The Verge - Entertainments |
- Fortnite season 7 has Superman, flying saucers, and a virtual influencer
- FuboTV’s fantastic live TV streaming service finally arrives on LG TVs
- Google Stadia is coming to Chromecast with Google TV and Android TV on June 23rd
- Loki is a chance for Disney Plus to escape the shadow of Marvel blockbusters
| Fortnite season 7 has Superman, flying saucers, and a virtual influencer Posted: 08 Jun 2021 01:43 AM PDT  As expected, aliens have invaded Fortnite's battle royale island. The game's latest season — Chapter 2: Season 7 — is called "Invasion," and it's just kicked off with a sci-fi vibe that's a big change from last season's prehistoric theme. Among the changes are flying saucers that players can hack and then pilot, weapons like a rail gun that can shoot through structures and a scanning device, along with a crafting material called nuts and bolts that lets players make classic weapons that were previously removed from the game. As always, the big draw of the new season is the battle pass, which introduces a number of characters to the game for those who purchase it. For season 7 that means Superman (who will be available to unlock later in the season), a customizable alien named Kymera, a human / alien double agent called Joey, and a hulking battle droid. Perhaps the strangest addition is Guggimon, a virtual influencer with more than 1 million followers on Instagram. For those playing on PC, the new season will also include a number of visual improvements putting the game on par with next-gen consoles.  |
| FuboTV’s fantastic live TV streaming service finally arrives on LG TVs Posted: 07 Jun 2021 01:33 PM PDT  FuboTV, one of the best over-the-top services for sports enthusiasts, is finally arriving on newer LG Smart TVs. While the app was already available on many set-top boxes like the Apple TV or Chromecast, it's now available on LG's native webOS platform on 2018–2021 Smart TV models (including LG's fantastic OLEDs). That'll give any consumers with newer LG models the ability to access the service's 100-plus sports and entertainment channels directly from their sets, rather than having to rely on a third-party device for access. "Over 90 percent of FuboTV's viewership is on the big screen and today's launch on LG Smart TVs expands FuboTV to even more smart and connected TV platforms," Mike Berkley, FuboTV's chief product officer, told The Verge. Starting at $65 per month, FuboTV offers one of the most robust catalogs of sports-specific programming, though it has plenty of entertainment and news channels peppered in as well. ESPN, ESPN 2, Olympic Channel, CBS Sports Network, Big Ten Network, Fox Sports 1, Fox Sports 2, and beIN Sports channels are among those available on the service's base tier. But FuboTV really shines with its sport package add-ons, which offer more diversity in additional sports channels than similarly priced live TV services like Hulu with Live TV or YouTube TV. That said, regional sports networks are fairly limited, but that's a persistent problem that plagues nearly all OTT live streaming services — not just FuboTV. Users on LG Smart TVs will now be able to easily record an entire series with a single click, customize their guide with their favorite channels, and add up to six user profiles, each of which will support personalized recommendations and user-specific recordings. Unfortunately, one of FuboTV's best features, the MultiView tool that supports up to four simultaneous channel streams at once, is still limited to the Apple TV, a spokesperson told The Verge. But hey, at least you'll be able to use the app on your fancy LG OLED without the help of a third-party box, stick, or dongle.  |
| Google Stadia is coming to Chromecast with Google TV and Android TV on June 23rd Posted: 07 Jun 2021 09:00 AM PDT  Google is expanding the availability of its Stadia game streaming service to more TVs and streaming devices later this month. The first version of Stadia on Chromecast with Google TV is launching on June 23rd, more than eight months after the device launched without official Stadia support. Alongside Chromecast with Google TV support, Stadia will also be available on a number of Android TV devices on June 23rd. Not every Android TV device is supported, but Nvidia's Shield TV devices have made the list. Here's the official support list:
If you don't see your Android TV device listed, you may still be able to get Stadia running. You can opt into experimental support to play Stadia, just by installing the Stadia app from the Play Store and hitting continue on the opt-in screen. Android TV devices will need a compatible Bluetooth controller or Google's own Stadia Controller to play Stadia.  |
| Loki is a chance for Disney Plus to escape the shadow of Marvel blockbusters Posted: 07 Jun 2021 08:00 AM PDT  Loki, the one-time Marvel villain played for over a decade now by Tom Hiddleston, is on the verge of starring in his own series. Instead of playing the scene-stealing antagonist — or, later, grudging sidekick — to Chris Hemsworth's square-jawed Thor, the God of Mischief is finally going to get to be fully in the spotlight. It's something that fans have been asking for since the character first made his scenery-chewing debut in 2011's Thor — but the new show looks far more detached from the MCU than any of his previous adventures. Loki is a new kind of series for Disney Plus. It's the first that intentionally feels like a capital-S Spinoff. The first two Marvel shows, WandaVision and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, occupied very different roles in the overarching storyline that Kevin Feige has been overseeing for the last 23 odd films. Those two shows are arguably continuations of Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame, providing more breathing space and room for exploration of events that might have, in an earlier phase of the Marvel experiment, been obliquely referenced in between movies. WandaVision, at the end of the day, is a prelude to Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness; Falcon and the Winter Soldier is a setup for the upcoming fourth Captain America film rumored to star Anthony Mackie as the star-spangled Avenger. If one were feeling particularly cynical, you could view Loki as being less tied to a grand storyline and more to Disney and Marvel just giving the people what they want. Hiddleston's depiction of the character has long been a fan-favorite. His repeatedly faked-out deaths and journey from murderous villain to an almost-hero speak to Marvel's hard work to keep the character in play. It's easy to look at Loki in a similar vein: the latest attempt by Disney to cash in on the popularity by resurrecting Loki one last time for an adventure that will get fans who might not have cared about Wanda's grief, Vision's existential crisis, or Falcon's internal struggle with race and power in America to pony up for a Disney Plus subscription. Loki is a natural story thread as much as a shoehorned backdoor pilot stuck into Endgame's time heist. It's not the bridge between blockbuster movies. It's a show that's attempting to strike out on its own, starting a new story for the trickster god that's — at least in theory — less tethered to future films. But in the same approach, its relatively disconnected status means that (in addition to pandering) there's the opportunity for Marvel to actually make a more standalone series that can actually be a good TV show, instead of just serving as blockbuster-lite fare stretched across too many episodes. It's a dichotomy that the original modern Marvel TV series — ABC's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. — struggled with over its run. The earlier seasons still attempted to stuff themselves into a box constrained by the films, with major plot points and character cameos dictated by the blockbuster release schedule, much to the detriment of the show. But once S.H.I.E.L.D. started to ignore the movies and strike out on its own (helped in part by the fraying relationships between Marvel Studios and the separate, and now shuttered, Marvel Television division) it became a far better series. /cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/22553154/ARC_101_09922.jpg) Image: Chuck Zlotnick By ignoring the larger MCU films, S.H.I.E.L.D. was able to branch out with storylines like its Ghost Rider and Framework arcs instead of trying to hide in the cracks between movies. And the show's final seasons — a time-travel-infused adventure — completely jettison the "everything is connected" mantra that dominated the first two seasons to become an almost completely standalone series that wasn't weighed down by awkward continuity issues or shoehorned cameos. Loki, as a character, has been best in small doses so far: a villainous turn here, a monologuing speech there, a few back stabbings on his way toward redemption. It's possible that a full series for the character will be too much of a good thing — that Loki, absent the foil of his brother or the Avengers, just isn't too compelling on his own. But Loki could help elevate Disney Plus' series into more standalone stories that don't just serve as way stations toward films (or as standalone as a Marvel related story can be, at any rate). It's a lesson that the comics that all these movies and shows are based on have taught long ago: sometimes the best stories are the standalone one-shot spinoffs, not the 1,000-issue epics.  |
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