Netflix

20 Nov

Hellbound Time Jump Explained

Netflix, New DVD release

This Hellbound article contains major spoilers through Episode 3. Hellbound creator Yeon Sang-ho may come from a feature film background, but you wouldn’t know it from the six-part supernatural horror series’ impeccable pacing, including a mid-season time jump that gives the drama new narrative life just when the world’s horror is perhaps becoming too much. Whether you’ve completed all six episodes of the Netflix series or are looking for some mid-season guidance following the end of Episode 3, here’s what you need to know… When is Hellbound Set? The first half of Hellbound is set in 2023. In Episode 1,…

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19 Nov

Hellbound Ending Explained

Netflix, New DVD release

This Hellbound article contains MAJOR spoilers. You can read our spoiler-free review here. Heading into Hellbound, I can almost guarantee you could not guess how the Netflix series would end its six-part first season. So many beatings, one precious newborn baby, and one time jump later, the Korean drama races towards its unpredictable, snowy conclusion in the backstreets of Seoul, leaving fans with both a satisfying (and surprisingly hopeful) ending to the first season as well as so many lingering questions about what might happen in a potential second season. Here’s everything that went down in the Hellbound season finale……

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19 Nov

Why Netflix’s Cowboy Bebop Doesn’t Work

Netflix, New DVD release

This article spoils much of Netflix’s live-action Cowboy Bebop adaptation as well as the original anime series. Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: Cowboy Bebop, the anime directed by Shinichirō Watanabe, is what got me into anime. The series was and remains a great gateway title for numerous reasons. The beautiful, high-quality animation looks as awesome now as it did when it premiered in 1998. Yoko Kanno’s jazzy soundtrack swings so hard that people who don’t normally listen to jazz find themselves downloading the soundtrack (guilty!). Also, for English-speakers, the dub is so good it’s widely accepted as…

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19 Nov

Andrew Garfield Astonishes in Jonathan Larson Movie tick, tick… BOOM!

Netflix, New DVD release

It would take a unique kind of audacity to reach out to Stephen Sondheim and insist he be your mentor. But then it took a unique kind of audacity—and pain, and tears, and talent—to be Jonathan Larson. As the brilliant if ill-starred artist who wrote a generation-defining musical in Rent, and then didn’t live to see it performed once in front of an audience, Larson was a singular voice who throughout his short life burned like a Roman candle, dazzling many all too briefly. That includes Sondheim. This dynamic is brought to life in Lin-Manuel Miranda’s profoundly impressive debut as…

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17 Nov

Hellbound Is Even Scarier Than Train to Busan

Netflix, New DVD release

This Hellbound review is based on the first three episodes of the Netflix series. It contains minor spoilers. We’re all going to die, but most of us don’t know when, how, or what will happen to us (if anything) after the inevitable event. This is a reality we all live with, and that much of modern life under capitalism actively encourages us to ignore. Hellbound, Netflix‘s six-part supernatural horror from Train to Busan director Yeon Sang-ho, asks: what happens when we are forced to face that reality, not only on a personal level but a societal one. It’s a particularly…

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16 Nov

Red Notice and the True Stories Behind Cleopatra’s Eggs

Netflix, New DVD release

We meet them even before Dwayne Johnson and Ryan Reynolds can exchange their first quip, and well ahead of Gal Gadot’s big entrance: Cleopatra’s eggs, beautiful and bejeweled golden idols that apparently have driven fortune seekers mad for millennia. In Red Notice’s opening prologue, we are informed that these three diamond-encrusted prizes were gifted by Marc Antony to Cleopatra ahead of their wedding at the end of the Ptolemaic Dynasty’s rule over ancient Egypt. Lost to the sands of time after Cleopatra and Antony’s deaths, and the fall of Egypt to Rome, these eggs were allegedly thought to be myth…

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12 Nov

Red Notice Ending Explained

Netflix, New DVD release

This article contains Red Notice spoilers. Who ultimately is conning who here? That’s up for debate by the time the credits roll on Netflix’s Red Notice, as the tables turned and turned again between Dwayne Johnson’s John Hartley, Ryan Reynolds’ Nolan Booth, and Gal Gadot’s “The Bishop.” The three characters crossed, double-crossed, and maybe even triple-crossed each other more than once. But when it’s all said and done, they’re each standing on the same boat agreeing to go after another job together. The film spells out its switchbacks pretty thoroughly, but even so there are just enough twists to leave…

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10 Nov

What Makes The Office So Rewatchable?

Netflix, New DVD release

You’ll have heard that young people don’t watch television anymore, which might come as some surprise to young people. They absolutely still watch television, just on their own schedule, not that of a broadcaster, and not the way it used to be done, anchored to a single spot or even a single screen.  If young people didn’t watch television, then The Office: An American Workplace wouldn’t have been streamed for 57 billion minutes in the US in 2020, because it’s far from only those of us who’ve experienced the mundanity of office life who love The Office. Increasingly, it’s youngsters who find in…

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09 Nov

Squid Game Creator Confirms Season 2, Talks Potential Release Date

Netflix, New DVD release

Hwang Dong-hyuk likely never imagined the massive scope of Squid Game‘s success. The creator of the Netflix global phenomenon is well-known feature film director in Korea who initially developed Squid Game as a movie. It only became a nine-part series after years of rejections; 13 years after the creator first had the idea for the story, the media landscape had changed enough that Hwang’s vision fit into a modern streaming TV drama format. That being said, Hwang didn’t necessarily imagine it as a multi-part drama, but, as we all know from watching Squid Game, money talks… and the talented creator…

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04 Nov

From Dr. Brain to Itaewon Class—Best K-Dramas Based on Webtoons

Netflix, New DVD release

If you’re into K-dramas, then you’ve probably already watched at least one series that was once a webtoon. Web-based comics that are told in a continuous strip, webtoons are a uniquely Korean storytelling format that developed alongside the internet via platforms like Daum Webtoon (now Kakao Webtoon) and Naver Webtoon (known simply as Webtoon). As K-culture continues to expand globally, webtoons will certainly be a major element of that ever-cresting Hallyu. In fact, the trends has already started: According to data from the Korea Creative Contents Agency (via The Korea Herald), the overall value of the domestic webtoon market jumped…

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02 Nov

Army of Thieves: Hans Wagner Safes Explained

Netflix, New DVD release

This article contains spoilers for Army of Thieves and Army of the Dead. Army of Thieves, the prequel to Zack Snyder’s Army of the Dead, has less to do with zombies than you might expect. Yes, there are a few undead creatures shambling around the claustrophobic hallways of Ludwig Dieter’s (Matthias Schweighöfer) nightmares and on European newscasts showing the horrific outbreak in Las Vegas, but the movie’s not really interested in what’s happening across the Atlantic. Instead, Army of Thieves is about the mythical safes built by legendary (and fictional) locksmith Hans Wagner, one of which will eventually become the…

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01 Nov

Army of Thieves: Inside Zack Snyder’s Vision for a Whole Army of the Dead Universe

Netflix, New DVD release

Coming less than a year after its predecessor, Army of Thieves is a prequel to Zack Snyder’s recent Netflix hit zombie movie, Army of the Dead. But Thieves is not an action-horror hybrid like that earlier movie, which was directed and co-written by Snyder. Instead Thieves is a heist thriller (one based on a Snyder story and written by Shay Hatten, who worked on the first film’s screenplay) and set in the early days of Dead’s zombie pandemic. Hence the new film focuses on one character we met in the previous film and what he was up to before the…

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29 Oct

The Witcher Season 2: ‘The World’s Acting Strange’ in New Trailer

Netflix, New DVD release

Netflix has done a great job of minimizing spoilers in the trailers for The Witcher season 2, and the latest promo in particular focuses on the rising tensions in the world of the show while only hinting at the causes behind the increasing conflict. There are, however, certain conclusions that can be drawn about how the turmoil will affect Geralt, Ciri, and Yennefer differently and what aspect of the story lies at the center of all three character arcs. Why, after all, would everything be getting so dangerous all at once? Perhaps even those who haven’t read The Witcher novels…

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28 Oct

Hypnotic Ending Explained

Netflix, New DVD release

The following includes Hypnotic spoilers. Read our spoiler-free review here. Hypnotic, the new Netflix thriller from directors Suzanne Coote and Matt Angel (The Open House), has arrived to scare the streaming service subscribers into a trance right before Halloween hits. Starring Midnight Mass’ Kate Siegel, Hypnotic centers on Jenn, a woman struggling after a miscarriage and who decides to seek professional help in the form of therapist Dr. Collin Meade (Jason O’Mara). Dr. Meade uses hypnosis on his patients to help them overcome their worst fears and Jenn decides to go under to determine how best to move on from…

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27 Oct

Will Tiger King 2 Figure Out What Happened to Carole Baskin’s Husband?

Netflix, New DVD release

Netflix’s early pandemic smash hit docuseries Tiger King was already pretty jam-packed to begin with. The story began with a legally dubious exotic animal zoo run with a showman’s flair by mulleted maestro Joe Exotic and then grew only more intense from there.  Still, Tiger King’s first seven episodes (plus a remote reunion special) proved so successful that a sequel of some sort seemed inevitable. The only question remaining was “is there possibly enough story left in this already wild tale?” Well, according to the first official trailer for Tiger King 2, that answer is a resounding “yeah probably!” Give…

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26 Oct

Army of Thieves Review: Zack Snyder’s Army of the Dead Universe Gets Second Helpings

Netflix, New DVD release

Zack Snyder’s Army of the Dead universe is expanding, and not in all the ways you expect. The first movie, which involved time loops, robots, aliens, and even copulating zombies, unsurprisingly left viewers with lots of questions, but don’t expect this universe’s sophomore outing to deliver any of the answers you’re looking for. Instead, Army of Thieves is a prequel that largely ignores the zombie-infested hell of Las Vegas, and it’s all the better for it. Green lighting a prequel before the first movie had even dropped always seemed a bit presumptuous on Netflix’s part, but the connections between the…

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25 Oct

The Last Kingdom Netflix Movie Title Calls Back to a Book Prophecy

Netflix, New DVD release

When Carnival Films adapted Death of Kings (the sixth book in Bernard Cornwell’s Saxon Stories series) they – probably wisely – left out a scene in which Uhtred of Bebbanburg is drugged in a witch’s cave and sexually assaulted by a goddess of the earth. Season three had plenty going on without that little adventure. King Alfred was dying, Uhtred was cursed, Danish war lord Bloodhair was doing what Danish war lords do and vowing to make the streets run with Saxon blood… Add in seer Skade running around the place stabbing priests and the last thing required was the…

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24 Oct

Locke & Key Season 2 Ending Explained

Netflix, New DVD release

This article contains major Locke & Key Season 2 spoilers. Netflix‘s fantasy-horror series Locke & Key returned for its second season this month, and managed to genuinely take a big step up in terms of its storytelling and overall quality. There was a lot to love about Season 2, but with a Season 3 already greenlit at the streaming giant and filming underway pretty much back-to-back, things came to a rather strange end during the show’s sophomore finale. Having dealt with the murderous Dodge and having finally pulled their tormented Uncle Duncan into the fold – with mother Nina soon…

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23 Oct

What Dino Fury’s Move to Netflix Means for Power Rangers

Netflix, New DVD release

After ten years Power Rangers has found a new home. Since 2011 the long-running franchise has been on Nickelodeon but, according to Deadline, starting in spring 2022 the second season of Power Rangers Dino Fury will premiere exclusively in the U.S. on Netflix. This is a major shift that could have long reaching impacts for not just the show but also the franchise as a whole. Let’s explore some of what this could mean moving forward.  More Serialized Stories While it’s likely that Dino Fury’s second season will continue with its mix of light serialization and stand alone stories, if…

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20 Oct

Night Teeth: Sexy Vampires Feast on Crime Movie Thrills

Netflix, New DVD release

Night Teeth is very entertaining, not particularly scary, and more of an action film than a straight horror movie. But at its center is a romance, and some wicked antiheroes who are sadly put in their place all too soon. Isn’t that the problem with intra-vampire spats, though? All the worst bloodsuckers bleed out, even when they’re really the most fun to watch. Yet we shouldn’t linger on the sad parts. Adam Randall’s Netflix horror film happily slashes the throats of humans of all ages, even dishing out a savory cut of niece to her veteran vampire-killing uncle. Don’t worry,…

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