Gliese436B

With the recent announcement of Robert Pattinson in yet another Batman movie, the question should be asked: how many Batman movies do we need? How many times can you re-tell the same story in different ways and it still be interesting to experience? Are movie studios latching onto fandom/nostalgia to the point of having a negative effect on the original character?

Capitalizing on the origin story of a very famous villain was an interesting direction to take by Sony. The Venom movie has critically 'survived' its release, but where will the story eventually go? So much of Venom's origin is built around his interactions with Spiderman, causing some people to criticise the appear of 'web-like' powers from the character despite no canonical appearance of Spiderman. Should other films focus solely on villains? Or can a villain's story only be told when alongside their famous superhero.

The success of the MCU has been one of the hallmarks of cinema for the past decade. Arguably what has contributed to this is a significant amount of planning, and team of people dedicated to the topic, as well as a large amount of source material. Given that the X-Men universe has the third reason locked in, what's to stop 20th Century capitalizing on the blueprint laid down by the founders of the MCU and giving them something to compete against? Arguably all it could take is a team passionate about making this a reality.

Analyse why novel sci-fi and fantasy ideas that have been released to the cinemas recently have not had the strong effect that the same kinds of films had during the 2000-2010s. One immediate example that comes to mind would be Jupiter Ascending, which performed abysmally at the box office and was critically demolished. John Carter is another example that seemed promising, yet was not given a sequel despite being based off a series of comics.

A fanfiction is defined as a fiction written by a fan of, and featuring particular characters of, a particular TV series, film etc. When a novel series graduates to the big screen or a popular franchise gets rebooted, the series is arguably getting a re-work by someone who is presumably a fan of the original work. A contemporary example could include David Benioff and D. B. Weiss adapting "A Song of Ice and Fire" as a TV series, eventually pursuing beyond the source material. Another might be Christopher Nolan's re-envisioning of the classic Batman character through the Dark Knight trilogy. Taking into account the degree of deviation from the original work, could these series' be considered fanfiction? At what point can a professionally produced piece of film be considered a simple interpretation of fiction by a fan?

Visiting foreign countries can truly change peoples lives. Whether its rural folk seeing thriving metropolises or hot climate citizens witnessing snow for the first time, being in a new environment can take your breath away. The use of graphics in gaming has skyrocketed. From the revolution of Pong 40 years ago, blades of grass and drops of rain have become routine for triple AAA titles. If we can imagine the difference in graphics rendering in 40 years, will a $100-$200 VR headset rival the thousands we spend on flights and accomodation overseas? If we could graphically render a building twice as tall as the Eiffel Tower, why go see the Eiffel Tower? Could virtual reality be a substitute, or threat, to global tourism?

*POTENTIAL SPOILERS* In the wake of Star Wars: The Last Jedi, one of the main negative points that critiques emphasize is the lack of narrative fulfillment. Many plot-arcs and burning questions were either left unanswered or unexplained, priming Disney to release other forms of media, comic books or novel series', to fill the gaps in the film. There is precedent for this technique in the gaming community, with Gears of War 3 introducing characters who were fan-favourites from comic book series' and Destiny including plot-relevant lore to be explored outside of the game and on the game's website. Will this present a negative impact on the way stories are told on different mediums? Are the release of expanded works intended to deepen our appreciation for a universe, or exploitation tactics by greedy content creators? Does exploring different characters and story-lines add depth to a franchise, or allow it to short-cut the narrative process?

Modern console's use of the internet in gaming has allowed some games to only be allowed to be played online. One example, is the incredibly popular For Honor, a hack and slash phenomenom. As popular as this game is, what is to stop Ubisoft from shutting off the servers if a sequel is announced, to force gamers to purchase the sequel? Many classic games suffer from eventual server closing, EA's underrated Lord of the Rings: Conquest is an example. Are gaming developers giving themselves too much power over consumers by forcing games to be mandatorily online?