Star Wars parents rejoice!!! We finally have a Star Wars series for our little ones!
Disney+ and Disney Junior will finally have a series meant for your Jedi younglings who are of preschool age called Star Wars: Young Jedi Adventures. The new original animated series will premiere on Star Wars Day aka May the 4th.
Continue reading “New ‘Star Wars’ Series for Preschoolers Focuses on ‘Young Jedi Adventures’”
Keith and Britney break down the latest episode of The Mandalorian and the return of Ahmed Best to the Star Wars universe. They also discuss the twin controversies surrounding Marvel Studios currently. Yikes!
As we are halfway through our return to the 25th Century, we can pretty much settle into the rhythm of Star Trek: Picard. It’s a bit of a clunky narrative but a lot of fun character work for new and returning players. Most discouraging but perhaps least surprising is for all the things Season 3 has done to get us those wonderful character moments, it can’t escape the Kurtzman of it all and has at its center a big dumb mystery around Jack Crusher.
Continue reading “How I Learned to Stop Worrying About ‘Star Trek’ Canon and Enjoy the Big Dumb Mystery”
There’s no fucking way they’re gonna be able to land this, I thought to myself.
I’m in a movie theater seeing Everything Everywhere All at Once for the first time. I had heard about it long ago, and was cautiously optimistic.
Continue reading “When Something is Nearly ‘Everything’”
Keith is out this week, so Britney brought back her Lituation Room partner Vanessa Shark to break down the season 3 premiere of The Mandalorian and share some thoughts on the evolution of her podcast, now titled the DC Studios Podcast.
With Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania currently in theaters and The Mandalorian season 3 streaming on Disney+, we have every reason to be excited to see more of Katy O’Brian.
Continue reading “‘Quantumania’ and ‘Mandalorian’ Star Katy O’Brian on Finding Nuanced Roles”
Yellow alert! This was still an overall enjoyable episode with a mix of good and somewhat forced character beats. However, some of the internal logic is starting to be concerning.
Continue reading “‘Star Trek: Picard’ is Really Worried about Mom and Dad Fighting”
Star Wars has always been more than a space opera. It mixes in different genres from action-adventure to space westerns. It even takes inspiration from the great Akira Kurosawa. And The Mandalorian brings a lot of what we love about Star Wars and throws in a brand-new story that doesn’t have much to do with the Skywalker saga.
Continue reading “‘The Mandalorian’ Season 3 is Off to Bold New Adventures”
The Mandalorian finally makes its season three debut tomorrow after a year-long hiatus. The season promises to be its most ambitious as Din Darjin (Pedro Pascal) seeks redemption for breaking the Mandalorian code after he had to off his helmet twice in season 2.
Continue reading “‘The Mandalorian’ Director Rick Famuyiwa on Ambitious Season 3 and Easter Eggs”
Mercifully, Picard is not hiding the ball. A recurrent problem with a lot of serialized shows is setting up a lot of mysteries that are slowly dripped throughout the season and you have to hope the mystery at the end is worth it.
Continue reading “‘Star Trek: Picard’ — That’s Not How Accents Work”
Star Trek has always wrestled with managing its legacy and the ability to do something new. Fans are always a prickly bunch judging a new series, movie, or a given episode as to whether or not it feels like Star Trek.
Continue reading “‘Star Trek: Picard’ — Once More Unto the Breach”
In anticipation for the third and final season of Star Trek: Picard, Keith welcomes his brother Raymond to Hard NOC Life as they countdown their top five episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation!
Today marks the 30-day countdown to the season 3 premiere of The Mandalorian. Starring Pedro Pascal as Din Djarin, the critically acclaimed, original, live-action series sees its titular protagonist reunited with his cute but very powerful Grogu — let’s face it, his real name is Baby Yoda — and going on new adventures across the galaxy. To mark such an occasion, Disney has released a brand-new poster along with a featurette centered on the show’s legacy.
Continue reading “‘The Mandalorian’ Season 3 Poster and Featurette Celebrate Din and Grogu”
Though The Mandalorian season two finale saw Din Djarin (Pedro Pascal) part ways with Grogu, their separation was short-lived as the two were eventually reunited in the final episodes of The Book of Boba Fett. Together once again, they’ll travel across the galaxy in pursuit of adventure. And a new trailer reveals more of the overarching plot and character drama, which sees Din trying to make amends for his past transgressions and the Republic making an effort to move away from its dark past.
Continue reading “Din Djarin Finds His Way Home in ‘The Mandalorian’ Season 3 Trailer”
One day remains until the return of Star Wars: The Bad Batch. For its second season, audiences will get to continue riding along with this troop of genetically altered clones as they navigate the ever-changing galaxy following Order 66, and where they fit into all of this.
Continue reading “‘The Bad Batch’ Stars and Executive Producers Discuss Making the Second Season”
When Avatar first came out in 2009, it used cutting-edge VFX technology to bring the jungle world of Pandora to life. The alien flora and fauna and the indigenous 10-foot-tall blue-skinned Na’vi looked so real. Even more so when watching it in 3D. More than a decade later, director James Cameron gives audiences a reason to revisit Pandora with the highly anticipated sequel Avatar: The Way of Water. The sequel explores new territories and utilizes newer natural elements like water. The latter of which has never been done before.
Continue reading “‘Avatar: The Way of Water’ VFX Artists on Creating Realistic Water in a CG World”
When James Cameron’s Avatar premiered in 2009, it represented a landmark moment in visual effects for film. Cameron made some of the most effective use of CGI and motion-capture performances since Andy Serkis’ brilliant portrayal of Gollum in Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings trilogy. The Na’vi, as alien and as CGI as they were, felt real to audiences as their animation took realistic form, as did the stunningly beautiful planet of Pandora. But while these visual effects were a spectacle, the story itself, while moving at times, was simplistic and derivative of other films in the realm of colonists and Indigenous peoples.
Continue reading “‘Avatar: The Way of Water’ Sinks More than It Floats”
A peaceful-looking island on an unknown planet, followed immediately by members of the squad of genetically altered clones, the Bad Batch, being chased by large crabs, breaks the ground for a glimpse at what’s to come from the upcoming second season of Star Wars: The Bad Batch. Set in the aftermath of Order 66, the show follows these group of rogue clones, as they navigate a galaxy under this questionable new Empire.
Continue reading “New ‘Bad Batch’ Trailer Teases Action Packed, High Stakes Second Season”
The name Bong Joon Ho is one that instills excitement into every cinephile out there. Right up there with Spielberg, Tarantino, del Toro, and Nolan, any time a Bong project is announced, the film world stops, and speculates about what the master has up his sleeve.
Continue reading “First Teaser for Bong Joon Ho’s Next Film ‘Mickey 17’”
On the final Hard NOC Life before we go on hiatus, Dominic, Britney, and Keith rank Andor against other live action Star Wars projects, including the Holiday Special from the 1970s. Speaking of Holiday Specials, James Gunn brings the tradition back with a special Guardians of the Galaxy mission to save Christmas.
This week on Hard NOC Life, Britney and Keith remember Jason David Frank and discuss how much grief has preoccupied the nerd spaces with Black Panther: Wakanda Forever and the most recent episode of Andor.
It’s been three years since the first-ever Star Wars live-action series, The Mandalorian — as well as the platform it lives on, Disney+ — debuted. In celebration, viewers received a little treat, by way of a collaboration between two beloved studios.
Continue reading “NOC Review: When Grogu Met the Soot Sprites”
Yesterday, Studio Ghibli, the iconic Japanese animation house founded by Hayao Miyazaki, set the internet ablaze when it cryptically tweeted a video of the Lucasfilm logo morphing into its own studio card.
Continue reading “Studio Ghibli and Lucasfilm Team on a Grogu Short”