The Verge’s entertainment section collects the latest news from the worlds of pop culture, music, movies, television, and video games. Whether you want to know what to watch on Netflix or how to make the most of your streaming service budget, the entertainment section acts a reliable source. There’s simply too much to read, watch, hear, and play. Let us be your tour guide.
Titanium Court is a seemingly confusing mixture of many different genres. I can’t get enough.
Titanium Court is a seemingly confusing mixture of many different genres. I can’t get enough.
After announcing in September it was working with industry group DDEX on a standard for disclosing when AI is used in a song, AI credits are launching with DistroKid as the first partner. Unfortunately, even if the rest of the industry gets on board, voluntary labels likely won’t be enough as AI uploads threaten to overtake humans.
The latest poster for DC Studios’ upcoming Clayface movie — out October 23rd — from director James Watkins definitely leans into a kind of body horror that’s very different for the DCU. That kind of energy could be nice change of pace as the studio builds its new cinematic universe.
Update: And now we’ve got a trailer.
Boards of Canada have just confirmed that their first album in well over a decade, called Inferno, will be out on May 29th. I was already sold, but this cryptic 40-second-long teaser has me even more excited.
Though Warner Bros. tried to kill Coyote vs. Acme for the insurance money tax write-offs, Ketchup Entertainment has released the long overdue movie’s first trailer ahead of its theatrical debut on August 28th.
Following Nevada’s settlement on Friday, West Virginia and Alabama have settled with company to address alleged child safety issues, as reported by Bloomberg. Last week, Roblox announced a bunch of new safety updates, including dedicated Kids accounts with increased restrictions.
I wrote about that — and other Catholic concerns — at my friend Rusty’s newsletter while he took the day off.
[Today in Tabs]
Ghibli’s getting a little meta with Night in the Valley of Witches — a new animated short co-directed by Goro Miyazaki and Akihiko Yamashita that is set in a fictionalized version the studio’s real world theme park. You’ll be able to see the movie at the actual theme park beginning on July 8th.
Netflix has announced the leading cast for its upcoming Gundam movie from director Jim Mickle (Sweet Tooth), and the lineup looks like… an interesting group of faces, to say the least.
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In celebration of National Deaf History Month, Disney has reanimated three songs — Frozen 2’s “The Next Right Thing,” Encanto’s “We Don’t Talk About Bruno,” and “Beyond” from Moana 2 — into American Sign Language. The full reimagined musical sequences are coming to Disney Plus on April 27th.
After a back-and-forth in court in 2024, it appears that The Onion really might take control of Alex Jones’ Infowars. The New York Times reports that under a new deal, The Onion will strike a licensing deal for Infowars intellectual property (though a judge still needs to approve it). The Onion is already promoting the new project, which will be under the creative direction of Tim Heidecker.
Though Apple has been radio silent about The Savant ever since it postponed the show’s debut last year, Deadline reports that the series may finally start streaming some time this July.
Fresh off the loss of its antitrust trial, the company settled with the DC attorney general over claims it “hid the true price of tickets” before checkout. The AG says Ticketmaster has since changed the practice. The settlement is similar to one between StubHub and the Federal Trade Commission.
[Office of the DC Attorney General]
This is also your last chance to catch any performances you might have missed. Last week I missed out on Clipse, Young Thug, The Rapture, and Tomora, so they’re my priority. But I also am looking forward to Röyksopp, who didn’t make the stream last weekend. Head over to the official Coachella YouTube channel.
I love horror movies and overanalyzing things, so Horror Lex scratches a really specific itch. It doesn’t actually host any papers or books. Instead, it’s a hand-selected index of over 13,000 documents, many of them from peer-reviewed journals. A lot of them are free to read, too.
[Horror Lex]
It finished the 21.1-kilometer race in 50 minutes and 26 seconds. The world record was set just a month ago by Jacob Kiplimo, at 57 minutes and 20 seconds. More impressively, when this race was held last year, the winning robot finished in 2 hours, 40 minutes — a stunning improvement.
Correction April 19th: An earlier version used the wrong unit of measurement. A half-marathon is 21.1 kilometers, or 13.1 miles.
The first hint was a sponsored Instagram post on March 31st. But Curry has been spotted wearing the mysterious device (possibly dubbed “Google Fitbit Air”) in a video from Sotheby’s, and it even made an appearance in a behind-the-scenes clip way back from All-Star weekend. We don’t know much, but it looks like Google is getting ready to take on Whoop.
Last week we got special guest, Jack White. This week it’s Musgraves who gets that honor, after releasing the title track from her upcoming album Middle of Nowhere, the second single after “Dry Spell.” This weekend’s livestream replaces the stage with Yuma. That means no Model / Actriz or Drain, but you do get Armin van Buuren and a solo Boys Noize set. Watch here.
YouTuber Patrick Willems has argued that movies look objectively worse than they did 25 years ago. Digital cameras and an overreliance on CGI are factors. But he also argues that YouTube killed off the music video-to-Hollywood pipeline, starving the industry of inventive visual stylists.
And a whole lot more, including alternate versions of Acts 2 and 3, Steam Workshop support, and “experimental game modes.” The game got its first major update for all players on Thursday.
The game is a big hit, selling three million copies a week after its March launch, and I can tell you from personal experience that it’s a blast with a friend.
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Some of the best explorations of virtual worlds come from anime, and up next is Labyrinth from director Shoji Kawamori. It centers on a high school student who gets trapped in her phone, only for a virtual doppelgänger to take over her life. It’s hitting theaters soon, but only for two days: May 10th and 11th.
Iron Galaxy Studios, which has also helped support and port dozens of games, including BioShock Infinite, Diablo III, and The Last of Us Part I, is cutting around 90 employees, according to Kotaku.
The layoffs follow last year’s job cuts at Iron Galaxy Studios, and come as the developer works to “adapt to the climate of the video game industry,” according to a post on LinkedIn.
A new Wired investigation details the lengths Jim Dolan, owner of the New York Knicks and venues like MSG and the Las Vegas Sphere, goes to to spy on perceived enemies, fans, and critics. The vast surveillance apparatus includes dossiers, social media posts, and facial recognition tech.
Last year I wrote about one fan who believes a t-shirt design he had made resulted in a lifetime ban from Dolan’s venues — and that facial recognition picked him out of the crowd.
With the next batch of pre-orders, the Thor Max model with 1TB of storage is getting a $100 price hike to $549, according to a Discord announcement.
AYN is also switching from UFS 4.0 storage to the slower UFS 3.1 storage starting with the next pre-orders of the Thor and the AYN Odin 3 because “UFS 4.0 is no longer available at a sustainable level.”
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Panic detailed the changes in a policy that went into effect this month. For now, however, Panic will allow Catalog titles that “have used AI assistance in the coding process,” but those games will be flagged to note that.
For its own games, Panic cofounder Cabel Sasser recently told The Verge that it does not “have any interest in generative AI-created products.”
[Playdate]
The company, which is the subject of multiple state lawsuits over alleged child safety issues, will also be required to implement a “default content mode” for users who haven’t had their age verified — which is basically what Roblox announced on Monday.
The settlement was reached after Nevada approached the company ahead of a lawsuit, Reuters reports.
[Nevada Attorney General Aaron D. Ford]
The YouTube livestream starts at 4pm PT / 7pm ET. This is your chance to catch anything you missed last weekend (Tomora wasn’t on my radar), and for artists who had some issues to iron them out (sound for Slayyyter’s set was rough). Here’s the schedule for tonight:
Disney released the “final trailer” for The Mandalorian and Grogu ahead of its May 22nd debut in theaters. It looks fun! And Grogu is still so dang cute.
The movie, which Activision and Paramount announced last year, is scheduled to hit theaters on June 30th, 2028. It’s set to be written, directed, and produced by Peter Berg, with Yellowstone co-creator Taylor Sheridan also onboard to write and produce.
