On the day that Apple TV+ drops the season 2 finale of its dystopian drama series, Silo, we’re hearing that Jessica Henwick (The Royal Hotel, Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery) and Ashley Zuckerman (Succession, Fear Street: Part One – 1994) are joining the cast of the show’s third season as series regulars. Jessica Henwick plays Helen, a whip-smart reporter, while Ashley Zuckerman plays Daniel, a young and eager congressman in Silo season 3.
While I understand Zuckerman’s role, I’m curious how Henwick’s Helen influences the show’s events. People in positions of authority don’t last long in Silo, so I get the need to have more players enter that arena. Still, a reporter role is interesting, given that I’m uncertain of how news travels in Silo. Does Helen manage a widely distributed newspaper? Does she give “Runners,” essentially the postmen of the Silo, pamphlets to share with the different levels? We’ll need to wait and see.
From creator and showrunner Graham Yost, Silo tells the story of some ten thousand people who believe they’re the last living humans on Earth. They live in the Silo, a protective housing structure buried a mile beneath a ruined planet. Outside the Silo, the environment is toxic, deadly, and mysterious. Time before the Silo is talked about in hushed tones, and “relics” from the past are illegal. If you mention going outside, authorities will gladly send you there, but not before making an example of you to the rest of the residents.
Rebecca Ferguson leads the series as Juliette, an engineer from the “Down Deep,” who uncovers a conspiracy after her lover dies from a shady suicide. As she unravels the truth, people see her as a savior, and the people at the top don’t much care for s**t disturbers. They’re willing to kill to keep their secrets, and Juliette must go outside.
Silo is produced by Apple Studios and based on the novels by Hugh Howey. I started watching Silo during the holiday break and could not stop until I was current with the series. I’m dying to finish my shift today so I can go and watch the season 2 finale, and I’m intrigued about Jessica Henwick and Ashley Zuckerman joining the Silo season 3 cast.
Do you watch Silo? Are you excited about the additions to the cast? Let us know in the comments section below.
A big 4K Blu-ray movie collection sale is happening right now, letting you grab all of the movies in some popular franchises—like Harry Potter and Mad Max—for around the cost of a single, new UHD film. But you’d better act fast as this deal ends in a few days!
A big 4K Blu-ray movie collection sale is happening right now, letting you grab all of the movies in some popular franchises—like Harry Potter and Mad Max—for around the cost of a single, new UHD film. But you’d better act fast as this deal ends in a few days!
Plot: Mark Scout leads a team at Lumon Industries, whose employees have undergone a severance procedure, which surgically divides their memories between their work and personal lives. This daring experiment in “work-life balance” is called into question as Mark finds himself at the center of an unraveling mystery that will force him to confront the true nature of his work… and of himself. In season two, Mark and his friends learn the dire consequences of trifling with the severance barrier, leading them further down a path of woe.
REVIEW: The first season of Severance was unlike any other series at the time. Created by Dan Erickson and directed and produced by Ben Stiller, the series blended creepy and surreal urban legends with a workplace comedy for a story that defied categorization into a single genre. With a great ensemble featuring Adam Scott, Patricia Arquette, Britt Lower, John Turturro, Zach Cherry, and Christopher Walken, Severance created a whole mythology around the mysterious Lumon Industries and their process to sever a person’s professional consciousness from their personal one. With a quirky retro vibe at the office and a mystery being investigated in the outside world, Severance builds mounting tension episode by episode through the cliffhanger finale. Two years later, we get to reconnect with our favorite innies and outies as we learn more about the truth behind what Lumon is trying to do and how the actions of the team of analysts will impact what is to come. The second season of Severance does not disappoint and achieves the rare feat of improving upon the debut season.
At the end of the first season, Mark Scout (Adam Scott) and his colleagues in Macro Data Refining, including Dylan (Zach Cherry), Irving (John Turturro), and Helly (Britt Lower), disabled the severance protocol and found themselves inhabiting their outie consciousnesses. Mark learned his boss, Harmony Cobel (Patricia Arquette), knew his outie and revealed to his sister Devon (Jen Tullock) that Mark’s deceased wife (Dichen Lachman) was alive. Dylan learned he was married with children while Irving found his coworker and love interest Burt (Christopher Walken) was in a relationship. Irving also noticed he had been painting a mysterious doorway at Lumon. Helly had the most shocking revelation as she learned she was actually Helena Egan, daughter of the head of Lumon. That cliffhanger opens the second season as the fallout at Lumon results in the dissolution of the MDR team and Mark being placed with a new set of coworkers. The floor supervisor, Seth Milchik (Tramell Tillman), has also taken a more prominent leadership role under the guidance of Lumon executives. The second season deepens the divide between the innies and the outies while not losing the mystery and surreal nature that made the first season so good.
Having seen the entirety of the second season, I can confidently say that Severance is better than ever. There is a lot more going on this season, both inside the Lumon offices and in the world at large, while not once feeling like the series is trying to top the twists and reveals from season one. The uneasy balance between what Lumon tells their severed workers and what they begin to uncover is central to the mounting plot of the show’s overall narrative, but it does not mean that Mark and his friends remain quiet and obedient. There is so much that I want to say about what happens this season, but virtually everything would be a spoiler. What I can tell you is that the trailer only hints at where this series goes, and that includes off-site work meetings, new departments, including the one where Gwendoline Christie’s character works, and episodes focused on the backstory for key supporting characters that have a direct impact on the main ensemble. Some interesting cameos and additions to the cast will surprise you right from the first episode, but what makes this season of Severance feel stronger than the first is the tightly controlled plot threads that connect back to elements from the first season while laying the groundwork for the seasons to come.
Severance‘s early episodes waste no time distinguishing themselves from the first season. The characters now know they are stuck and that something nefarious is happening at Lumon. Adam Scott gets a lot more conviction playing both halves of Mark Scout, who grows in self-confidence as an innie and makes decisive choices as an outie. There is much more for Zach Cherry to dig into this season with a unique romantic subplot, while John Turturro and Christopher Walken remain the best couple to root for on television. Britt Lower gets some heavy lifting as Helly deals with who she is on the outside. At the same time, we meet new characters played by John Noble, Alia Shawkat, Merritt Wever, Robby Benson, Olafur Darri Olafsson, Bob Balaban, and Sarah Bock. The return of actors from season one, including Sydney Cole Alexander as Lumon PR rep Natalie, Michael Chernus as Mark’s brother-in-law Ricke,n and Karen Aldridge as Reghabi, built this world into something much more sinister than I expected. The idea of what Lumon is and the purpose of the severance process continues to be a MacGuffin for this series, but one that is slowly revealing itself. By the end of the second season, there is so much more known than at the end of the first, but the mystery remains intact, and we do not feel like we are being led on a meaningless journey.
Series creator Dan Erickson once again leads the writing team, having scripted four of the ten episodes alongside Mohamad El Masti, Wei-Ning Yu, Anna Ouyang Moench, Erin Wagoner, Mark Friedman, Adam Countee, and K.C. Perry. Outside of Erickson and Moench, the team comprises new writers who delve further into the complex backstory of Lumon and the Egan clan. Ben Stiller helmed five episodes this season, down one from the first year. Stiller directed the premiere and finale with Sam Donovan (The Crown, The Widow) and Uta Briesewitz (Stranger Things, Black Mirror, Westworld), each helming two episodes, and cinematographer Jessica Lee Gagne (Mrs. America, Escape at Dannemora) made her directorial debut on the remaining episode. This season continues to mine the surreal, retro look of the Lumon offices with new forays in midseason episodes that shed light on the larger world of Severance. The eerie music from composer Theodore Shapiro continues to balance the series’ themes. A new opening credit sequence teases hidden messages about the season and where the story is headed. Some episodes do not have a credit sequence for reasons that will be evident when you watch those specific chapters.
Severance was already a unique series unlike any other show on the air and has built on that with an even better second season. The cast is exceptional, and the direction, led by Ben Stiller doing the best work of his career, improves on what came before it. This is such a rich world that has deepened what the audience knows without sacrificing any quality along the way. Each episode is full of character development that makes you care deeply about what happens to each member of the MDR team and even gives reasons to care about the antagonists as well. Few shows on television rival how bizarre and brilliant Severance is, and I look forward to seeing how viewers react to what this season has in store for them. As much as the first season impacted pop culture, season two will result in many memes, quotes, and references that will make this show a hard one to top in 2025.
Severance debuts its second season on January 17th on Apple TV+.
Way back in 2020, we heard that Francesca Gregorini, writer/director of the 2013 psychological thriller The Truth About Emanuel, was not happy about Servant, the Apple TV+ psychological thriller series that was created by Tony Basgallop and executive produced by M. Night Shyamalan. Gregorini was so upset about the show, and so convinced that it was a rip-off of her movie, that she hit Apple, Shyamalan, Basgallop, and the rest of the show’s executive producers and production companies with a copyright infringement lawsuit. While Servant has gone on to complete its four season run since Gregorini filed the lawsuit, Variety reports that the copyright trial got started this week and is expected to last for two weeks. What’s at stake? $81 million.
Jessica Biel and Kaya Scodelario star in The Truth About Emanuel, which told the following story: A troubled girl (Emanuel) becomes preoccupied with her mysterious new neighbor (Linda), who bears a striking resemblance to her dead mother. In offering to baby-sit Linda’s newborn, Emanuel unwittingly enters a fragile, fictional world, of which she becomes the gatekeeper. The twist is that Linda’s newborn is actually a doll, but Emanuel goes along with the act that it’s a real baby.
Starring Lauren Ambrose, Toby Kebbell, Nell Tiger Free, and Rupert Grint, Servant is about a couple that has formed an emotional bond with a doll created to resemble their dead infant daughter and the nanny the couple hired to take care of it.
On the first day of the trial, Gregorgini’s lawyer showed “jurors clips of both projects during his opening statement. He argued that both depict a delusional mother who cares for a doll as though it is a real baby, and a nanny who is complicit in the delusion.” As the trial goes on, jurors will be watching The Truth About Emanuel and the first three episodes of Servant in their entirety.
The defense will be arguing that “Basgallop began developing the show years before The Truth About Emanuel was released, and that those involved with the show never drew on the film. … To prove copyright infringement, the plaintiff must show both substantial similarity and that the defendant had access to the infringed work.“
Do you think Francesca Gregorini has a case, or do The Truth About Emanuel and Servant just happen to be about similar subjects, with no copyright infringement involved? Share your thoughts on this lawsuit by leaving a comment below.
The nine episode first season of the Marvel series Daredevil: Born Again is scheduled to premiere on Disney+ on March 4, 2025 – and during the FAN EXPO San Francisco, series star Charlie Cox revealed that season 2 of the show is scheduled to begin filming sometime before the first season’s premiere date!
Although the initial plan was to rework some elements and make Daredevil: Born Again stand separate from the Netflix Daredevil series (despite sharing some cast members), the show underwent a creative overhaul when the writers and actors strikes shut down production in 2023. Now, this series is a direct follow-up to the Netflix series, picking up five years later.
Dario Scardapane, who worked on Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan and the Netflix series The Punisher, was brought in to serve as showrunner on Daredevil: Born Again during the creative overhaul. The behind-the-scenes shake-up also led to Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead, the directing team who were at the helm of multiple episodes of Moon Knight and Loki season 2, being hired as directors on the show. Matt Corman and Chris Ord were previously the head writers on the show, but they were let go. Scaradapane had this to say about the creative overhaul: “It had been conceived as more of a legal procedural, and we really brought it back towards an action-based New York crime story. The real trick was to have the DNA of the old Netflix show, but then push it forward into something very new.“
The cast of the series includes Charlie Cox, Vincent D’Onofrio, Elden Henson, Deborah Ann Woll, Jon Bernthal, Wilson Bethel, and Ayelete Zurer, reprising the roles of Matt Murdock / Daredevil, Wilson Fisk / Kingpin, Murdock’s associates Foggy Nelson and Karen Page, Frank Castle / The Punisher, Benjamin “Dex” Poindexter / Bullseye, and Vanessa Marianna Fisk. Also in the cast are Margarita Levieva as Matt Murdock’s love interest Heather Glenn, Michael Gandolfini as a character named Daniel Blade, Genneya Walton as BB Urich, Jeremy Earl as Anti-Vigilante Task Force member Cole North, and Lou Taylor Pucci, taking on an unspecified role.
Cox told FAN EXPO San Francisco attendees (with thanks to SuperHeroHype for the transcription), “It’s been so many years since we released any Daredevil content, I’m really excited about it. By the time we release [Born Again] on March 4th, we’ll already be shooting season 2. So, it’s just a gift that keeps on giving, really.“
Are you glad to hear that Daredevil: Born Again season 2 is going to start filming soon? Share your thoughts on this one by leaving a comment below.
PLOT: Two married former CIA spies (Cameron Diaz and Jamie Foxx) are pulled back into espionage when their former identities are exposed.
REVIEW: There are two genres all of the streamers seem to be obsessed with: spy capers and heist movies. The super spy genre is an especially attractive one, as the plots can be thin, and old formulas can be recycled over and over again. As long as your stars are likeable and you have a decent director at the helm, spy flicks do their job as mindless entertainment. However, it’s worth noting that none of them have ever successfully launched a franchise, with most viewing movies like The Grey Man, The Mother, Heart of Stone or Ghosted as mediocre one-offs.
Back in Action has a storyline that’s awfully close to that of another streaming spy flick from just a few months ago, The Family Plan, with Mark Wahlberg. In this one, you get a Mr. And Mrs. Smith-style couple, Matt (Jamie Foxx) and Emily (Cameron Diaz), who narrowly survive their last mission and opt to retire once they discover they’re going to have a baby. Fifteen years later, they’re suburban parents with two kids (McKenna Roberts & Rylan Jackson) who think they are boring. What do you want to bet their identities are going to be exposed, and the whole family will have to plunge – as the title promises – Back in Action?
Indeed, there’s nothing here you haven’t seen a million times before, with the movie totally coasting on the chemistry of its two stars. The most appealing thing about Back in Action is that it finally lured Cameron Diaz back to the screen for the first time in eleven years. She looks great, and she’s cast exactly to type with the movie, not only having loads in common with her two Charlie’s Angels films but also her Tom Cruise team-up Knight and Day.
On a grimmer note, this is also the last movie Jamie Foxx made before the medical crisis that almost killed him. You can see how his condition, which he documented in the candid Netflix special What Had Happened Was, ended up being a total surprise, as he looks terrific. While director Seth Gordon (Horrible Bosses) is not known for action, the film is jam-packed with fisticuffs and chases, making it seem like the streamer pumped a pretty penny into it.
Yet, like a lot of their other would-be blockbusters, Back in Action is forgettable and little more than a movie to throw on in the background while you work or scroll on your phone. What’s worse is that given Netflix’s love of second-screen content, that may actually be how it was designed, with a simple plot that’s easy to follow – to the point that you could join the film 10-20 or 30 minutes in without missing much. You can also duck out for huge chunks and still be able to follow it, which is a disturbing streaming trend, in terms of how disposable their content feels at times.
The action scenes, of which there are a lot, are well-done, but to keep things light and frothy, they’re always scored by too obvious needle drops you’ve heard in too many other rom-coms. It’s the same rinse-and-repeat style of filming which made Red Notice such a chore to sit through and marred the recent Carry On (although those films are so popular, one can’t blame Netflix for adhering to the formula).
Other than the two leads, Netflix was able to attract a top-shelf supporting cast, although many are wasted. Andrew Scott, among the more gifted actors of his generation, is wasted as an MI6 agent with the hots for Emily, while Kyle Chandler’s role as their CIA handler is predictable and a waste of his talent. At least Glenn Close gets to camp it up a bit, affecting an English accent to play Emily’s former spy mom, who’s got a much younger boyfriend (Jamie Demetriou) who’s a wannabe spy out of Johnny English.
The fact is, if you want to see a romantic comedy involving spies, you can do so much better. In a world where True Lies and Mr and Mrs Smith exist (both the film and TV versions), Back in Action is all too familiar. It’s the kind of movie can you throw on in the background, not pay too much attention to and perhaps walk away slightly amused by – but not more than that. Then again, I suppose that’s exactly what Netflix wanted.
Martin Luther King Jr. weekend is upon us, though people looking to celebrate could have other plans than heading to cinemas. How do we know this? The starting totals for two brand-new movies are off to a grim start. Then again, we’ve been surprised by dark horses before. Analysts said Leigh Whannell’s body horror film Wolf Man howled during Thursday previews with $1.4M, while Lawrence Lamont’s comedy, One of Them Days, led by Keke Palmer and SZA, banked $1.3M.
Wolf Man comes in low out of the gate. Still, the Blumhouse feature only cost $25M to produce before promotional materials. The horror movie starring Christopher Abbott (It Comes at Night, Possessor, Poor Things) and Julia Garner (Fantastic Four: First Steps, Ozark) could transform its 4-day holiday weekend total into $20M, but only if people show up. Wolf Man‘s Thursday total is slightly surprising, given the success of Whannell’s 2020 psychological thriller The Invisible Man, which earned a global total of $144M during its theatrical run. Positive word of mouth helped The Invisible Man make an impression on horror fans, and the film’s popularity has only grown with time. Unfortunately, reviews for Wolf Man are mixed, with some critics saying the movie lacks bite.
Sony’s One of Them Days could surprise us, as the film holds a 96% Fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes, with an Audience Score of 94%. Tyler Nichols reviewedOne of Them Days for JoBlo, saying, “the laughs per minute were high,” while the film also presents engaging emotional stakes. The story focuses on best friends and roommates Dreux (Keke Palmer) and Alyssa (SZA), who discover Alyssa’s boyfriend has blown their rent money. The duo then finds themselves going to extremes in a race against the clock to avoid eviction and keep their friendship intact. Maude Apatow, Lil Rel Howery, Katt Williams, and Vanessa Bell Calloway star as primary cast members.
Are you going to the movies this Martin Luther King weekend? Do you think Wolf Man will find an audience in the coming weeks? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section below, and enjoy your holiday!
Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero felt a bit content-lite when it launched last year. Its first DLC pack will remedy some of that. Bandai Namco revealed that 11 new playable characters will join the arena fighter later this month, including all forms of Gohan and Piccolo from the most recent Dragon Ball film, Super Hero.
Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero felt a bit content-lite when it launched last year. Its first DLC pack will remedy some of that. Bandai Namco revealed that 11 new playable characters will join the arena fighter later this month, including all forms of Gohan and Piccolo from the most recent Dragon Ball film, Super Hero.
