NASA announced Sept. 16 that the spacecraft had experienced engine trouble on its way to the space station, with the main engine cutting off earlier than planned.
“NASA and Northrop Grumman are delaying the arrival of the Cygnus XL to the International Space Station as flight controllers evaluate an alternate burn plan for the resupply spacecraft. The Cygnus XL will not arrive to the space station on Wednesday, Sept. 17, as originally planned, with a new arrival date and time under review,” a statement by NASA read.
NASA said that everything else is performing as expected with the spacecraft.
Once the Cygnus spacecraft does arrive at the International Space Station, astronauts Jonny Kim and Zena Cardman will use the space station’s robotic Canadarm2 to grab and dock it.
This mission — refrred to as NG-23 — is the first flight of the company’s new Cygnus XL spacecraft. It is described as solar-powered, larger and a more capable cargo spacecraft compared to previous Cygnus models, which have flown multiple NASA resupply missions in the past.
It is not the first time a Cygnus spacecraft experienced an issue in flight. In 2022, a Cygnus spacecraft flying as part of the NG-18 mission failed to deploy a solar array, putting the spacecraft’s power levels at risk. Northrop Grumman and NASA were able to work around the issue, and the spacecraft was successfully captured by astronauts onboard the station.
As of the morning of Sept. 17, NASA had not released an update on the current issue.
A version of this post originally appeared on September 9, 2024, in Eater and Punch’s newsletter Pre Shift, a biweekly newsletter for the industry pro that sources first-person accounts from the bar and restaurant world. Subscribe now for more stories like this.
While Chicago’s public transit system isn’t as reliable as New York’s, it’s not as scarce as LA’s. Last year, the Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) provided 279 million rides, many of which were for hospitality staff, getting them to and from their place of employment. The Bear found a friend in the CTA, and for three seasons, the FX-produced TV show has relied on the city’s public transit system for plenty of footage, showing Chicago’s famous elevated train system, the El. Much of Season 3, Episode 6 is spent showing Tina Marrero (played by Liza Colón-Zayas) relying on trains and buses during her frantic job search.
But the CTA has drawn much ire in recent years. Low-wage workers like Tina rely on the system, but the city’s network of buses and trains hasn’t proved worthy. That’s especially true on the South and West sides, areas where the network doesn’t fully extend. For example, restaurant owners in Hyde Park, a South Side neighborhood where the University of Chicago is located, have shared that it’s been challenging to lure experienced hospitality workers. They’d rather work on the North Side, where there are more restaurants and it’s easier to get home at night.
While many restaurant workers also depend on their cars for their daily commute, despite Lake Michigan’s infamous spine-chilling winter winds, the city has its share of all-season cyclists, too. We connected with restaurant staff about their commute, talking about convenience, parking, and the power of bike lanes.
Name: Diana Dávila, chef and owner, Mi Tocaya Antojería Length of commute: Two miles Mode: Bike
“I have been a biker for — it’s crazy — the past 20 years. The first place I started biking was [now-closed] Butter. When I moved to D.C., I biked to work… I remember the bike rides when there weren’t bike lanes and I would take different routes, and that was part of the fun, finding which ways to take.
“It’s funny, I never nerded out about bikes. I would just go into the bike store and pick out which one looked nice. Shit, I’ve never been depressed, I’ve always been a super positive person, as a default. But once I didn’t feel like getting out of bed and I didn’t want to see anybody… Those 10-minute rides made such a big difference. It is a service to myself and is 100 percent a stress de-escalator at work for me — open air and sunlight or moonlight.
“Most of our employees live super close, and not everyone has cars. Cars eat income, which is why so many of us cooks ride bikes! Cars are a big responsibility, with permits, parking, insurance, tickets. Bike riding, scooting, and carpooling are great solutions. Just like what we used to do in school.”
Rishi Manoj Kumar from Mirra.Barry Brecheisen/Eater Chicago
Name: Rishi Manoj Kumar, chef, Mirra Length of commute: Two blocks Mode: Walking
“The market to find apartments right now is horrible. The Bucktown neighborhood was hard, but I just kept searching and searching, and then suddenly, one day, I found what I’m living in now. It’s a block behind Mirra. It was a duplex and a duplex at two grand. Shit, this is unheard of in Chicago. So even before looking at it, I knew the proximity, I knew what it would bring for my peace of mind, like avoiding the traffic and even being able to go in on my days off. I can just walk through the restaurant and just check on things while I’m walking my dog, you know. And that proximity gives you so much freedom mentally, too. So it’s pretty dope.
“Avoiding a bad commute gives you a peace of mind coming to work. Otherwise you spend so much time getting ready, or getting stuck in traffic, like, ‘Oh shit, I’m stuck, I’m an hour late because of something like Lollapalooza going downtown.’ It takes forever to get downtown. For me, I worked eight years downtown, like, just getting to work meant preparing an extra 45 minutes just to make sure I’m turning up on time. That mental burden is gone once you can just, like, wake up, change, go to work in two minutes. It’s a whole different lifestyle.”
Billy Zureikat at a pop-up at Pequod’s.Barry Brecheisen/Eater Chicago
Name: Billy Zureikat, pop-up chef, Tripping Billy Length of commute: Varies Mode: Car
“I drive everywhere. I don’t take public transportation anymore because it’s just too hard to navigate crowds. I got invited to the Windy City Smokeout and I’m like, ‘I’m gonna pass on that.’ It’s just too hard navigating with a cane [having limb girdle muscular dystrophy]. In an electric car, if I take my foot off the gas, the car will come to a straight-up complete stop. It regenerates your brakes, saving and repowering the battery, and is wonderful for me because I don’t have to pick up my legs and move around as much… It’s so much more comfortable and I feel safer when I drive.
“I have to allow myself more time. There’s a big lack of available parking, especially accessible parking. I’m not trying to walk three or four blocks to get to a pizzeria to do a pop-up. I’m going to circle that block for a while until I find a spot that’s fairly close, because many times I have to carry lots of equipment. And I can’t walk multiple blocks carrying a bunch of heavy things, so I have to allow myself time to get parking.
“I work remotely, so I can do my day job from anywhere. And that allows me the freedom to do these collaborations and pop-ups where I can go in the mid-morning, middle of the day — when it’s maybe a little quieter, traffic-wise — to get something done, or I can do it later in the evening. I have flexibility, and because I have a disability, my body has kind of changed over the years.”
The exterior of Obélix.Chris Peters/Eater Chicago
Name: Gustavo Lopez, food runner, Obélix Length of commute: Five miles Mode: Bike
“Recently, I got a Divvy [bikeshare] membership. I dragged my heels about it, but I thought, I’ll get it for the gimmick, because those e-bikes really interested me. I hopped on one, like, ‘Oh, wow. This is amazing.’ There’s so much power in those electric bikes. Since then, I’ve been on Divvy for about three years. The docking stations are sprawled all over the city, so it’s very convenient. I can get to my destination within minutes.
“If you want to bike [to the restaurant], and you’re chronically late, it’s more of a time management issue. I’m giving you a little leeway, but if you’re not here at the set time you’re supposed to be, then it just ruins the flow with the rest of the team. It doesn’t matter what the position is: server, expediter, food runner… We just pick up plates and just clear the table. The servers have to pick up the slack. It does add up. If there’s an event with traffic, I’m usually pretty vigilant about checking the news on Facebook and Instagram. I’ll avoid the busy streets. But, you know, you always have residual traffic. Thank God for bike lanes.”
Rachel Lindsay and Chelsea Stark-Jones kick off this week’s Morally Corrupt by sharing their reactions to the new Real Housewives of Salt Lake City Season 5 trailer (1:36), then dive head first into Season 18, Episode 7 of The Real Housewives of Orange County (13:26). Later, Callie Curry hops on to briefly discuss Season 2, Episode 11 of The Real Housewives of Dubai (44:03). Rachel is then joined by Bravo royalty and Dubai housewife herself, Caroline Stanbury! Caroline spills all about the upcoming reunion, where she stands with Chanel Ayan today, her marriage with Sergio, and more!
Host: Rachel Lindsay Guests: Chelsea Stark-Jones, Callie Curry, and Caroline Stanbury Producer: Devon Baroldi Theme: Devon Renaldo
We are so back. And by “we,” I mean video games. At a half-dozen slickly produced promotional events over the next week, games will be teased in the form of captivating cinematic trailers with promises to push the medium forward.
The annual Summer Game Fest extravaganza, host Geoff Keighley’s replacement for E3, kicks off the promotional activities on Friday, June 7. The rest of the weekend is also filled with similar hours-long events from Xbox, Activision, Ubisoft, Devolver Digital, and other organizers who have rallied smaller, indie-created games for a combined show of force.
There’s an expectation that the annual parade of trailers for exciting new games will include plenty of games that won’t be out for many months, if not years, after their unveilings. To be clear, that happens every year. And I’m here to remind you that there are countless unreleased games that were announced with gusto at similar events in years past — some of which have slipped from the public consciousness, and we’re convinced that if they don’t show up in a meaningful way over the next couple weeks, it’s so over.*
*It’s not really over, especially given the volatile state of the video game industry. But we’re getting pretty worried/impatient about the following games and honestly hope they show up, look great, and will be critical and commercial successes — all of them.
Monolith’s Wonder Woman game
Announced in 2021, developer Monolith Productions promised to bring its patented Nemesis System from Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor to a game based on Wonder Woman. We were excited about it, even with the taste of Wonder Woman 1984 relatively fresh in our mouths, but haven’t heard a peep about the game since then. DC’s approach to video games based on its characters has changed since the announcement of Wonder Woman, and we remain hopeful that Monolith can capture the magical feeling of battling wisecracking Orcs in a game that gives us control of Diana Prince and her golden lasso.
Ubisoft’s Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell remake
Another announcement that dates back to 2021? Ubisoft Toronto’s plan to remake the original Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell. The new Splinter Cell promises to take advantage of 20 years of technical innovations and to rework parts of the game’s story “that may not have aged particularly well,” creative director Chris Auty said in 2022. Showing off the Splinter Cell remake at Sunday’s Xbox Games Showcase would go a long way to appeasing longtime Xbox fans, with a deeper dive ideally poised for Monday’s Ubisoft Forward event. Just sayin’.
Skate. (Skate 4)
Credit to Electronic Arts: The publisher and development team, Full Circle, has been very transparent about the development of the next Skate game — which is called skate., not Skate 4, officially — and opened up playtesting to in-progress versions of the game. But please give us the new Skate already! How about a release date? Barring that, can I get a beta key? I want to flump, too.
Capcom’s Pragmata
It’s been four years since Capcom revealed Pragmata at Sony’s big unveiling of the PlayStation 5. Pragmata’s been delayed several times since then, and the last we heard about it was when Capcom pushed it back indefinitely. Is Pragmata joining the increasingly long list of games coming in 2025? It’s starting to feel like it.
Rare’s Everwild
We’re nearing the five-year anniversary of Everwild’s unveiling. Eighteen months later, we learned that developer Rare had reportedly rebooted the game with “a complete overhaul of the game’s design and direction.” Frankly, we just want to find out what Everwild even is — especially since Rare has proven that given the right development resources, it can turn good games into great games.
Transformers: Reactivate
Call me an idealist, but I’m always willing to give a Transformers game the benefit of the doubt. Sometimes you get an unexpected surprise — a Transformers: Devastation, if you will. So when Splash Damage teased Transformers: Reactivate in 2022 with a moody cover of Bon Jovi’s “Dead or Alive,” I was immediately on board. But we haven’t heard much about the cooperative online action game since, and that’s a shame. I’ve been in transform-and-roll-out mode for the past 18 months and I’m concerned.
Perfect Dark
Announced at 2020’s The Game Awards, developer The Initiative’s Perfect Dark reboot promised to revive a long-dormant franchise and serve as a cornerstone of the Xbox Series X’s lineup of game exclusives. But the studio and owner Microsoft have said very little about their new Perfect Dark and what we can expect from Joanna Dark’s return. We continue to wait for it, alongside Xbox Game Studios’ Avowed, Contraband, Fable, The Outer Worlds 2, and State of Decay 3.
Kingdom Hearts 4
We’re now two years out from the announcement of Kingdom Hearts 4, a reveal timed to the Square Enix-Disney role-playing game franchise’s 20th anniversary. It increasingly looks like we’ll have to wait for Kingdom Hearts’ 25th birthday to actually get our hands on Sora’s next adventure. Given how long it’s taken Square Enix to realize its Final Fantasy 7 remake trilogy — to say nothing of its next mainline Dragon Quest game — we don’t actually expect to see Kingdom Hearts 4 showing up any time soon. There’s a painful dose of reality.
Hollow Knight Silksong
It’s not happening, is it? Any time soon, I mean. That’s fine. Everything’s fine.
We weren’t very kind to Amy Winehouse when she walked among us. She was a tremendous singer with a mesmerizing style, a strange case of a 21st-century pop star who was largely influenced by postwar jazz. She was also an alcoholic and, in her later years, a connoisseur of harder drugs, including heroin and crack cocaine. We know this much about Amy Winehouse because The Sun published photos of her at home in East London, smoking crack, sure enough, on a famous front page with the splashy headline “Amy on Crack.” The tabloids tracked her emaciation in real time, swarming her at every smoke break and liquor run, running a barefoot woman down as if they were chasing a wet rat all over London, New York City, and Miami. Ultimately, Amy Winehouse recorded only two albums, her striking debut, Frank, and her legendary breakout, Back to Black, the latter selling millions of copies, winning a ton of awards, and setting her up for still more massive success in the long run. But Winehouse died from alcohol poisoning, alone in her flat, at age 27, five years after Back to Black, and so she became the sort of icon who now arouses great defensiveness in all corners—only now it’s too late for anyone to protect her in any real way.
So now we have the obligatory biopic, Back to Black, directed by Sam Taylor-Johnson (Fifty Shades of Grey, A Million Little Pieces). Fans of Winehouse have been dreading this thing for months. The trailers seemed treacherous. Here you have the opportunity to produce a biopic about the edgiest pop singer of the century so far, and yet you’ve got Marisa Abela seeming so perfectly harmless, in the baddest of signs, in the lead role. What also doesn’t help is the very existence of Asif Kapadia’s excellent 2015 documentary, Amy, full of home video footage and passionate interviews with her family, friends, and peers. Back to Black, by comparison, seemed cartoonish. This, many feared, would be Disney’s Amy Winehouse: a pretty, sappy, plastic bit of hagiography turning her into one of those chibi caricatures of famous people that you see in children’s books. A disgrace, surely.
Really, though, Back to Black isn’t bad. We might’ve braced ourselves for something exceptionally awful, but no, Back to Black is perfectly mediocre and otherwise unremarkable, as far as these things go. It’s unsatisfying only so far as biopics, in general, are almost inherently irritating: It’s trite, it’s formulaic, and it’s conspicuously easy on key figures with keen interest in not coming off too poorly in the story of a woman who clearly wasn’t served very well by the company she kept. The two most controversial men in her life were her father, Mitch Winehouse, who notoriously discouraged her from entering rehab to address her alcoholism a couple of years after Frank; and her ex-husband, Blake Fielder-Civil, who introduced the singer to hard drugs circa Back to Black. Nearly a decade ago, Mitch trashed the Amy documentary and told those filmmakers to their faces, “You should be ashamed of yourselves,” presumably due to the film’s characterization of him as self-absorbed and negligent in the face of his daughter’s disorders.
Back to Black, as a biopic, was going to have be a more diplomatic project; Taylor-Johnson met Mitch and Janis Winehouse, and the director ultimately won the family’s approval. Back to Black isn’t entirely uncritical of Mitch but rather depicts him as a loving father who was understandably blinded by the limelight and too proud of his daughter to see the darker signs. Blake Fielder-Civil wasn’t involved in the making of Back to Black, but the biopic nonetheless spares him much blame for the hard drugs and physical violence in his relationship with Amy. What Back to Black says about Fielder-Civil is more or less what he’s said about himself in recent years: He was a bad influence, yes, but he tried to distance himself from Winehouse and ultimately divorced her in July 2009—nearly three years after the Back to Black album and two years before her death—hoping to “set her free.” With this biopic, Taylor-Johnson seems to have a similar agenda—to finally end the cycle of recriminations about the death of Amy Winehouse and instead treat the world to a more sentimental and straightforwardly enjoyable overview of her life and her music.
But who ever wanted to see that? Fans of Winehouse, if anything, might’ve found themselves wishing, perversely, to see something as startling and ugly as the contemporary tabloid coverage, something as irreverent as “Stronger Than Me,” something as righteous as “Rehab,” something as intense as “You Sent Me Flying” or, well, “Back to Black.” Amy is grainy and candid and argumentative, and that’s all about right, but of course that’s a documentary. As a biopic, Back to Black is somewhat hamstrung by the absence of the real Winehouse and its need to be significantly less demoralizing and infuriating than the real story, which culminated with one of the greatest singers of her generation dying alone, watching YouTube, on the losing end of alcohol addiction and also bulimia. The trailers, to the movie’s detriment, show a lot of scenes of the singer in her late teens, the years when she’s less recognizable as the tattooed, beehived icon she’d become, but really, this is who Winehouse was, too. Abela sells both the musical wonderment and jazz geekery of Winehouse in her formative years as well as the bruised and bleary disillusionment of her 20s, as she slathered herself in booze and tattoos, in the years after Frank and Blake. Together, Abela and Jack O’Connell, as Amy and Blake, do a decently captivating dance as two troubled lovers who clung to each other in all the wrong ways and for all the wrong reasons. It just isn’t enough for the audience. It was never going to be enough.
Ultimately, the pre- and post-release grumbling about Back to Black isn’t owing to any egregious failure of Taylor-Johnson or whether or not Abela physically resembles the character so much as it speaks to a mean grief, persisting to this day, for Winehouse. It’s a grief to be rehashed but never relieved by a biopic such as this. We miss plenty of troubled entertainers who died too young, of course, but Winehouse especially rubbed her fate in our faces. Her biggest song was “Rehab,” for chrissakes. She was a dead woman walking through volleys of camera flashes for five years. She made her pain so plain and so integral to her music, yet it was ultimately something to be mocked and gawked at. The tabloids made her out to be some goddamned alien. The late-night comedians reduced her to a punch line. No one’s ever going to feel good about any of this, biopic or not. Amy Winehouse deserved better than just pop sainthood. She deserved so much more than Back to Black, even if it didn’t really do anything wrong. One day, we—so far as the collective consumers of popular entertainment and celebrity metaculture can be addressed as such—will be at peace about Amy Winehouse. But no time soon. We’re still mad about the girl.
Wednesday, Tim Burton’s take on The Addams Family naturally became hugely popular on Netflix. Both are staples of spooky goth teens everywhere, so it was a match made in heaven (or hell?) and the series spent 20 weeks on Netflix’s Global Top 10. Jenna Ortega’s sharp, sardonic take on the character bewitched many — as did her firm stance against love triangles.
“Nobody wants to see her in the middle of a love triangle,” Ortega said to W Magazine back in 2022. “They want to see her torturing people.”
Netflix officially renewed the YA supernatural romp in January 2023, though news has been scant (likely due to the ongoing strikes last year). But with filming beginning this week and some exciting casting announcements, here’s everything we know about Wednesday season 2.
Photo: Netflix
What’s Wednesday season 2 about?
We’re not entirely sure of the plot, but it’ll likely pick up during Wednesday’s next school year at Nevermore Academy. According to the showrunners, the entire Addams family will be coming to the school in some capacity. There were a lot of loose ends last season, including the identity of Wednesday’s stalker and the weird cult that mean girl Bianca’s mom is part of.
Who’s in Wednesday season 2?
Jenna Ortega returns as Wednesday, and this season she’ll also serve as a producer. Other returning cast members include Emma Myers as Wednesday’s perky werewolf roommate Enid; Joy Sunday as school queen bee Bianca; and Hunter Doohan as Tyler, the cute barista who is actually the bloodthirsty monster that killed a lot of people last season.
The other cast members of the Addams family, namely Catherine Zeta-Jones (Morticia), Luiz Guzmán (Gomez), and Isaac Ordonez (Pugsley), have been promoted to series regulars.
“We are thrilled that the entire Addams family will be enrolling in Nevermore Academy this season along with a dream cast of icons and new faces,” showrunners Al Gough and Miles Millar said in a statement to Netflix. For Pugsley, this makes sense, but will Morticia and Gomez be teachers or students? Are they going for graduate degrees, perhaps?
Image: Netflix
Who’s not coming back?
Even though Tyler was carted off the jail at the end of season 1, Doohan is still a series regular — clearly there’s some unfinished business! But Jamie McShane, who played his father, will only appear in a few episodes. In addition, Percy Hynes White who played the other bland cute boy Xavier, won’t be returning. This coincides with sexual assault allegations that led to a campaign to remove him from the show.
Anyone new in the Wednesday season 2 cast?
You know it! Some big names are joining the new season of Wednesday as series regulars. According to Netflix Steve Buscemi (Spy Kids 2: Island of Lost Dreams) will play a character named Barry Dort and Billie Piper (Doctor Who) will play someone named Capri. Other actors joining as series regulars include Evie Templeton (Return to Silent Hill), Owen Painter (The Handmaid’s Tale), and Noah Taylor (Park Avenue), though their roles are still undisclosed.
Additionally, we’ve got some interesting guest stars, including Christopher Lloyd, who played Uncle Fester in the 1990s Addams Family movies. Last season Christina Ricci, who played Wednesday in those movies, was the show’s big bad villain, so it’ll be interesting to see what Lloyd’s involvement is. Thandiwe Newton (Westworld) will play someone named Dr. Fairburn and Joanna Lumley will play the Addams family Grandma. Other guest stars include , Frances O’Connor (The Missing), Haley Joel Osment (The Kominsky Method), Heather Matarazzo (The Princess Diaries) and Joonas Suotamo.
When is season 2 coming out?
Filming began in May 2024, so at the very earliest, Wednesday season 2 wouldn’t come out till late this year. But early 2025 is more likely.
Where can I watch more Wednesday in the interim?
The first season is on Netflix, but if that’s not enough, you can also check out Christina Ricci’s Wednesdayin the 1990s movies, which are both currently streaming on Pluto TV. This will especially prime you for whatever role it is that Christopher Lloyd has in the new season. The 1964 sitcom is also streaming on Pluto TV. Oh, and there’s the 2019 animated movie, but we don’t really talk about that here.
For a little while, it seemed like The Walking Dead was eager to use its popularity as a platform to create an entire universe of zombified television. First, there was the spinoff/prequel Fear the Walking Dead, followed by The Walking Dead: World Beyond and then the anthology series Tales of the Walking Dead. Each one intermingled with the original show, but for the most part, they were intent on telling their own stories. Fast-forward to 2024, and the former two series have ended, while Tales got an order for another season last year with no further news.
This leaves us with the question: What do we want out of The Walking Dead now? Because it seems like whatever plans AMC had for a sprawling empire have been whittled back down to focusing on what the central characters of the main show have been up to. Dead City looks at Negan and Maggie, Daryl Dixonis concerned with the titular badass, and The Ones Who Live reunites Rick and Michonne, the franchise’s power couple who previously departed The Walking Dead, leaving it to end in a rudderless, underwhelming fashion. Is the future of The Walking Dead… The Walking Dead divided into three shows?
If it’s a ploy to regain a dwindling audience, it makes sense. At its height, The Walking Dead was a ratings behemoth. Its peers in the “prestige TV” boom of the 2010s might have eaten its lunch in terms of sustained critical appraisal, but at its height, the fifth-season premiere scored 17.29 million viewers. To put that in perspective, the finale of Breaking Bad had 10.28 million.
Going back to the “glory days” with a handful of the characters most associated with them seems to be a good idea in perhaps luring back the viewers that absconded from the show due to its exhausting length or unpopular creative decisions. The debut of The Ones Who Livenabbed 3 million viewers, a far cry from the massive numbers it once landed a decade ago, even considering TV viewership being down in general. However, it’s a marked improvement from the relatively measly audience of the final season. And AMC is happy with the show’s performance on its streaming service, AMC Plus.
As a way to reignite its narrative potency, it’s a more questionable direction. Dead City, in particular, suffers from a “been there, done that” feeling — didn’t Maggie already sort of forgive Negan for whacking her beloved Glenn with a baseball bat back in the original? Do we really need another series where they have to play an apocalyptic odd couple and go through the same emotional arc again?
Photo: Emmanuel Guimier/AMC
Photo: Peter Kramer/AMC
Image: AMC
Daryl Dixon thrives on Norman Reedus’ bottomless well of likability and an engaging atmosphere. And with best pal Carol co-headlining the upcoming season 2 of his spinoff, we’re likely to get something at least somewhat watchable. However, with franchise overseer Scott Gimple seemingly set on one day reuniting the gang, will it eventually feel like Daryl ’n’ Carol are just spinning their (motorcycle) wheels until we can get the Avengers of Walking Dead side projects? And aren’t all of these Walking Dead spinoff leads coming together just… The Walking Dead?
And considering that The Walking Dead ended with a look toward the future, what wider meaning is there for them to reunite aside from a nostalgic group hug? The zombies have become a bit of an afterthought as the world moves toward rebuilding itself, and they mostly serve as a fleshy obstacle course in 2024. There is always some terrific gruesomeness to be mined from The Walking Dead’s consistently stellar makeup and practical effects, but piecing the cast back together for the sole purpose of seeing them beside one another, squaring off against undead hordes, feels a little empty. The Walking Dead managed to shock us in its early years thanks to its commitment to going the distance in showing that no one is safe from the zombies, but a reunion tour of all the people that were clearly safe misunderstands the “glory years” that the creators want to return to.
Luckily, The Ones Who Live is tapping into some much-needed emotional territory and making it seem like the event that it wants to be (even if the zombie horror aspect has long since rotted). Rick Grimes, now an established soldier of the paramilitary group CRM, must reconcile with his guilt and survival instincts when Michonne, his sword-wielding partner and the mother of his youngest child, comes back into his life to corral him and bring him home. It’s something that Grimes wrestles with, as heading off might put him and the people he loves in the line of fire from the CRM, who has some serious dirt on him and the community he left behind.
“What We,” the fourth episode of the new show, might be one of the best in the franchise’s history that doesn’t focus on undead bloodshed. A good chunk of it is devoted to Rick and Michonne arguing and finally getting to reflect upon the world-weariness that an experience like this would instill. In particular, Rick finds it hard to return to his family because of what happened with his late son Carl, and The Ones Who Live gives him a chance to properly grieve for the ones who don’t. He doesn’t want anyone to have to go through that kind of pain again, nor does he believe that he’d be able to. They’d all be much safer if he bore the weight of their tragedy alone. It is misguided patriarchal martyrdom, but it makes sense for Rick.
Photo: Gene Page/AMC
Of course, Michonne is able to convince him of the fact that he’s Rick Grimes, that he shouldn’t give up, that there’s more out there for the pair, etc. But Rick Grimes being reduced to an anxious, melancholy shell of a man and giving him an ultimate redemption makes The Ones Who Live feel like a fitting narrative follow-up to The Walking Dead and the closest thing the show has gotten to a proper epilogue. It could have very easily been a hollow attempt to draw in the unconvinced crowd with “Hey, it’s that sheriff guy that you liked!” Instead, it competently grapples with Rick as a character that’s been through so much trauma rather than Rick as a returning action hero.
On a wider level, The Ones Who Live can also serve as a fitting cap to the escalating threats of the show. The “We are the Walking Dead” mindset, where the physical menace of the zombie (amid a pop culture saturation of zombie media at the time) was no match for the terrifying specter of your fellow man, produced bad guys like the unstable Governor, the brutal Negan, and a host of other antagonists that ranged from wannabe cults to cannibals. The CRM, an army equipped with massive firepower that is willing to adjust the world to its specific definition of law by force, is the logical “final boss” of The Walking Dead. By fighting back against them, Rick and Michonne aren’t just taking on a rival group but helping decide the order of the future.
Where this leaves the end goal of The Walking Dead remains to be seen. It could all be pointing toward some eventual grand reunion, given that the original show concluded with Michonne and Daryl both running off to find Rick. But the first seasons of both Dead City and Daryl Dixon end with the shows spiraling off further into their own specific plots, so it will be a while before the gang gets back together again.
Until then, The Walking Dead franchise is in, essentially, its DLC era. What you want out of The Walking Dead depends on how attached you are to certain characters, and luckily, there’s now DLC side quests available for a few of them. It remains to be seen if these threads will ever interconnect again (now that every actor is on their own show, AMC would also have to deal with a truckload of contractual issues if it wanted to then push them back into the same series), so until then, The Walking Dead survives entirely on audience interest in the solo exploits of characters it worked to build together. With 11 seasons of the main show, AMC did plenty of asking for you to wait for plots to be resolved and character arcs to be fulfilled. And now, with the hint of bigger things to come and a host of orbiting spinoffs, it’s asking you to wait just a little while longer. For what? We’ll just have to see.
The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live is now streaming on AMC Plus.
Callie Curry and Jodi Walker kick off today’s Morally Corrupt by discussing the news that Karen Huger of RHOP has been charged with a DUI following her recent car crash (3:02) before jumping into Season 11, Episode 8 of Vanderpump Rules (12:41). Then, Callie and Jodi transition to the series premiere of The Valley (39:45) and Summer House Season 8, Episode 5 (53:24). Finally, Callie is joined by Summer House fan favorite West Wilson to talk about his relationship with Ciara, his take on the Lindsay and Carl dynamic, his fascinating upbringing, and more (1:12:08)!
Host: Callie Curry Guests: Jodi Walker and West Wilson Producer: Devon Baroldi Theme Song: Devon Renaldo
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 JinPhoto: 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?
Callie Curry steps in for Rachel this week to talk about this week’s Bravo news
Callie Curry steps in for Rachel on today’s Morally Corrupt, and kicks off the episode by sharing her opinion on the recently released RHONJ Season 14 trailer with Jodi Walker (2:14). Then, Callie and Jodi recap Season 11, Episode 6 of Vanderpump Rules (7:17) before diving into Season 8, Episode 3 of Summer House (40:11).
No streaming service can pull off a perfect batting average with its original programming, but when it comes to Netflix’s live-action anime adaptations, the company has long been hitting below the Mendoza Line. Storied animes likeCowboy Bebop and Death Note arrived on the streamer with plenty of fanfare, only to be eviscerated by the very communities to which Netflix was trying to cater. Every live-action anime adaptation faces a unique challenge: the fantastical, seemingly limitless possibilities of animation are something even the best special effects can fail to capture. But Netflix has kept trying despite those high-profile early failures because the shows tend to come with a large built-in audience. If an anime adaptation can appease the fandom and become a hit with the rest of its subscriber base, Netflix could be sitting on a gold mine—perhaps even the next Stranger Things.
To the streamer’s credit, Netflix finally made some progress on the live-action anime front last year. The first season of the One Piece adaptation, which premiered in August, was beloved by critics and fans alike for embodying the kinetic energy of the manga. (The show has since been renewed for a second season. The only problem: One Piece creator Eiichiro Oda still hasn’t finished writing the series, which has been active since 1997. In theory, Netflix could roll out a dozen seasons of One Piece and barely scratch the surface of the source material.) Then, in December, the streamer dropped a live-action adaptation of Yu Yu Hakusho. While Yu Yu Hakusho didn’t carry the same hype as One Piece, it also scored favorable reviews—in fact, the biggest complaint about the show was that its first season was far too short.
After so many whiffs on the live-action anime front, Netflix was suddenly two for two on major titles, which appeared to bode well heading into arguably its buzziest adaptation to date. Whether the Nickelodeon animated series Avatar: The Last Airbender qualifies as anime is something even its own creators debate, but at the very least, it’s heavily influenced by the genre. (Dante Basco, who voiced Prince Zuko, considers it “American anime,” which is a solid compromise.) In any case, Avatar is a franchise that’s treated with the kind of reverence that’s rare among American animation: a story that gracefully touches on mature themes such as genocide, war, and imperialism for a younger audience. (The animation itself is also stunning, echoing the esteemed works of Hayao Miyazaki, another major inspiration for the show.) In the nearly two decades since Avatar first aired on Nickelodeon, it’s been widely regarded as one of the best animated series ever made.
With all the adoration surrounding Avatar, however, an adaptation of the series is a terrifying prospect. (Even the sequel series made by the original creators, The Legend of Korra, divided the fandom—and it was very good!) The last time the world got a live-action Avatar adaptation, M. Night Shyamalan’s The Last Airbender, it was universally panned. How bad was it? Well, the film earned a whopping 5 percent on Rotten Tomatoes—when something as notoriously reviled as Dragonball: Evolution has better reviews, you know something went horribly wrong. Surely, Netflix’s adaptation (also called Avatar: The Last Airbender) couldn’t fumble the bag as badly as Shyamalan, right?
Fans certainly had reason to worry when the original Avatar creators, Bryan Konietzko and Michael Dante DiMartino, left the project over creative differences. The promotional rollout for Avatar didn’t exactly inspire confidence, either, with showrunner Albert Kim explaining that the adaptation would bypass many of the story’s side adventures and that character traits deemed “iffy” were removed entirely. But despite all signs pointing to the live-action series being a misfire, that’s not what transpired. The new Avatar is just … fine.
For the uninitiated, Avatar takes place in a fantastical world composed of four nations related to one of the classical elements: Water, Fire, Earth, and Air. Gifted individuals from each nation are capable of “bending”: essentially, manipulating their native element in an elevated form of martial arts. But one being, the Avatar, is able to master all four elements and maintain peace among the nations. Similar to the Dalai Lama, the Avatar reincarnates and passes to a different nation with each life cycle. Before the start of the series, the Fire Nation eradicates all of the Air Nomads, knowing that the Avatar lives among them: the first step in an ambitious plan to conquer the world. A young Airbender named Aang (Gordon Cormier in the Netflix series), the Avatar in training, isn’t with the Air Nomads during the fateful attack; instead, he’s caught in a terrible storm, and his Avatar State (a heightened ability that’s akin to going Super Saiyan) freezes him in a block of ice for a century as a defense mechanism.
In the time that the Avatar disappeared, the Earth and Water nations have isolated themselves from the rest of the world in a handful of cities: the last strongholds standing in the way of the Fire Nation. The story begins with two siblings from the Southern Water Tribe, Waterbender Katara (Kiawentiio) and her sardonic older brother, Sokka (Ian Ousley), inadvertently stumbling upon Aang as he awakens from his century-long slumber. Aang’s reemergence quickly captures the attention of Zuko (Dallas Liu), the Fire Nation’s exiled prince who has spent years searching for the Avatar—his only hope of being welcomed home by his father, Fire Lord Ozai (Daniel Dae Kim), the show’s Big Bad. With threats lurking around every corner, Aang and his new pals must travel the world so that he can master the other three elements and stop the Fire Nation before it’s too late.
Netflix’s Avatar broadly covers the first season of the animated series, during which Aang focuses on mastering Waterbending while traveling to the Northern Water Tribe to help defend it from a Fire Nation assault. Along the way, Aang must contend with what’s happened to the world in the century he’s been gone—the extermination of his people, the loss of hope among the other nations—and what sorts of sacrifices are required to become a fully realized Avatar. As far as adapting the story to live action, it’s a pretty seamless transition, aided in part by a young cast that not only looks the part, but also largely embodies their respective characters. Ousley, in particular, absolutely nails Sokka—someone whose constant wisecracks hide a well of insecurities that he’s not the fearsome warrior he makes himself out to be.
Really, the show’s greatest strength is its ability to lean on such gripping source material. While some story lines from the original series are meshed together for the sake of brevity, all of the rich character dynamics remain intact: the relationship between the emotionally wounded Zuko and the kindly Uncle Iroh (Paul Sun-Hyung Lee) will once again tug at the heartstrings; Sokka, somehow, remains the franchise’s most eligible bachelor, spitting game at warriors and princesses alike. Perhaps the show’s finest improvement on its animated predecessor is a secondary antagonist from the Fire Nation, Commander Zhao, whose guile and arrogance are given new dimensions by Industry’s Ken Leung. (Performance-wise, Leung and Lee are at the top of their game, with few weak links in the sprawling cast.)
The biggest problem for Avatar is a familiar one for many live-action adaptations: By streamlining the narrative into eight episodes, the show loses sight of the idiosyncrasies that made the animated series so beloved in the first place. Some of the best moments in the original Avatar happened during Team Avatar’s side adventures, which weren’t just important from a character development standpoint, but also allowed the viewer to become engrossed in the world. This version of Avatar is like doing a speedrun in a video game, rather than savoring every little detail: you may get to the finish line faster, but the journey isn’t nearly as memorable. In fact, the characters bounce between major locations so quickly—the Earth Kingdom city of Omashu, Kyoshi Island, and so on—that the world can’t help but feel smaller in the process.
Of course, it wouldn’t have been possible for Avatar to adapt the entirety of the animated series without Netflix spending the equivalent of a small nation’s GDP. What we do get visually, however, is a bit of a mixed bag. Appa the flying bison and Momo the winged lemur have been impressively brought to life with CGI, but some of the bending sequences more closely resemble PS2 cutscenes. (The same sentiment applies to the show’s many locations: Omashu and the Fire Nation’s throne room are clear winners; the Water Tribe communities look glaringly artificial.) Thankfully, the show does excel in some of the finer details: Each nation is inspired by Asian and Indigenous culture and folklore, which is reflected in everything from the set design and artwork to the food. (Not gonna lie: I wanted to devour every tastefully presented meal.) It’s the kind of authenticity that Shyamalan’s The Last Airbender notoriously lacked, so seeing that cultural representation realized on-screen is commendable in and of itself.
All told, a solid if unspectacular Avatar adaptation is probably the least interesting outcome. After months—if not years—of anticipation, Netflix has delivered neither a masterpiece nor a colossal failure; instead, the show gets a passing grade, at least from this fan of the animated series. I’m much more curious to see how Avatar is received by people unfamiliar with the franchise, and whether this unique universe of benders, animal hybrids, mythical spirits, and ill-fated cabbages draws them in. If that does happen, then Netflix could have another massive hit on its hands, and, hopefully, a chance to improve on some of the show’s early shortcomings in future seasons. Trying to live up to the legacy of the original series was always going to be a losing battle, but while Netflix’s Avatar isn’t off to a flawless start, I still believe Aang can save the world.
Erika and Steven catch up with each other about their holidays, including everything they watched, and talk about what TV, movies, music, etc. they’re excited for in 2024. Then they do some personal ins/outs for the new year.
If you want to share any culture you’re excited to experience in 2024 or your ins/outs for this year, email us at whataboutyourfriendspod@gmail.com.
Hosts: Erika Ramirez and Steven Othello Producer: Sasha Ashall
Echo season 1 ends with a bang, with Echo (Alaqua Cox) going up against Kingpin (Vincent D’Onofrio) again after confronting him in Hawkeye. Along the way, she reconnected with her roots, her family, and her sense of self, putting her on the track to becoming a hero.
It’s enough to make you wonder where Echo might show up next. So far, Echo has only appeared in Hawkeye and Echo, but with the MCU branching farther than ever, it seems like there are a lot of places a hothead superhero could pop up — including, potentially, a second season of her own show?
Here’s everything we know about Marvel’s future plans for Echo and Echo:
Is there going to be an Echo season 2?
As of this writing, Disney hasn’t confirmed if there will be a season 2 of Echo. For now, the show is being billed as a miniseries, just like Hawkeye before it. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that the show won’t be coming back.
When will Echo show up next in the MCU?
So far, neither Alaqua Cox nor Echo have been confirmed to show up anywhere else in the MCU. But there is a Daredevil show in the works (and in the reworks) that seems like an opportunity for her; after all, they had a pretty great fight in Echo.
And if Hawkeye is any indication, this doesn’t have to be the end for Cox’s Maya Lopez. Hailee Steinfeld’s Kate Bishop showed up in a teaser scene at the end of The Marvels as Hawkeye’s heir apparent, meaning Echo could find an analogous slot somewhere in the MCU. (Even if, for now, it’s still unclear what Kate will be doing as part of Kamala’s team.)
When might Echo season 2 debut on Disney Plus (or Hulu)?
If there is an Echo season 2, it might be a while before it actually comes out. Echo was first announced in November 2021, right after Cox showed up as Echo in Hawkeye. With the show only getting released some two years later, the earliest we’re likely to see Echo season 2 would be 2026.
What does this mean for the Marvel Spotlight?
Photo: Chuck Zlotnick/Marvel Studios
Echo was a unique release for Marvel, not just because it was the first one to drop on Hulu (and in full) instead of Disney Plus. It was also the first entry in the new Marvel Spotlight umbrella, something Echo producer Richie Palmer says Echo was the right show at the right time to be.
“I think it was us saying, You know what? Echo wants to be its own thing. So let’s allow it to be,” Palmer tells Polygon. “We wanted to figure out, when we were bringing Maya Lopez to life, how do we honor that aspect of the comics? How do we keep it dark and gritty and separated from everything else that was going on?”
“And then Kevin [Feige] came in, as we were editing the show, and we were seeing how dark we were pushing it. And he was saying, Don’t hold back on the violence, don’t hold back on the grit and this grounded tone, it’s what’s making this show so unique and special. So Marvel Spotlight kind of came from Kevin.”
With Spotlight offerings being framed as an opportunity for more casual viewing, even sans any other MCU knowledge, it’s unclear if shows like Echo are being designed (or promised, or even considered for) a second season.
This week, Dave, Neil, and Joanna discuss the worst things they watched in 2023! They start by going over the results of the big movie bet and receive their collective punishment for being wrong—“Tubthumping” (3:31)! Then they go through honorable mentions and toughest cuts (20:44) before revealing their list of the 10 worst things they watched in 2023 (39:27).
Don’t forget to vote on the final poll of the Holiday Trial Royale! What is the best holiday movie? You can vote for the winner at TheRinger.com, on The Ringer’s X feed, and in the Spotify app, where you’ll find Trial by Content. The winner will be announced on the next episode!
You can send your picks for the next topic and a few sentences to support your pick to TrialByContent@gmail.com. You can also submit suggestions for future Trial By Content topics. Is there a great pop culture debate that you’d like us to settle? Send it on over!
Hosts: Dave Gonzales, Joanna Robinson, and Neil Miller Associate Producer: Carlos Chiriboga Additional Production Supervision: Arjuna Ramgopal Theme Song and Other Music Credits: Devon Renaldo
In this special episode of Morally Corrupt, Rachel Lindsay talks to Jodi Walker all about her upcoming narrative podcast series An American Scandoval, which drops on the Ringer Reality TV feed December 26. Jodi dishes on what pushed her to create a narrative podcast about the exploits of Tom, Ariana and Raquel, what surprised her most during her reporting process, and what exactly made Scandoval such a huge moment in 2023 pop culture.
Steve and Jomi are joined by Daniel Chin to look back at the year in fandom culture and highlight some of their favorite shows and movies that they weren’t able to cover. Suzume, Monarch: Legacy of Monsters, and Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur are some of the many shows and movies covered in this episode. Later, producer Kerm chimes in with his favorite comic books in the world of X-Men in 2023.
Hosts: Jomi Adeniran and Steve Ahlman Guest: Daniel Chin Producer: Jonathan Kermah
Rachel Lindsay and Callie Curry begin today’s Morally Corrupt by sharing their reactions to the new Vanderpump Rules Season 11 trailer (1:40), before discussing the brand-new Ultimate Girls Trip season, which features lots of familiar faces (8:55). Then, Rachel and Callie chat about The Real Housewives of Potomac Season 8, Episode 6 (36:38). Rachel is later joined by Chelsea Stark-Jones, who’s recaps The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City Season 4, Episode 14 (53:11) and The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills Season 13, Episode 8 (1:13:44).
Host: Rachel Lindsay Guests: Callie Curry and Chelsea Stark-Jones Producers: Devon Baroldi Theme Song: Devon Renaldo
Blue Eye Samurai is coming back for a second season at Netflix. The series debuted on Nov. 3, and got renewed a few weeks later. Netflix announced the second season on Monday with a short video.
The show’s renewal comes as no surprise considering it’s popularity. It spent several weeks in Netflix’s top 10, and made several best-of-the-year lists, including the number two spot on Polygon’s own list. On top of that, the show’s first season ends with clear intention for another season. But Netflix didn’t announce much more about what we can expect from season 2, other than that it’s on the way. So, here’s everything we know about the next season of Blue Eye Samurai:
[Ed. note: This story contains spoilers for Blue Eye Samurai season 1.]
Is Blue Eye Samurai getting more seasons?
We know for sure that a second season is on the way, but Netflix’s announcement didn’t come with the promise of more than that. While some animated series often get picked up for at least a season or two, it seems we’ll have to wait a while until we find out just how long Mizu’s journey may stretch on for.
When will Blue Eye Samurai season 2 release?
There’s no good way to tell, but the first season was greenlit back in 2020. With pandemic conditions making production harder, and the general difficulty of starting up an animated project, it’s likely we won’t have to wait a full three years before the next season, but turning around another batch of episodes next year would be pretty daunting too. With that in mind, it seems like 2025 is the most likely date for new episodes of the show to arrive.
What will season 2 of Blue Eye Samurai be about?
This one the show is very clear about: We know that Mizu is heading off of London, ready to make her way through a foreign land, which is likely to come with quite a bit of culture shock, in hopes of killing her last two targets. Meanwhile, Akemi is heading to the palace to find whatever influence she can over the future of Japan, while Ringo seems to have found a new master.
All of this should make for a much bigger, more expansive second season, but also one that broadens the show in exciting new ways.
Who will be in the cast for Blue Eye Samurai season 2
Along with the main cast of the first season, who all seem likely to return, Netflix hasn’t made any announcement of additions for season 2. Although, considering the talent that’s involved in the show already, it’s possible some pretty big names could get onboard as the show heads to London.
Is there anything similar to Blue Eye Samurai I can watch while I wait for season 2?
Weirdly enough there is, though we can’t promise it will be good just yet. FX’s new series Shogun is about an Australian who journeys to Japan and becomes a samurai, and its first trailer looks pretty good. The series is set to debut in February and will probably scratch a similar itch to Blue Eye.
If even waiting a few months feels like too much for you, there’s also Vinland Saga, an anime about a Viking seeking revenge for his slain father until he finds out that revenge is much more complicated than he thought.
While Rockstar hasn’t given the next GTA game a proper name yet, it’s almost assuredly going to be titled Grand Theft Auto 6 (or Grand Theft Auto VI). And we know some details about GTA 6, after an unprecedented leak of the game in 2022. But thanks to Rockstar’s secrecy and the enormous task of following up one of the biggest games of all time, much about GTA 6 is still shrouded in mystery.
Here’s everything we do know about Grand Theft Auto 6 so far.
When does GTA 6 come out?
Rockstar hasn’t announced a release date yet for GTA 6, but parent company Take-Two Interactive might have revealed a release window for the next Grand Theft Auto game. In August, Take-Two told investors the company plans to see a “significant inflection point” during its 2025 fiscal year, which has been interpreted by analysts to mean that GTA 6 will be released sometime between April 1, 2024 and March 31, 2025. Obviously, that’s a pretty big window, but it could point to a 2024 release for GTA 6.
While GTA 6 may be targeting a 2024 launch, Rockstar is famous for delaying its biggest games in the name of polish. Its last major release, Red Dead Redemption 2, was publicly delayedthree times. And back in 2013, Grand Theft Auto 5 saw a significant delay, slipping from its original spring release date to its ultimate September 2013 launch.
In other words, even if Rockstar gives us a release date or window by the end of 2023, history tells us that nothing is set in stone.
When does the GTA 6 trailer come out?
Rockstar co-founder and president Sam Houser has only confirmed an “early December” release for the first GTA 6 trailer. It may or may not coincide with The Game Awards 2023, which streams live on Dec. 7. It’s more likely that Rockstar will release the trailer on its own schedule, without competing with a bunch of other game announcements.
Where does GTA 6 take place?
According to a massive leak of early gameplay videos and early reporting on the game, Grand Theft Auto 6 will be set in Vice City, the GTA version of Miami. That location was previously explored in 2002’s Grand Theft Auto: Vice City and that game’s 2006 prequel Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories. Those entries were set during the mid-1980s, but GTA 6 will reportedly tell a modern-day, Bonnie and Clyde-inspired story featuring two leads named Jason and Lucia, based on early gameplay videos. Lucia would be the GTA series’ first female lead playable protagonist in a mainline game.
The videos show robberies, gunplay, open-world driving, a police chase, a crowded nightclub scene, and conversations with full voice acting. The game footage was clearly not intended to be shown publicly, with debug programming elements visible on-screen at the time.
One of the longer videos showed the female player character robbing a diner, as well as threatening staff and customers, who react in fear to having a gun pulled on them. Then she and her male accomplice get in a shootout with police before jumping in the police patrol car and driving off. The game’s graphical treatment is quite realistic, but still consistent with GTA games’ style.
TBD, but PlayStation 5, Windows PC, and Xbox Series X are a safe bet. Unlike previous Grand Theft Auto games, which saw staggered releases on consoles versus PC, it seems more likely than ever that Rockstar would release all versions of the game on the same day. But given Rockstar’s track record, the PC version could lag behind PlayStation and Xbox releases.
There’s also another platform coming that could be home to Grand Theft Auto 6: Nintendo’s Switch successor. Rockstar has embraced the Switch with releases like L.A. Noire, Red Dead Redemption, and Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy — The Definitive Edition, so don’t rule out an eventual release of GTA 6 on Switch 2.
How much will GTA 6 cost?
Rockstar and publisher Take-Two haven’t announced a price point, but it seems likely that Grand Theft Auto 6 will carry a $69.99 price point, increasinglythe standardfor AAA video games with big budgets.
Don’t worry about those unfounded rumors that GTA 6 will cost $150, or will be priced per hour, based on misinterpreted comments from Take-Two boss Strauss Zelnick. There may be higher-priced premium or collector’s edition versions of GTA 6 that cost more than the industry-standard $69.99, but hold your horses (and your pre-orders) until Rockstar makes it official.
What happens to Grand Theft Auto Online when GTA 6 comes out?
Rockstar hasn’t said, but given the massive popularity of GTA Online, which is also sold as a stand-alone experience, it will likely continue. Rockstar may have more grand ambitions for an online mode for GTA 6, and it may run two versions of the online experience for each game. The future of GTA Online is one of the biggest open questions — not to mention Rockstar’s trickiest needle to thread — when it comes to discussing GTA 6. Rockstar may very well keep those plans under wraps for the foreseeable future.
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