It takes a team of 22-3o animators to create Daenerys Targaryen's dragons on HBO's Game of Thrones. HBO's visual effects team works with visual effects studio, Pixomondo, to bring the dragons to life.
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It turns out that "Ultra Street Fighter II," a souped-up version of the 1991 classic for the new Nintendo Switch console, is a certifiable smash hit.
So far, "Ultra Street Fighter II" has sold 450,000 copies, reports developer Capcom — despite lukewarm reviews, and the ongoing shortage of the Switch console itself. Now, Capcom says it's planning to release a flurry of new Switch games to meet this apparent demand.
From my perspective as a Nintendo Switch owner, the reason for the runaway success of this game is simple: Every video game ever made is better, or would be better, on the Nintendo Switch. All of them. Full stop.
Let me explain.
I own a PlayStation 4 and an Xbox One, and a whole heap of games to play on them. Still, I don't get a lot of time to play games on the TV, and when I do, it's usually for a matter of minutes, not hours. Lately, I've played many more games on my iPhone or Nintendo 3DS than my fancy-pants TV consoles.
It means that critically acclaimed games like "The Witcher 3" and even the older "Skyrim" have all passed me by. They're probably both great, but I just haven't been able to commit the 40-plus hours in front of my TV that those games would demand from me for full enjoyment.
Back to Nintendo. In case you haven't heard, the Nintendo Switch has a simple, killer gimmick: It's a TV console, like an Xbox or PlayStation, but when you're on the go, you can pick it up right off its dock and keep on playing. It even lets you split one controller into two, for impromptu two-player action. 
This has been a huge boon for me, personally. The Switch is a TV console, and a thing I can take with me. All of a sudden, I don't have to choose between playing a console game or something portable. Console games fit into my life, once again. And I suspect that I'm not alone in feeling this way.
So, yeah, of course "Ultra Street Fighter II" sold like crazy, despite being a mediocre version of a decades-old classic. And when "Skyrim," which first released in 2011, comes out for the Switch later this year, it'll probably sell like crazy, too. The Switch itself makes any game more accessible, and more playable, by virtue of sheer flexibility. (Plus, this early in a console's life cycle, people are thirsty for any half-decent game, which also helps.)
Ultimately, I would urge every game developer out there to consider a Nintendo Switch version of any games they're working on, or even that they've already made. Superhero fighting game "Injustice 2," for example, would be killer on the Switch.
And, look, I get that the Nintendo Switch isn't as powerful under the hood as the Xbox One or PlayStation 4, graphically. Speaking personally, though, I would rather play a version of a great game at a lower resolution, or with slightly diminished special effects, than I would not play it at all.
SEE ALSO: The 11 best reasons to buy a Nintendo Switch
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NOW WATCH: Nintendo dropped another trailer for 'Super Mario Odyssey' — and it looks amazing
It was the adults versus the kids at the box office this weekend — and the adults won!
Warner Bros.' "Dunkirk" and Sony's "The Emoji Movie" were neck and neck the entire weekend, but "Dunkirk" has taken the weekend with an estimated $28.1 million, according to Variety.
Christopher Nolan's World War II intimate epic also won the weekend last week, and has now earned over $100 million domestically. While "The Emoji Movie" has defied the odds of sporting a 0% rating on Rotten Tomatoes going into the weekend (it currently sits at 8%) but still competing for the top spot.
The animated movie that follows the antics of a meh emoji (voiced by T.J. Miller) won the Friday box office with $10 million. But it looks like the adult-catered IMAX war epic overpowered the kids showing up at the matinees to see talking emojis. "The Emoji Movie" came in second place with $25.7 million.
Sony can't complain with the movie's performance, which could have been disastrous.
It wasn't good news for Focus Features' ultraviolent "Atomic Blonde." The Cold War-era spy movie starring Charlize Theron and a lot of butt-kicking fight scenes underperformed this weekend, taking in only $18.5 million.
The feel-good story of the last two weeks has been the surprise performance of Universal's raunchy comedy "Girls Trip." Taking in $20.1 million to place third this weekend, the movie only had a 36% drop in ticket sales from last weekend, a fantastic second-week outing. It also adds to Universal's impressive year, which is close behind Disney for the top-earning studio of 2017.
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NOW WATCH: Here's everything we know from the second trailer for 'Game of Thrones' season 7
Christopher Nolan has never been shy about challenging audiences with unique musical scores in his movies.
For 2010’s “Inception,” composer Hans Zimmer took Nolan’s reference in the script to Edith Piaf’s song “Non, je ne regrette rien,” and slowed it down to create one of the major musical themes of the movie. Then Zimmer and Nolan’s collaboration for 2014’s “Interstellar” led to the movie’s powerfully haunting organ music.
Nolan is constantly thinking about the music for his films at the script stage, and his latest, “Dunkirk,” is no different.
“Very early on I sent Hans a recording that I made of a watch that I own, with a particularly insistent ticking, and we started to build the track out of that sound. And then working from that sound, we built the music as we built the picture cut,” Nolan told Business Insider.
But the score went beyond having just a ticking theme for the story, which tells three different timelines surrounding the evacuation of Allied forces from Dunkirk, France. To build the drama of those three stories coming together for the movie’s dramatic conclusion, Nolan went back to a musical technique he played with in one of his early movies.
“There's an audio illusion, if you will, in music called a ‘Shepard tone’ and with my composer David Julyan on ‘The Prestige’ we explored that, and based a lot of the score around that,” Nolan said. “It's an illusion where there's a continuing ascension of tone. It's a corkscrew effect. It’s always going up and up and up but it never goes outside of its range. And I wrote the [“Dunkirk”] script according to that principle. I interwove the three timelines in such a way that there's a continual feeling of intensity. Increasing intensity. So I wanted to build the music on similar mathematical principals. So there's a fusion of music and sound effects and picture that we've never been able to achieve before.”
Perhaps what makes this score by Zimmer the most powerful out of his Nolan projects (a collaboration that goes back to “The Dark Knight” franchise) is the limited amount of dialogue in “Dunkirk.” Zimmer’s ticking score doesn’t just heighten the thrills, but explains what’s going on in the scene as much as the photography does.
Listen to a portion of the "Dunkirk" score below:
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UPDATE: John Henson replied to Business Insider with the following in regards to him rumored to have written "Logan Lucky:" "Unfortunately, I did not write 'Logan Lucky.' Steven, however... did write every single episode of 'Talk Soup.'"
Steven Soderbergh has always enjoyed messing with Hollywood conventions, and this latest mischief might be his best yet.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, the auteur — who enjoys using his father's name for some of his cinematography credits (Peter Andrews), and his mother's for editing (Mary Ann Bernard) — may have came up with a new one for the screenwriting credit for his upcoming movie, "Logan Lucky."
The movie, which opens August 18 and marks Soderbergh's first time directing a feature after a four-year retirement, has the name Rebecca Blunt as the screenwriting credit. This is her first credit of any kind, according to IMDb.
But THR has suspicions, and says Blunt might not exist, suggesting either Soderbergh, his wife Jules Asner, or former E! "Talk Soup" host John Henson really wrote the script.
Honestly, each theory is as ridiculously fantastic as the next, and it becomes more plausible that a "Rebecca Blunt" doesn't exist when you do a little digging. For a screenwriter who has written a script that caught Soderbergh's attention, and has critics raving (the movie has a 100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes), she has no representation at all (according to IMDb Pro). Typically, buzz about the script and her talents would have already swirled around Hollywood, and she would have nabbed an agent or manager by now.
According to the THR story, Blunt never visited the set, though cast members Channing Tatum, Adam Driver, and Daniel Craig are said to have had email exchanges with her from the UK, where they believed she lives.
One source believes Asner, a former E! News host and author of a 2008 novel titled "Whacked," penned the script. Another told the trade it's Soderbergh himself, though it's unclear why he would he use a pseudonym for the screenwriting credit, when he used his name for the cinematography and editor credits on "Logan Lucky." Yet another believes it's Henson, as he's a friend of Asner's and, according to THR, worked on a screenplay with Soderbergh years ago that's similar to "Logan Lucky."
Entertainment Weekly recently interviewed Soderbergh and brought up the THR story.
“Well, that’s going to be news to Rebecca Blunt,” he said. “When people make a statement like that they should be very careful, especially when it’s a woman screenwriter who is having her first screenplay produced.”
He went on to add: “Why are you going after her? She’s interviewed in the press kit. I happen to know that she’s working on something and that she’s on a deadline. She doesn’t want to do any press until after the movie opens. Isn’t she allowed to do that?”
So that brings us to the press kit. Yes, Blunt is mentioned and quoted in the press notes. According to the notes, Blunt is a friend of Asner, who passed the script to Soderbergh. Though the THR story references she might live in the UK, the notes say she grew up in West Virginia and now lives in New York City.
"Logan Lucky" is set around two brothers, played by Channing Tatum and Adam Driver, who live in West Virginia and plot to pull a heist across the line in North Carolina at the Charlotte Motor Speedway.
The notes also say Blunt is friends with Tatum.
“Chan’s from a small southern town, I believe he won a football scholarship to play in Florida but ended up blowing out his knee before the season started, so he became a stripper," Blunt is quoted in the notes. "I thought of 'Logan Lucky' as, ‘What if Chan hadn’t become a male stripper and had gone back home?’ I ran into Chan and his partner Reid [Carolin] at a bowling alley and mentioned the the idea to them — at the time I called it 'Hillbilly Heist' — and Chan said, ‘That sounds great!’ I don’t know if he even remembers saying that and I never imagined all of this would really happen.”
In the press notes biography for Blunt, along with stating she was raised in Logan, West Virginia, and now lives in New York City, it also includes this gem: that in researching on the internet the explosive device the characters used in the movie to rob the speedway, she was informed her TSA PRE status was permanently revoked.
Soderbergh has admitted on numerous occassions that he has embellished certain things about his movies in the past while promoting them, so it's possible this is all a hoax. And that's what many will think until the real Rebecca Blunt stands up.
Business Insider contacted the movie's distributor, Bleecker Street, but did not get an immediate response (representation for Jules Asner could not be found).
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NOW WATCH: Here's what Kevin G. from 'Mean Girls' is up to today
Elusive R&B singer Frank Ocean performed at the Panorama Festival on Friday, his first concert in New York City in five years, in a set marked both for its intimacy and its elaborate production, headed by legendary film director Spike Jonze.
Rather than perform on a traditional stage, Ocean and his team created a runway and central platform that extended down the middle of the audience.
The set-up allowed Ocean to spend the set wandering up and down the runway, sitting calmly in a chair at the center, or hanging out at the front of the platform with a keyboard.
Fans that were lucky enough (or got there early) to make their way to the the closest third of the audience were gifted with a close-up view of Ocean, depending on which area of the crowd he decided to sing to during a song.
The central platform was arranged with a keyboard, a tapedeck, some speakers, and a few clear chairs for his band — who didn't even come out for the first couple of songs and played from a pit below the stage.
At times, the set gave off the feeling of watching a recital or a jam session in someone's living room, not a festival headliner.
The minimalist arrangement meshed well with Ocean's spare style, but was contrasted by all the other elements that went into the production.
The main stage was reconfigured with a video screen that stretched 30 feet high and 170 feet wide, wrapping around the entire audience:
A kind of improvisational concert film played on the screen, with a team of camera operators running around the platform with Ocean, capturing his every move:
The camera work, which mixed ultra-HD and lo-fi video cameras, was directed by none other than Jonze, best known for "Her" and "Being John Malkovich." Some have speculated that Jonze is working on a film project with Ocean; he filmed the singer's concerts at FYF Festival in Los Angeles and Lovebox Festival in London earlier this month.
Here's a look at the live film on screen, courtesy of Kendall Jenner (who was spotted at the show along with Justin Timberlake, Aziz Ansari, and other celebrities):
Adding to the production was an arrangment of speaker towers that wrapped around the entire crowd, allowing the music and Ocean's voice to literally surround the fans as he sang.
Here's the roadies testing the speaker arrangement to an anxious crowd shortly before Ocean went on:
If that wasn't enough, fog machines, a projector, and a disco ball topped it all off.
But, of course, despite all of the production, the star of the show was Ocean, who had the crowd singing every word back to him.
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NOW WATCH: Marvel just dropped the first trailer for 'Black Panther'
Warning: Huge spoilers for "Game of Thrones" season seven, episode three. If you aren't caught up on the series or the season, read at your own risk.
After another long week, season seven episode three of "Game of Thrones," titled "The Queen's Justice," finally arrived.
"The Queen's Justice" delivered a lot more action than the first two episodes of the season, and focused on the bickering and brooding in Dragonstone between Jon Snow, Tyrion, and Daenerys; the fate of Euron's prisoners; and a battle at Casterly Rock. This episode was so heavily focused on the queens and ladies in Westeros that we didn't get to see what Arya was up to, and for the second week in a row, we didn't see The Hound and the Brotherhood Without Banners.
There's a lot to remember between Cersei's revenge and the Stark reunion in Winterfell — so we highlighted the episode's biggest moments.
Here's our recap of "The Queen's Justice:"
SEE ALSO: The 5 ways to kill a dragon in ‘Game of Thrones’ — and how Cersei plans to do it
Jon and Davos were greeted in Dragonstone by Tyrion and Missandei, and then by dragons.
Daenerys expected Jon to bend the knee. And Jon expected Daenerys to offer her help to fight the White Walkers immediately. But unfortunately, the two are both incredibly stubborn, which is definitely a trait they share because they are related (but do not know it, yet).
But with the help of Tyrion Lannister, the two come to an agreement: Daenerys will let Jon makes weapons out of the dragonglass at Dragonstone. That's good, because it can destroy White Walkers.
In a move that was surprisingly responsible, Melisandre tells Varys that she's leaving Westeros for Volantis, rather than cause a stir upon Jon and Davos's arrival. She says she'll be back, but this is probably the last we'll see of her for some time.
This was expected, but it took a brutal turn. Euron also included Yara Greyjoy as a prisoner to Cersei, but we only see the fate of Ellaria and Tyenne. Cersei locks them in a dungeon, and gives them a long monologue while wearing a lipstick color we've never seen her wear before. Cersei poisons Tyenne with a kiss, the same poison used to kill Myrcella. Cersei locks Ellaria in the same dungeon, forcing her to watch her daughter slowly die.
Before that, however, we see Theon get rescued by Greyjoys. Looks like they might be the one ship heading to Dorne to recruit allies.
Warning: Major spoilers for those who have not season "Game of Thrones" season 7 episode 3.
A piece of information that Olenna Tyrell had kept a secret since season four on "Game of Thrones" was revealed Sunday night.
In a shocking twist at the end of the episode, Highgarden is conquered by the Lannister army headed up by Jaime Lannister.
As the battle quiets down, Jaime finds Olenna Tyrell, and the two have a brief conversation about the battle, and Cersei.
Olenna then asks Jaime very casually how she'll be killed by him. Jaime rattles off a couple of gruesome options that Cersei proposed, but ultimately replies to Olenna by simply pouring a vile of poison into her glass of wine.
Olenna accepts her fate and drinks her glass of wine. Olenna, after finishing her glass of wine, exclaims that she hopes her death comes quickly and painlessly, not like Joffrey's death, which looked painful, and embarrassing. Olenna then says that she didn't know how the poison would work until she saw it ravaging Joffrey, revealing to Jaime that it was her who poisoned Joffrey during his wedding to her granddaughter Margaery. Jaime says nothing, but Olenna asks for him to tell Cersei, explaining that she wants Cersei to know that it was her who killed him.
Up until this moment, everyone in King's Landing had assumed that Sansa Stark was responsible for Joffrey's death, so this is a huge revelation to Jaime.
Of course, the audience already knew. In season four, episode four, Olenna reveals to Margaery that she was the one who poisoned Joffrey, explaining that there was no way she'd let her 'marry that beast.'
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NOW WATCH: Here's what Kevin G. from 'Mean Girls' is up to today
A Tribe Called Quest announced Sunday that their concert at Panorama Festival would be their last "ever" in New York City.
Q-Tip made the announcement to the crowd mid-set, stopping the music, and giving a tribute to late A Tribe Called Quest member Phife Dawg, who died due to complications from diabetes in 2016.
Q-Tip announced that Phife Dawg's parents were in the audience and then led the crowd in a chant thanking Phife Dawg.
An image of the deceased rapper with his hands in prayer against a backdrop of the sky was shown during the tribute and at numerous times throughout the show.
Q-Tip ended the tribute by playing Phife Dawg's verse, without music, from the song "Butter" off 1991 album "Low-End Theory."
The hip hop group played a wide-ranging set that pulled from 2016's "We Got It from Here... Thank You 4 Your Service" as well as fan favorites such as "Bonita Applebum. "
Throughout the set, DJ Ali Shaheed Muhammad let Phife Dawg's verses and rhymes play, while the video screen focused on an empty microphone placed at the center of the stage. Q-Tip and Tribe member Jairobi White often played off the microphone, trading verses with their absent member.
Case in point:
Phife Dawg had health issues for years, Rolling Stone reported last year. He received a kidney transplant in 2008 in his long battle with Type 1 diabetes.
Towards the end of the set, Q-Tip thanked the crowd for supporting the group since its inception in the 1980s. Q-Tip and Phife Dawg were childhood friends, who originally performed as solo acts in the early 80s, before forming Tribe with Muhammad and White.
Phife Dawg appeared on all of Tribe's albums, serving as a vocal counterpoint to Q-Tip.
Here's another one of the Phife images the group played on the screens:
And a clip from "Bonita Applebum" for good measure:
Though the group broke up after 1998's "The Love Movement," they have occasionally reunited throughout years. Following the release of 2016's "We Got It From Here ... " the group announced that they would do one final world tour in 2017.
The group, who remain one of the most important acts in hip-hop history, will play at Red Rocks Amphitheatre in Colorado and at Outside Lands Festival in San Francisco next month.
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NOW WATCH: Here's everything we know from the second trailer for 'Game of Thrones' season 7
Amazon is planning a home makeover show that will be designed to help the retailer sell products.
The e-commerce behemoth has partnered with Kin Community, a web video production/ad company, to produce "Overhaul," a six-episode show that will feature several YouTube stars having their home's refurbished made over.
"Overhaul" is being hosted and co-produced byChristiane Lemieux, founder of DwellStudio, and the high-end custom furniture firm Cloth & Company.
While the show is designed to be entertainment, it will also be loaded with products people can buy on Amazon, including furniture sold by Lemieux's companies. It will live on a special hub on Amazon.com where people can easily click to purchase items in the show, as well as more affordable alternatives.
"Overhaul" is scheduled to premiere in September. The first two episodes feature YouTube baking star Rosanna Pansino and beauty blogger Teni Panosian. In addition to the six episodes, each of the featured digital creators will produce videos showing their home after being made over, which will be distributed on their YouTube channels and other social platforms. These videos will also drive people to Amazon to shop for featured products.
Amazon, of course, has made a big splash in recent years producing and distributing prestige TV shows like "Transparent" and "The Man in the High Castle." But those series ostensibly exist to sell Amazon Prime subscriptions.
While Amazon has featured commerce-related video content on its site for a while from companies like the female focused Stylehaul, this is the first time it's produced a show explicitly designed to facilitate shopping.
Kristiana Helmick, director of home innovation at Amazon, said the idea for the series was born out of Amazon's ongoing retail partnership with Lemieux.
"Amazon Home is constantly looking to innovate and find ways to bring our customers inspiration when searching for products," said Helmick. "The 'Overhaul' series is a great opportunity to provide our customers with some curation and guidance when searching through our large selection of products and we continue to look for new and different ways to do that. ... This is the first time Amazon has had a co-branded storefront tied to a video series."
If successful, "Overhaul" could spark an potent trend, one that Amazon would be uniquely positioned to exploit. For years, people in the media world have talked about a future where you can watch your favorite show and buy a character's outfit (the talk has been around for so long, the example many have used was "you'll soon be able to buy Ross's shirt on "Friends.")
Kin Community was originally built as a web video company focused on women. In recent years, it's evolved into a boutique multi-channel network, working with YouTube talents like Pansino and Hannah Hart to produce and distribute original shows, and also help them connect with marketers. Last year, Kin raised $13.5 million in new funding.
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Warning: Spoilers for "Game of Thrones" season seven, episode three, "The Queen's Justice." If you aren't caught up on the series, read at your own risk.
It wouldn't be "Game of Thrones" without all the deaths. This week's episode, "The Queen's Justice," ended just as violently as last week's, with an attack on Olenna Tyrell in Highgarden.
On "Game of Thrones," there are so many characters to keep up with. And even in its seventh season, it can get a little hard to keep track of who has died.
So here is your guide to who died on "Game of Thrones" last night:
SEE ALSO: All the biggest moments from 'Game of Thrones' season 7 episode 3, 'The Queen's Justice'
Cersei wants revenge on Ellaria Sand, who killed her daughter, Myrcella. So in "The Queen's Justice," Cersei locks Ellaria up in a dungeon with her daughter, Tyene Sand, who she poisons the same way Ellaria poisoned Myrcella: with a kiss and a poison called the long farewell. So Ellaria has to watch her own daughter die a brutal death, and there's nothing she can do about it.
While we don't see Ellaria die on screen, actress Indira Varma confirmed to Entertainment Weekly that this was her last appearance on the show. She'll have a slow death rotting in the dungeons of the Red Keep, but fortunately we won't see it.
Instead of protecting their home of Casterly Rock, Cersei has Jaime bring a majority of his Lannister army (including Bronn and Randyll Tarly) to take the Tyrell home of Highgarden in The Reach. Cersei wants to give Olenna a cruel death in King's Landing, but Jaime convinces her otherwise, and he gives Olenna poison.
But Olenna goes down memorably. Right after she drinks the poison, she confesses to Jaime that she was the one who poisoned Joffrey, and she wants Cersei to know it.
Angelina Jolie has defended herself from claims that she played psychological tricks on impoverished Cambodian children to see who could play the most convincing thief.
Jolie was criticised over a casting exercise she carried out for "First They Killed My Father", an upcoming Netflix film about the Khmer Rouge and the Cambodian genocide of 1975-79.
Details of the process came out in an interview with Vanity Fair, which described it like this:
"In order to find their lead, to play young Loung Ung, the casting directors set up a game, rather disturbing in its realism: they put money on the table and asked the child to think of something she needed the money for, and then to snatch it away. The director would pretend to catch the child, and the child would have to come up with a lie."
Jolie told the magazine that the exercise led them to their leading actress, a girl called Srey Moch who was "overwhelmed with emotion" on giving back the money, which she had planned to spend on a funeral for her grandfather.
Jolie was criticised on social media for staging the audition, which many considered exploitative. Guardian columnist Marina Hyde said the anecdote was more proof Jolie is "clearly bats--t" and one of many "Hollywood crazies" who hijack poverty for their own ends.
A journalist for US radio network NPR accused her of playing "orphan Hunger Games":
Amazon is planning a home makeover show featuring YouTube stars
N this crazy news week u prob missed the f'd up story of how Angelina Jolie played orphan hunger games 2 cast a film https://t.co/4dYOSTY1W6pic.twitter.com/HFeoA9lU9F
— Sam Sanders (@samsanders) July 28, 2017In response, Jolie said Vanity Fair had misrepresented the exercise, which did not use real money and was consensual.
In a statement to HuffPost she said:
"I am upset that a pretend exercise in an improvisation, from an actual scene in the film, has been written about as if it was a real scenario. The suggestion that real money was taken from a child during an audition is false and upsetting. I would be outraged myself if this had happened."
Her producer added that not all the children were impoverished orphans, that they had carers with them at all times. He said: "The children were not tricked or entrapped, as some have suggested. They understood very well that this was acting, and make believe."
Business Insider has contacted Vanity Fair for comment.
Jolie's film is based on the memoirs of human rights activist Loung Ung, who fled her childhood home in Cambodia during a deadly four-year Communist regime, known as the Khmer Rouge years.
Between 1975 and 1979, the Khmer Rouge party leader Pol Pot and his followers drove people out of their homes and confiscated property in an attempt to redistribute the country's wealth.
Historians estimate that 2 million people were killed.
The casting process has not been the only controversy to emerge from the film.
Jolie has also been criticised by Human Rights Watch for cooperating with the Cambodian army, who provided 500 soldiers to feature in its footage.
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NOW WATCH: Angelina Jolie delivered a powerful plea to help refugees
Throughout his career, director Darren Aronofsky has loved to look at the darker side of life — whether it's "Pi," "Requiem for a Dream," or "Black Swan."
And it looks like we're in for another horrific story from the Oscar nominee.
The teaser for his anticipated next movie, "mother!" has gone online and it seems to be preparing us for a lot of chilling moments.
The little bit we know about the movie so far is it has an incredible cast — Jennifer Lawrence, Javier Bardem, Ed Harris, and Michelle Pfeiffer — and is a psychological thriller about a couple whose lives are interrupted by uninvited guests.
If it's anything like Aronofsky's previous work, expect a movie that will completely mess with your heart (we can't wait!).
"mother!" opens in theaters September 15.
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The third episode of season 7 of "Game of Thrones" had two of the main characters finally meeting each other, and a fan favorite meeting their untimely doom. There were multiple call backs to previous scenes and some clues that history might be repeating itself. Here's what you might have missed.
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Sitting alone in a screening room, finishing up the director’s cut of “Atomic Blonde,” the movie’s music supervisor John Houlihan couldn’t move from his seat. The lights went on and director David Leitch entered the room to see Houlihan sitting there, white as a sheet.
Bracing himself for the criticism to come, Leitch reluctantly asked, “What did you think?”
“I couldn’t talk,” Houlihan told Business Insider, thinking back on the moment. “I was so overwhelmed by the business challenge of how do I get all of these iconic songs cleared and paid for on an indie budget.”
Doing some quick math, Houlihan figured there was around $3 million worth of music in the cut he just saw, and he didn’t even have a fraction of that in the budget to pay for it.
“I called David back two hours later driving home,” Houlihan said. “I said, ‘I love the movie, it’s amazing,’ but I’m thinking I just paid a huge $6 million license figure for George Michael’s ‘Careless Whisper’ in ‘Deadpool,’ now I have to go clear another George Michael song for a fraction of that!”
Set days before the fall of the Berlin Wall, Cold War-era “Atomic Blonde” stars Charlize Theron as a lethal MI6 agent who travels to Berlin to investigate the death of a fellow agent. The intense action sequences are the movie’s standout, but what makes it unique from others in the genre is the inclusion of 1980s-era classic songs throughout.
From David Bowie’s “Cat People (Putting Out Fire)” to The Clash’s “London Calling” to the song that gave Houlihan instant cold sweats, George Michael’s “Father Figure,” the music doesn’t just suck the audience into the era the story is set in, but also heightens everything that happens on screen.
But these songs don’t come cheap. With a music license budget that started in the ballpark of around $200,000 — or as Houlihan put it, smaller than a one-month catering budget on 'Deadpool 2' — Leitch was counting on the talents of Houlihan to pull off a great soundtrack.
A veteran music supervisor, having worked on movies ranging from the 1990s “Austin Powers” movies to Oscar-winning “O.J.: Made in America” and “Deadpool,” Houlihan had to basically call in every favor to pull off the “Atomic Blonde” soundtrack. And he said he’s still mending a few relationships in the aftermath of tough negotiations.
After having a great experience working with Leitch on “John Wick,” Houlihan was brought onto “Atomic Blonde” at the script stage, which he prefers (the total budget of the movie is around $30 million). Leitch, Houlihan, and Theron, who is also a producer on the movie, collectively came up with the chart-topping songs they wanted to try to get. But originally, the group wanted to not use the original tracks of the songs, but license covers of them instead. That idea eventually went away when the original songs were implemented into the scenes.
“It just felt great,” Houlihan said of how the music worked with the footage. “We rediscovered the genius of the original recordings and just that perfect time capsule nature: the experience of listening to ’80s songs.” (Three cover songs ended up in the movie — HEALTH did New Order’s “Blue Monday,” Kaleida did Nena’s “99 Luftballons,” and Marilyn Manson did Ministry’s “Stigmata.”)
After the shock of the rough cut screening, Houlihan and his team began working the phones.
Generally, well-known songs will run a movie around $30,000. That price will double though if the song is featured in the opening or end credits. But it’s never cut and dry. Every song has multiple ownership parties — one song could have four publishers and a record label attached to it. And all those parties have to agree on the negotiated figure for it to be licensed in a movie. In the case of one lesser-known song in “Atomic Blonde” (which Houlihan wouldn’t reveal), getting the song took months to clear because one of the publishers wouldn’t agree on the license rights price.
There were also the songs that took a while to find a home. One example was Bowie’s “Cat People,” which was on Leitch’s mind all the way back in the pitch stage, when he featured it in a reel he put together to show off the themes he was going for in the movie. It was even written into the script. But the song didn’t find its permanent home — playing over the introduction of the Theron character in the beginning of the movie — until a few songs from The Cure didn’t work in the scene.
Then there’s dealing with artist estates, which happened when Houlihan tried to get the Queen/David Bowie classic “Under Pressure” (it plays going into the movie’s end credits). The song was the biggest challenge for Houlihan because name dropping doesn’t help.
“Artists can go, ‘Oh my gosh, my song in a scene with Charlize Theron in this cool movie, that’s amazing, I don’t care if they don’t have the money we normally get,’ you don’t get that,” Houlihan said. “You’re dealing with a lawyer and they don’t get emotional.”
Then there’s the one that got away. Originally, Houlihan and company wanted the Berlin hit “Take My Breath Away” to play over one of the movie’s major fight scenes (the one in which Theron smacks a freezer door on one of the bad guys’ faces and jumps out the window).
“We loved it, it became ‘temp love,’” Houlihan said, referring to when a filmmaker falls in love with the temporary score or song put into the movie while in production. “But it had this legal problem clearing it.”
That led to Houlihan going with a song that wasn’t even on their radar, George Michael’s “Father Figure.” The song fits perfectly in the scene, giving it the right sense of moodiness and twisted comedic tone.
“We’re much happier with ‘Father Figure,’” Houlihan said. “I always believe as much as you think a song is the only song in the world that can be in a scene, there’s always another option out there that’s just as compelling, if not more.”
Despite some moments of panic, looking back on the “Atomic Blonde” experience, Houlihan only has fond memories.
“It's a movie that's infectious and pulls you in, so it's very easy for me as a music supervisor to get passionate about a movie like this,” he said. “We went the extra mile on everything.”
And it shows.
“Atomic Blonde” is currently playing in theaters.
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You can go anywhere in "Grand Theft Auto." Well, almost anywhere — you can't, for example, go to space.
But you will be able to soon!
Indeed, the final frontier is the latest place for you to venture in "Grand Theft Auto V" — albeit unofficially, as this is an upcoming "mod" for the PC version of "GTA V." When the game was released for PC players, it also got "mod" support allowing custom modifications to the game's code; in practice, that means there are dozens of variants of the "GTA V" formula out there waiting to be played.
A handful of hardcore "GTA" fans are putting together "Grand Theft Auto Space," and it looks to be coming along quite well if a new trailer is any indication.
It looks like a central concept of "Grand Theft Auto Space" is taking on aggressive aliens who look more "Mars Attacks!" than "Independence Day." But can you hijack their ship? Here's hoping!
The "Grand Theft Auto" game series is notorious for its mockery of modern culture, for its aggressive attitude, and for its massive open worlds. This isn't a series about shooting alien invaders before they can enslave humanity — it's about riding down the street in my six four, so to speak. As such, "Grand Theft Auto Space" is a delightful twist on a long-running series.
Check out the latest trailer for the mod, which its creators say is "coming soon," right here:
And check out the game mod in action right here:
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After taking most of July off, HBO's "Last Week Tonight with John Oliver" came back Sunday night. And boy did he have to catch up on a lot.
Though the show could have dedicated its entire half hour to what happened this past week — from Jared Kushner's prepared speech to press at the White House, to the explosive interview new White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci gave to The New Yorker, to the firing of White House chief of staff Reince Priebus — Oliver instead used the main story of Sunday's show to look at radio host Alex Jones.
The "InfoWars" host has climbed to conservative media prominence through explosive claims that go viral, like how chemicals in our water are turning frogs gay, or ones that have made him infamous, like saying the Sandy Hook school shooting in 2012 was a hoax.
But Oliver looked past all that to delve into something else Jones does a lot on his show: shill merchandise. Oliver said that in one week of Jones' recent broadcasts, he spent nearly a quarter of the time either talking about or playing ads for his products. And he's got a lot of them.
The "InfoWars" store has survival gear, organic shampoo and soaps, and even a Bill Clinton rape whistle ("Last Week Tonight" bought this item and Oliver said it came with a complimentary "9-11 was an Inside Job" bumper sticker).
Radio hosts doing ads is nothing new, but Oliver said since 2013, Jones has been focusing on his own vitamins and other supplements. Reportedly, two-thirds of his funding comes from marketing his own products — which range from vitality drugs for men and women, to something called "Caveman," which is a paleo formula chocolate drink with bone broth. It sounds awful and Oliver, who bought it, tasted it on air, and confirmed that tastes awful too.
Jones even has a doctor come on his show to hock the merch with him. Jones claims Dr. Edward Group III has a degree from MIT. But "Last Week Tonight" did some digging and learned he actually attended Texas Chiropractic College, and when the show asked MIT about him it responded, "calling him an alumni would be inaccurate and misleading."
The show played a clip of Jones saying "InfoWars" costs $45 million to $50 million to run, and that any money from his store goes back into the show. However, Oliver notes that Jones has sported at least three different Rolex watches on his show.
Jones often says that his critics focus on things he says that are taken out of context. But Oliver showed on Sunday's show that in context what Jones is doing is chilling.
"At the start of this piece I promised Alex Jones that I would put his statements in context, because he is right, that if you play small clips in isolation he looks like a loon," Oliver said. "But if you play them in context, he looks like a skilled salesman spending hours a day frightening you about problems like refugees spreading disease, and then selling you an answer."
Perhaps the best example of this is that after Jones' "gay frogs" video went viral, he did a follow-up on how chemicals are being put in the water to feminize society and reduce the population. He then immediately segued to an ad about water filters.
Watch the "Last Week Tonight" Alex Jones piece below:
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NOW WATCH: 8 details you might have missed on the season 7 premiere of 'Game of Thrones'
Warning: Major spoilers for those who have not season "Game of Thrones" season 7 episode 3.
In the surprising final scene on "Game of Thrones" Sunday night, Highgarden's ruler Olenna Tyrell is poisoned by Jaime Lannister.
After Highgarden is overthrown by the Lannister army, Jaime finds Olenna in her chambers, and after speaking with her briefly, pours a vile of poison into her glass of wine. Olenna calmly accepts her fate, and finishes her poisoned glass of wine.
But she go the last laugh.
Olenna, in her final moments on the show, reveals to Jaime that she was the one who had poisoned Joffrey, and asks that he relay the message to Cersei.
"I'd hate to die like your son. Clawing at my neck, foam and bile spilling from my mouth, eyes blood red, skin purple," Olenna says. "Must have been horrible for you, as a Kingsguard, as a father. It was horrible enough for me. A shocking scene. Not at all what I intended. You see, I'd never seen the poison work before. Tell Cersei. I want her to know it was me."
In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, "Game of Thrones" showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss discuss Olenna's final scene:
“What I love about the way she plays the scene is that even though you leave the scene knowing she’s soon going to be dead shortly after you cut to black you still feel like she won. She’s probably the only character to win her own death scene,” said Weiss.
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NOW WATCH: 8 details you might have missed on the season 7 premiere of 'Game of Thrones'
Having sold over 6 million copies in just four months — making over $150 million in the process— "PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds" is a bona fide blockbuster hit.
What's even more impressive is that the game technically isn't finished — it's only available through Steam, the world's largest digital game store, as an "Early Access" title. That means you can buy it, and play it, but it's not considered a finished product. And even in that state, millions of people have bought "Battlegrounds."
Better yet: At any given point in a day, hundreds of thousands of people are playing "Battlegrounds." It's the No. 3 most-played game on Steam, with nearly 500,000 concurrent players:
That may not sound terribly impressive, but it's an insanely important metric: Steam is, by far, the largest game platform on the planet. Somewhere in the vicinity of 200 million people actively use Steam; being the No. 3 game on the platform, in terms of concurrent players, is a huge deal.
The top two spots are permanently occupied by "DOTA 2," and "Counter-Strike: Global Offensive" — the former is a free game, and the latter is a $15 game, and both are created/operated by Valve, the same company in that runs Steam. Thus, being the third-most played game on Steam is like being number one.
The game's creative director, Brendan "PlayerUnknown" Greene, took to Twitter to celebrate:
We now hold the record for the highest peak player count of any non-Valve game! GG WP everyone <3 pic.twitter.com/cHjXPeSE8p
— PLAYERUNKNOWN (@PLAYERUNKNOWN) July 30, 2017As Greene points out, not only is "Battlegrounds" steadily holding the No. 3 spot, but it now holds the record for "highest peak player count of any non-Valve game." This is an especially incredible statistic — the game's only been available since March, and it's an unfinished game, yet it's competing with the likes of "Grand Theft Auto V" and "Fallout 4" and dozens of other heavy-hitters.
There's a simple explanation for why it's doing so well: It's an unbelievably good game.
More than just a bizarre name, "PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds" is a brilliant concept for a game: 100 people on a massive island, armed with their wits and a scavenge-able arsenal, fighting to the death. Whoever survives at the end of the match wins — and there can only be one.
The future of "Battlegrounds" is even brighter.
The game is expected to reach "1.0" by the end of 2017, and it should arrive on the Xbox One in the same time frame. All of which is to say one thing: Expect to hear a lot more about "Battlegrounds" as the year goes on.
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Pandora announced that its internet radio service will be discontinued in Australia and New Zealand on Monday, leaving only its United States service in operation.
Pandora subscribers and free users who tried to log on to the service in Australia and New Zealand over the weekend were reportedly warned of the shut down with the following message:
"Dear Pandora listener, We will be shutting down the Pandora service in Australia and New Zealand on July 31st, 2017. After this date, you will no longer be able to access the Pandora app of website. We're honoured to have connected so many listeners with the music they love these past few years. Thank you for your loyalty and the opportunity to serve you. Sincerely The Pandora Team."
Pandora launched its regional services in Australia and New Zealand in 2012. It has recently struggled financially, lost its founder CEO, and been unable to turn around its momentum despite launching its own on-demand streaming service, Pandora Premium, in March.
In June, Pandora also landed a $480 million investment from Sirius XM, after it rejected an offer from Sirius to buy the company outright.
Pandora will now be available in the US only. Global radio operation laws have prevented Pandora from launching its radio service in any countries other than Australia, New Zealand, and the US in the past.
Pandora's stock dropped over 5% in trading early on Monday, following news of its Australia and New Zealand closures.
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NOW WATCH: Here's everything you need to know about Azor Ahai — the legendary savior on 'Game of Thrones'
