On this side of the Coyote vs. Acme debacle, things are looking up for the John Cena, Will Forte, and Wile E. Coyote-starring legal comedy. But remember that that wasn't always the case - for a while, the world seemed doomed to never see the film, due to Warner Bros' shelving of the project. And what made that shelving especially devastating, says the film's director, is that he didn't see it coming.

Green recently sat down with The Hollywood Reporter for a tell-all interview ahead of Coyote vs. Acme's theatrical debut, already promising to be a triumph. And while the tale of 'resurrected film to spite Hollywood big wigs' gives everybody a good feeling now, Green says that it's not the first time the future for the movie looked bright...

Even though the climate around it didn't.

Summer 2026 may be coming to a close, but for some of us, it’s already March 2027. Yes, Emerald City Comic Con 2027 is on its way, and we’re giving Superfans a chance to sign up for the fun early. The ECCC Superfan ticket presale opens August 26 at noon Pacific, giving the faithful a chance to pick up their tickets a full 24 hours before everyone else.

For those of you who don’t know about Superfan memberships, we’re here to spread the word. It’s not just about getting early access to tickets for the 2027 show, as wonderful as that is. ECCC Superfan membership offers a whole host of opportunities and benefits, including the following:

If all of this makes you excited about becoming an ECCC Superfan, find out more here.

First there was the Ryan Coogler reboot, then the Chris Carter cut of I Want to Believe, and then that gorgeous LEGO set... It's a great time to be a fan of The X-Files, folks. Making it even better is the news out of Dynamite Entertainment today - Agents Mulder and Scully are headed back to comics, courtesy of the medium's longest-serving X-Files writer. And where better to restart this new era of freaky federal funnybooks than that most iconic of UFO locales:

Roswell, New Mexico.

Dynamite released a statement announcing the new comic August 13 (spooooky), along with the info about the comic's writer we mentioned, one Joe Harris. According to the statement, Harris was the scribe behind more X-Files comic scripts than any other writer, in particular the post-series "Season 10 & 11" run of the books originally published at IDW.

Warning: spoilers for X-Men '97 season 2's finale are ahead

X-Men '97 season 2 may have concluded, but it appears that the third season of the show is promising a showdown between Mystique and the US government, now that anti-mutant politician Graydon Creed - Mystique's son - is President of the United States. Oh, and Mystique has slain the real Valerie Cooper too. 

This was all revealed in the mid-credits scene from X-Men '97 season 2, episode 9, "Survival of the Fittest." We got fleeting scenes of Mystique this season, but the mid-credits scene sets her up to take center stage for season 3. 

The Doctor is in… the Javits Center. Wait, is that too dated a reference? We could talk about Daemon Targaryen from House of the Dragon, or his Prince Phillip in The Crown, or his roles in Caught Stealing, Morbius, Last Night in Soho, his upcoming turn in Star Wars: Starfighter...? Look, what we’re actually saying is very simple: Matt Smith is coming to New York Comic Con 2026, and we couldn’t be more excited.

Smith will be appearing at the show on Friday, October 9, and yes, he will be available for photographs and autographs on that day. He’ll be part of the second round of photo ops and select autograph sales, with a presale 24 hours ahead of the general on-sale launch to be announced soon. Want to be part of that presale? Sign up to become an NYCC Superfan now, and receive presale access, as well as a host of other perks.

Smith joins a lengthy guest list already announced, with more being added until the show begins October 8. For the most up-to-date list of NYCC 2026 guests, check out the official NYCC site.

Magic: The Gathering is constantly evolving. And with the game bigger now than it ever has been before, it's an apt time for the game's brain trust to get together and take a closer look at the Commander format. What's working, and what isn't working? In a matter of months, all will be revealed. 

In a video posted to YouTube, Magic's Principal Designer, Gavin Verhey, ahead of this week's Banned and Restricted card announcements, assured Commander fans that while there would be no immediate changes to the format, the format will be evaluated for potential changes next month. "Next month, the whole Commander format panel is coming to Wizards of the Coast. We're going to talk about any potential changes to the format, including banned and restricted updates. But I'm not expecting any changes to happen until sometime after that meeting," said Verhey. 

In case you're not familiar, Magic is very communicative when it comes to announcements of new banned and restricted cards across the game's various formats. Magic understands that banning certain cards may result in lots of players having to reconfigure the decks they've made around those cards to begin with. If you're curious, the cards that were banned in Standard this week are Badgermole Cub, Stormchaser's Talent, and Gran-Gran. You can hear specifically from the team in the video below, or read more in the article here. 

Admittedly, Critical Role's Liam O'Brien does tend to play the sad boi of the group, but don't mistake that as monotony. Across four core campaigns and a handful of spinoffs and one-shots, O'Brien has played some of Exandria & Aramán's most fascinating subjects; tragic, yes, but wildly ranging in their backgrounds and personalities. Recently, O'Brien spoke to this fact when he sat down to talk about a subject Critical Role forums everywhere are regularly discussing:

That is, the difference between The Legend of Vox Machina's Vax'ildan and The Mighty Nein's Caleb Widogast.

The subject came up during an interview O'Brien did with Animation World Network ahead of The Mighty Nein's premiere season debuting on Prime Video. Asked about the show's human wizard differs in his "inner turmoil" from that of the half-elf that appears on Critical Role's first animated adaptation, O'Brien had a thorough but very brief response.

If you watched Tales from Woodcreek season 1, you've seen that DM (and Daredevil: Born Again) Deborah Ann Woll knows how to welcome a TTRPG newbie into the world of Dungeons & Dragons. Even before her reality/escape room/actual play series debuted on The Dungeon Dudes channel, though, Woll was already roping celebrity costars into fantasy worlds by way of D&D, and there was one celebrity that stood out: Kevin Smith.

I spoke to Woll ahead of the current Tales from Woodcreek season 2 campaign on Kickstarter, but our conversation went back a little bit further than that project, to when Woll was running the mystical Relics and Rarities series for Geek and Sundry. Clerks director Smith appeared in episode 8 of the actual play webseries, where he portrayed a Tiefling Warlock called Private Detective Sam.

"Kevin was great," the True Blood star began, "He's like you would expect, extraordinarily busy, and so leading up to Relics and Rarities, I reached out several times. I was like, 'Would you like a primer on the rules? Do you want to go over your character or anything?' He'd give me a basic idea of who he wanted to play, and I'd made him a character because he didn't he didn't play D&D at that point, and I was offering that to all of our new guests. But he didn't have time, so he showed up on the day."

One of the most interesting things about Kentaro Miura is how candid he seemed to be about his insecurities. Despite becoming one of the most celebrated comic book artists of all time, Miura constantly felt like he had to catch up to his friends growing up. In fact, that sense of needing to prove himself as an artist eventually bled into the initial plot of Berserk and the relationship between Guts and Griffith.

During an interview that came out shortly before the release of Berserk Volume 20, Kentaro Miura was very candid about how his insecurities helped push him to become a better manga artist. “[In high school,] I was in a group full of people saying they wanted to be manga artists, but were actually busy getting girlfriends and getting into fights, so they weren’t really all that otaku. So I was basically the biggest manga nerd out of the bunch. It was a group of five, and I was pretty much the yellow ranger of the group; lagging behind in terms of emotional growth, but way ahead of the others in terms of drawing ability. I wasn’t capable of making a story that would make anyone feel much of anything, though.”

“So that information coming from outside – the other group members’ love troubles and fights – was really new to me. Also, there’s the fact that people who go into fine arts tend to be people with big egos who all have something that they’re particularly good at, and so with these other guys showing off what they’re good at, I wanted to find what I could do. Drawing, I decided, was my only option. The only way I could keep on equal footing with these guys was to make my mark as a manga artist. It became a strange obsession for me.”

Warning: spoilers for the X-Men '97 season 2 finale are ahead!

Well, one X-Man arises, and another one falls - but not who we were expecting.

This week on X-Men '97, Rogue was successful in saving Gambit from Apocalypse, but at great personal cost. After finding out from the Celestial, Eson, that her Celestial power-up would require her to sacrifice herself after saving Remy, Rogue was at peace with what appeared to be her immediate fate. But that would not come to pass. 

I've got bad news for DC fans: the Waller and Paradise Lost TV shows are reportedly dead in James Gunn and Peter Safran's DC Universe. 

The report comes from The Ankler, which published an article about the present and future of DC Studios' TV slate on August 12. Lesley Goldberg wrote, "Now, I can exclusively reveal that both Waller — which was to have Viola Davis star — and Paradise Lost are both dead. Sources say DC and HBO also heard pitches for series built around Poison Ivy and Catwoman but passed on both. Booster Gold, meanwhile, remains in development, and a search is underway for a new writer after David Jenkins (Our Flag Means Death) revealed his script also wasn’t moving forward. (Berlanti, as it happens, tried multiple times to adapt Booster Gold, first for Syfy in 2011 and then a feature in 2016, neither of which went beyond development.)"

So perhaps, all hope is not lost for Booster Gold, but there's no guarantee that DC Studios will find a writer with a pitch they can get through all stages of development. As a Justice League International fan myself, I'm holding out hope that we'll get to see Booster get into ridiculous situations with Ted Kord's Blue Beetle. 

In a world where AI artwork is on the rise, comic book artists are responding by returning to traditional artwork.

As computers and digital art programs became more advanced, some comic book artists began embracing these programs, trading in their pencils for a digital stylus. Today, you can create an entire comic book without using a pencil or a sketchpad. All you need is an iPad and some digital proficiency. However, The Department of Truth co-creator Martin Simmonds says he prefers the hand painted approach, and other comic book artists are joining him.

 “If you go back and look through my different projects, you can see there’s kind of a transition for a cleaner digital work to the more expressive stuff,” Martin Simmonds says during a panel at San Diego Comic Con 2026. “I spent a lot of time trying to make digital work look hand-painted. And there’s a point where I was like, just paint it. And Department of Truth was the perfect opportunity to do that. It’s so much more exciting to go back to the traditional means, especially in this day and age with AI. Hopefully, one of the positives that comes out of AI is people reverting back to using traditional methods. I really hope so, it helps comics more when people do that.”

According to a new report, Jack Lowden, a Slow Horses actor, is in the running to play James Bond in the next era of 007 movies. While rumors still swirl around Jacob Elordi as Bond, it appears that the search for Bond is still ongoing. 

In an episode of the podcast, The Rest is Entertainment, entitled "Sex Playlists - A Deep Dive" (no, I'm not making this up), producer Richard Osman dished on the men in the running to play 007. Osman said, "The name I’ve heard is Jack Lowden. It is definitively not a ‘he’s definitely got it’ thing. He is definitely being strongly considered. I think he’d be amazing."

I think I'll need 5 to 7 business days to process that last bit of information. But if you've been paying attention to Lowden's career for the past decade, he's been steadily building steam in British film and television. He appeared in the films, Dunkirk and Mary, Queen of Scots, while popping up in TV shows like Small Axe, Slow Horses, and The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power. He played Sauron in a flashback scene in The Rings of Power, in case you're wondering. 

We already know that Hal Jordan's former mentor-turned-adversary, Sinestro, is appearing in HBO's Lanterns series, thanks to a performance by Danish actor Ulrich Thomsen. But there's a lingering question mark hovering above actor Garret Dillahunt, who is playing a seemingly human villain in the show named William Macon, Sr. 

Macon, Sr. is an influential man residing in the Nebraska town that Hal Jordan and John Stewart investigate over the course of the season. But is he really who he appears to be? The trailer for Lanterns revealed that there are shapeshifting Manhunters on Earth, who can take the form of anyone or any species they choose. Could Dillahunt's character be one of these storied villains?

In an interview with SYFY Wire, Dillahunt wryly addressed the speculation about his role. "It might be a front for some other kind of character that's very familiar to you all," the actor began. "I don't want to rule out the possibility that maybe 'William Macon' is just a secret identity that had to be created. It was fun to be able to create him from scratch—at least that facet of the character."

It's never too early to start planning your Halloween costume, and thanks to Linda Cardellini, we now have a hint at what a lot of folks might be dressing up as this year. In case you don't know, Cardellini will be playing iconic slasher mom Pamela Vorhees in the Peacock/A24 Crystal Lake, prequel to the long-running Friday the 13th  horror series. And recently, Cardellini revealed that not only will her name carry over from the series that put Pamela in the murder Hall of Fame - 

Her iconic outfit will as well.

Cardellini recently appeared at the NBC Backlot Press Day, an event covered by the good folks at Deadline. At one point in the panel/screening of the show's pilot episode (also attended by series showrunner and IT: Welcome to Derry vet Brad Caleb Kane), Cardellini spoke to how she was going to fill the shoes of Friday the 13th's Betsy Palmer, who originated the Pamela Voorhees role in 1980.

No one takes hit shows from other countries and makes them bigger and louder than America, and, for the past few years, David Fincher has been trying to get his US version of Squid Game off the ground. It seemed like the pieces were all in place when Cate Blanchett showed up at the end of the final episode of the Korean version of the Netflix hit. However, it is now being reported that the long-rumored spin-off of Squid Game won’t be going ahead.

Of all the proposed American versions of hit international shows, an American Squid Game probably makes the most sense. Moreso than that horrifying reality TV show, at least. It is a show that relies heavily on a setting with rampant inequality and a lack of a social safety net that have driven people to take desperate measures. David Fincher, who had been attached to direct Squid Game’s American spin-off, has never been one to shy away from these kinds of themes in his movies like Alien 3 or The Social Network or his work on House of Cards for Netflix.

While Netflix hasn’t officially announced that they are cancelling the US version of Squid Game, which reportedly had a working title of Heckler, it has recently been reported that they’re pulling the plug on whatever David Fincher had been working on. Fincher is currently working on The Adventures of Cliff Booth, a Netflix follow-up to Quintin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, which may be the reason why the streamer is pulling the plug on his Squid Game spin-off; they need to move forward with their new version before the series fades from the pop culture zeitgeist. 

As befits the penultimate season of a series, The Legend of Vox Machina season 4 was filled with some of fans' favorite moments yet, and I'm not just talking about fans on our side of the creation table. Critical Role's own Laura Bailey was singing the season's praises even before it began; in particular, the OG Roler pointed to how costar (and series writer) Liam O'Brien wrote episode 5 of the season, the infamous 'heist episode' entitled De Rolo's Eleven, penned by himself and Marisha Ray.

That's what Bailey dove into during an interview with The AV Club published shortly before Vox Machina's fourth season dropped on Prime Video. Bailey, who has been the real-life avatar of the half-elven Vex'ahlia since Critical Role's 2015 debut, has played sibling to O'Brien's Vax'ildan across ten plus years and two mediums, and 

"The beauty of Liam writing the scene with the twins," The Mighty Nein voice actor said, "Is that he knows our voices so well [...] It just felt like words coming out of our own brains. They were so funny and so perfect, and the scene was so wonderful. Everybody’s moments in [episode 5] are some of my favorites of the season

The entertainment world is currently Timothée Chalamet’s oyster. With Dune 3 about to hit cinemas in December, he’s become one of the biggest stars in Hollywood at the moment. He’s got his pick of projects and is reportedly trying to decide what he wants to do next. According to the co-writer of 2023’s Wonka, a sequel to that prequel film is ready to go as soon as the star is ready to sign on.

During an interview that covered the impressive scale of Simon Farnaby’s career, which includes BBC sitcom Ghosts and the Paddington film series, the topic of Wonka 2 came up. Farnaby assured fans that there were still plans to do the follow-up to 2023’s Wonka, with the only real stumbling block being Timothée Chalamet himself.

“He wants to do one, but he’s not sure about timing or what he wants to do next,” Simon Farnaby explained. He believes that Wonka 2 is “delayed indefinitely.”

Deborah Ann Woll isn't just any nerd. As the person who portrays Karen Page in Daredevil: Born Again, Woll is one of the most beloved comic book media actors working today. Then, in a completely different sector of geekdom, Woll is an accomplished Dungeon Master and one of the minds behind groundbreaking TTRPG/reality series Tales from Woodcreek. Those are accomplishments that very few people have seen in a career, and so when I got to speak with her about it, I had a specific question about how they overlapped.

Namely, what would the characters of Daredevil be classified as in a game of D&D?

Some context here - I spoke to Woll ahead of the second season of Tales from Woodcreek heading to Kickstarter (the campaign launched August 11). The show, which mixes escape room puzzles with on-camera D&D gaming, has previously seen other familiar Marvel Cinematic Universe faces during its first outing (Ms. Marvel's Iman Vellani and Anjali Bhimani, to be specific), so it seemed only natural to bring up class specifics for Woll's closest MCU buddies.

Absolute Batman is an absolute unit, a massive, towering version of Bruce Wayne whose enormous physicality overshadows everyone around him. In fact, he's so big that series artist Nick Dragotta warned writer Scott Snyder that he was reaching a superhuman size - with the writer telling him to push the envelope even further.

"Scott had the initial idea to go big. And when I tell you, I drew him big initially, I did. And Scott saw it, and he said, 'No, bigger.' And I started, you know, going, 'Scott, we're getting into Hulk proportions now. He's massive," Dragotta tells NPR in an interview alongside Snyder.

Absolute Batman's impressive size is a bit polarizing for fans, though speaking personally, Nick Dragotta's rough and tumble take on a Dark Knight whose body is his own greatest weapon, above and beyond Bruce's skills and resources as an engineer, is one of the most engaging aspects of the title, setting it apart visually from every other incarnation of Batman on the stands.

Chris Carter, the creator of The X-Files, still wants to believe. But he's willing to wait however long he needs to for audiences to be ready for his complete vision of The X-Files. 

This August 14, a director's cut of the 2008 film, The X-Files: I Want To Believe, will hit Disney+ and Hulu, and the film has been re-titled as The X-Files: I Want to Believe – Vrach Frankenshteyn. If you're a fellow basement office dweller, you might remember that The X-Files have been rebooted twice since then, in 2016 and 2018, to tepid response from fans and critics. Even with the subsequent reboots, Chris Carter feels he hasn't told the full story he envisioned for Mulder and Scully. 

But now that Ryan Coogler is developing an X-Files reboot of his own, Carter revealed to The Hollywood Reporter that he's willing to hold off on returning to Quantico proper so that he doesn't disrupt what Coogler has in place for his specific reboot. 

One of the first things that anyone notices when picking up a copy of Berserk is Guts’ sword. We know that Kentaro Miura wanted to give his protagonist something distinctive to help him stand out among other manga characters, but there were two specific sources that influenced that giant sword: Shinji Wada’s Pygmalio manga, and the other comes from Kaoru Kurimoto’s Guin Saga novel series. Before he settled on the image of Guts we all know and love, Kentaro Miura went through multiple versions of the character.

During an interview, Kentaro Miura was asked about where the inspiration for Guts’ inhumanly large sword came from. The interviewer suspects it came from Go Nagai’s Violence Jack manga series, but Miura had two other influences in mind. “That comes from Shinji Wada’s Pygmalio. Also, I think it was in the Guin Saga spin-off The Snow Queen, there was this illustration of a two- or three-meter-tall giant wielding a sword,” Miura explains. “Guts’ sword is a cross between those two. It’s just the right size to be still somehow carryable, while giving that close-to-the-action feeling of violent men’s manga.”

Meanwhile, it wasn’t easy to settle on one specific design for the main character of Berserk. “I couldn’t make up my mind for a while, though, and Guts’ design went through quite a bit of change — long hair, wielding a katana, etc. After agonizing over it for a while, I ended up with what he is now, and I felt like I really nailed it. All I had to do was somehow capture the swinging around of that sword and that pleasingness of it. I probably don’t know what I’m talking about given that I’ve only created the story for one manga, but when you do manage to hit upon that crucial something before you start, I feel like it works out.”

DC Comics has spent years trying to get James Tynion IV to do more superhero work. The comic company is finally getting their wish, even if Tynion’s first choice gave them pause. Swamp Thing is Killing the Children is an upcoming crossover between Swamp Thing and Tynion’s Boom! Studios horror series Something is Killing the Children. For Tynion, the title was too good to pass up. 

“It did start with the title Swamp Thing is Killing the Children,” James Tynion IV says during a panel at San Diego Comic Con. “That was something that I remember talking about with [DC editor-in-chief] Marie Javins when I was still on the main Batman book. Something is Killing the Children was a rising success, and we were going to lean in. Let’s do a crossover. And Marie was like, ‘I don’t know about that, James.”’

Tynion was the writer on Batman in 2020 and 2021, and the Swamp Thing is Killing the Children isn't coming out until this fall.... so that means this has been in the works for at least six years.

In 2021, Image Comics declared it was no longer working with writer Warren Ellis due to very serious sexual misconduct allegations made against him. In a public statement, the publisher said it would only reconsider it if the writer made "amends to the satisfaction of all involved." Now, five years later, it's working with Ellis on new material. It's unclear if Ellis has made amends to the extent Image Comics has said they would require, or if something else changed behind the scenes.

Popverse asked Image Comics what had changed, and the publisher declined to comment. 

In 2020, more than 60 individuals came forward alleging sexual misconduct by Ellis dating back to the early 2000s. Ellis did release a public statement in which he acknowledged that he "hurt people deeply" and expressed contrition, but talks with a group of some of the victims who had organized under the name 'So Many Of Us' ultimately led to an impasse in late 2022 over a mediated accountability process, according to a group statement released in January 2023.

Love it or hate it, that House of the Dragon season 3 finale was probably not what you expected. While it did end in a battle, it was seemingly not the one that was teased in earlier trailers. But perhaps the biggest surprise for keepers of Westerosi lore (nerds like us) wasn't a battle at all but a speech - specifically, the climactic pronouncement that Queen Rhaenyra makes of being "the Prince that was Promised." Now, the concept itself does come directly from George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire novels, but the moment of the speech itself is an invention of the series.

And for those of us confused, House of the Dragon's own showrunner is here to clear things up. 

That showrunner is Ryan Condal, who spoke to journalists including representatives of TV Insider for an article published August 11, just two days after House of the Dragon's third season finale premiered. Before we get into that, though, here's a little bit more context: as part of the Westeros universe, the events of Martin's Fire & Blood novel are technically affected by the prophecy of "the Prince that was Promised," a messianic figure who will unite the Kingdoms against their greatest threat in a time of need. Game of Thrones fans know that that figure will eventually be revealed as one Jon Snow. 

I'm not sure I need to tell you this, reader, but Game of Thrones works pretty darn well on stage, too. At least, that's what we've gathered from a recent report on the success of Game of Thrones: The Mad King, a prequel to the events depicted in George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire books. Written by Duncan Macmillan, the play is currently being put on by the Royal Shakespeare Company in Straford-Upon-Avon.

But we also noticed this in the report - that may not be the last place the show goes up.

This article we're talking about is one run by The Guardian, published August 8. A rollicking retinue of raving reviews, the piece takes snippets from folks who have already seen the Westerosi drama, one enthusiastic endorsement at a time. Then, right as it's wrapping up, The Guardian cites one theater-goer called Steven, who says of the play, "You’d expect to see it on the West End rather than Stratford."

Sorry, folks, Rosario Dawson's scene in Spider-Man: Brand New Day was cut. And while we've now gotten official confirmation that she was, in fact, slated to appear in the Destin Daniel Cretton film, the scene is different than the one that fans online believe she was deleted from. 

No, the hospital scene at the end of Spider-Man: Brand New Day wasn't supposed to involve Rosario Dawson's Night Nurse character. Actually, Night Nurse was supposed to appear earlier on in the film, contrary to rumors that circulated before the film came out. According to a new interview from TheWrap with screenwriters Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers, the scene between Night Nurse and Spidey took place after Spider-Man's fight with Scorpion, where he would have been hospitalized. 

On the scene itself, Sommers said, "The scene [Rosario Dawson and Tom Holland] did was a good scene I think the only reason it’s not in the final cut was just it was probably cut for time because it was very good." This scene would have taken place right before Peter goes undercover at Empire State University to meet with Bruce Banner. There are a lot of moving parts in Brand New Day, and somehow, it all works. 

I suppose it was only a matter of time. 

ScottGames, the wildly successful video game company whose Five Nights at Freddy's has inspired a generation of horror media, is teaming up with a very real entertainment company to bring the infamous Freddy Fazbear's Pizza to life. Yes, you'll get the opportunity to literally step into the most cursed Chuck E. Cheese ripoff in our culture's collective consciousness, and the best news?

The site promises to be fully interactive.

In a curious moment of an internet rumor making inserting itself into reality, U.S. production company Electric Entertainment has announced that it is interested in being involved in the future of Doctor Who, days after initial reports declared that it was already in discussions with the BBC to take over the show.

To be clear, Electric Entertainment — best known for television shows Leverage and The Librarians franchise — was not in fact in discussions with the BBC when The Times reported it as fact, because the BBC has yet to officially open the show up to competitive tender as announced in June 2026. Simply put, the BBC isn’t talking to anyone about the future of Doctor Who just yet… but thanks to the Times’ report, Electric has revealed that it would definitely like to be considered when the tender does open.

In a statement released to Radio Times, Electric CEO Dean Devlin said, "It is untrue that we have had negotiations with the BBC. Preliminary or otherwise. When the proper time comes when they are prepared to speak with people, we certainly hope to have a discussion with them."

Though Berserk will always be his best-known work, it isn’t the only manga that Kentaro Miura produced during his lifetime. Duranki, a story about a young hero named Usumgal who was part man, part woman, and part god without really fitting into any of those categories, was partly inspired by young people’s shifting views on gender and fashion. This is something Kentaro Miura credits Frozen’s Elsa and Mad Max’s Furiosa with helping to bring about.

The character of Usumgal is distinctly androgynous in a way that leans into the blurred lines between gender in today’s world. During an interview shortly after the launch of Duranki, Kentaro Miura discussed the influences behind the characters in the new manga. For Miura, he saw the public’s changing views on gender and wanted to work on something that played on that. “I feel like androgyny is relevant in today’s world,” he explained. “From ‘Frozen’ to ‘Mad Max: Fury Road,’ there’s been a continuous stream of works depicting strong women who clearly assert their own will, and it’s become the standard.”

This wasn’t the first time that Miura played with gender identity or expectations in his work. Berserk has Casca, who is introduced as a woman trying not to be viewed as a woman in the typically masculine field of warfare. Meanwhile, Griffith is viewed as an almost inhumanly beautiful man with obvious feminine or androgynous features while he was human. So clearly Miura enjoyed playing with gender expectations long before the world was introduced to Elsa or Furiosa. He was just waiting for everyone else to catch up.

After 12 years of behind-the-scenes machinations, Marvel Comics has finally got the Star Wars crossover they've wanted.

Star Wars/Marvel: Hope Assembles is a five-issue, in-continuity event where the heroes (and villains) of Star Wars will be coming to the main universe of Marvel Comics, as first reported by Entertainment Weekly... and somewhere in there, I see subtle shades of another landmark crossover from 30 years prior, with Marvel and Star Trek. 

“It’s an idea we’ve wanted to explore since getting the Star Wars license back over a decade ago, but we knew we’d have to wait with the patience of a Jedi to make it happen," Marvel Comics' former editor-in-chief C.B. Cebulski, who was involved in the planning, tells EW. "Getting the call with the green light from Lucasfilm was a magical moment; it was as if Han Solo himself had called to tell me, ‘You’re all clear, kid!’”

Marc Silvestri made his name in comics with a run on Uncanny X-Men alongside legendary writer Chris Claremont, who stayed on the title for 17 years. Looking back, Silvestri says X-Men was seen as the pinnacle achievement for a Marvel artist, calling it a major highlight of his career.

"I was in a point in my career, personally, because I had been in the comics for 10 years, and I had done the X-Men with Chris Claremont. It's like, at that time, even though the general population had no idea what the X-Men was, within the comics community, it was really cool. We knew that the X-Men was the thing," Silvestri says during the Image Comics Founders panel at Comic-Con International: San Diego 2026. "Working with Chris Claremont on the X-Men. It just didn't get no better than that."

Silvestri drew Uncanny X-Men from issue #218-261, with a few fill-ins along the way, over a span of nearly 3 years. Silvestri was succeeded by Jim Lee, who also became a superstar on the title. Both creators would go on to co-found Image Comics alongside Todd McFarlane, Rob Liefeld, Erik Larsen, and Jim Valentino. 

As a wildly accomplished voice actor, Critical Role's Laura Bailey has had to do a lot of weird stuff in a booth. And while she puts her all into things like spellcasting, fight scenes, and more, The Legend of Vox Machina star admits that there's at least one person better than her at one common element of a voice actor's regular responsibilities: faking vomit.

Bailey brought it up during a live taping of Collider Ladies Night, where host Perri Nemiroff asked Bailey and costars  Marisha Ray and Ashley Johnson a question that probably every actor who's ever done physical comedy has had to engage with on some level - would you rather fake vomit or fake sneeze? Vomit was the answer for most of the folks on the stage, and Bailey used the consensus to bring up a real pro.

"Roger Craig Smith," she said. "Best fake vomiter I've ever met in my life."

Rob Liefeld has one hell of a life story, starting in the comic industry as a teenager, becoming a celebrity outside of comics, co-founding Image Comics, and remaining a foremost presence for decades. He sold a high-profile tell-all memoir a few years back, but just recently canceled it... but he says it's not over. Not because there's not good stuff, but that he can't say it just yet.

"I do. I'm gonna go back," Liefeld says when asked if he's got an autobiography in the works during his spotlight panel at Comic-Con International San Diego 2026. "I saw Mick Jagger - what is with Mick Jagger? - he's on 60 Minutes a year ago and they're like, 'Why haven't you, you're Mick Jagger, written an autobiography?' And he said, you know, 'I think the minute I look back, I'm not looking forward.' And I'm like, 'I can't be looking back! I gotta go forward!'"

"So right before I die, I'll tell you all the good stuff," he continues. I'll invite you over. I was younger, and I'm like, I'm too young. They were throwing me a pretty good deal. I had to give all the signing money back, but I'm like, I can't write it. I'm too young. And like I said, Mick Jagger isn't writing one, and I am. That's weird."

San Diego Comic Con is a magical event. There are tons of announcements, special appearances, and exclusive merchandise, but that’s nothing compared to some of the networking and special deals that happen behind the scenes. It’s the place where the biggest names in the comic book industry gather, making it the ideal venue for editors to find new talent and writers to form partnerships with artists.

Take Scott Snyder for example. Today, he’s one of the most prolific and consequential Batman writers of all time, but back in 2010 he was preparing for his first run on the character. Snyder had pitched a story for Detective Comics, and he included artist Jock in his pitch. The only problem was he hadn’t discussed this with Jock yet. Luckily San Diego Comic Con was coming up, and Snyder was prepared.

“When I pitched Detective Comics, I had Jock in mind, and they told me Jock will never work with you. He’s a big star, and you’re nobody,” Scott Snyder says during a panel at San Diego Comic Con 2016. “I came to this con to convince him to do it. I paid my own money here, and I met him in the Gaslamp. I was like, ‘You’ll get to draw a million batmobiles and all this cool stuff, and the Joker.’ And he was like, ‘I don’t care. What is it about?’ And then it really opened me up where I was like, ‘Oh, well it’s really about my fears in life.’ Basically, I gave him a real personal pitch. And he was like, ‘Let’s do it.’”

The biggest thing that fans of Bloodborne consistently ask for is, er, more Bloodborne. Released in 2015, the lusciously dark action RPG directed by gaming legend Hidetaka Miyazaki has inspired legions of merch campaigns, action figures, and in 2026, an upcoming movie from Sony and YouTuber JackSepticEye. The thing is, though, franchise obsessees don't actually have to wait for incredible Bloodborne adaptations - there's already a way to get their fix, courtesy of one of the best horror comics artists in the game.

That artist would be E.M. Carroll, the mind behind such groundbreaking work as the Eisner-winning folk horror Through the Woods and hit webcomic His Face all Red. Once described as a "master of atmosphere and mood," Carroll is known for haunting and emotional stories set in expansive, shadowy worlds - and I don't have to tell you, reader, how well that fits the Bloodborne bill.

Carroll's first Bloodborne fan comic is 2023's Writhe, which focuses on characters Arianna and Adella. In 2025, Carroll released their second Bloodborne strip Radiance, starring Hunter Alfred, and on August 3 of this year, Carroll published a third entry, Milkweed, which is an emotional, poetic communion between characters Adeline and Saint Adeline. Every comic is available for download via the links above.

One of the most popular changes regarding this latest season of Critical Role's Prime Video adaptation, The Legend of Vox Machina, was the casting of Wayne Brady as Taryon Darrington, a character originally portrayed at the D&D table by OG Roler Sam Riegel. But even though the character was a huge hit on both the original webseries and its adaptation, there was a time when even the cast themselves weren't so sure about his presence. 

At least, that's how Marisha Ray tells it.

That's what we learned during a live taping of Collider Ladies Night, hosted by Perri Nemiroff and featuring Ray, Laura Bailey, and Ashley Johnson. During the discussion, self-proclaimed Taryon fan Nemoriff asked the assembled cast to give some thoughts on the character played by Wayne Brady in The Legend of Vox Machina season 4, and Ray used the opportunity to shed some light on the character's origin. 

Marvel Midnight brings a new kind of horror to Marvel Comics, moving away from the publisher's classic monsters toward something far more visceral and disturbing, a choice that Midnight X-Men writer Jonathan Hickman says Marvel is only encouraging.

"We're not getting a lot of pushback," Hickman tells The Beat in an interview conducted at Comic-Con International: San Diego. "They're like keep pushing further and all of that kind of stuff. So yeah, the company seems like they're on board."

That extends to everyone from top Marvel Studios executives Kevin Feige and Brad Winderbaum to new Marvel editor-in-chief Steve Wacker, all of whom Hickman states he's spoken with. That's probably a good thing, as Midnight Spider-Man writer Phillip Kennedy Johnson is specifically aiming to capture the spirit of some of the most gruesome, skin-crawling horror movies of all time.

Absolute Batman paints a picture of a totally different Dark Knight who relies on his physical power and endurance more than gadgets and high-tech, million dollar toys, to the point where he takes nearly as much punishment as Wolverine and still finds a way to bounce back. Writer Scott Snyder says there's a simple reason behind why Absolute Batman takes so much punishment: "Because he can take it."

"We love beating him up," Snyder jokingly tells NPR in an interview alongside series artist Nick Dragotta. "No, I mean, you put him through it because he can take it. Ultimately, like, you can't really break these characters. You push them against the things that you're most afraid of in the world."

For Snyder, those fears culminate in the danger of mass shootings, a reality all too present in his life as a parent of school age children. The writer explains that he looks for real world touchstones to drive the story of Absolute Batman, in order to make him feel relevant to modern audiences.

Image Comics was founded by a group of mega-popular Marvel artists who exited the publisher to form their own company. Rob Liefeld, one of the seven creators involved alongside Jim Lee, Todd McFarlane, Erik Larsen, Whilce Portacio, Marc Silvestri, and Jim Valentino, describes the group as "alpha dogs" and compares them to the ravenous soldiers of The Odyssey.

"I think that's what happened with Image Comics. You've got seven alpha dogs. Marvel had never seen anything like us. We were rabid," Liefeld explains in his spotlight panel at Comic-Con International: San Diego 2026. "Every day we woke up and were like, we want to eat more. What's more? That scene, if you've seen The Odyssey when they're all turning into pigs? That's Jim, Rob, Todd, Marc, Whilce, Valentino, and Erik Larsen. Because we were like, 'More, more, more.' And I think Marvel was trying to shake us. Get the heck out of this. We're going to eat your whole house. And eat everything down."

In The Odyssey, the sorceress Circe transforms Odysseus' crew into pigs by feeding them a magic stew that polymorphs them. Christopher Nolan's critical smash hit adaptation of the story renders the scene in visceral detail, making it one of its most memorable moments.

If you look at the credits for Absolute Batman, you won’t see Deniz Camp’s name. However, the writer, who is known for his work on Absolute Martian Manhunter, has been a creator advisor on the series from the beginning. In fact, Camp was one of the first people to see Absolute Batman.

“When I was starting Absolute Batman, I don’t even know what I was thinking,” Absolute Batman writer Scott Snyder says during a panel at San Diego Comic Con 2026. “It was literally an outline or a sketch. I wasn’t supposed to show it to anybody. And I just really liked [Deniz’s] stuff. I was like, ‘Hey, I know we don’t know each other, but do you want to Zoom and I’ll show you this script. I would love your opinion.’ And he was the first person to give me real notes.”

“From that point forward, I knew I had maybe found somebody who would make me feel young again in comics. And my relationship with him has been easily one of the most important relationships in my career.”

In recent years, there's been a movement to record dubs of major Hollywood films in languages that are considered vulnerable or endangered by the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger. For instance, there is a Comanche dub of the Predator prequel film, Prey, while there's a dub of the animated Moana film in te reo Māori. And now, Welsh actors Matthew Rhys and Rhys Ifans are teaming up with Lucasfilm, Disney, S4C, and the Welsh Government to create a Welsh-language dub of Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope. 

According to Empire, the Welsh dub will be called Gobaith Newydd and will feature Matthew Rhys as Han Solo, Rhys Ifans as Obi-Wan Kenobi, and Aimee-Ffion Edwards as Princess Leia. Mark Lewis Jones, who played a menacing First Order captain in The Last Jedi, will voice Darth Vader. 

Lucasfilm's co-president, Lynwen Brennan, is enthusiastic about the caliber of Welsh talent in the dub, saying the following in a statement: "Wales has such a rich history of storytelling and a beautiful lyrical language. We have never before had a translation of Star Wars into Welsh and I am so thankful, that in celebration of our 50th anniversary, we have been able to work with some incredible Welsh talent to make that a reality. Welsh speakers will finally be able to enjoy the film in our native language and my hope is that it will have the same emotional impact as if you were watching the film again for the first time." 

Marvel Comics has a history with horror comics nearly as deep as its legacy of superheroes, but its new Marvel Midnight line is taking a different approach from the classic Marvel monsters, a concept that Midnight Fantastic Four writer Benjamin Percy likens to today's cutting-edge horror over classic, more straightforward scary movies.

"This is an elevated horror space we're working in. This isn't business as usual. We're not writing, you know, Werewolf by Night or Man-Thing here. It's more of an A24 joint," Percy states in an interview with The Beat at Comic-Con International: San Diego.

"You know, they're really letting us off leash, and they're letting us be patient. We have years of stories ahead of us already mapped out. In my case with the Fantastic Four, I'm taking a Lovecraftian approach and so it's cosmic horror and eldritch horror, and I have presently about 24 issues all outlined. So yeah, we can't wait to make your eyes bleed."

Between SpongeBob SquarePants' "my leg!!!!" character and the Cabbage Man from Avatar: The Last Airbender, it's clear that Gen Z-era animated TV shows love a screaming background character. And with Netflix's live-action Avatar: The Last Airbender series, the streamer is capitalizing on the mythology and fan appreciation of the unnamed Cabbage Man with a new mockumentary centering on the man portraying him, James Sie, going full method actor. 

James Sie, who plays the Cabbage Merchant on the show, talks to amusing effect about the "great responsibility" that he feels in portraying the iconic character. To him, the Cabbage Merchant is a "symbol of resistance and perseverance and survival." And honestly, he's right. I'd actually argue that the Cabbage Merchant is one of pop culture's greatest Crash Out Kings. 

Anyways, you can watch the 5-minute mockumentary below. 

Writer Scott Snyder is more synonymous with the modern Dark Knight than any other writer thanks in large part to his visionary skill for putting the hero in new situations, such as the current smash hit Absolute Batman, something he credits to writing primarily for himself and his own passions, comparing his style to "fanfiction."

"I just like to pretend we're making fanfiction and nobody's reading it. Like, [series artist Nick Dragotta] comes over, we go in our treehouse, and it's just a book that no one on Earth is reading, and that's it." Snyder tells NPR, expressing his love of writing Batman.

Part of what makes Snyder's various versions of Batman so popular is his ability to find the core of the character and bring his most striking qualities to the forefront no matter the setting or story, a specific goal for Absolute Batman and its take on Bruce Wayne as a civil engineer front the slums of Gotham rather than a billionaire.

There's a lot of discussion amidst Star Wars fans about who the real good good guys in the Galaxy Far, Far Away are. Is the Rebel Alliance really that great if they blew up all the prisoners of war on the Death Star? Is the Jedi Temple really that holy if they deny their own emotions? But here's what's fascinating - sometimes, it's unclear how good or bad a Star Wars character is even to the actor in the role.

At least, that's how The Mandalorian's Katy O'Brian tells it.

The topic came up on David Dastmalchian's Grave Conversations, where the Love Lies Bleeding star delved into her time as Imperial communications officer Elia Kane on the Disney+ Star Wars series.

Maximum X-Men brings a new, more superheroic version of the mutant team to the forefront, but according to the title's writer Christopher Yost, who creates the title alongside artist Tony Daniel, the biggest inspiration for his new take on the X-Men goes all the way back to the halcyon days of writer Chris Claremont and artist Jim Lee, right down to the visuals.

"I wanted a team that looked and felt like Chris Claremont and Jim Lee’s X-Men run, even to the point of leaning into the blue-and-yellow uniforms for most of the cast," Yost tells AIPT, referring to the X-Men's yellow and blue training uniforms from X-Men #275, which, though short-lived, have become a fan-favorite look for the team.

The roster of Maximum X-Men includes some of the team's biggest names such as Wolverine, Storm, Colossus, Iceman, and Bishop, with the additions of Firestar and Justice. Betsy Braddock rounds out the team, though Yost clarifies that she actually won't be going by Psylocke in Maximum X-Men. 

It doesn't get much bigger than the 1000th issue of something. It only happens once in a comic book's lifespan (no matter what kind of math you use), and Marvel Comics' flagship title Amazing Spider-Man will be reaching that pinnacle on September 16 with Amazing Spider-Man #1000. 

Just one small problem... the printer they are using is having some problems, and it'll take two weeks to sort it out.

Marvel has just sent a notice to comic book store retailers alerting them that the vaunted Amazing Spider-Man #1000 will not be going on sale August 16, but has been delayed at least two weeks, with the new presumed release date being September 30. This would be all 32 versions of the issue, meaning the two main covers and the 30 variants (well, 30 at last count). Marvel primarily uses three printing houses for its comic books, but has not disclosed which printer is having the issue. 

Starting with his 2023 comic Void Rivals, Robert Kirkman has been stitching together one of the coolest quilts in the medium - that is, the Hasbro-inspired Energon Universe. Working in IPs like Transformers, G.I. Joe, and now ROM: The Space Knight, Kirkman and a team of spectacular creators have created a comic line he hopes will one day be uttered in the same breath as Marvel itself...

And he's even studied their history to help ensure that happens.

That was one of the things that came up during Kirkman's interview with Collider that went down at this year's San Diego Comic Con, in which Kirkman discussed the creative end of the Energon Universe at length. At one point in the discussion, the conversation turned from what Skybound/Hasbro were publishing to how they were publishing it.

When it comes to gaming, most table-toppers know Ashley Johnson for her work on Critical Role, or shows that it has spawned - The Legend of Vox Machina and The Mighty Nein. But when it comes to video games, Johnson may be best known as the actor behind not just the voice but the physical performance of Ellie Williams, arguably the main character in Naughty Dog's The Last of Us games and the HBO series they inspired. Recently, Johnson had the opportunity to chat about what she took from that latter experience, and how being in a motion capture suit on a PlayStation sound stage changed how she approached her other work.

That was a subject of conversation during a live taping of the Collider Ladies Night, in which host Perri Nemiroff challenged Johnson and costars Marisha Ray and Laura Bailey to share a moment that changed how they approached their voice acting careers.

"Not just for voice acting," began Johnson, "But just acting as a whole and performing: The Last of Us. Because that was my first time doing motion capture. You have to strip away so much that, you know, you can't rely on your shoes to walk the way that your character walks. You can't rely on flipping your hair or the way that you look. [...] You can't use your little tricks."

Scott Snyder has plenty to be proud of. Absolute Batman, a title he launched in 2024 alongside Nick Dragotta, was the best-selling direct market comic book of the year. His work on American Vampire earned him an Eisner Award for Best New Series in 2011, and Absolute Batman just won book earlier this month. He’s also one of the architects behind the DC All In publishing initiative, which has been a critical and commercial success.

In other words, Scott Snyder knows how to write a successful DC Comic, so if you’re looking to do the same thing, you should probably follow his advice. If you ever find yourself in the fortunate position to be pitching work for DC, Scott Snyder says there are three things you need to avoid.

“I have two jobs at DC now. I’m a writer, and then I have this consulting gig,” Scott Snyder says during a recent appearance on AIPT Comics Podcast. “I’m sort of figuring out that aspect of my role there now. We have a lot of big stuff coming and we’re trying to figure out how that evolves. But ultimately, that is the job, you see a ton of pitches. And the three things that are the most common problems are, one, they’re not new reader friendly. They read as though it’s a continuation of things before. Where it’s referencing things before. So, it doesn’t embrace the idea that this is someone’s first comic and that you need to earn their readership every issue.”

Robert Kirkman knows when a comic deserves a spinoff. The writer, responsible for both The Walking Dead and its offshoot Negan Lives, as well as both Invincible and its offshoot Battle Beast, has a pretty great handle on not just crafting a fictional universe, but knowing when it needs to expand in the direction of one particular character. So you would expect that, now that he's helming the Skybound Comics/Hasbro collaboration called the Energon Universe, he would want to plot out a few spinoffs down the line.

Well, the truth is - he does want to. And yet, he's holding back.

This is one of the things Kirkman discussed with Collider during their interview at this year's San Diego Comic Con. Kirkman is in the midst of writing one of Energon's main titles, Void Rivals, in which he works in a number of Hasbro-property characters into a single, cohesive (though massive) story. And as he told his interviewer, there is at least one character that stands out in his mind.

Superstar X-Men writer Jonathan Hickman is returning to Marvel's mutants under the banner of Marvel Midnight, creating a horror-focused take on the team as part of the Marvel Midnight line, which grew out of a planning meeting with outgoing Marvel president Dan Buckley in which the pair discussed what kind of new initiative might land best with Marvel's audience.

"It kind of came out of a brainstorming session with Dan Buckley, and we just were kind of like, what would we like to do? What do we feel like could move the needle?" Hickman states in an interview with The Beat from Comic-Con International: San Diego.

"And I was like, 'Look, I'm not I'm not the best horror writer or anything like that, but I feel like if we did it like a true horror line of Marvel Comics, and we did it the way that Marvel does things where we were top down, you know, we do the biggest stuff first and then we we grow it out of that," he continues. "It could be really successful.' And then he was like, 'Well, who all could we get?' And I was like, 'We should get [Philip Kennedy Johnson]. We should get [Benjamin Percy].' And they said yes, which is awesome. And then now they're writing me under the table."

When Rob Liefeld took over as artist of New Mutants, he insisted on bringing in a "brand new, kickass leader" for the team, resulting in his creation of Cable, the mutant freedom fighter from the future. Taking inspiration from iconic '80s and '90s action hero Arnold Schwarzenegger, Cable became what Liefeld calls "the right character at the right time," with his introduction leading New Mutant to become a best seller as the title transitioned into X-Force.

"Cable was intended as a force that would transform the book and give a different voice. And I worked this out with my editor. I mentioned his name a bunch. His name's Bob Harris," Liefeld states during his spotlight panel at Comic-Con International: San Diego 2026

"He was invested in transforming the X-Men. The X-Men office. And that's why he went and got me. He got Jim Lee. He got [Whilce Portacio]. He was recruiting. And I said, 'I can't do this book unless you let me introduce this character.'"

The OG cast of Critical Role are a lot of things, but perhaps chief among them is 'voice actors.' Across a multitude of video games and animated series, the cast that now make up Prime Video's The Mighty Nein have earned the experience to give sage advice to just about any voice actor out there... including each other. Although as Laura Bailey shared, it was still just a tiny bit weird when she ended up giving voice acting advice to a particularly close cast member - her IRL partner Travis Willingham.

The topic came up during a live edition of the Perri Nemiroff-hosted Collider Ladies Night, in which Bailey was joined by costars (and OG Rolers) Marisha Ray and Ashley Johnson. At one point in the discussion, the cast was asked to share a voice acting tip they learned over the course of their careers, one that stuck with them and changed their trajectory as actors.

"I don't know if this is not voice-acting specific," the The Legend of Vox Machina actor began, "But my theater director in college, Brad Baker, he was amazing. One of the best notes he ever gave me was, 'Don't move. Stop moving so much.' I just thought it was so natural, because I move a lot when I talk. So I was like, 'I'm just being me.' But he's like, 'It's so distracting from the message that you're trying to deliver. Just stop. Just stop doing all of the things and just say it because it's more powerful. [...] It kind of does translate to voice acting because it also helps with just stop."

George R.R. Martin is opening up about his struggles with depression, on his own terms. The Game of Thrones author, who has been in the spotlight ever since his work was adapted for HBO in 2011, recently posted a personal message detailing his struggles during a year that has been "stressful, to say the least." 

Martin made the post to his official blog, the first message to not come from his assistants since February of this year. 

"Some great things, exciting things," the Tales of Dunk & Egg author said of 2026, "Dreams coming true. But there have been nightmares too. I have lost friends. Battled sadness and depression. The worst may be yet to come. I turned seventy-seven last September, and I tell you, getting old is no fun. But there have been amazing times as well." 

The numbers behind the most-streamed shows from the first half of 2026 are in, and somehow, Stranger Things has come out on top. The show's finale may have hit Netflix in December of 2025, but it still racked up views into the New Year. Could this be part of the effect of #ConformityGate? Maybe, but we don't know for sure.  

The Hollywood Reporter has released the figures for the most-watched shows of 2026 from Nielsen, and behind Stranger Things was The Pitt and Bridgerton. Thirteenth on Nielsen's list was Love Island USA, which is noteworthy because it debuted in June, and the rankings are for the first half of 2026 - which means that Love Island immediately became a hit after being released, quickly courting a devoted fanbase that has kept its streaming numbers high. 

Speaking as a massive fan of The Pitt who sat his friend down and said, "I know you're squeamish, but you're going to watch this right now because it's amazing," there's an absorbing quality to the show that differentiates it from other shows on the air right now. The illusion that each episode is taking place in real time makes you cling to every second of screen time as it all unfolds. There's also the fact that the show builds upon small details in each of its episodes, meaning it encourages repeat viewings from fans, who may want to revisit certain storylines or moments and develop their own interpretations or theories for where the show is going next. 

How do you get Jim Lee motivated? A challenge.

During DC Comics' Jim Lee & Friends panel from Comic-Con International: San Diego 2026, Lee and his 'Hush' co-creators Jeph Loeb, Scott Williams, and Alex Sinclair reminisced about their 2002 - 2003 run on the Batman series and brought up an interesting, honest, and human way Lee was able to motivate himself to draw monthly comics again after years away.

"The one thing you do not do with Jim Lee is challenge him," Loeb says, talking about what he heard about a betting pool inside DC Editorial offices that the artist - who just joined the company two years prior - would not be able to make monthly deadlines for the Batman series. 

Look, we all have a guilty pleasure when it comes to media. I have lingering psycho-emotional damage from all the seasons of America's Next Top Model that I watched while my brain was still developing. And for some folks, the Twilight books and films are their guilty pleasure. 

In an interview with Complex, Anya Taylor-Joy shed light on how Twilight captured her imagination as a child. "Revisiting the book as an adult is slightly problematic. The context of, like, ‘this fragile girl and this man that wants to kill her and that’s so hot.’ Like, there’s issues, definitely. But as a child, I just think vampires are really cool," the actress said.

After recalling how Jacob falls in love with Bella's infant daughter, Renesmee, Taylor-Joy said, "These books are insane." And she's right, because what the hell was going on with that storyline in Breaking Dawn?!

Something is Killing the Children is a series that has plenty to be proud of. The Boom! Studios horror comic has won numerous Eisner Awards, and the trade paperback collections have regularly topped graphic novel bestseller lists. The series is currently building towards its 50-issue milestone, which hits stores this October. However, if writer James Tynion IV had stuck with his original plans, the series would’ve been over after its fifth issue. What changed? A monster hunter named Erica Slaughter.

“I really kind of just had the core pieces, and when I started writing the first issue, I had a very different vision of the series,” James Tynion IV says during a panel at San Diego Comic Con 2026. “I saw it as a five-issue miniseries. Every issue was going to be a standalone one-shot story. But then two things happened very quickly. One was [artist Werther Dell’Edera] came aboard the project and drew Erica Slaugther for the first time. And the thing that I had not ever conceived of before was the idea of the bandana.”

“The moment I saw the bandana I understood the energy of the series. And then I started writing the first issue, I realized in the first five pages that I needed all five issues to tell one story, not just the one-shot. And then even beyond that, starting the second issue, I was just like, I can’t tell this story in five issues.”

Magic: The Gathering is getting bigger and bigger with each year that goes by. According to a new report from Hasbro, Wizards of the Coast - specifically Magic: The Gathering - has led the charge in a successful fiscal quarter for the company. 

In the report, Hasbro CEO Chris Cocks stated, "Hasbro posted another quarter of topline growth, led by Wizards of the Coast. Magic: The Gathering eclipsed $500 million in quarterly revenue for the first time in its 30-plus year history, led by the record-breaking debut of Marvel Super Heroes. With strong indications for our remaining releases and line of sight to continued growth in 2027, the Magic flywheel is firing on all cylinders."

Over the past year, Hasbro's revenue increased by 16%, which the company attributes to a 27% increase in revenue from Wizards of the Coast and Digital Gaming. To get more specific, Magic achieved a 34% increase in revenue over the past year alone. Elsewhere in the report, they noted that Magic's growth was "fueled by Secrets of Strixhaven and Marvel Super Heroes," signifying that both Magic's in-universe sets and Universes Beyond crossover sets are working in tandem to bring the game to new heights. 

When people talk about influential social media websites, they will usually mention Facebook, Instagram, or Tik Tok. However, DeviantArt is one that is often overlooked. The online artist community, which launched in 2000, is a place where many influential comic book artists have honed their craft and made lifelong connections. For Tradd Moore, the artist behind Silver Surfer: Black and The Strange Talent of Luther Strode, he can’t imagine how the industry would look today without DeviantArt.

“I don’t know the age bracket of everyone in here, but there used to be this website called DeviantArt,” Tradd Moore says during a panel at San Diego Comic Con. “For this age bracket, I was born in 1987, if you were an art kid, you were on DeviantArt. And that is where you were meeting your art friends, and a lot of my friends went on to become successful fantastic creators.”

“Andrew MacLean who does Head Lopper, James Harren, who is the best, we all met on DeviantArt, and shared work with each other.  And clever writers were like, oh, this is where all the artists are hanging out, so I’m going to get on DeviantArt and do a little searching. So, I think a lot of writers and editors who had some cleverness, they would jump on there and meet people.”

Ahead of the launch of the ongoing Spider-Woman series this fall, the creative team of writer Dan Watters (Nightwing, Batman: Dark Patterns) and artist Andrea Broccardo (Spider-Man: Noir, Marauders) will begin to spin their web early with a story in the Spider-Woman 50th Anniversary anthology — and we have a first look.

"I'm super excited to be part of Jessica Drew's new chapter,” Broccardo says in a release. “After Spider-Man Noir, it's great to come back to that dark atmosphere that I love. This series is a bit different from the previous Spider-Woman series, it is a detective noir story, with Jessica tormented by something that changes her life, her super hero behavior and her approach to the cases as a detective. It also has horror and gore, which is unusual for Spider-Woman, but super stimulating for me!”

Here is a first look at two pages from Broccardo and Watters' story from the Spider-Woman 50th Anniversary special: 

You might recall Popverse recently reporting on Damon Lindelof sharing his experience of being fired from a Star Wars movie and figure, 'Wow, it’s wild that Lucasfilm would let go of one of such a massive name in entertainment.' Well it won’t take more than a quick Google to find out that Lindelof isn’t alone - Spider-Verse directors Phil Lord & Chris Miller also got the axe (lightsaber?) from the Franchise Far, Far Away. But in a recent interview, the pair of directors revealed a side of their firing that was more positive than what Lindelof has said publicly of his own.

In that, through the experience, they learned how to make Project Hail Mary.

The story comes from the latest issue of Empire Magazine, in which the directing duo wound the clocks back to 2017. After already having begun principle photography, Lord & Miller were let go by Lucasfilm due to creative differences, but as Chris Miller tells it, those few weeks were still worth a great deal.

For lovers of Critical Role, Prime Video’s animated adaptations have been the means to experience Exandria in a way they never have before. But that doesn’t just go for the fans. As Popverse has reported on previously, CR creatives like Travis Willingham have touted the shows The Legend of Vox Machina and The Mighty Nein as opportunities to revisit the choices they made for their characters at the TTRPG table. And apparently, costar Ashley Johnson agrees. 

In fact, for the Pike Trickfoot actor, and The Legend of Vox Machina is an opportunity to tell her story in a way that, because of scheduling conflicts, Campaign 1 couldn’t.

That’s what Johnson said in an interview with The AV Club, published ahead of The Legend of Vox Machina’s season 4 debut. 

You might recall Popverse reporting on the moment James Tynion IV decided to retire from superhero comics, a decision that, barring the odd Swamp Thing-adjacent project, the Something is Killing the Children author has yet to walk back. Then again, a writer as prolific as Tynion is always learning from projects he's worked on in the past, so it shouldn't surprise his readers when his history in the superhero space influences

Like, for example, his serial-killer-battle-royale book, Exquisite Corpses.

Speaking with Popverse's Editor-in-Chief Chris Arrant at this year's C2E2, Tynion dove into the Venn diagram between the Tiny Onion book and the genre that most dominates the industry.

Yeah, yeah, everybody thinks that Marvel’s cornered the market when it comes to post-apocalyptic zombie superhero stories. But I’ll remind you, reader, that DC’s got its own share of beloved characters falling prey to the brain-gnawing undead. Beginning in 2019, the DCeased saga told the story of a zombie plague spinning out of Darkseid’s Anti-Life equation - beginning a tale that spanned 2 sequels, 3 spinoffs, and 4 years. Even in all that time, though, the creatives didn’t get to do everything they hoped to, and in a recent interview, the story’s primary writer got into what might have been.

That writer is, of course, Tom Taylor, author of alt-universe DC hits like Injustice and Dark Knights of Steel. In July of this year, Taylor hopped onto the forums of League of Comic Geeks to chat directly with DC readers worldwide, and at one point during the Q&As, one fan asked whether there were any more tasty brains left in DCeased’s proverbial corpse.

"We always had a little side story planned for DCeased," Taylor revealed, "Which is why the Titans never really appeared. And there were a number of plots (like Talia and Steph) that we just never had the space to come back to. There were scenes written that had to end up on the cutting room floor, so to speak."

James Cameron is the king of the side quest. Beyond being an Academy Award-winning director, writer, and editor, Cameron is also a deep-sea explorer who has discovered new species of sea cucumber, squid worm, and giant-celled amoeba on his adventures to the ocean depths. He's also visited the wreckage of the Titanic dozens of times.

But with two more Avatar films planned to be released in the future, how much longer is James Cameron planning on staying in Pandora? The director has revealed that he's not quite sure. He addressed the "last act" of his career in an interview with the Governor General's Performing Arts Awards. 

"There's been a lot of momentum in the Avatar universe for me across twenty-one years at this point, because we started in 2005. I took a little time off to build a submersible and dive to the deepest spot of the planet, as you do, but then I came back to Avatar after that. And it's been kind of an unbroken continuum. So this is the point where I'm looking around the landscape and saying, 'What are the other stories I want to tell?' How many of them do I need to direct myself versus writing and/or producing, working with other filmmakers?" Cameron began. 

After his well-received introduction in The Legend of Vox Machina season 4, Taryon Darrington is once again the name on every Critical Role fan’s lips. We’ve talked at length about the possibility of Prime Video investing in a Taryon spinoff (both voice actor Wayne Brady and a devoted season 4 staff writer are fully in), but one question that’s not getting asked as much is: what happened to Taryon Darrington’s time at the TTRPG table that birthed him?

Well fear not, curious Critter, OG Roler Sam Riegel is here with answers.

As you may know if you’ve been a fan of the D&D-playing webseries for any amount of time, Riegel was not only the original actor behind Taryon, but he’s also been at the helm of the big-on-laughs, small-on-screentime Campaign 1 spinoff starring Taryon, The Darrington Brigade. As of this writing, there have only been two one-shot adventures starring the eclectic band of comedic heroes - the first of which aired in November of 2019; the second of which aired this past April. And as you might’ve guessed just by the date on that former session, the reason that there aren’t more episodes comes down to the big thing that happened as 2019 was wrapping up.

It doesn’t take more than a casual glance at recent comic book history to recognize one of the industry’s biggest modern trends. That is, renumbering a popular title starting with number one. The Big Two are the main perpetrators of said trend, with both Batman and Captain America #1s dropping some 80+ years after the first actual comic came out. But there’s one name in superhero comics that won’t be headed down that path - the hellishly powered Spawn - and we have it on pretty authority that that’s going to stay the case.

Because when Todd McFarlane says he’s sticking to something, he tends to do so.

I spoke to McFarlane recently ahead of his latest miniseries set in the Spawn universe - the groovy demon-drama known as Spawn ‘77. It’s the latest addition to the Spawn universe after an Image Comics expansion of the line in 2021, which introduced hits like King Spawn, GunSlinger Spawn, and The Scorched. And while McFarlane is fully supportive of revitalizations like that ("I do revamps," he told me), that will never amount to winding the numbers in the corners back.

The closer we get to the debut of Prime Video’s The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power season 3, the more we learn about the gargantuan scale it will be working with. We’ve heard about the crew actually filming in the valley that inspired Rivendell, but it’s possible that even that titanic achievements will feel small when compared to what promises to be the biggest moment of the season - the forging of the One Ring in Mount Doom, the filming of which required Tolkien’s most infamous geological feature to take on a life of its own.

Somewhat literally, apparently.

Details of the sequence were recently revealed by way of Empire Magazine, which published a Rings of Power season 3 cover story in its latest issue. Speaking to showrunner Patrick McKay, Empire learned that this season’s scenes in Mount Doom were "the single most ambitious, technically challenging sequence we’ve ever done on the show."

Chicago Fire season 15 is going to be a bit of a bittersweet chapter for longtime viewers of the hit show, as Dermot Mulroney is officially taking the next firepole out of town. The actor, who has played Chief Dom Pascal since season 13, is departing the series for good, but fans will get one more chance to bid him farewell before his tenure on the show wraps.

That’s what we learned from a People magazine article published August 3, in which Mulroney both gave a heartfelt sendoff to the show and spoke about his involvement with the upcoming season 15.

"Now, this season," the actor said during a public appearance, adding, "Sadly, I have [only] one episode. I finish on Tuesday and they write the character off. So we gave it our all for two seasons. They wrote an incredible storyline that put me as an actor in high challenge. So I loved every minute of it. Thanks for asking. [I’m] sad to see it go."

For most people, real estate is an investment, but sometimes, a building goes on the market that is more than meets the eye. Maybe it was used to film an iconic movie scene or was the birthplace of someone famous. In the case of a building currently for sale in Japan, it is a former manga library that is still filled with thousands of vintage comics and magazines, including decades-old copies of Weekly Shonen Jump.

The former manga library in Sakata, Japan was listed for sale earlier this year and is going for the surprisingly low price of around $11,750. However, the interesting thing here isn’t the structure itself; it’s the fact that there are thousands of copies of vintage manga still on the bookshelves – many dating back to the 90s when the library was in full use.

As pointed out by YouTuber Yusuke Yoshikawa, who covers unusual real estate finds, during an interview, the property has captured the imagination of people both for the low price and for the novelty of such a unique building. “While there are certainly significant risks, there’s also something romantic about it, and I was happy to see so many responses that reflected that romance.”

Warning: spoilers for Spider-Man: Brand New Day are ahead. 

Over the past couple of years, mutants have slowly trickled into the MCU. And it couldn't come at a better time, because Namor needs all the friends he can get. 

In Spider-Man: Brand New Day, the villain possessing New Yorkers is revealed to be none other than a young woman named Jean Grey. Now, we've been expecting the X-Men to show up in the MCU any day now, and who better to get things off the ground than one of the Original Five X-Men? 

By now, we’re all well aware that The Mandalorian and Grogu movie landed like a wet fish at the box office earlier this year. Even Disney isn’t trying to spin it as a success on its own, but it seems they’re not worried about losing a little money at the box office. That’s because even when a Star Wars movie flops, it still makes the company money in other ways.

During a recent earnings call with investors, Disney CEO Josh D’Amaro explained that even underperforming movies lead to profits for the company. “Even when our franchise films don’t meet our box office expectations, as with The Mandalorian and Grogu and the live-action Moana, our investments in these core properties fuel other parts of our company. The Mandalorian and Grogu drove healthy growth in retail sales for the Star Wars franchise and drew guests to the updated Millennium Falcon attraction at Disneyland and Walt Disney World, and led to significant engagement in gaming as well. And the live-action Moana is expected to be a strong title on Disney+, building on the success of the original film, which is one of the most-streamed movies of all time.”

Disney CFO, Hugh Johnston, added, “Look, theatrical performance is important to us, of course, and we certainly aspire to deliver consistent financial results for our films, but the nature of the film industry is such that it is more of a portfolio game. The good news for us is our diversified business helps us basically cover the volatility that comes out of the film business.”

In case you've been living under a rock (or perhaps been hiding away in a coffin), vampires are all the rage right now. Between The Vampire Lestat rolicking with the Queen of the Damned herself, to the exploration of Jubilee's vampiric past in Marvel Rivals, to Anya Taylor-Joy revealing that she's Team Edward, there's never been a better time to escape from the summer sun and curl up with a fine piece of media.

And now, another boon for the vampirically inclined will arrive soon in the form of Matt Wagner and Kelley Jones's fourth and final graphic novel in their Dracula series, Dracula: Book IV: The Undead, where they'll be joined by colorist José Villarrubia. We've got the gorgeous cover art by Jones below for you to feast your eyes upon. 

The graphic novel will launch with a Kickstarter from Orlok Press, which you can support here. The campaign's description reads: "Legendary comics creators Matt Wagner and Kelley Jones return for the fourth and final volume in their series of original graphic novels about the shadowy history of the world’s most famous literary character—DRACULA! For the first time ever, this beautiful European-sized volume will unveil what happened after the events of Bram Stoker’s classic 1897 book, when the infamous vampire lord finally became…THE UNDEAD!"

Spider-Man: Brand New Day is full of the kind of things that will fuel fan theories from now until the next time we see Spider-Man on the big screen – or the X-Men, for that matter. But nothing is causing more debate than the final scene in the movie. No, not the nothing-burger of a post-credits scene. I’m talking about the scene between Peter Parker and his best friend, Ned, which is beautifully and infuriatingly ambiguous. According to the film’s director, that ambiguity is part of the point.

Spoilers for Spider-Man: Brand New Day follow.

There are plenty of things to talk about in Spider-Man: Brand New Day, but online chatter has been focused heavily on the final scene. In it, Peter Parker encounters his best friend Ned, who still has no memory of their friendship thanks to Doctor Strange’s spell in Spider-Man: No Way Home. Peter goes to Ned, introduces himself, and the pair do the secret handshake they performed countless times over the previous three movies. Ned seems to have a moment of clarity, smiles, and says, “Peter!”

It has been more than 70 years since the first Godzilla movie explained the horrors of nuclear war through the medium of giant monsters, but the franchise has never been bigger. The King of Monsters is currently starring in two distinct franchises. While Legendary’s Monsterverse is showcasing the campy side of kaiju fights, Toho’s Godzilla Minus Zero aims to tap into the inherent drama of living in a world with giant monsters. Before its upcoming theatrical release, Godzilla Minus Zero is making its world premiere at the NY Film Festival in September.

Takashi Yamazaki is giving audiences at the NY Film Festival the first look at his follow-up to Godzilla Minus One on September 26, 2026, more than a month before Godzilla Minus Zero debuts in cinemas in November. “It is truly an honor to introduce our film to a global audience for the first time in a place of such history and prestige,” Yamazaki said in a statement around the announcement. “I am filled with both awe and excitement to see how far the power of Japan’s Godzilla can terrify audiences around the world, and whether they will resonate with what lies beyond that fear.”

If you can’t make it to the NY Film Festival, Godzilla Minus Zero will open in Japan on November 3, with its US release coming just days later on November 6. This highlights the popularity of Godzilla Minus One in the US, where it became one of the highest-grossing Japanese films ever in North America when it released in 2023.

Horror movies are never about the scary thing on the screen. They’re always about something happening in the world around us. So it shouldn’t be a surprise to find out that the new Resident Evil movie isn’t just about the zombies; it’s about the impossible task of trying to bring a child into a world that seems to be slowly collapsing around us.

Director Zach Cregger gave that insight into the central theme of his upcoming Resident Evil movie, which is the second reboot of the horror franchise in the past decade, in a recent interview appearing in the latest issue of Empire Magazine. We don’t know much about the plot of Resident Evil except that it takes place alongside Resident Evil 2 and follows medical courier Bryan as he tries to navigate Raccoon City during the zombie outbreak. Cregger explains that the movie opens with Bryan, “getting a call from his girlfriend, telling him that she’s pregnant. For Bryan, it’s already like being in a horror movie. It’s a terrifying situation for a young guy who doesn’t quite have his life figured out yet.”

It isn’t just the unexpected pregnancy that has Bryan terrified; he’s also got the whole zombie apocalypse to contend with. But the idea of bringing a child into this world is still hanging over his head. Cregger says that is a question plenty of people ask themselves. “[Is it right to] bring a child into a world that just seems to be getting worse and worse? We’re wrestling with that question. Only for this character to find out it’s even worse than he’d imagined… It’s interesting in Resident Evil, seeing a character ask that question in a way more terrible, fucked-up world.”

The past two months have been very big for Tom Holland, Zendaya, and Jon Bernthal. After starring in Christopher Nolan’s epic The Odyssey, all three then delivered Marvel its biggest hit in years in Spider-Man: Brand New Day just a few weeks later. That meant promoting and supporting both films – which are produced by different studios – simultaneously, something that would normally be a no-no. However, one Sony executive thinks the success of The Odyssey actually helped, not hindered, Spider-Man: Brand New Day.

Sony, which owns the rights to Spider-Man on film and TV and has plenty to lose from the film’s star being effectively double-booked, didn’t stop Tom Holland from taking a major role in Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey. In fact, they pushed back the release date for Spider-Man: Brand New Day to accommodate this change in his schedule, something Holland believes made the latest Marvel movie better.

Tom Rothman, Chairman of Sony Pictures Motion Pictures, said in a recent interview that he didn’t have a problem with their three stars also promoting another major movie at the same time. Tom Holland told him of the potential clash last year, but Rothman adapted his plans accordingly. “We had to adjust our timing and our plan,” Rothman explained. “Tom Holland, Zendaya, and Jon Bernthal fully supported both films and both films benefited. This reminds me of what the late great distribution exec Tom Sherak said, ‘A rising tide lifts all boats.’ When people go to the movies, they value experience and that’s what we’ve been needing to do in our business.”

One of the biggest unanswered questions in Hollywood is who is going to have the task of stepping into Daniel Craig’s shoes as the next James Bond. The iconic secret agent has been sidelined for years now as Amazon MGM Studios continues to look for the right actor to become the new 007. While we still don’t have an answer for you there, we at least have a timeframe of when we could find out; expect some actual James Bond casting information by the end of 2026.

That comes from Amy Pascal, one of the producers of the new James Bond film, during an interview to promote Spider-Man: Brand New Day. It seems that Pascal can’t do any publicity without being asked about James Bond. She gave the most concrete update on who is playing 007 we’ve had in years.

“I would say [an announcement before] the end of the year is a good bet,” Pascal said. “We are being really, really methodical. Having worked with Barbara Broccoli at the studio, I mean, Daniel Craig is a hard act to follow. And it’s got to be something really different that is a stirring and exciting and different.”

There are two things that Tom Holland is known for at the moment: powering Spider-Man: Brand New Day to a nearly $1 billion opening weekend and always being a breath away from spoiling something in the Marvel movies he is in. So much so that, even though it is highly unlikely that Spider-Man won’t show up in Avengers: Secret Wars, the actor is being kept far away from any plot points that he might accidentally spoil. 

During an appearance on the Happy Sad Confused podcast, Spider-Man actor and Marvel’s new box office hero, Tom Holland, was asked about the possibility of his Peter Parker wearing the symbiote suit in Avengers: Secret Wars. He was quick to throw his hands in the air and claim ignorance on that one. “I have absolutely no idea,” he declared. “I swear to you, Josh [Horowitz, Happy Sad Confused host], that I have no idea what Secret Wars is about. And I think that that is by design because Marvel know that I’m going on this press tour and that is their biggest asset and I think it is really important that no one ruins it.”

How much effort has Marvel put into not letting Tom Holland know what is happening in Avengers: Secret Wars? Enough that the directors went on vacation with the actor and didn’t bring it up. “I went on holiday with Joe Russo not a month ago. I don’t know nothing… Truth be told, I know nothing about that movie.”

One of the most exciting things about any comic-con is finding out that your favorite star will be there. However, it can also be incredibly disappointing to discover that they’ve had to pull out of an appearance at the last minute due to illness or other work commitments. While they can’t protect you from missing out on meeting your heroes, a Japanese company does have a plan to help protect fans from the financial loss that can come from these situations with a new celebrity cancellation insurance policy.

The Japanese Credit Bureau (JCB) announced last month that they would be partnering with insurance company Mysurance to provide what they’re calling “oshikatsu cancellation insurance.” The term “oshikatsu” refers to activities undertaken to support their “oshi,” which is loosely defined as someone’s favorite celebrity. The intent of this new policy is to protect fans from having to cancel travel plans at the last minute when their favorite idol, voice actor, or other celebrity can’t make a performance or appearance.

“We will fully compensate you for the cancellation fees of accommodations, flights, etc., if you cancel your trip,” explains the Mysurance website. “Unfortunately, the emotional impact of not being able to see your oshi cannot be alleviated by insurance.”

If you’ve had a chance to read the latest Dungeon Crawler Carl book, A Parade of Horribles, you might have stumbled upon a little bit of trivia that author Matt Dinniman drops before you even get to the first page. And that is that he’s never seen a single episode of Gossip Girl. Truly, this is an outrage, but why would he share something so seemingly random? To help protect fans from potential spoilers that they legally had to put into the copyright page.

In the opening pages of Dungeon Crawler Carl Book 8: A Parade of Horribles, Matt Dinniman gives the usual statement that no part of the book can be used without permission, including training GenAI systems. However, in bold text, he adds the line “Also, stop reading these copyright thingies now if you don’t want to get spoiled. Seriously. It gives something away. Also, just FYI, I have never watched a single episode of Gossip Girl, which came out on September 19, 2007.”

That is a very strange thing to add to a page that most readers will barely glance at. The reason for that is that there is, indeed, a very mild spoiler for the ending of A Parade of Horribles. Nothing that gives big plot points away but which is related to a specific character’s story and growth. And, to protect fans from accidentally reading said spoiler, Matt Dinniman added a little more text to help hide it.

Heated Rivalry is currently shooting its sophomore season, and while the show's production company is thankful for all of the enthusiasm and support that fans have given, it has one small request: please don't disturb cast and crew while they're shooting season 2. 

In a message posted on social media, Accent Aigu Entertainment wrote, "To our incredible fans and everyone who's been sharing in the excitement for the show: Your support, enthusiasm, and kindness have meant the world to us. As we gear up for more Heated Rivalry, please help us in making it the best it can be. If you happen to come across one of our filming locations, please give our cast and crew the space they need to do what they do best. We promise it'll be worth the wait!" 

Since Heated Rivalry exploded last fall, the show's stars Hudson Williams and Connor Storrie have been catapulted into the pop culture stratosphere. This popularity, unfortunately, has coincided with a wave of harassment directed at members of the cast. 

Spider-Man appears to be immune to all of the chatter about “superhero fatigue.” Spider-Man: Brand New Day has already grossed a billion dollars, and it’s been out for just six days as of writing. It’s a victory for Marvel Studios, who have had a rough go of it recently between Captain America: Brave New World, Thunderbolts*, and The Fantastic Four: First Steps underwhelming at the box-office. It seems that wherever Spidey goes, the dollars follow. 

In an interview with Variety, Marvel Studios boss Kevin Feige analyzed why Spider-Man: Brand New Day has done so well after a string of tepid releases.

“Many things can be true at once,” he argued. “I think last year’s Fantastic Four looked and sounded like nothing that had been done in a superhero movie before, and it only [grossed] $521 million. Brand New Day is very directly a part four. It picks up right after the events of Spider-Man: No Way Home, and yet it tells a story that resonates. It’s ultimately about loneliness and the dangers of staying in our apartments by ourselves, looking at our phones. That resonates across cultures and across the globe right now.” 

Marvel and DC have both had recent successes with their alt-reality Ultimate Universe and Absolute Universe lines, and Absolute Batman writer Scott Snyder, who is one of the architects of the Absolute Universe, points to each line's similar approach as the hallmark of why they've done so well. 

Specifically, Snyder says that both the Ultimate Universe and Absolute Universe have taken strides to cast their beloved characters in a new light that reflects the current state of reality and the various anxieties and hopes of the modern world.

"I think they're doing a lot of the same things in the way that they're both attempts to reinvigorate fans about how these characters can feel even more relatable, even more heroic, even more immediate and urgent," Snyder tells YouTuber Charli Romero in an interview at La Mole 2026. "We take different paths, but I think it's all the same kind of project. It's about, how do we make these characters even more exciting for existing fans and new fans."

Don't hold your breath for a potential Big Wheel or Hypno Hustler movie from Sony Pictures any time soon. Even though Spider-Man: Brand New Day has been a smash success at a busy summer box office, Sony Pictures isn't keen on developing films featuring Spider-Man characters just to have a Spidey-related movie in cinemas every year.  

Speaking with Variety, Sony Pictures boss Tom Rothman addressed the critical and commercial pitfalls of films like Kraven the Hunter, Madame Web, and Morbius. Rothman said, "Ultimately, the audience wasn’t satisfied enough with them. Whether that’s a fair assessment of those movies, who knows. That’s howling into the wind. The audience is the boss, and they didn’t respond. It’s as simple as that."  

So what about the future? Clearly, Spidey still has legs (sorry). Will Sony be capitalizing on that?

Seven years ago, Marvel Studios announced at San Diego Comic-Con that a Blade movie starring Mahershala Ali was in the works. And seven years later, there still is no Blade film. At this point, with Ali now 52 years old, the dream of seeing him play Marvel's Daywalker is now over. But the actor has already moved past the project failing to materialize.

In an interview with GQ, Ali addressed how he's moved on from the Blade film falling through, and has instead welcomed taking an approach predicated on "original work," like his upcoming film Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother, rather than big-budget adaptations. "The best way I can answer this question is, when I look at what is for me, is it was either this or that—and I'll take [Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother]. No offense to [Marvel Studios]," he began.

"I've been doing this professionally for pushing 30 years now, and one thing I've learned is that what is for you is for you and what is not is not. For whatever reason, [Blade] is not for me. If they wanted to do it, we would've done it. So I have to move on, and I have moved on. Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother feels very much in alignment with the type of work I want to be known for. I don't really want to be known for remakes. I’d love to do original work that resonates with people and impacts them in unique ways," Ali said. 

Tom King is responsible for some of the most memorable DC Comics of the past decade. From the existential Mister Miracle to the cosmos-spanning Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow, King has been the mind behind some of the most unique takes on the comic book page in recent memory. And as it turns out, he's also the catalyst for what promises to be one of the more unique takes in comic book media: HBO's Lanterns.

The story comes from a profile on King done by Variety. Touching on everything from the beginnings of his comics career to his time in the CIA, the profile recounts one night in 2022, when what is now DC Studios was just a series of ideas. Invited to studio head Peter Safran's house, King came bearing copies of Woman of Tomorrow for both Safran and co-lead James Gunn, an event that undeniably shaped the course of the cinematic DCU, as the book inspired this year's Supergirl. But King had more than just copies of his comics to hand out.

It was at this meeting that the idea for a "grounded murder mystery" starring Green Lanterns came to Gunn and Safran's attention, and according to Variety, it came out of a pitch by King himself. It would still be a while until the series was announced as part of the DCU's first slate of projects, but the way the above outlet tells it, that idea made such an impression on Gunn and Safran that it was greenlit that very night.

It hasn’t even been filmed yet, and Prime Video’s live-action God of War series has hit a massive roadblock when star Ryan Hurst had to step away from the role of Kratos following an on-set injury. While he is expected to recover, the production team isn’t waiting for him to heal fully and is recasting their star before filming starts again. And they may have found their Kratos (again) as Guardians of the Galaxy star Dave Bautista is reportedly in talks to star in God of War.

It hasn’t been officially announced, but multiple outlets have confirmed that Dave Bautista is in talks to join the God of War TV series as Kratos as Prime Video tries to get the long-in-development series back on track following Ryan Hurst tearing his bicep during a stunt on set earlier this year. Bautista seems like a good fit for the role; he is the right age and has a history of portraying both the physicality and emotional vulnerability that the character is known for.

Kratos wouldn’t be a huge jump for Dave Bautista, who is best known for playing Drax the Destroyer in the three Guardians of the Galaxy movies. Both roles are, at their heart, a man accustomed to solving all his problems with brutality suddenly having to connect with other people. For Drax, that was his fellow Guardians. For Kratos, that connection comes with his son Atreus. Bautista is a better actor than most people give him credit for, so we’re excited for what he (potentially) brings to the God of War series for Prime Video.

X-Men '97 season 2 has X-Force fans everywhere living. And if you thought the second episode of season 2 was la crème de la crème for Cable and his crew, then you're sorely mistaken. There is more to come for Cable this season, and according to Nathan Summers' co-creator, Rob Liefeld, it's going to be explosive. 

At his panel at San Diego Comic-Con 2026, Rob Liefeld revealed that he's seen upcoming episodes of the season, and they blew him away. "Let me tell you about Cable," Liefeld began. "X-Men ’97 Season 2, episodes 8 and 9 are going to blow [your minds] — I made Cable, and I didn’t know they were going to have him kick so much butt. I said 'butt,' not 'ass,' because I saw there were kids in the room. He kicks all sorts of butt. And, when you see the opponents he’s taking down, it’s like, what is happening? My comic books are roaring to life! It is fire. These episodes are crazy. You are going to lose your minds - episodes 8 and 9," Liefeld said. 

Liefeld co-created Cable with Louise Simonson during their run on New Mutants, and thus far in X-Men '97, Cable has appeared in all of his 90s glory with his bulky gear and weapons. That's not a criticism, by the way - I am an X-Force man through and through, and it's been a delight to see the show celebrate comics onscreen. 

"I do comics to do comics. I don't do comics to do TV. I don't do comics to do movies."

That's the philosophy of Robert Kirkman, the author behind The Walking Dead media empire. Take a look at his work and you'll see that he's telling the truth - long before his comics were adapted for other mediums, Kirkman was putting his heart and soul into them. But even so, it's undeniable that, after one's work gets adapted (like, say, into a sprawling TV franchise), it's tempting to let that adaptation influence the work one does in their original projects.

Fortunately, Kirkman knows exactly how to avoid that temptation.

Marvel Comics is undergoing some major executive changes with Steve Wacker coming in as the new editor-in-chief, with current president Dan Buckley set to exit the company next year. But the remaining leadership, including Wacker, Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige, and head of television, animation, comics, and franchise Brad Winderbaum have all apparently thrown their support behind the publisher's upcoming Marvel Midnight horror comic line.

"I don't know how in motion everything was. Obviously, plans are plans and they're short- and long-term on the Marvel side," Hickman tells The Beat in an interview at Comic-Con International: San Diego 2026. "But I talked to Kevin. He's on board with it. You know, I've talked to Brad. I've talked to Steve. We have everybody's blessing. Everybody has read the scripts. Everybody's really excited about it. So we feel really good about it. I think they're expecting us to knock it out of the park, and so that's our job."

Marvel Studios has already embraced horror as part of the MCU, particularly in its Werewolf By Night Halloween special and its Marvel Zombies animated series. Like Marvel Midnight, Marvel Zombies started out as an alt-reality story that burgeoned into its own universe.

Rob Liefeld's Supreme is the creator's take on his own version of Superman, a comparison the character has always worn on his sleeve. It's no secret at all that Supreme as a Superman analogue is completely intentional on Liefeld's part. But what's lesser known is where the hero got his name, and weirdly enough, Liefeld himself thanks a burrito for the inspiration.

"That would be Supreme," Liefeld says in his spotlight panel at Comic-Con International: San Diego 2026 when asked about his favorite analogue character that he created. 

By now, you’ve probably heard that Spider-Man: Brand New Day has done pretty well at the box office. In fact, it did so well that it is on its way to becoming one of the highest – if not the actual highest – grossing movies of all time. To help it get to that mark, it is getting a boost at the box office as The Odyssey makes space at IMAX screens for Spider-Man: Brand New Day.

It is actually a little surprising that Spider-Man: Brand New Day has pulled in over $900 million at the global box office without the benefit of more expensive IMAX tickets included in that total. Up until this week, those larger screens were occupied by Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey, which was made for IMAX (much to the confusion of some of its actors) and had an exclusive lock on the screens in the US. However, that exclusivity comes to an end on August 6, which is when Spider-Man is set to swing onto IMAX across the nation.

Starting on Thursday, Spider-Man: Brand New Day and The Odyssey will be sharing the 440 IMAX screens that exist across North America. We don’t know the exact breakdown, but we suspect that there will be slightly more Spider-Man showings in the coming weeks, considering it is a newer film and has clearly shown the incredible potential that the franchise has for making ridiculous amounts of money. Even if you saw it during its nearly $1 billion opening weekend, seeing it again on an even bigger screen is now on the cards.

Tradd Moore isn’t pulling any punches with his next series. The artist, who is known for his work on Silver Surfer: Black and The Strange Talent of Luther Strode, will be writing and illustrating a comic about a bender to end all benders. Touch Me Someplace Nowhere, which will be published by Oni Press in 2027, will focus on the chaotic misadventures of Kelly Muir, the child of a powerful crime family. Kelly will be embracing big mistakes, and taking the readers along for the ride.

“Kelly can’t decide if she’d rather fight, fuck, or die. Tonight, she’ll try all three,” Tradd Moore says during a panel at San Diego Comic Con 2026. “It’s a fun story honestly. I’m having a blast writing it."

While Tradd Moore made a name for himself in creator-owned comics with the Luther Strode series with writer Justin Jordan, Touch Me Someplace Nowhere will be the first creator-owned comic he fully owns, controls, writes, and draws. 

The latest season of Apple TV's feel-good sports comedy Ted Lasso is just around the corner, with a chapter that gets its titular, mustachioed coach back to the UK. You'll recall that at the end of season 3, Jason Sudeikis's Lasso was back the States to coach a little league soccer team, but here's what's really interesting - if the show's creatives went with their original idea, he would've stayed there. 

This revelation comes via an interview that Sudeikis himself did with the Radio Times, in which he wound the clocks back to the planning stages of the upcoming season 4.

"[In] the early, early stages," said the star, "We had a couple ideas of maybe coaching over here in the States. To keep Rebecca [Welton, played by Hannah Waddingham] and the Richmond family in the mix, maybe she bought a team over here, maybe a women's team over here."

One of the most enduring images of Berserk will always be the sight of Guts with his impossibly large sword. While the importance of that sword has been something that Kentaro Miura has discussed frequently over the years, many fans might wonder why he bothered to give Guts such a massive weapon in the first place. The reason, it seems, is that he is a product of a time when manga always needed some sort of gimmick to stand out.

In an interview for the Berserk Illustrations File (which was subsequently translated by the Skullknight community on Patreon), Kentaro Miura explains why he gave Guts a huge sword in the first place.

“As for the related materials, so many sources were mixed together,” he said. “The arm cannon, the big sword, the outfit of a black knight and the one-eyed man... I'd say they form a kind of image. The cannon and the sword are my signature items. It's because I'm from the generation that was impacted directly by Hokuto no Ken [Fist of the North Star]. The idea is the most important part of the manga. It was a time when the idea was considered to be the core of it, preceding the story or the characters. In Hokuto no Ken [Fist of the North Star], Hokuto Shinken was a lot more important than Kenshiro's personality. The idea of Hokuto Shinken: once attacked, they explode. That's why it blew us away.”

The DC Universe has so many teams that it can be tough to keep track of them all. It has been a few years since fans saw Young Justice on the pages of the comics, but that is set to change as the creative team behind Teen Titans: Together is already at work on a new Young Justice graphic novel series. Best of all, both Blue Beetle and Kid Flash are joining the team this time.

Kami Garcia and Gabriel Picolo are about to set off on a book tour to promote Teen Titans: Together, which is the final chapter of their Teen Titans series. Ahead of that tour, DC has confirmed that both Garcia and Picolo are going to continue working together on DC’s other teenage superhero team, Young Justice. We don’t have many details about this new series just yet, but we do know at least two characters who will be part of this new team: Blue Beetle and Kid Flash.