Your weekly roundup for everything nerdy: Steven Yeun joins the MCU while Warner Bros. has announced that new Lord of the Rings movies is in the works. The Mandalorian’s fourth season has apparently already been written and a new iteration of Hellboy is on the way. Meanwhile, on the science side of geekdom, scientists have discovered galaxies that may make us rethink how the universe began.
Call of Duty is coming to Switch, Tohru Okada passes away, Steven Yeun is joining the MCU, and the James Webb Telescope discovers six “universe breakers”. Here’s what you may have missed this week in geek.
Steven Yeun joins MCU
The South Korean-American actor well known for his role as Glenn Rhee in The Walking Dead and his film Minari, which bagged him an Oscars nomination, has been cast in an undisclosed role in the upcoming MCU film Thunderbolts. According to Deadline, Yeun is playing a “key role” and “could also play a role going forward in future films of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.”
Thunderbolts is a film based on a group of anti-heroes from Marvel comics. The ensemble cast sees Florence Pugh and David Harbour reprising their roles in Black Widow as Yelena Belova and the Red Guardian. Sebastian Stan also returns as Bucky Barnes, who is rumoured to be the leader of the team. Julia Louis-Dreyfus’ Valentina Allegra de Fontaine will also be appearing.
New Lord of the Rings movies are on the way
Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav announced that multiple new Lord of the Rings movies are in the works. It’s not entirely clear whether these films are reboots or a story outside of the main trilogy in the same vein as The Hobbit or The Rings of Power. Peter Jackson, the original director of the first three films and The Hobbit trilogy, has said that he and his original collaborators, Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens, have been “kept… in the loop every step of the way”. However, there’s been no word on whether Jackson will be involved in these films.
Jon Favreau has written season four of The Mandalorian
Though the third season is just a few days away from dropping, Jon Favreau has revealed that he has already written the fourth season of The Mandalorian. On top of that, the director has also revealed that Mando and Grogu’s adventures are nowhere near the end. On the Inside Total Film podcast, Favreau calls the fourth season “a middle chapter of a much larger story”. He continued, “I love for these stories to go on and on. And so these characters potentially could be with us for a while.”
Microsoft is officially bringing Call of Duty to the Nintendo Switch
We want the record to be clear and address any misunderstandings. I’m delighted to repost below this statement and affirm Microsoft’s strong commitment to bring Call of Duty to Nintendo’s customers if our acquisition of Activision Blizzard is approved by regulators. pic.twitter.com/AlsIjwAGEU
— Brad Smith (@BradSmi) February 24, 2023
While it was announced last year that Microsoft was inking a 10-year deal to bring the iconic Call of Duty franchise to the Nintendo Switch, that deal has been signed and is now legally binding. Brad Smith, Vice Chair and President of Microsoft, tweeted that Nintendo users will soon get CoD games “the same day as Xbox, with full feature and content parity”.
James Webb Telescope discovers “universe breakers”
The James Webb Telescope has discovered six galaxies which, according to the Smithsonian Magazine, “could change how we think of the origins of galaxies”. The galaxies, dubbed “universe breakers”, seem to have been the same age as our galaxy is now just 500-700 million years after when the big bang theoretically happened. However, there is the possibility that these objects aren’t galaxies at all and that they’re just being obscured by black holes. The findings are yet to be officially confirmed.
The Truth Behind NASA Orbiter’s Latest ‘Teddy Bear’ Image From Mars
Hellboy is getting a reboot… again
The Dark Horse Comics hero is coming back to the big screen in his third iteration. After 2019’s Hellboy was critically panned, this new reboot of the character will have one significant difference from the past two film iterations: Mike Mignola, the creator of Hellboy, is one of the people who wrote the script. The reboot is titled Hellboy: The Crooked Man as per a Deadline report.
Tohru Okada, the creator of the iconic PlayStation logo sound in ads, passes away
We love you pic.twitter.com/CyvjEj6pFJ
— moonriders_net (@moonriders_net) February 22, 2023
If you’ve seen a PlayStation ad, you’ve definitely heard that sound that plays when the logo appears at the end. That sound was created by Tohru Okada, who sadly passed away on February 14 at the age of 73. Okada was also part of the Japanese band The Moonriders, whose members paid tribute to their founding member when the news of his passing came out.
This story first appeared in Lifestyle Asia Bangkok
