Jeopardy! celebrates its 35th anniversary this February with a two week All-Star tournament featuring 18 of its most popular past champions. They were drafted today into six teams, representing hundreds of thousands of dollars in winnings and victory streaks spanning several weeks. The No. 1 draft pick was Alex Jacob of Greensboro, N.C. whose six-game winning streak and Tournament of Champions victory in 2015 won him more than $400,000. Alex was selected first by Buzzy Cohen of Los Angeles, one of six team captains chosen for their prolific winning and crowd appeal. Cohen, who in 2016 won more than $150,000 in a series of blowouts that featured snarky Final Jeopardy answers, joined all time money winner Brad Rutter of Los Angeles ($4.3 million) and Ken Jennings of Seattle, probably the most famous Jeopardy! contestant ever and owner of a record 74-show winning streak from 2004. Other captains included Colby Burnett of Chicago (a two-time tournament winner); Julia Collins of … [Read more...] about Jeopardy! picks all-star teams to celebrate 35th anniversary
Entertainment
Netflix’s live-action Bleach movie is a product of its time
The time is right for a live-action Bleach movie. After rushing to an unnatural conclusion two years ago, the once-popular action manga’s resonance has flatlined. The anime adaptation came to a similarly abrupt close in 2012 and, despite 300-plus episodes, was unable to cover all the source material. So while the Bleach heyday has long passed, nostalgia and curiosity make it the perfect discovery for Netflix, where Warner Bros. Japan’s live-action Bleach movie has now premiered. Bleach joins the Japanese Fullmetal Alchemist and the American whitewashed Death Note for questionable adaptations of good, popular franchises, albeit with a key difference: Bleach survived the conversion process. Helmed by director Shinsuke Sato, who’s carving out a niche for these adaptations between this and Gantz, Bleach charts how red-headed, ghost-seeing high schooler Ichigo Kurosaki (Sota Fukushi) first becomes a grim reaper, of sorts. Draped in a black kimono and wielding a huge anime … [Read more...] about Netflix’s live-action Bleach movie is a product of its time
The House With a Clock in Its Walls and the need for ‘spoopy’ horror movies
This week’s The House With a Clock in Its Walls marks a departure for director Eli Roth, whose usual horror movies lean towards the bloody, R-rated gorefest genre. But The House With a Clock in Its Walls, based on a 1973 book by John Bellairs, isn’t without its scares, they’re just calibrated for the younger audience. There’s nothing that’ll traumatize them — unless they have a deep fear of Cate Blanchett and Jack Black — but there’s enough to leave them with chills. Tim Burton made a career out of that type kid-friendly, scary movie, which is now finding cultural resurgence due to the rise of Halloween as a pseudo-internet-fandom. The internet even has a word for it: “spoopy.” Spoopy originated from a (now-defunct) Tumblr post from 2011, which aggregated an even older Flickr photo of a misspelled Halloween sign. Instead of the word “spooky,” skeleton bones spelled out “spoopy.” The goof gained a … [Read more...] about The House With a Clock in Its Walls and the need for ‘spoopy’ horror movies
Marvel Studios greenlights rumored Eternals movie for post-Avengers 4 phase
Chloe Zhao will direct The Eternals for Marvel Studios, according to the Hollywood Reporter, in one of the first definite hints at the future the production company has planned for Marvel Cinematic Universe, following Avengers 4 and the end of its “Phase Three.” Kevin Feige confirmed the movie was in early development in April, 2018. The Eternals will feature “the super-powered and near-immortal beings known as Eternals,” according to THR, “and a more monstrous off-shoot known as the Deviants that were created by cosmic beings known as Celestials.” The story will also, at least in part, involve a love story between the Eternals Ikaris and Sersi, the latter of whom loves spending time with mortal humans. The Eternals are a relatively obscure group of Marvel Comics characters. Jack Kirby, one of the major architects of the Marvel universe, really, really liked shaggy God stories, and the Eternals was the second time he’d created a group of … [Read more...] about Marvel Studios greenlights rumored Eternals movie for post-Avengers 4 phase
Jude Law’s Captain Marvel character might be an old version of the title hero
The first trailer for Marvel’s Captain Marvel puts Brie Larson’s Carol Danvers front and center. Remaining more mysterious, even after two-and-a-half minutes of adrenaline-pumping introductions, is Jude Law’s Walter Lawson, Danvers’ mentor in the intergalactic military unit known as Starforce. Savvy comic readers pin Law has having a double identity, eventually revealed to be “Mar-Vell,” the original Captain Marvel. If it’s true, the film, directed by Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck, could be folding over 50 years of comic lore into one MCU epic. The first Marvel Comics character to be called Captain Marvel was an alien soldier and spy called Mar-Vell, created in 1967. He’s also been dead, canonically, since 1982. He was created at least in part so that Marvel Comics — which had started using the “Marvel” name to brand its superhero comics in 1961 — could register the trademark on the name “Captain Marvel.” … [Read more...] about Jude Law’s Captain Marvel character might be an old version of the title hero