapping the mess out of surly bar patrons? That’s all right, there’s plenty new releases to watch on streaming this weekend. Anatomy of a Fall finally comes to Hulu after winning Best Original Screenplay at this year’s Oscars. Shirley, the new historical biopic starring Regina King, arrives on Netflix along with several other new releases on Criterion Channel and Starz. That’s not even mentioning the new movies on VOD this week, like the irreverent DIY comedy Dad & Step-Dad or the satirical historical film The Monk and the Gun.

    Here’s everything new that’s available to watch this weekend!

    New on Netflix

    Shirley

    Where to watch: Available to stream on Netflix

    Photo: Glen Wilson/Netflix

    Genre: Biographical drama
    Run time: 1h 56m
    Director: John Ridley
    Cast: Regina King, Lance Reddick, Lucas Hedges

    Regina King (If Beale Street Could Talk) stars in this biopic following the life of Shirley Chisholm, the American politician who became the first Black candidate for a major party nomination and the first woman to run for the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination. Notably, Shirley features one of Lance Reddick’s final performances as Wesley “Mac” Holder, Chisholm’s campaign manager and chief aide.

    Fighter

    Where to watch: Available to stream on Netflix

    A pilot resting his hand on the outer hull of a fighter jet in Fighter.

    Image: Viacom18 Studios/Marflix Pictures

    Genre: Action
    Run time: 2h 40m
    Director: Siddharth Anand
    Cast: Hrithik Roshan, Deepika Padukone, Anil Kapoor

    Not to be confused with the 2010 boxing drama starring Mark Wahlberg and Christian Bale, the latest movie from Pathaan director Siddharth Anand is like the Hindi equivalent of Top Gun: Maverick. Modern heartthrob Hrithik Roshan stars as the pilot of an elite Indian Air Force response team tasked with responding to a series of terror attacks.

    New on Hulu

    Anatomy of a Fall

    Where to watch: Available to stream on Hulu

    A dead, bloody body in the snow in Anatomy of a Fall, as someone near talks on the phone

    Image: Neon

    Genre: Crime thriller
    Run time: 2h 31m
    Director: Justine Triet
    Cast: Sandra Hüller, Swann Arlaud, Milo Machado Graner

    This Palme d’Or- and Oscar-winning French courtroom drama follows the story of a writer trying to prove her innocence following the mysterious death of her husband outside of their home. Was it murder or was it suicide? Beyond a simple interrogation of guilt, the film is a psychological thriller that delves deep into the complicated circumstances behind the couple’s relationship.

    New on Prime Video

    Road House

    Where to watch: Available to stream on Prime Video

    A man in a button-up shirt standing in a street at night.

    Photo: Laura Radford/Prime Video

    Genre: Action
    Run time: 1h 54m
    Director: Doug Liman
    Cast: Jake Gyllenhaal, Daniela Melchior, Billy Magnussen

    This reboot of the classic 1989 action film sees Jake Gyllenhaal step into the role of Dalton, a former UFC middleweight fighter who becomes a drifter after his career unceremoniously ends. Finding work at a roadhouse in the Florida Keys as a bouncer, Dalton must contend with a vicious landowner and his enforcer Knox (Conor McGregor) when they attempt to seize the property the roadhouse is built on.

    New on Criterion Channel

    Anselm

    Where to watch: Available to stream on Criterion Channel

    A man standing in a darkened studio surrounded by art supplies and large paintings.

    Image: Janus Films

    Genre: Documentary
    Run time: 1h 33m
    Director: Wim Wenders

    This documentary follows the life and career of painter-sculptor Anselm Kiefer. Shot in 6K resolution in a 3D format, the film attempts to blur the boundary between Anselm’s work and the movie itself.

    New on Starz

    Expend4bles

    Where to watch: Available to stream on Starz

    A midshot of Sylvester Stallone wearing a black beret and vest in the film Expend4bles.

    Photo: Yana Blajeva/Lionsgate

    Genre: Action comedy
    Run time: 1h 43m
    Director: Scott Waugh
    Cast: Jason Statham, Sylvester Stallone, Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson

    The fourth entry in the brash franchise has its best action scenes yet, hands the reins over to Jason Statham, and brings in Tony Jaa and Iko Uwais for some extra martial arts bona fides.

    From our review:

    Expend4bles stretches the franchise to its limits, and those limits frankly don’t reach very far. There’s a level of self-awareness to Expendables films that can make their paper-thin plotting and characterization excusable — in the end, they’re just a reason to see certain action legends interact with each other. But in a decade-plus of homage, the series hasn’t developed any stylistic flourishes of its own. Mission: Impossible movies have their signature stunts, Fast and Furious movies have their improbable applications of cars, but the Expendables lacks a comparable calling card. There’s nothing for fans to look forward to beyond Jason Statham’s resilient charm and Sylvester Stallone’s braggadocio. And frankly, there are plenty of other places for people who want those things to get them.

    New to rent

    The Monk and the Gun

    Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu

    A group of villagers and monks admiring an antique rifle.

    Image: Roadside Attractions

    Genre: Comedy drama
    Run time: 1h 47m
    Director: Pawo Choyning Dorji
    Cast: Tandin Wangchuk, Deki Lhamo, Pema Zangmo Sherpa

    Set in Bhutan during the mid-2000s in the wake of the king’s abdication, this satirical comedy follows the story of a young monk and an American gun collector who vie for possession of a rare antique rifle. Meanwhile, the people of Bhutan hold mock elections in their hesitant transition from living in a monarchy to a democracy.

    Bob Marley: One Love

    Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu

    A smiling man with dreadlocks standing next to a band of musicians playing.

    Image: Paramount Pictures

    Genre: Biographical musical
    Run time: 1h 47m
    Director: Reinaldo Marcus Green
    Cast: Kingsley Ben-Adir, Lashana Lynch, James Norton

    This biopic follows the story of Bob Marley, portrayed by Kingsley Ben-Adir (High Fidelity), the acclaimed reggae singer and songwriter. The film follows Marley from his rise to fame in the ’70s up until his death in 1981.

    Dad & Step-Dad

    Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu

    Three men sitting on the bed of a rusted truck in the middle of a field.

    Image: NoBudge

    Genre: Comedy
    Run time: 1h 18m
    Director: Tynan DeLong
    Cast: Colin Burgess, Anthony Oberbeck, Clare O’Kane

    This slow-burn character comedy follows a dad (Colin Burgess), a stepdad (Anthony Oberbeck), and a mom (Clare O’Kane) who agree to spend time with one another over a long weekend trip in the woods for the sake of their son Branson (Brian Fiddyment). Sounds awkward? You have no idea.

    Inside the Yellow Cocoon Shell

    Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu

    A man standing at the entrance of a church with a wide field of trees and grass in the distance.

    Image: Kino Lorber

    Genre: Drama
    Run time: 2h 58m
    Director: Pham Thien An
    Cast: Le Phong Vu, Nguyen Thi Truc Quynh, Nguyen Thinh

    After his sister-in-law dies in a motorcycle accident, a man takes on the responsibility of shepherding both her remains and his 5-year-old nephew to the rural village where he grew up. A three-hour meditation on the fragility of life, the pain of grief, and the importance of being present, every frame of Pham Thien An’s Caméra d’Or-winning film is as gorgeous as it is melancholic.

    Land of Bad

    Where to watch: Available to rent on Amazon, Apple, and Vudu

    Two men in army camouflage holding rifles in a tropical forest.

    Image: R.U. Robot Studios/Highland Film Group

    Genre: Action thriller
    Run time: 1h 50m
    Director: William Eubank
    Cast: Liam Hemsworth, Russell Crowe, Luke Hemsworth

    Liam Hemsworth and Russell Crowe star in this military thriller about a rookie Delta Force officer who is lost in enemy territory when his team is ambushed. Refusing to leave without his comrades and with time running out, he’ll have to rely on a seasoned Air Force drone pilot to be his eyes in the sky in their desperate mission to escape alive.

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    Toussaint Egan

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  • Converse teams up with Dungeons & Dragons for 50th anniversary gear

    Converse teams up with Dungeons & Dragons for 50th anniversary gear

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    Converse is partnering with Dungeons & Dragons to celebrate the legendary tabletop franchise’s 50th anniversary with a hot new collection of shoes and other gear that will be available online starting April 11. For those attending this year’s Gary Con, the popular Dungeons & Dragons fan event celebrating its co-creator Gary Gygax, they’ll be available there on March 21.

    Converse’s new products display a clear understanding of the assignment. Just look at the designs, which draw inspiration and incorporate details from first editions of D&D’s Player’s Handbook, Monster Manual, and the Dungeon Masters Guide.

    Naturally, the collection includes several limited-edition “Chuck 70” style canvas and leather high top sneakers. The two leather high top designs feature an alternate version of the Chuck Taylor All-Star logo, designed to resemble a D20 instead. The canvas designs feature some other fun details, like illustrations of Kelek the Sorcerer, Warduke the Fighter, and Zarak the Assassin from the D&D action figures made in the 1980’s.

    Image: Converse

    Some of the patterns, illustrations, and other unique elements will even be ported over to Converse By You, letting you apply them to your own bespoke apparel designs. To top it all off, the box that these high tops ship in has lovingly been transformed into a Mimic.


    In addition to the special-edition high tops, Converse’s D&D collection will include a trucker hat, shorts, a sweatshirt, and three T-shirts. The hat and shorts feature the demonic face found on the cover of the player’s guide for the first edition of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, but my personal favorite is the light green tee that features a Gelatinous Cube, which is consuming the Chuck Taylor logo.


    Converse hasn’t revealed any pricing information surrounding the collection just yet, but as someone who wore Chuck Taylors to their wedding, I can’t wait to pick up a pair for myself.

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    Alice Jovanée

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  • Diablo 4 joined by The Quarry, MLB The Show 24, and more on Xbox Game Pass

    Diablo 4 joined by The Quarry, MLB The Show 24, and more on Xbox Game Pass

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    Xbox is jumping into spring with a huge slate of games coming to Xbox Game Pass. Starting today, the service will be getting Lightyear Frontier, a space exploration and farming sim with a mech, and MLB The Show 24, which also launched Tuesday across platforms and will feature women players for the first time in franchise history.

    Arguably the biggest addition, though, is Diablo 4 on March 28, the first new Activision Blizzard title to hit Game Pass since Microsoft’s acquisition of the company was completed last year. Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer said that players shouldn’t expect all Activision Blizzard games to drop onto Game Pass the moment the deal was finalized, but this signals the start of more additions to come. New Diablo 4 players will also have plenty of time to play this RPG for dozens of hours before the paid DLC Vessel of Hatred releases later this year.

    There’s also Supermassive Games’ The Quarry, a previous PS5 console exclusive and spiritual successor to Until Dawn. This time, a group of teenage counselors have to survive a night at an abandoned camp while being stalked by violent creatures and mysterious locals. As the player, you have to make a series of choices on behalf of all the characters to try and ensure everybody makes it out alive. (Spoiler alert: It’s very unlikely you will succeed.)

    If none of those games are for you, this is still a very packed list of new titles for the rest of March into April. Here’s the full list:

    • Lightyear Frontier (Game Preview) (Cloud, PC, and Xbox Series X|S) — March 19
    • MLB The Show 24 (Cloud and Console) — March 19
    • The Quarry (Cloud and Console) — March 20
    • Evil West (Cloud, Console, and PC) – March 21
    • Terra Invicta (Game Preview) (PC) – March 26
    • Diablo IV (Console and PC) – March 28
    • Hot Wheels Unleashed 2 – Turbocharged (Cloud, Console, and PC) – March 28
    • Open Roads (Cloud, Console, and PC) – March 28
    • Ark: Survival Ascended (Cloud, PC, Xbox Series X|S) – April 1
    • F1 23 (Cloud) EA Play – April 2
    • Superhot: Mind Control Delete (Cloud, Console, and PC) – April 2

    As you can imagine, with the release of MLB The Show 24, last year’s MLB The Show 23 will be leaving Xbox Game Pass at the end of the month, along with two other games:

    • Hot Wheels Unleashed (Cloud, Console, and PC)
    • Infinite Guitars (Cloud, Console, and PC)
    • MLB The Show 23 (Cloud and Console)

    Xbox Game Pass costs $10.99 a month, while PC Game Pass costs $9.99 a month. PC Game Pass includes EA Play access, which offers another 70 games on PC. Xbox Game Pass Ultimate, at $16.99 per month, gives subscribers access to everything — the PC Game Pass and Xbox Game Pass libraries, EA Play on both console and PC — as well as access to online multiplayer. Xbox Game Pass Core (formerly called Xbox Live Gold) costs $9.99 per month or $59.99 per year.

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    Carli Velocci

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  • Manhunt’s greatest strength is letting Abraham Lincoln just be a bro

    Manhunt’s greatest strength is letting Abraham Lincoln just be a bro

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    There is a moment that looms large over everything else in the pilot of Apple TV’s post-Civil War drama, Manhunt, a conversation that will haunt Edwin Stanton (Tobias Menzies) for the rest of his life. He’s hard at work in his office, putting together the plans for Reconstruction, when Abraham Lincoln (Midnight Mass’ Hamish Linklater) comes in tossing a baseball and invites him to the theater tonight (Ulysses S. Grant flaked to hang with his wife). Stanton is intrigued, drawn in by his friend’s easy charm, but ultimately backs out — he also owes his wife a night together. And so Lincoln strolls out, bemoaning that he’ll just be hanging out with Mary’s friends as he sees Our American Cousin.

    The rest is history: That night, Lincoln would be assassinated at the theater. Andrew Johnson would take the oath of office the following day. And Stanton — as Manhunt depicts — would spend the next 12 days hunting down Lincoln’s killer, John Wilkes Booth, and the rest of his life wondering what would’ve happened if he said yes to an evening at the theater.

    It’s no surprise that Stanton might forever ponder the road not taken, even though he made sure someone was guarding Lincoln that night. It’s a thought that’s incredibly compelling as Manhunt turns Stanton’s survivor’s guilt over and over. His connection to Lincoln makes it all the more provocative: Losing a friend like this is a tragedy. But when you’re also secretary of war to one of the most important presidents in United States history, trusted with his security and that of the nation, your actions have larger consequences. Every choice Johnson makes (or doesn’t make) in the postwar panic, every new vector point for the country, hangs on Stanton’s soul, a constant reminder of his failures and what we could’ve had.

    As a period drama, Manhunt is tasked with reading viewers in on a lot of vernacular and specific historical context. Too often its script cuts corners, making things as simple as possible, eschewing ambiguity in favor of a tidy narrative. The show grinds to a halt every time someone is forced to underline the point of the scene you just saw. It can be clumsy about working in exposition, or tackling Lincoln as a Great Man™, and big moments often come with the desire to be seen as big moments, rather than feeling like them. It’s hard for there to be enough scenery to chew on when most everyone in Manhunt feels like they have to stop and tell you how it tastes.

    Image: Apple TV Plus

    But it’s Menzies’ performance that grounds the show even when its dialogue can’t fully connect those dots. Every scene post-assassination has a heaviness to it, even when Stanton is energized on the hunt for Booth. Menzies brings in a sort of lightly manic energy, a ferocity of offense to mask the deeply rooted guilt already taking hold in his soul. It’s his performance that best ensures Lincoln’s loss is felt even when it’s unspoken, or when the show gets too busy. It’s this angle that gives Manhunt its juice, a reminder that Lincoln the myth was Lincoln the man first and foremost, and that he was mourned as not just a compatriot but also a companion.

    So it’s no surprise that the moment in Stanton’s office looms large in Manhunt’s narrative. It’s the first scene we get to see Lincoln as just a dude. He comes into his friend’s office, plops his feet up on his desk, jokes around, and bemoans his bud’s need to put in the time. It’s a distinctly casual feel, Abraham Lincoln: The Legend, only in the accurate (if distracting) makeup and costuming the show layers Linklater behind. This is more than a man who could rouse a room and change how we see ourselves as a nation; he was also a pal you could look up to. That’s the loss that Manhunt makes us feel, and what makes the stakes for Stanton’s mission feel so incredibly high.

    The first two episodes of Manhunt are now streaming on Apple TV Plus. New episodes drop every Friday.

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    Zosha Millman

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  • Honkai: Star Rail version 2.1 livestream codes

    Honkai: Star Rail version 2.1 livestream codes

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    Honkai: Star Rail just closed out its version 2.1 livestream, teasing what’s to come in the next update, which launches the evening of March 26 EDT. Alongside new characters and events, Hoyoverse uses the stream to distribute codes that reward free Stellar Jade and other upgrade materials.

    This update brings three new playable characters that Penacony enjoyers will already know from the game’s story: Acheron, Aventurine, and Gallagher. For the five-star characters, Acheron is Lightning Nihility and Aventurine is Imaginary Preservation. Gallagher, the sole four-star character making his playable debut in 2.1, is a Fire Abundance character. In addition to these playable characters, version 2.1 will have a bartending minigame event and a new world in Simulated Universe.

    These codes are only active until the day ends, so you’ll want to make sure to use them quickly.

    The Honkai: Star Rail reward codes from the version 2.1 livestream are:

    These codes will expire on March 17 at 11:59 a.m. EDT / 8:59 a.m. PDT, so use them quickly or you’ll miss out on the free loot. For more codes that don’t expire in just a few hours, you can check out our constantly-updated list of active Honkai: Star Rail codes.

    How to redeem codes in Honkai: Star Rail

    You can redeem the codes in game by opening the menu and tapping on the ellipses in the top right corner. A “redemption code” option will come up that you can select.

    Image: Hoyoverse via Polygon

    You can also redeem them online through the Honkai: Star Rail code redeem website. You’ll need to select your correct server and login through the website in order to get rewards. You will also need to have a working UID for Honkai: Star Rail. If you’ve never logged into Honkai: Star Rail in any form using your Hoyoverse account, it will not work.

    If you’re just getting started in Honkai: Star Rail, you can check out our beginner’s guide and gacha explainer.

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    Julia Lee

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  • The Halo TV show making the humans the villains completely misses the point

    The Halo TV show making the humans the villains completely misses the point

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    It’s become increasingly clear that the Halo TV show has a villain problem. This may seem impossible for a series that’s supposed to be about a hostile race of aliens led by liars who exploit religious fanaticism, but instead the show can’t stop focusing on human bickering, bizarrely relegating the galaxy-conquering aliens to an afterthought for both the characters in the show and the audience.

    I could talk about how Halo’s centering of humans as the bad guys behind every plot cheapens one of the few fascinating moral complexities of the Halo games and books — that the Spartans were built for fundamentally inhumane treatment of rebel fighters and then accidentally found justification in a surprise alien invasion. But it’s more fair and even more damning to talk about all of this on the Halo TV show’s own terms. And on those terms, I simply have no fucking idea why there are even aliens in this show to begin with.

    In an effort to underline the badness of humanity, Halo has completely sidelined the Covenant, throwing the entire show off course and spinning wildly into space. Even the Covenant’s grand invasion of Reach in the show is just another human plot, one of a thousand ways the TV show wants to prove that the human bureaucrats are evil, something we’ve known since the earliest moments of the show’s first season.

    But all this emphasis on humanity’s sins begs a critical question: Almost two full seasons into Halo, what point is it trying to make, exactly? Season 2’s seventh episode, “Thermopylae,” seems to offer some attempt at answering that question, when Makee (Charlie Murphy) pleads with Chief to stop helping humanity so that the two of them can settle Halo on their own and make it a paradise, rather than letting either side use it as a civilization-destroying weapon. Setting aside the silliness that is this version of Halo being so constantly tempted to recast Master Chief (Pablo Schreiber) as the lead of a domestic drama, Makee’s statement still leaves a gap in our understanding of what this show is doing. If the point is “war makes monsters of us all,” then shouldn’t we see that equally in both the human and Covenant factions? And even more pressingly, why won’t anyone acknowledge that the Covenant are the ones who threatened extinction first and based their whole galactic conquest on the Prophets’ lie about a Great Journey that would take them from the galaxy?

    Photo: Adrienn Szabo/Paramount Plus

    We’re subjected to half a dozen scenes each episode of humanity’s reckless and evil leaders making civilization-shaping choices — particularly the ongoing machinations of Admiral Margaret Parangosky (Shabana Azmi), one of the worst and least compelling characters in recent TV memory, thanks to her consistently baffling decisions and seemingly lack of strategy and communication. (Put simply: She’s here to antagonize every other character, with no real character of her own.) Meanwhile we only get to see the Covenant’s side from the point of view of Makee and the criminally underdeveloped Arbiter. Sure, we hear them say that the Prophets might be full of shit and that the Great Journey might be a lie, but it remains a complete mystery why the alien’s genuinely compelling similarity to Earth’s own corrupt and lying authorities is drawn with such a faint line. Perhaps drawing those connections more clearly would help us make sense of why Master Chief has fought more humans in Halo season 2 than he has Covenant.

    Despite the moment-to-moment conflict rarely making sense, or seeming to lead anywhere, it hasn’t stopped the show from introducing more plot threads or drip-feeding longtime series fans with new bits of recognizable lore. For instance, this latest episode gave us our most meaningful look yet at the Forerunners, though they haven’t been named quite yet. It also hinted at yet another alien faction that could soon arrive, but we’ll have to wait and see if that thread goes anywhere.

    All these new introductions do little to lessen the feeling of narrative cheapness that surrounds Halo, however. As more ideas and plots get introduced, it only serves to underline how little sense any of this really makes. Sure, we know the Covenant are knocking on humanity’s front door, but the sudden diversion of every character in the show now converging on a need to capture “the Halo,” as they keep calling it, feels like it came out of nowhere. Which is a pretty astounding feat of messy storytelling considering it’s the object the entire franchise is named after.

    Halo season 2 is now streaming on Paramount Plus. The season finale will be released on Thursday, March 21.

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    Austen Goslin

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  • The best thriller TV series to watch on Netflix

    The best thriller TV series to watch on Netflix

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    There’s plenty of great thriller films to watch on Netflix. But if you prefer your stories to be more procedural, there’s just as many fantastic TV series to choose from on the service.

    We’ve put together our conspiracy corkboards, crunched the numbers, and followed the money to bring you our list of the top suspects for the best thriller TV series to watch on Netflix. From modern classics like David Fincher’s Mindhunter and You to pulse-pounding murder mysteries like Erased and more, Netflix has a selection of thriller TV just waiting to become your next obsession.

    Here are the best thriller series you can watch right now on Netflix. Our latest update added The Diplomat as our editor’s pick.

    Editor’s pick: The Diplomat

    Image: Netflix

    One of Netflix’s biggest hits from its 2023 slate of shows added a different (but well-trodden) sort of thriller to this list — the political thriller — following in the footsteps of the streaming platform’s first-ever hit original show.

    A throwback to the kind of plot-heavy political thriller that used to run television (and the screwball comedies of days gone by), The Diplomat is a delightful star vehicle for Keri Russell. She is Kate Wyler, a whip-smart career diplomat whose plans are thrown into disarray when her upcoming assignment in Afghanistan is changed to what seems to be a cushy post as the new U.S. ambassador to the United Kingdom. For Kate, who loves her work and is very good at it, this is a clear downgrade, but the more power-focused people in her life (including her conniving husband Hal, played by Rufus Sewell) are delighted by the new role. What follows is a whirlwind of intrigue and mystery, with snappy dialogue, strong chemistry between the leads, and plenty of twists and turns.

    After courting many viewers for its first season, The Diplomat will return for a second. We can’t wait, especially after the first season’s cliffhanger ending. —Pete Volk

    Babylon Berlin

    A raucous party set in 1929 Berlin, as seen in Babylon Berlin.

    Image: X Filme Creative Pool

    Bad things are coming to 1929 Berlin. We know this, of course — with the vantage point of history, the Weimar Republic era was marked by economic insecurity and the beginning of the Nazi Party. But the ’20s in the world of Babylon Berlin exist just before that horror, when the degeneracy from all that economic downturn could give way to roaring ’20s clubs just as easily as unending darkness.

    That tension is captured in Babylon Berlin by two protagonists: Gereon Rath (a soft and strong Volker Bruch), a vice inspector on a secret mission to take down an extortion ring, and Charlotte Ritter (Liv Lisa Fries, all vinegar and chutzpah), the new police clerk who moonlights as a sex worker. Together they provide two very distinct vantage points on the Weimar Republic’s waning days, exposing the rot of what’s to come at the same time they find hope in what could’ve been.

    Babylon Berlin’s trick is by not getting ahead of itself. The show is perhaps one of the slower boils on this list; the thrills of the mystery, such as they are, come from meticulous pacing. Answers don’t come easy, and a whole country’s politics don’t change overnight. Babylon Berlin is a web of history and conspiracy, and by taking those elements equally seriously and methodically, you get a twisty, hardboiled detective story for the ages. —Zosha Millman

    Bodies

    Shira Haas as DS Maplewood kneeling beside a body in a courtyard overrun with plants in Bodies.

    Image: Netflix

    Solving a murder is hard enough, but how do you go about apprehending a culprit whose crime literally transcends space and time?

    Bodies is a terrific cerebral whodunit with an excellent ensemble cast whose stories weave into one another effortlessly as the series builds and the mystery deepens. Created by Paul Tomalin (Torchwood) and based on Si Spencer’s 2014 comic, this sci-fi crime thriller follows four detectives living in different time periods of London who find themselves investigating a strange murder. What’s so strange about it? Well, the victim’s body appears — and reappears — in each time period in the exact same location. What’s even stranger is that the victim was last seen alive in 2053, despite being seen dead both in that year and as early as 1890.

    A engrossing drama that feels like a mashup between Class of ’09, Dark, and Alex Garland’s Devs, Bodies is one of Netflix’s most compelling releases this year and wholly deserves to be added to your watchlist. —Toussaint Egan

    Erased

    A black haired anime character (Satoru Fujinuma) with glasses stares at wafting shreds of paper in Erased.

    Image: A-1 Pictures/Aniplex of America

    This sci-fi mystery thriller miniseries from 2016 centers on Satoru Fujinuma, a 29-year-old delivery man who is inexplicably sent back in time and reawakens in his 11-year-old body. Determined to save the lives of his mother and his elementary school classmate, who died and disappeared, respectively, under mysterious circumstances, Satoru must combine his knowledge of the future with his ability to change the past in order to apprehend the culprit and bring them to justice.

    Erased is a compulsively watchable thriller anime, filled with enough twists and turns to keep audiences guessing right up to the series’ exhilarating conclusion. —TE

    Ganglands

    Samuel Jouy firing a submachine gun beside an open truck door in Ganglands.

    Image: Netflix

    French action cinema is having a bit of a renaissance, and one of the leading figures is director Julien Leclercq. He made the very good Olga Kurylenko thriller Sentinelle, the Jean-Claude Van Damme-led The Bouncer, and my favorite movie of his, the tense crime thriller Braqueurs (also known as The Crew).

    Six years later, Leclercq took his talents to television with the Netflix series Ganglands (also known as Braqueurs). It shares the same name, lead (the excellent Sami Bouajila), and general vibe, but is not technically a sequel or a remake. In Ganglands, a crew of expert armed robbers are drawn into a gang war: They’re so dang good at crimes, everyone wants to hire them, even the people they rob.

    Leclercq and writer Hamid Hlioua have created a muscular little thriller anchored by strong leading performances and the director’s tension-filled style of building action and conflict. The second season was recently released on Netflix, and both seasons are very much worth your time. —Pete Volk

    Lupin

    omar sy in lupin

    Image: Netflix

    The thrill of the heist — there’s just nothing like it. Ask Assane Diop (Omar Sy). He’s been working as a con artist and thief for years, drawing his inspiration (and moniker) from an obsession with the literary gentleman thief Arsène Lupin. His thrills are hard-won, but they’re also smoothly meticulous. For Assane, the art of the heist — even with a priceless diamond necklace worn by Marie Antoinette — is a given.

    What comes less naturally is revenge. Lupin’s first season follows his quest to seek vengeance on the rich family that wronged his father, and the show is full of twists and turns as his mission starts to bleed from his gentleman thief persona back into his real life.

    The French series was a breakout hit when it premiered on Netflix, thanks in large part to Sy’s performance. He is magnetic as he makes con artistry look easy, with the sort of natural charm that makes you believe he can fake his way into any vault or safe in France (and that’s all before we get into his thieving skills and connections). With a heist, the end is, typically, self-assured. Sy’s performance ensures Lupin has the same confidence, and makes every step of the ride along the way its own thrill. —ZM

    Mindhunter

    Albert Jones, Holt McCallany, Jonathan Groff leaning against the hood of a car while lit by the police sirens in episode five of Mindhunter season 2.

    Image: Netflix

    David Fincher’s exacting vision is applied to the television format in one of the best shows Netflix has ever produced. Over two seasons, odd-couple FBI agents Holden Ford (Jonathan Groff) and Bill Tench (the terrific Holt McCallany) interview serial killers in the burgeoning field of criminal psychology.

    In a nice twist on conventional character tropes, it is the young agent who is often cold and emotionally removed, and the older one who worries about the consequences of their actions. Their chemistry, as well as Mindhunter’s deep study of our culture around serial killers and the approach to stopping them, makes the show excellent, and it never veers into the exploitation of its peers in the genre.

    How exacting is Fincher’s vision? Take a look at this mind-blowing VFX reel from the show, which literally changed how I watch modern cinema. —PV

    Monster

    Kenzo Tenma staring down at his hands solemnly in Monster.

    Image: Madhouse/Viz Media

    If you’re a fan of the 1960s crime drama series The Fugitive, you’ll likely love the 2004 anime adaptation of Naoki Urasawa’s psychological thriller manga. After all, the series was inspired by it! Set in Germany before and after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Monster centers on the story of Kenzo Tenma, a Japanese brain surgeon living in Düsseldorf. After being implicated in the murders of his superiors, Kenzo must go on the run to clear his name by tracking down the real culprit: a young man he once treated.

    Spanning 74 episodes, Monster is a labyrinthine drama filled with a rich cast of characters and enough harrowing twists and revelations to fill a Matryoshka doll. —TE

    The Night Agent

    Gabriel Basso holds out his FBI badge in The Night Agent

    Photo: Dan Power/Netflix

    Sometimes, you want a “light brain” thriller — something not too deep that might be perfect for a bucket of popcorn or for background viewing while you fold some laundry. The Night Agent is Netflix’s quintessential plot-heavy popcorn thriller, elevated to solid fare thanks to the surprising chemistry between its two leads.

    Adapted by The Shield creator Shawn Ryan from the novel, The Night Agent stars Gabriel Basso as an FBI agent who has been relegated to watching a phone that never rings in the basement in the White House. When that phone does ring one night, he and the person on the other end (Luciane Buchanan) are brought into a vast conspiracy that threatens to unravel everything he knows. —PV

    You

    Penn Badgley as Joe Goldberg removing a knife from a dead man’s chest in You season four.

    Image: Netflix

    No one is doing it like Joe Goldberg (Penn Badgley). The man is in a league of his own when it comes to stalking women and obsessing over them. This is the double-edged sword of watching You and following Joe in his unethical exploits: He is outright the villain of his own story.

    Luckily, You is very aware of this, taking the initial premise of the first season — boy meets girl, boy stalks girl, boy manipulates her whole life to a dangerous degree — and continues flipping it over, putting Joe through his paces, letting him scramble to cover his ass as he gets in deeper and deeper. Each You season is a flavor unto itself, switching locales and ladies and letting Joe make the worst kind of case for himself.

    You is not a show for the faint of heart, but it’s also not a thriller that rests easily on its underlying darkness. Joe may be an absolute piece of shit (even Badgley thinks so, and would really like it if you did too), but the show knows how to keep him engaging as it turns the screws on him. Each of the four seasons challenges him in new ways, and it makes for a snaky and startlingly good time. With You there’s only one thing you can always expect: for Joe to go to extreme and violent lengths to prove he’s not the bad guy. Also a plexiglass vault. —ZM

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    Pete Volk

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  • Persona 3 Reload’s ending, explained

    Persona 3 Reload’s ending, explained

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    Persona 3 Reload is a long game with an emotional ending — made more emotional by the sheer amount of time you’ve spent in this world and with these characters. If you got the game’s true ending, you may still find yourself watching the credits and asking: Wait, is there anything I could’ve done differently?

    In this Persona 3 Reload guide, we’ll walk you through the ending of the game, the fate of the game’s protagonist (Makoto Yuki), what influence you have over its outcome (if any), and how it all connects to Episode Aigis — the upcoming epilogue expansion.

    [Spoiler Warning: This post contains major spoilers for the true ending of Persona 3 Reload and some minor spoilers for “The Answer” epilogue from Persona 3 FES, which is being remade into the upcoming Episode Aigis DLC for Persona 3 Reload. If you want to stay as spoiler-free as possible, bookmark this guide and return to it once you see the credits roll. In the meantime, check out our guides for classroom answers and social link requirements.]

    Graphic: Polygon | Source images: Atlus/Sega

    Is the protagonist dead at the end of Persona 3 Reload?

    The protagonist uses the Great Seal ability in Persona 3 Reload

    Image: Atlus/Sega via Polygon

    Yes. When the protagonist falls asleep in Aigis’ lap, as all his friends are rushing up to the rooftop of the school, he passes away. This happens regardless of whether you choose the “……” option or the “Close them” option when the game tells you your eyes feel heavy. The blue butterfly fluttering away is meant to symbolize the character’s death in that moment.

    OK, but how do we know for sure? Well, that answer — funnily enough — comes from the game’s epilogue expansion called “The Answer,” which is a part of Persona 3 FES. That expansion is not part of Persona 3 Reload, but it’s coming in September of 2024 as the Episode Aigis DLC.

    In “The Answer” — and presumably Episode Aigis, based on how faithful Reload is to Persona 3 FES — you play as Aigis a few weeks after graduation and the death of the Leader character (which the game explicitly calls out). If you look back at the final battle against Nyx, the protagonist uses the Universe Persona to perform the Great Seal ability. The cost for casting Great Seal is equal to the Leader’s max health, suggesting that he gave everything to stop Nyx.

    The death is a little bit more complex than that, but we’ll leave you to discover those answers in Episode Aigis. Just trust for now that — unless Atlus makes an absolutely massive change to the story — the Leader is dead.

    Can you save the Leader in Persona 3 Reload?

    The protagonist rests and dies on Aigis’ lap in Persona 3 Reload

    Image: Atlus/Sega via Polygon

    No, technically. While you can choose to get the bad ending for Persona 3 Reload and kill Ryoji back in December, it’s understood that everyone on Earth will eventually die in that reality — even if you never see it. In order for everyone else to survive in Persona 3 Reload, the Leader must give up their own life to stop Nyx.

    Sacrifice is part of the main story thrust of Persona 3 Reload, with many players losing loved ones to heroic moments of sacrifice. Yukari and Mitsuru’s fathers are both great examples of this theming at work. By dying for his friends and the world, the protagonist’s death completes the sacrificial theme.

    Enjoy the game’s beautiful final moments knowing that you did nothing wrong here. You got the game’s good — albeit bittersweet — ending.

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    Ryan Gilliam

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  • Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth has no right being this funny

    Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth has no right being this funny

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    As many people have said on dating profiles (or mothers on their wall art), I love a video game that makes me laugh, and I am delighted Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth has been so goddamn good at it.

    In my time with the game, it has asked me to do absurd things like play a card game against a regular-ass dog. It has featured Cloud Strife, the badass protagonist with a giant sword, carrying a little cushion around for him to use on benches. It’s got dudes who play acoustic guitar at you like the Kens in Barbie, the franchise’s second homoerotic biker duel, and a lot of other things I want to talk about but would probably be spoilers. I mean, Chadley???

    But if you’ll allow me the indulgence, I need to talk about one in particular.

    Consider this a spoiler warning. I’m serious. I’m going to embed a photo of Cloud Strife playing the piano (also funny) to try and spare casual scrollers, but right underneath it, there will be a YouTube video of one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen in video games, one that I recommend seeing for yourself if you’re interested in playing through Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth. (You can’t miss it, it’s part of the story.)

    Okay, ready?

    Image: Square Enix

    Here it is:

    There are a lot of incredible things about this scene, which takes place in Chapter 5 aboard the Shinra-8 cruise to Costa del Sol. First, like a lot of things in Rebirth, it’s a gag lifted directly from the original Final Fantasy 7, but it’s been given such a lavish reinterpretation that it becomes an entirely different kind of funny, a throwaway gag made into a comedic centerpiece for no reason at all.

    As previously established in Final Fantasy 7 Remake, the characters are more than happy to break out into dance, but that still doesn’t prepare you for seeing Red XIII do a Michael Jackson impression, or the (smaller but funnier) sight gag of the canine warrior trying to cross his legs across the table from Cloud. (Also the kid crying at the sight of him kills me every time.)

    I don’t think you get any of this in Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth without Square Enix’s crucial development decision to never shy away from or soften the oddity of the original game’s polygonal abstraction. Under the older game’s art constraints, the unrealities of, say, riding a dolphin or meeting a talking cat are much easier to roll with, and not particularly unusual.

    Recreating these moments with such a high degree of realism is in itself funny, an endearing commitment to a bit I can’t believe a massive studio signed up for. It’s also both a necessary counterbalance to an otherwise dire and melodramatic story — yes, the heroes of Rebirth must also fight for a world that has room for fun and levity — and a bit of a eulogy for this kind of goofballery in modern big-budget games.

    Sure, every once in a while we get something like Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth, the latest in a long line of games that always show players a tremendously goofy time — but Final Fantasy 7’s comedy is something different. It’s a relic from a time when games were a little more mysterious, a little more challenging to interpret, with a little more room to surprise. Maybe publishers will see people eagerly sharing photos of Red XIII riding a chocobo and think, hey, this stuff would be good to have in video games again.

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    Joshua Rivera

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  • 3 Body Problem is the kind of TV epic we need

    3 Body Problem is the kind of TV epic we need

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    When Game of Thrones ended in May 2019, the hunt was well underway for a series that could match its blockbuster scale. HBO was already talking spinoffs with George R.R. Martin, while Netflix’s The Witcher, Disney’s The Mandalorian, Apple’s Foundation, Paramount Plus’ Halo, and Amazon’s mega-budgeted gambit on a Lord of the Rings prequel bubbled at various stages of development and production. Five years later, all the shows exist — but there’s no clear champion. Even reactions to HBO’s prequel, House of the Dragon, were more golf-clap acclaim than calls of the second coming of a franchise.

    What the wannabe successors proved (that everyone seemed to know at the time except IP-hungry executives?) is that Thrones’ secret wasn’t scale, but substantive drama. A great show needs characters with big questions and big goals, but down-to-earth emotions. The balance of a continent could hinge on valiant knights and ancient prophecy and dragon battles as long as when those involved got mad, it felt like actual people getting mad. For all the finale-related flack, Thrones showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss were afforded the time and space to adapt the human side of Martin’s sprawling narrative as well as its set-pieces. So it’s no surprise that while the rest of Hollywood chased tentpoles, Benioff and Weiss set their boyhood dreams of making a Star Wars movie aside (phew, crisis averted) to cash their chips on a deal where they could demand time and space and quality work that didn’t involve swordplay.

    And they actually did it: Teaming up with veteran TV writer Alexander Woo (The Terror season 2), their new Netflix series 3 Body Problem, like Thrones, feels epic in scale while probing the messiness of human instinct. Movies like Interstellar and Solaris ventured into deep space to confront our innate spirituality, but 3 Body Problem season 1 sticks close to home to the benefit of its characters, who juggle romantic relationships and work-life stress and impending doom. Still, there is something extraterrestrial out there in the universe, a cosmic unknown. Benioff, Weiss, and Woo treat that promise like a chemical pipetted into a petri dish. Just a few drops of knowledge cause an instant reaction with consequences that will only be felt hundreds of years in the future.

    Image: Netflix

    The showrunner trio adapts Liu Cixin’s famed Remembrance of Earth’s Past science fiction trilogy with both reverence and an eye toward storytelling economics. The core drama of 3 Body Problem season 1, focused on a set of physicists out to understand what the hell is going on in the universe, weaves together people, places, and things from across all three books in order to be propulsively paced while easily digested. Die-hard readers may miss Liu’s dense “far out, man”-core style, but the pillar moments remain. Early episodes bounce from China’s Cultural Revolution to present-day London to virtual reality landscapes that hold the key to greater mysteries. The prickly politics of solving Earth’s perilous future simmer across timelines. Benioff, Weiss, and Woo don’t dumb any of it down as they tear through the plot, relying on genre conventions to keep it all watchable. (British mysteries like Broadchurch and Happy Valley feel as much part of the show’s DNA as any sci-fi series.)

    Perhaps a 10- or 12-episode season would have made room for deeper character work, but the writers are pros at making every line of dialogue illustrative of their characters’ deeper motivations, and every silent gesture — staring at the stars, gasping at equations, even watching a kid play Mortal Kombat — speaks volumes. Unlike recent Netflix adaptations that have crammed long narratives into uncompromising run times by removing all downtime “filler,” 3 Body Problem is full of humanity’s quirks. The show has religious zealots, anxious nerds, quiet romantics, and Benedict Wong as a no-bullshit cop. There is a lot of mumbo-jumbo about quantum physics and gravitational interaction, but also one of the best on-screen meet-my-family awkward dinner dates in recent memory.

    Doing the Lord’s work is actor Jess Hong, a relative newcomer and the nexus of all of 3 Body Problem’s narrative strands. In a cast full of Game of Thrones veterans and big-screen talent like Wong and Eiza González (Baby Driver, Godzilla vs. Kong), Hong takes on the burden of making all of the show’s otherworldly turns feel totally natural. Whether her character, Jin, is sipping a beer and making pub chat or navigating the immersive third level of the least fun virtual puzzle game ever invented, she reflects an authentic reality that’s increasingly tested by the show’s oddities. 3 Body Problem ultimately questions whether we deserve the planet we have so often fucked up. Hong’s Jin, in all her ups and downs, glimmers with the kind of humanity that we want to believe in.

    Jess Hong as Jin wearing Victorian era clothing and holding up an apple in a throne room

    Jess Hong as Jin
    Photo: Ed Miller/Netflix

    It really helps that Netflix didn’t skimp on 3 Body Problem, which, for all its character drama, goes big when it needs to go big. Benioff and Weiss’ clout has bought them the kind of top-tier production value that I thought only David Fincher commanded; flashbacks to the 1960s/’70s China feel rich in detail, while scenes set in the present-day drama have a refined look, rather than the cheap digital sheen that’s plagued so many post-Fincher Netflix projects. Anyone haunted by awful renderings of VR in movies and TV will be relieved by the show’s intentionally uncanny, often fantastical digital worlds that look like actual Unreal Engine survival-game backdrops. And when 3 Body Problem kicks into a high sci-fi gear, the show gets truly mind-bending — and often gnarly. The giddy provocateurs who orchestrated the Red Wedding are absolutely at the helm of this series.

    I’m a little in awe of 3 Body Problem. Liu’s books are like a character study of humanity itself; there is inherently too much to chew on. But Benioff, Weiss, and Woo came ready to cook. Their adaptation is gripping from the start and already prioritizing the pieces needed for a coherent endgame. From the trilogy’s pages of information they’ve carved out a visual story, dazzling and frightening. There are nits to pick from episode to episode, leaps in logic that may not stand up to scrutiny, but it’s a show that, unlike the Game of Thrones imitators, swept me up. Most of those shows settled on escapism. 3 Body Problem feels like a true escape, an excuse to wonder about the vastness of the cosmos from the comfort of the couch and wonder, What if?

    3 Body Problem premieres on Netflix on March 21.

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    Matt Patches

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  • Imaginary is a mess of a horror movie, and not in the fun way

    Imaginary is a mess of a horror movie, and not in the fun way

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    It’s hard to know where to start in describing how bad Imaginary is. The new horror movie from Blumhouse and director Jeff Wadlow (Kick-Ass 2) starts with the simple but promising premise of a haunted stuffed animal and a malicious imaginary friend, but its bland characters, muddy storytelling, and lack of scares leave behind a movie more lifeless than a teddy bear with no stuffing.

    Imaginary’s mess of a story begins with a woman named Jessica (She’s Gotta Have It and Jurassic World Dominion’s DeWanda Wise) and her new husband, Max (Tom Payne), waking up after one of Jessica’s recurring nightmares. She’s being chased through a long hallway by a giant spider, who also happens to be the main villain in the children’s books she writes. The couple quickly decide that it’s time for them and Max’s two kids from a previous marriage, teenage Taylor (Taegen Burns) and much younger Alice (Pyper Braun), to move into Jessica’s childhood home, in hopes that the familiar setting will cure her of her nightmares. Max’s kids aren’t too happy about the move, though it isn’t quite clear how far they’re going or what their specific objection is.

    It isn’t really clear whether we’re supposed to believe Jessica wants to get along with her new stepdaughters, or if her rudeness to them is an accidental problem of the script and the performance. Either way, after a few days in the house, Jessica ignores Alice by sneaking out of the house during a game of hide-and-seek in order to take a work call, leaving Alice to explore the basement and find Chauncey the creepy teddy bear.

    Photo: Parrish Lewis/Lionsgate

    Chauncey quickly becomes Alice’s new imaginary friend, who she talks to constantly and takes with her everywhere. This part of the plot strongly evokes M3GAN, without ever getting near that movie’s knowing sense of fun. All this setup happens by about 10 minutes into the movie, and it’s also where the coherent details of the plot end.

    [Ed. note: The rest of this story contains significant spoilers for Imaginary. The good news is, reading about them is much more fun than sitting through all 104 minutes of the movie.]

    Chauncey’s arrival should also usher creepiness into Imaginary, but the movie gets so diverted by trying to piece together a story out of its myriad meaningless plot threads that it doesn’t have much time to dedicate to actual horror. In one scene, for instance, the children’s biological mother shows up at Jessica’s house without warning, attacks Jessica, reveals that she seems to psychically know there’s something evil in the house, gets arrested, then disappears for the entire rest of the movie. This scene is never brought up again.

    Shortly after that, Max just leaves his children with their new, clearly not up-to-the-task stepmom so he can go on a seemingly indefinite tour with his band. There’s also a creepy neighbor who just happens to have a fully illustrated academic textbook on imaginary friends that seems tailor-made for a lazy exposition scene. The movie even throws in two separate child-abuse plotlines that it eventually just shrugs off when they aren’t useful anymore.

    It’s tempting to try to read into this labyrinth of digressions to try to find some kind of meaning or intention, but Imaginary never makes that feel worthwhile. There isn’t a single character in the movie who feels worth rooting for, and the performances are entirely devoid of charisma. The script, written by Wadlow, Jason Oremland, and Greg Erb, is full of wooden dialogue that’s stiff and often feels almost completely nonsensical. Characters sometimes introduce new information like it’s a fact the audience has known forever.

    At other times, they treat seemingly obvious plot points like major, unguessable reveals — like when we find out that Chauncey once belonged to Jessica. None of these plot threads ever amount to much, and most of them are just left dangling by the end of the movie. If the filmmakers don’t care about them, why should we?

    A young girl played by Pyper Braun sits at the top of the stairs next to a teddy bear while an ominous shadowy figure lurk behind her in Imaginary

    Photo: Parrish Lewis/Lionsgate

    But as with any horror movie, most of this disaster could be overlooked if only the story was scary. Instead, that’s where its failures become most apparent. Imaginary doesn’t bring a single original idea to the horror genre. It’s entirely paint-by-numbers filmmaking that never even manages to create tension, let alone fear. Characters look under beds while the cloying score brings in a swell of strings to beg us to feel something. Chauncey moves on his own a time or two, and even transforms into a monstrous bear, but the scenes are lit so badly that the effect just looks cheap and underbaked rather than remotely terrifying. Watching sequences this rote is soul-crushing for a horror fan, and they make the moments where the movie slows down for its next attempt at a scare feel like they drag on for ages.

    The one briefly interesting sequence comes in the final third of the movie, when Alice has been tricked into visiting the world of the imaginary friends, and Jessica and Taylor have to rescue her. This world floats in darkness, and its only solid ground is a checkerboard floor in an endless hallway of doors. Sections of the world form staircases to nowhere, dead ends that drop into an abyss, and doors that seem to float upside down.

    None of these visuals are wholly original — they take aim at the middle ground between Twin Peaks’ Red Room and a Scooby-Doo chase scene, without any of the fun that combination implies. But even without originality, it’s far and away the best visual of the movie. Sadly, for most of their time in this world, the characters just charge blindly into doors and end up in the same boring rooms we’ve seen in the rest of the movie, each one shot essentially the same as it was in the real world, just a little bit darker.

    Imaginary didn’t have a high bar to clear. In a year that’s been lacking interesting horror movies so far, with the other Blumhouse entry Night Swim as the only real bright spot, all this movie ever really needed to be was some silly fun with a few good scares. Instead, it gets lost in a maze of awful storytelling and frustrating characters, all without offering anything more than the stock-standard horror tropes that have been done better in a million other movies.

    Imaginary is in theaters on March 8.

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    Austen Goslin

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  • How to permanently unlock Destiny 2’s new hoverboard vehicle

    How to permanently unlock Destiny 2’s new hoverboard vehicle

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    The Skimmer is a new kind of vehicle type in Destiny 2 that you can use in place of your trusty Sparrow. It’s essentially a hoverboard that you can ride all over the galaxy. There is a catch, however: the first Skimmer, the Allstar Vector, is exclusive to the Guardian Games 2024 event, which runs March 5-26. Luckily, there’s a way to unlock the Allstar Vector permanently, so you can continue to hoverboard around once The Final Shape expansion drops in June.

    In this Destiny 2 guide, we’ll teach you how to unlock the Exotic version of the Allstar Vector, which you’ll be able to use forever.

    How to pick up the Allstar Vector Skimmer in Destiny 2

    Image: Bungie via Polygon

    Before you can receive the permanent, Exotic version of the Allstar Vector, you’ll first need to unlock the Common one. To do that, complete the “Best in Class” tutorial quest for Guardian Games. You can pick it up from Eva in the Tower and it’ll ask you to don your special class item, do a quick Guardian Games activity, and talk to some people.

    Once you finish “Best in Class,” pick up Eva’s new quest, “Drop In.” As soon as you get “Drop In,” you’ll get the Common version of the Allstar Vector Skimmer. The big difference between the Common Allstar Vector and the Exotic is that the Common one warns it expires at the end of Guardian Games.

    Now that you have the non-Exotic Skimmer, the clock is ticking for you to complete “Drop In” and unlock the permanent version.

    How to permanently unlock the Allstar Vector in Destiny 2

    A Guardian picks up the Drop In quest from Eva Levante in Destiny 2

    Image: Bungie via Polygon

    Once you get the “Drop In” quest from Eva, it’s time to get to work. This quest rewards the Exotic Skimmer and it only has one step. Just know that your time spent on this quest is going vary heavily depending on your skill level and your ability to play the game during certain times.

    There are three objectives to complete for “Drop In,” but you only need to complete one of them to finish the quest. Here are your options:

    • Earn 1,200 Medallion Score
    • Earn a top 10% score in Nightfall challenges
    • Open 3 Focus Activity winners packages

    However you end up finishing “Drop In,” the Skimmer will automatically appear in your inventory once it’s done. And that’s it. Once you get the Exotic, you have the Allstar Vector for life.

    Medallion Score

    Let’s start with the simplest and longest one: Medallion Score. Getting 1,200 Medallion Score is time consuming in Guardian Games, as you’ll need to spend a lot of time earning and dumping medals into the podium. Bronze medals are worth one point, Silver medals are wroth two points, Gold medals are worth five points, and Platinum medals are worth 15 points.

    If you’re earning a lot of Platinum medals, you’ll get done with this pretty quickly, but if you’re a more casual player who mostly dumps in bronze and silver medals, it’s going to be a bit of a grind. But this is a guaranteed way for everyone to get the Skimmer — as long as you’re willing to put in the time.

    Top 10% Nightfall score

    The fastest way to get the Skimmer by far is earning a top 10% score in Nightfall challenges. (I was able to unlock the Skimmer on my first Nightfall run of the week using this method.) But in order to do this, you’ll need two things: endgame PvE skills and endgame PvE friends to fill out your Fireteam. If you have both of those, this is a very fast way to get the Skimmer.

    If you keep banging your head against the Nightfall and can’t get the score you need, then it might be best to try one of the other two methods. One quick tip for this one is that if you can complete the Nightfall as close to the weekly reset (Tuesdays at noon ET) as possible, you’ll stand a much better chance of getting a high score.

    Open Focus Activity chests

    Finally, there are the new Focus Activity packages. Basically, every few hours a new Guardian Games playlist will become the “Focus Activity” for two hours during the week and three hours over the weekend. As you compete in the Focus Activity, you’ll earn bonus chests based on how you do, from bronze to gold. You can get these chests by just spending time in the Focused Activity, so this is a great way to get the Skimmer. However, you do have to be online at the right time to make it happen, so depending on your schedule, this might be a tough sell.

    Are there any other Skimmers in Destiny 2?

    The Winged Wolf Eververse-only Exotic Skimmer in Destiny 2

    Image: Bungie via Polygon

    Yes! Bungie launched two Skimmers on March 5, alongside Guardian Games 2024. However, only one of them (the Allstar Vector) is free. The other Skimmer is exclusive to the Eververse store, and it’s called the Winged Wolf.

    The Winged Wolf is part of a gear set called the Gjallarheart Gear based on the iconic Gjallarhorn rocket launcher. There’s a new armor set for each of the three classes, which runs 1,500 Silver each. Then there’s a Gjallarhorn-like Ornament for the Thunderlord Exotic that runs 700 Silver. And finally there’s the Gjallarheart Gear Bundle, which is 2,500 Silver and appears to be the only way to get the Winged Wolf. In addition to the Eververse-exclusive Skimmer, it also comes with a Ghost, ship, and Shader, all based around Gjallarhorn.

    Extra unfortunately, you cannot just buy 2,500 Silver, so you’ll need to purchase 3,000 Silver instead. This will run you $29.99 and it comes with 300 bonus Silver for a total of 3,300.

    It’s unclear how long this Gjallarhorn bundle will be in the shop or if the Winged Wolf will be available for purchase after Guardian Games 2024 ends.

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    Ryan Gilliam

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  • Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth is basically a Chadley simulator

    Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth is basically a Chadley simulator

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    Final Fantasy 7 and its compilation media have introduced some of my favorite video game characters. There’s Cloud Strife, the emotionally cagey but endlessly awkward dude who just wants to be cool. His childhood friend, a sullen-eyed Tifa, brings a sense of kindness and warmth to the most dire of situations. Hell, even the villains are charming in their own ways. I wouldn’t want to be a generic Shinra lapdog, but maybe I’d go and be one for Rufus, whose cutting-edge sense of style somehow makes me forget he’s the CEO of an evil company.

    Then there’s Chadley, an unfortunate character whose design looks like if you combined 9S from Nier: Automata with a Boy Scout.

    Chadley made his series debut in Final Fantasy 7 Remake when he recruited Cloud to collect battle intel by undertaking virtual fighting challenges. As we learned in Remake, Chadley is a humanoid robot created by Shinra’s Professor Hojo. Although he worked for that evil and cruel scientist, Chadley seemed harmless enough and Cloud could actually help free him from Hojo’s programming toward the end of Remake, turning him into a fully independent being. Now, he’s back in Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth and ready to help Cloud and Avalanche’s cause.

    In Remake, Chadley served as a perfectly adequate character to talk to every now and again. Cloud could talk to him when he needed to, but he now plays a pretty big role in the larger world and gameplay in Rebirth. Toward the beginning of the game, he tasks Cloud with surveying each region by visiting different geographic locations — like a special spring or a cave dedicated to a summon — and scanning them with a device to collect data. Given that exploring each region and all the points forms a major part of the game, this forces players to interact with Chadley and hear his boring chatter frequently.

    Image: Square Enix via Polygon

    The scanning device Chadley gives Cloud doubles as a communications device that he can call Cloud up on at any moment. Chadley doesn’t talk every single time Cloud scans a new location, but he jabbers on about all kinds of random knowledge. If Cloud slashes a rock to find a Summon Sanctuary, he will give you background information on a god’s mythology. If Cloud scans a Lifespring or a tower, he might talk about any local regional phenomena. He frequently pops in with basic facts about the region, and then dips out. And his excited, pubescent voice doesn’t hold up well over long stretches.

    Chadley functions as a living encyclopedia, but his prattling isn’t all that helpful. Something that I appreciated about Remake was how the developers showed us the way of the world. Little tasks, like going to another neighborhood, took additional quests to secure documents like ID cards and helped give a sense of Shrina’s tight grip on the city. We learned about the city by how it felt to play and the stories of characters. Now, Chadley is just used as a way to dump a bunch of decontextualized lore into a giant world. Sure, It’ll make great fodder for fan-run wiki pages down the line, but it doesn’t make for a compelling way to show us the larger world.

    Luckily, there is at least one thing you can do to lower the overall Chadley levels in the game. The young savant largely talks through the built-in speaker on the PlayStation 5 controller, and you can mute it in the game settings. Unfortunately, this just means he’ll talk through the screen, but it at least minimizes any potential Chadley jump scares through the controller.

    Overall, Chadley comes across as the annoying familiar that was never needed in the first place. The game has plenty of other, more interesting characters. Personally, I’d be more interested in learning more about what Red XIII has to say about a given desert landscape, or hearing what Barret thinks about the gods, rather than getting an encyclopedia-like entry on each topic via Chadley. So while I appreciate learning more about the larger world, I think I’d be better off without him.

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    Ana Diaz

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  • With the Automaton invasion, Helldivers 2 proved failure is part of the point

    With the Automaton invasion, Helldivers 2 proved failure is part of the point

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    Helldivers 2 was compared to Starship Troopers when it was first released, but since then, the squad-based third-person shooter has become closer to the post-Judgment Day future in Terminator. While the first mission order, to retake territory from bugs called Terminids, was a success, things went downhill once the game introduced the Automatons, the much harder-to-kill robots that attack Super Earth planets.

    Just this week, players lost the planet Malevelon Creek to the Automatons while just barely liberating Mort after around 10 million Helldiver deaths, according to a post in the official Helldivers 2 Discord (via Gamesradar). Despite some gains, the Automatons have pushed back Super Earth’s forces for now. Starting Thursday, players will see a message stating the major order to liberate planets under Automaton control has been a failure, and players should change course:

    Despite the valorous efforts of the Helldivers, Automaton marauders have invaded Super Earth territory. Patriotic citizens mourn as their sufficiently-sized homes burn to the ground. Super Earth citizens demand justice, and they will receive it. But for now, the Terminid Control System is ready for activation.

    While players can still fight on Automaton worlds, most will likely shift their priorities to Terminid territory, starting with Veld, which features a hive that “eluded detection and has been gestating un-Democratic vermin for weeks.”

    Helldivers 2 launched with the Terminids, and while they proved to be a challenge, players banded together and were able to complete the first major order and reap the rewards. That was not the case with the Automatons, which proved to be way tougher than their organic bug brethren. Besides the fact that even the smallest units are covered in tough-to-pierce armor, the game introduced missions that required way more strategy and teamwork than previous ones. Along with some surprise real-time work from Arrowhead Game Studios devs, the failure was inevitable.

    Image: Arrowhead Game Studios/Sony Interactive Entertainment via Polygon

    The mission type that specifically threw players for a loop was escort missions, which required Helldivers to help researchers and other citizens trapped on planets being invaded by Automaton fleets escape into an extraction point. Sounds easy enough on its face: Follow some unarmed civilians as they run from one side of a relatively small area to another. It was a common objective with the Terminids as well. However, anybody who’s played one of these Automaton missions through will tell you that after the first 10 or so get rescued, you’ll get bombarded with Automatons of all kinds. And because these missions take place in one small space with a lot of chokepoints, and the NPCs aren’t the best at self-preservation, it’s easy for players and civilians to die over and over… and over.

    Players on the Helldivers subreddit have been trying to plan out strategies for this specific mission type since the campaign started. The consensus has been to have a full four-person team, with three people luring enemies into the outskirts of the mission area and one person focusing on stealth tactics to escort civilians (that means using smoke stratagems or specialty scouting armor sets). However, this only works if people are willing to constantly communicate in voice chat. Depending on your difficulty level, you still might run into some extremely heavy spawn rates that will decimate your team regardless of how coordinated you are. And with its 40-minute clock, there is a lot of time for things to go horribly wrong. Plus, players have reported bugs, like NPCs standing in front of the extraction point without entering.

    I spoke with a player who identified himself to Polygon as Alessio, aka Zarrusso on Reddit, who posted a clear, comprehensive visual guide on how to tackle these missions this week, basically putting all the disparate Reddit threads and YouTube videos on the topic together. The guide suggests landing as far away from the objective as possible, along with a set of stratagems to equip.

    A Helldiver shooting at an Automaton drop ship that’s exploding in flames.

    Image: Arrowhead Game Studios/Sony Interactive Entertainment

    “On difficulty 6 [Extreme] and all of the above, the difficulty spikes greatly and we couldn’t kill the enemies fast enough and the civilians kept dying after taking one step outside,” he wrote. “So after getting some advice from YouTube and Reddit and just playing the missions, I put together that little strategy. And now I play those missions on difficulty 7, 8, and 9, and I have completed like 90 percent of my escort missions.”

    These escort missions require way more strategy than others. Some Automaton objectives are nearly identical to Terminid ones (kill a certain number of enemies; launch an ICBM), so they didn’t have a large barrier to entry and therefore didn’t need nearly as much coordination between players, especially on lower difficulties. “The other missions don’t require this much strategy. On lower difficulties, you can pretty much do them without thinking but still need to bring the right weapons,” Zarrusso explained.

    The Automaton escort missions, though, have been a completely different challenge for players, despite being similar to previous ones. This led to many people spamming easier 15-minute objectives instead. With this many failures on the board, it’s no wonder the community didn’t succeed in their collective fight.

    But also, failure might’ve been the point all along. In a pre-release video, deputy game director Sagar Beroshi revealed Helldivers 2 would have a game master who would introduce twists and story moments, watching players as they complete missions and responding in real time. Players still have a degree of control over how mission orders go, but like in a tabletop RPG, the GM will move players in a specific direction, sometimes with a little improv. This might include something small like giving players an extra stratagem mid-round, or something much more globally impactful.

    “The enemies have goals, right? They will look at what you’ve done, respond to the ways in which you have — you as the community, that is — has behaved, and react in a way that changes the face of the galaxy thereafter,” Beroshi said.

    A recent PC Gamer article features a quick interview with CEO Johan Pilestedt, who explained this dev’s name is Joel and he apparently “takes his job very seriously.”

    “Joel, in his infinite wisdom decided, ‘What happens when a faction wins a portion of a war? Well, they mine everything.’ That’s where the incendiary mine segment came from,” Pilestedt gave as an example, referring to the period where players got access to the incendiary mine stratagem for free.

    Helldivers 2 will continue to surprise players with these tactics. “We have a lot of systems built into the game where the Game Master has a lot of control over the play experience. It’s something that we’re continuously evolving based on what’s happening in the game,” Pilestedt said. “And as part of the roadmap, there are things that we want to keep secret because we want to surprise and delight.” This will likely be with mechs, which have been teased and have been the subject of leaks, along with other new enemies and stories. It’s all a good reminder that your best efforts might be in vain, but you can turn the tides of war, and that makes for a more complex play experience.

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    Carli Velocci

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  • The Halo TV series bailed on its best chance yet to actually take us to a Halo ring

    The Halo TV series bailed on its best chance yet to actually take us to a Halo ring

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    Reach has fallen in the Halo TV universe. If you know anything about the lore of the Halo games, you know that the next thing that’s supposed to happen is Master Chief escaping from Covenant forces above Reach, his ship getting attacked, and then promptly crashing onto the series’ first Halo ring. In other words, this is basically the moment where the action starts. That is not what happened in the Halo TV series. Instead, Chief (Pablo Schreiber) and his friends took a reflective excursion to a backwater planet that felt a lot more like a detour than character development.

    After escaping Reach, Chief and everyone else on the escape ship with him (which is basically all of the still-living series regulars except for Kate Kennedy’s Kai), visit Aleria, a small dirt farming planet with plenty of land to spare and nearly toxic soil. After an episode as big and exciting as the Fall of Reach, this feels like a very HBO-style respite: the kind of episode dedicated to taking stock of the characters we lost and examining the new shape of the world after a big shake-up. But those shows earn those reflective episodes with consistent quality before them, and they tend to make those quiet episodes feel ever bigger and more important than the loud ones. That was certainly not the case in Halo season 2’s fifth episode.

    Photo: Adrienn Szabo/Paramount Plus

    In defense of the Halo series’ entire premise, it has no obligation to follow the events of the games directly. Since the show’s announcement, the creative team behind it has been careful to specify that this series takes place in the “Silver Timeline,” which is completely separate from the canon of the games. So going somewhere other than Halo after the Fall of Reach isn’t really a problem. The problem is that the show once again fails the most basic and important test of doing interesting things with those changes.

    The series seems convinced that the audience loves and cares about its side characters. But they’re just not interesting. During this episode the most coherent plotline we spend time with involves Soren (the wonderful Bokeem Woodbine, trying his best as always) and his wife searching for their child. We see them question various people around the village, and even find someone they think is keeping their kid from them. But by the end of the episode, they discover that he was actually kidnapped by the UNSC — an organization we almost exclusively know at this point as the military that loves kidnapping children. It’s a bland, “no shit” reveal that feels both too obvious and totally meaningless at the same time. Another of the episode’s plotlines involves Riz, a Spartan who was introduced just a few episodes ago, deciding that she wants to be a farmer now that she is too injured to be a Spartan.

    With plotlines this boring, about characters that the show never really does a good job of convincing us to care about, it’s getting awfully hard not to long for the circular perfection and alien weirdness of the Halo rings that give this franchise its name. So why aren’t we there yet?

    The answer seems to lie in the Halo show’s approach to the rings in general. The series clearly recognizes one of the great strengths of the first game was that Halo was profoundly mysterious. But the show is approaching that mystery in a very different way than the original game did.

    Fiona O’Shaughnessy as Laera in Halo season 2 stands wrapped in a blanket with two people talking behind her on a porch

    Photo: Adrienn Szabo/Paramount Plus

    For the game, the mystery of Halo was in how little information you had about both the alien ring and the video game’s world. Aside from the basic premise of humanity being on the back foot in a war against aliens, almost everything else was a black box. So when you crash-land on Halo in the game’s second level (a level also called “Halo”), the path is clear for the game to slowly reveal its secrets about Forerunners, the Covenant religion, the Flood, 343 Guilty Spark, and everything else that feels commonplace in the series today. The TV series, on the other hand, decided to make Halo a destination. Instead of giving us no lore, it’s been stacking up piles and piles of lore through its first two seasons and dangling the Halo ring in front of his via characters’ prophetic visions. This path to Halo isn’t inherently bad; a well-done buildup and reveal can make for a fantastic moment in a TV show. But like the Hatch in Lost, the key is that you have to show the audience why the thing is mysterious and important — you have to really prove it to us, not just have characters bombard us with insistent dialogue that it matters. And more importantly, the characters actually have to get into it eventually.

    None of this is to say that the show has run out of time to make it to Halo, or even that it can’t be good once it gets there. But it is to say that the journey there so far has felt profoundly misjudged and way too slow, and it’s starting to feel like it might not happen at all. In this episode, Makee (Charlie Murphy) tries to convince the Arbiter to go to the Halo rings because she insists that the Prophets are lying about the Great Journey, telling the rest of the Covenant fanciful stories about its importance and transcending the physical realm, but never actually planning to take them along on their trip to divinity. Now, I’m not saying that the Halo series is the Prophets and we’re the rest of the Covenant, but I am saying that our lack of a journey to a Halo ring is starting to feel a little suspicious, and they’re running out of time to convince me we’re really going.

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    Austen Goslin

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