This weekly update kicks off with the news that Lisa Marie Presley has died from cardiac arrest at age 54. Singer-songwriter Presley was the only child of Elvis and Priscilla Presley, and the mother of actress Riley Keough. Presley also had two notable two-year marriages to Michael Jackson and Nicolas Cage. Her last public appearance was at the Golden Globes earlier this week.
Now on to the past week’s standout stories from the various entertainment industries.
Film
There’s a new trailer for Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania, which is not just the third solo Ant-Man film. It’s also important as the first big screen entry in Marvel’s Phase Five, setting up Jonathan Majors’s powerful, time-and-multiverse-manipulating Kang the Conqueror as the next Big Bad of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Peyton Reed directs this Ant-Man installment as he did the other two, while the cast includes returning Paul Rudd, Evangeline Lilly, Michelle Pfeiffer and Michael Douglas as two generations of Ant-Man and Wasp costumed heroes. Kathryn Newton plays now 18-year-old Cassie Lang, the daughter of Rudd’s Scott Lang.
Quantumania comes to cinemas in just over a month, on 17 February. You can check out the film’s pair of brand-new posters here.
Series
Grease is the word. Again, thanks to Paramount+.
Premiering 6 April is prequel series Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies, a musical romantic comedy, which is set in 1954, four years before the events of beloved movie musical and stage play Grease. Going the more representative route (brace yourself now for the anti-woke whiners), the series explores the emergence of Rydell High’s girl gang The Pink Ladies, spearheaded by four fed-up, misfit students.
Rise of the Pink Ladies had a 10-episode first season order.
In other television news:
- As no real surprise, given its reported high viewership numbers, Netflix’s YA-orientated Addams Family series Wednesday has been renewed for a second season.
- Meanwhile, despite initially being approved for a second season last year, Netflix has made an about turn and cancelled animated conspiracy theory comedy Inside Job.
- But to confirm that cancellation of a show does not mean the end, after being axed by HBO Max, despite filming about to conclude on its second season, raunchy 1970s-set comedy Minx lives on thanks to Starz. The network has picked up both seasons of the series.
Gaming
Ubisoft is in trouble. Publicly admitting disappointment in sales performance (or, rather, underperformance), the game publisher hasn’t had a new smash hit in a while. And now it’s cancelled three unannounced games and delayed its pirate MMO game Skull and Bones yet again, from March this year into the company’s next financial year – which is any time from April 2023 to March 2024. Restructuring and cost-cutting is on the cards as the company tries to, officially, adapt better to industry trends like the “shift towards mega-brands and long-lasting titles than can reach players across the globe, across platforms and business models.”
Though things are always subject to change, what players can look forward to this year include the next Assassin’s Creed game, Mirage, which returns the franchise somewhat to its smaller, tighter roots; and the open-world tie-in Avatar game Frontiers of Pandora.
In happier news, this year’s D.I.C.E. Awards nominees have been announced (with D.I.C.E. standing for “Design Innovate Communicate Entertain” out of interest). In short, God of War: Ragnarok and Elden Ring are dominating here as at The Game Awards, with significant more love for Horizon Forbidden West… probably at the expense of A Plague Tale: Requiem:
A total of 61 games released in 2022 are nominated. God of War: Ragnarök leads the pack with 12 nominations, followed by Horizon Forbidden West earning 8 and Elden Ring with 7. Tying with 4 nominations each are Call of Duty®: Modern Warfare ll, IMMORTALITY, Moss: Book II, TUNIC, and Vampire Survivors. Finalists for 2022’s top honor, Game of the Year, are: Elden Ring, God of War Ragnarök, Horizon Forbidden West, Stray, and Vampire Survivors.
The D.I.C.E. awards are determined by the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences, with voting cast by members of the Academy’s 33,000+ membership base. The winners will be revealed at a livestreamed ceremony on Thursday, 23 February.
Xbox has a Developer Direct showcase coming up on Wednesday, 25 January. Learn what to expect here, but in summary, developers will be providing fans with an inside look at some of the games coming to Xbox, PC and Game Pass over the next few months, including The Elder Scrolls Online, Forza Motorsport, Minecraft Legends, and Redfall. Bethesda’s space RPG Starfield as massive enough that it will be getting its own standalone show.
Developer Direct will be streamed on multiple platforms, and South Africans can watch from 10pm.
One final gaming news tidbit: Marvel Snap’s PVP mode is coming with the 31 January patch, allowing fans of the mobile game to battle their friends for the first time – as opposed to other anonymous matched-up players.