What pop culture stories stood out last week? Here are our top picks from the relatively quiet period.

Lifestyle

Some good and bad news on the South African geek event front. The good first:

Another cosplay guest has been announced for Comic Con Africa 2025, following Kuwait’s Majed Cosplay. Award-winning Vietnamese cosplayer Yuji Koi, who appeared at Comic Con Cape Town this year, and was supposed to be at CCA last year (until visa issues scuppered those plans), will be hitting up Johannesburg. Catch her all four days at the pop culture celebration, where, along with stage sessions and booth appearances, she’ll also be judging the twice-daily casual cosplay contests. And, hey, still talking that laid-back competition, this site’s Noelle (AKA Pfangirl) will be helping out there too.

A reminder that CCA is taking place this year over 4 days, from 28 – 31 August. It has moved forward from its usual September timeslot due to unexpected renovations at its long-standing venue: the JHB Expo Centre at Nasrec.

As for the bad news, ICON Comic & Games Convention, which was supposed to run this coming weekend, 4 – 6 July, has been postponed last minute. The event will still be taking place at Crawford International School in Lonehill, as it did last year, but has now shifted out to 10 – 12 October. That’s one weekend after the six-years-later return of its coastal sibling ICON Durban, happening 4 – 5 October.

Out of interest, looking far ahead, electronic gaming expo rAge is locked down for the weekend of 5 – 7 December at the JHB Expo Centre this year.

Film

The Superman press tour may be in full swing right now, but eyes are on another iconic hero, and his “rebooted” return to the big screen: James Bond.

After five directors were shortlisted, it’s Dune’s Denis Villeneuve who has emerged as the filmmaker steering the next 007 action adventure for Amazon MGM Studios. As for the film’s creative direction, rumours are that the franchise will take audiences back to the British spy’s foundational years, much like the upcoming game First Light from IO Interactive. This claim stems from reports that the studio wants to cast a British actor under the age of 30, with Jacob Elordi, Tom Holland and Babygirl’s Harris Dickinson all current favourites to fill the role of the suave MI6 agent.

The next James Bond film will be the first made with full creative control in Amazon’s hands, after filmic James Bond brand custodians Barbara Broccoli and Michael G Wilson stepped down – after decades in charge. The last Bond film was 2021’s No Time to Die, which saw Daniel Craig exit the role.

Okay, this one snuck up on us. It wasn’t until we saw the attention-grabbing first trailer last week on the big screen that we even knew Weapons existed. However, we are now officially all in for this horror mystery, the latest effort from Barbarian filmmaker Zach Cregger. It doesn’t hurt that the film’s impressive cast includes the likes of Josh Brolin, Julia Garner, Alden Ehrenreich and Benedict Wong. As for the plot, the film sees 17 children disappear overnight in a small town. The kids all have one thing in common: they’re in the same class at the local school, putting suspicion on teacher Justine Gandy (Garner).

Weapons comes to cinemas, including IMAX, from 8 August.

As for other movie news tidbits:

  • Look out for the teaser trailer for sci-fi adventure Project Hail Mary today! This adaptation of Andy (The Martian) Weir’s novel releases on 20 March 2026, and stars Ryan Gosling as an amnesiac astronaut who wakes up alone in space, but still has to save the world. 21 Jump Street and The LEGO Movie’s Phil Lord and Christopher Miller direct. There’s also a new poster for the film.
  • Why more characters haven’t made the transition from the pages of seminal British anthology comic 2000 AD to the screen is a mystery, but Judge Dredd is about to have a bit more company in the form of Rogue Trooper. Moon and Warcraft’s Duncan Jones is driving a photorealistic animated movie (made with Unreal Engine 5) about the titular blue-hued supersoldier (Aneurin Barnard) who embarks on a revenge mission with a sentient gun, backpack, and helmet containing his dead squadmates’ voices. Empire has more info on the film here, which is due for release this year.