It’s a bumper Geektown Radio this week, as Dave is joined by Matt from Entertainment Talk for an episode packed with reviews, gaming chat, and some rather big developments in the world of television. We’ve got a spoiler-free verdict on Marvel’s ‘VisionQuest‘, the latest twists in the battle to take over ‘Doctor Who’, Amazon having another crack at ‘Stargate’, and the enormous Paramount-Warner Bros. merger. Plus, Marvel has been busy announcing new projects, and we’ve got plenty of TV renewals and UK premiere dates to discuss. At around 80 minutes, you might want to make yourself a cuppa for this one!
VisionQuest, Resident Evil & A Plague Tale
We kick off with our usual look at what we’ve been watching and playing, and Matt has had a particularly busy week.
First up is supernatural horror ‘Other Mommy’, starring Jessica Chastain (The Eyes of Tammy Faye), which has an intriguing premise involving a mysterious entity attempting to manipulate a young girl. Unfortunately, Matt reckons the film takes that promising idea and makes pretty much every wrong decision possible. Not exactly a glowing recommendation, then!
Things improve significantly with ‘Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy’, the new prequel game featuring Sophia. Matt explains why, despite a slightly rocky opening, the game develops into a brilliant action-adventure experience with some excellent puzzles, stealth sequences and emotional storytelling.
He also reviews director Zach Cregger’s new ‘Resident Evil’ movie, which takes an original story set within the world of the games rather than directly adapting one of them. Matt is particularly impressed by the pacing, inventive camera work and surprisingly effective humour. We also get into why some video game adaptations succeed by capturing the atmosphere of the source material rather than simply recreating its plot.
Meanwhile, Dave has been watching all eight episodes of Marvel’s ‘VisionQuest’, and he has some rather enthusiastic things to say about it!
The series concludes the trilogy that began with ‘WandaVision’ and continued through ‘Agatha All Along’, with Paul Bettany (WandaVision) returning as White Vision and James Spader (The Blacklist) reprising his role as Ultron.
Without giving away spoilers, Dave explains why he considers it one of Marvel’s best television series, praising its layered exploration of family and identity, the wonderfully strange collection of AI personalities living inside Vision’s mind, and Spader’s outstanding performance. Dave also recently interviewed showrunner Terry Matalas, who previously worked his magic on ‘Star Trek: Picard’, and shares a little insight from that conversation.
There’s also a shout-out for Danny Dyer (EastEnders), who turns out to be an unexpectedly brilliant host of ‘Saturday Night Live UK’, along with a discussion about an entirely AI-generated ‘Doctor Who’ episode from YouTube channel The Unmade Season.
On the gaming front, Dave has finally completed ‘Marvel’s Midnight Suns’ after around 90 hours of playtime. Just in time, too, because ‘Planet Zoo 2’ is arriving, and given how much time he spent in the original, we may never see him again…
Paramount, Marvel, Doctor Who & Stargate
Moving into the TV news, we have renewals for ‘The Hunting Wives’, ‘Anna Pigeon’, ‘Not Going Out’ and ‘Karen Pirie’, while ‘A Thousand Blows’ is coming to an end after two series.
There are also updates on ‘Star Trek: Starfleet Academy’, ‘This City Is Ours’, ‘The Assassin’, ‘All’s Fair’, and the newly announced television continuation of ‘Crazy Rich Asians’. Plus, Jeremy Clarkson has apparently decided that farming isn’t difficult enough, so he’s going to attempt to build a car using materials grown on his farm. As you do.
Then we get into the bigger stories, starting with the officially completed Paramount and Warner Bros. merger.
With Skydance now sitting above two of Hollywood’s biggest entertainment companies, franchises including ‘Star Trek’, ‘Game of Thrones’, DC Comics, ‘Harry Potter’, ‘Mission: Impossible’ and ‘Mortal Kombat’ all fall under the same corporate umbrella. Dave and Matt discuss what this enormous combination means for the studios, the gaming businesses, and the eventual merging of Paramount+ and HBO Max. Neither of us is particularly convinced that all this consolidation is a wonderful idea, but here we are!
Over at Marvel, the studio has announced ‘Zodiac’, a mysterious new Disney+ spy thriller. We currently have very little information about the series, but Marvel has released a logo which appears to contain some rather intriguing clues. Could this involve S.H.I.E.L.D., the Great Wheel, or even some familiar faces from ‘Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.’? We dig into the comic-book connections and speculate about what Marvel might be planning.
There’s also more undead superhero action on the way, as ‘Marvel Zombies’ is returning with three new two-part Halloween specials spread across 2027, 2028 and 2029.
Next, we turn our attention back to ‘Doctor Who’, where the competition to become the show’s next production company is heating up.
With the BBC inviting bids for the next era of the long-running sci-fi series, we’ve now heard reports involving Jed Mercurio’s Hat Trick Mercurio, World Productions and STV Studios, alongside two as-yet-unidentified BBC Studios subsidiaries.
Could the man behind ‘Line Of Duty’ be a good fit for the Time Lord? Might we see the TARDIS move from Wales to Scotland? And would keeping production within the BBC family be the safer option? We discuss the various contenders, their previous work, and what we think the BBC needs to do to get the series back on track.
Finally, Amazon is reportedly having another go at ‘Stargate’, this time with ‘WandaVision’ creator Jac Schaeffer developing a new version.
On paper, that’s a rather interesting choice. The problem is that Amazon already had a ‘Stargate’ series in development from franchise veteran Martin Gero, complete with a writers’ room, pre-production plans and involvement from several of the original creative team, before deciding to cancel it.
We discuss why the decision still seems rather baffling, whether Schaeffer can win over the existing fanbase, and the big question hanging over the project: will this be a continuation of the established franchise or a complete reboot?
What’s Coming To UK TV?
As always, we finish with a rundown of the biggest shows arriving on UK television over the coming week.
Highlights include Marvel’s ‘VisionQuest’ on Disney+, the return of ‘The Diplomat’ for Season 4 on Netflix, ‘Grey’s Anatomy’ Season 23, ‘The Last Leg’ Season 35, ‘Tulsa King’ Season 4 on Paramount+, ‘Dark Winds’ Season 4 on U&alibi, and the much-anticipated ‘Friday the 13th’ prequel ‘Crystal Lake’ on Sky.
With so much returning television, and some genuinely exciting new shows, there’s certainly no shortage of things to watch this week!
You can find Matt and his various podcasts over at Entertainment Talk, and you can keep up with all the latest TV news, reviews, and UK premiere dates right here on Geektown.
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