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From the wacky world of Steve Kostanski’s workshop, comes another character inspired by ‘80s rubber creatures, this time playing on the subgenre of mischievous little monsters running amok à la Gremlins, Ghoulies and The Garbage Pail Kids Movie. Following up on his fan-favourite feature PG: Psycho Goreman, Konstanski summons forth Frankie Freako, a fantasy laugh riot that takes what would otherwise be the premise for a kid’s movie, and pumps it up for a midnight audience.

Suburban yuppie Conor is facing an existential crisis. His boss Mr. Buechler is telling him his board presentation needs to be spiced up because it’s too “bland.” His bombshell wife Kristina says he can be a bit of a “square.” How can Conor convince them that he is capable of taking a walk on the wild side? His answer comes in the form of a late-night commercial featuring a little red...

The enduring “Rocky” fandom sure packs an expensive punch.

The rise of VHS auctions has included a whopping sale of $53,750 for the “Rocky” trilogy starring Sylvester Stallone. A February sale from Heritage Auctions in Dallas, Texas marked a return for videotapes. As Quentin Tarantino and Roger Avary relive their video-store days with a VHS-centric podcast, and video production company and YouTube channel Red Letter Media raised over $80,000 for charity by selling a sealed “Nukie” tape, consumers are flocking to collectibles. And especially as content keeps getting yanked off streaming services.

“A man told us he found a sealed first release of ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’ at Goodwill,” Heritage specialist Jay Carlson, a collector who uses an Instagram account titled Rare and Sealed, told The New York Times. “He paid a quarter. That will probably go for $20,000.”

Carlson’s first auction in June 2022 profited more than half a million dollars.

Sias Odendaal and Michael Pakleppa's 1987 film "Nukie" is only remarkable for how undeniably terrible it is. Very clearly riding on the coattails of Steven Spielberg's "E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial," "Nukie" follows the adventures of the titular space alien as it crash lands in the African savannah and befriends two young brothers named Tiko and Toki (Siphiwe Mlangeni and Sipho Mlangeni). Much of the film is devoted to reuniting Nukie with his alien compatriot Miko (both played by Anthony Morrison) who crash-landed in the United States, and who is being held in a high-security military facility. The two aliens can communicate telepathically, and they repeatedly scream each other's names, perhaps inspiring rowdier audience members to join in.

"Nukie" has appeared on lists of the worst movies ever made, and is a largely miserable experience. Steve Railsback from "The Stunt Man" and "Lifeforce" appears, as does Glynnis Johns from "Mary Poppins.

The YouTube channel Red Letter Media proved how much nostalgic cult classic VHS tapes are worth.

Rlm, comprised of Mike Stoklasa, Jay Bauman, and Rich Evans, set out to capitalize on their massive fan-sent “Nukie” VHS collection to benefit charity. With 1.46 million subscribers, a Patreon page, and frequent celebrity guests like Jack Quaid, Macaulay Culkin, and Patton Oswalt, the Rlm film review founders opted to use their platform for philanthropy. After almost a decade of collecting VHS copies, the trio of hosts finally watched the 1987 South African sci-fi movie “Nukie” — the infamously bad “E.T.” knockoff about an alien who sets out to rescue his brother from evil researchers — and sold their best copy for upwards of 80,000 on eBay.

Host Stoklasa explained that the idea came from a recent sealed VHS copy of “Back to the Future” selling for 75,000 at auction, and the YouTubers were curious about what “Nukie” would garner.

Whether he’s passionately lauding his fellow filmmakers’ new movies, or enlightening the masses on how to create the perfect movie monster, Guillermo del Toro’s accessible and friendly social media presence has earned the director admiration for more than just his movies. As if his cuddly figure and supportive opinions weren’t enough to endear him to cinephiles, now he has a perfectly fitting new nickname: Guillermo del Totoro.

The name was coined by child actor Mana Ashida, who played young Mako (Rinko Kikuchi) in del Toro’s 2013 monster movie, “Pacific Rim.” Ashida, who is Japanese, could not pronounce del Toro’s name, so she asked if she could call him “Totoro-san,” as a reference to Studio Ghibli’s “My Neighbor Totoro.” Del Toro confirmed the story a few days ago on Twitter, solidifying his place as one of the nicest directors in show business.

Read More:‘Suspiria’ Rediscovered:...

There is no question that writer/director Guillermo Del Toro is adored by his fans and now we all have even more reason to admire the legendary filmmaker. Earlier this week, the director of The Shape Of Water confirmed something that allegedly happened on the set of his giant monster movie Pacific Rim.

Via Twitter, a fan asked Del Toro if he allowed one of his young cast members to address him "Totoro-san" similar to the cuddly anime forest spirit from the beloved Studio Ghibli film My Neighbor Totoro. Mana Ashida, who played the child version of Mako, had trouble pronouncing Del Toro’s name, so he gave her permission to call him that. The story has been floating around the internet for a while now, but Del Toro has officially confirmed it to be true.

@RealGDT is this true? I hope so because it's just lovely. pic.twitter.com...

Across three decades, 10 canonical titles and countless cinematic easter eggs, Metal Gear creator and celebrated Game Designer Hideo Kojima is a master of craft when it comes to layering intricate and complex narratives with fun moments of fan service.

So, when the opportunity presented itself for Kojima to be included in Star Wars: The Force Awakens, the auteur simply couldn’t resist. Granted, it’s a very, very minor shoutout, though we imagine that’s exactly the kind of nod Kojima-san would have wanted.

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Word comes by way of StarWars.com, publishing a list of the starry voice cast that brought some of the aliens to life in J.J. Abrams’ box office-shaking juggernaut. As such, while Daniel Craig’s Stormtropper and Simon Pegg’s cameo gained a lot of traction prior to The Force Awakens hitting theaters, it’s now time to shed light on...

Star Wars: The Force Awakens may be winding down at the box office but new secrets and details are continuing to emerge, seemingly every day.  The latest news to emerge is that J.J. Abrams snuck a sneaky reference to Hideo Kojima into the film.  During the opening confrontation between Poe Dameron and  Kylo Ren & The First Order on  Jakku, the sand alien who watches Bb-8 escape into the desert shouts Kojima.  This shout-out to Kojima seems to be a result of J.J. Abrams and Kojima meeting a few months back to discuss the latter's new video game company and presumably the possibility of a collaboration with Abrams' Bad Robot. As for Kevin Smith, it turns out that he actually had lines in the film (along with Sam Witwer, Dee Bradley Baker and Matthew Wood among other noticeable surprises).  Remember the stormtroopers who assault Maz Canata's castle on Takodana?  Smith's lone line,...

Konami

Hideo Kojima is one of the only game developers around who puts replayability to the forefront of the experience. There’s not been a single Metal Gear yet that made you feel as though you’d seen everything by the time the credits rolled, and Mgs V is the most robust and feature-packed yet, easily the best-playing entry so far.

From the open-world exploits you can indulge in with Venom Snake, to the smattering of memorable characters we’ll be analysing for years and a story that’s all over the place thanks to leaving many plot points on the cutting room floor, The Phantom Pain just begs to be lived in for weeks worth of game time, simply to ensure we’ve seen all there is.

So leave your own observations and secrets in the comments below, but not before you’ve seen the best little-known features fans have uncovered since release.

Outside of his gothic passion project, Crimson Peak director Guillermo del Toro struggled to garner much luck in 2015. Not only was Pacific Rim 2 shelved indefinitely, but the filmmaker’s collaboration with decorated video game developer Hideo Kojima for the now-canned Silent Hills reboot quickly unravelled after Kojima’s much-touted fallout with Konami.

As such, the passionate Mexican director is actively casting the net in search of a new project, and it appears del Toro has settled on his next venture: a remake of classic 60s sci-fi film Fantastic Voyage. That’s according to The Hollywood Reporter, noting that the celebrated filmmaker has opened talks to helm the modern retelling that’s in the works over at Twentieth Century Fox and Cameron’s Lightstorm Entertainment.

Negotiations are still in the early stages, though del Toro’s potential involvement would reunite the director with his Blade 2 screenwriter David Goyer, who has remained...

Welcome to The Recap for all the entertainment news you may have missed this week. So the big week is finally here and not only is the Force awake it's running wild like like a honey badger on espresso. How much money did the film make opening night? Star Trek showed us that their newest trailer and I hope you can see the influence of it's latest director. Who's in the front running to play the father of Peter Quill a.k.a Star Lord in the next Guardians of the Galaxy? Also Unravel a game we saw at E3 finally gives us a better look and Hideo Kojima is far from done with the world of video games.

Who's in the running to play Star Lord's Dad?

Star Trek is going Beyond

Unravel release date

Kojima is not done by a long shot

 

Star Wars Episode Viistar Trek: BEYONDKurt...

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Following Hideo Kojima's move to Sony, he talks about his new game, a possible movie, and his desire to work with Guillermo del Toro...

So after a very public parting of the ways from his old company Konami, Hideo Kojima has inked a deal with Sony that will see him produce an exclusive game for the PlayStation 4. This may mean that Kojima's involvement with the Metal Gear franchise is officially at an end, but it at least means we'll see what else he can come up with away from his enormously successful action stealth series.

At Sony, Kojima's set up a new iteration of his independent studio Kojima Productions, where he'll be joined by producer Kenichiro Imaizumi and artist Yoji Shinkawa - the genius behind Metal Gear's incredible artwork. But what will they make together? While specifics are currently being kept from public view, Kojima's...

Well, it’s now official – Hideo Kojima’s contract with Konami has officially expired. What’s next for the legendary games designer, you ask? How about a new studio and a PlayStation 4 exclusive? Yeah, wouldn’t that be nice.

As luck would have it, that’s exactly what’s happened. Along with the formation of his own independent studio – Kojima Productions – the Metal Gear series creator’s first new project will be a PlayStation 4 console exclusive title, that will, Sony says, come to PC at a later date.

Of the new position, Kojima said that:

I will be taking on a new challenge by establishing my own independent studio, and I am thrilled to be able to embark on this journey with PlayStation, who I have continued to work with all these past years. I cannot wait to deliver, with PlayStation, a game that will become a compelling franchise.

Sadly,...

Hideo Kojima may finally be free from Konami and he is already hard at work forming a new studio, and his first game may be a Sony title.

Japanese publication Nikkel has noted that Kojima is finally free from Konami. Initial reports suggested he was forming a studio alongside Sony, but instead he is forming a studio of his own. With that his first game with the new studio may be a Sony partnership as he is indeed in talks with Sony, but not for the studio itself.

The article also notes that many of the staff members the original Kojima Productions are making the jump with Kojima. This follows earlier reports of many of the staff leaving or being fired at the same time Kojima was stated to have left.

Kojima was tied to a "no compete" clause through December, which seems to be expired by now. He was...

The 2015 Game Awards, the second year of the successor to the Spike Video Game Awards, just wrapped in Los Angeles and it was "The Witcher 3: The Wild Hunt" that proved the bigger winner - taking home Game of the Year, RPG of the Year and Developer of the Year for CD Projekt Red.

Other winners of multiple awards included "Rocket League" for Best Independent Game and Best Sports/Racing Game, "Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain" for Best Action/Adventure and Best Score/Soundtrack, "Her Story" for Best Narrative and Best Performance, and "Splatoon" for Best Shooter and Best Multiplayer.

Single award winners included "Mortal Kombat X" for Best Fighting Game, "Super Mario Maker" for Best Family Game, "Lara Croft Go " for Best Mobile Game, "Ori and the Blind Forest" for Best Art Direction, and "Life Is Strange " for the Games for Change award.

"Counter-Strike: Global Offensive" was...

Set to go live a mere few days before Sony’s PlayStation Experience event, it’s been announced that The Game Awards 2015 will take place on Thursday, December 3 at 6pm Pt/9pm Et in Los Angeles.

Much like previous years, the gaming-centric event will feature “world premiere game trailers, game-inspired musical performances, and award presentations from the game industry’s biggest names.” Set to be hosted and produced once again by Geoff Keighley, here’s a brief teaser of what’s to come in little under a month’s time.

2015 has been a blockbuster year for gaming, and now, with the help of go90, we are going to take The Game Awards to the next level. This year we plan to put fans at the center of the show – and give them special opportunities to interact with us by using their gaming consoles, mobile devices and computers.

Celebrating the best...

A virtual reality showcase isn't worth its salt these days unless it's making you drench your headset with scare sweat. So as Capcom's Kitchen became the word of mouth hit of Los Angeles' E3 expo this past summer, at Paris Games Week that baton has been passed to Vrwerx's Paranormal Activity demo for Htc's Vive. And it's horrible.

Effectively the Pt Vr we wished Metal Gear creator Hideo Kojima and director Guillermo Del Toro had been given the opportunity to make – they could have called it 'Ptsd' – it simulates a very normal looking house where not so normal things happen as you make your way down corridors laden with flickering lights and jump scares.

Yet while doors crash close and windows shatter, it's the feeling of dread that's nailed, using Vive's central control circle to edge ever forward whilst standing. And edging is very much the word – at one point...

Buoyed by the impassioned response to the terrifying appetizer P.T., Kojima Productions was on course to overhaul one of gaming’s more illustrious franchises with Silent Hills. History has taught us that such a reboot will never materialize, with Konami opting to shut down the game early in development after it parted ways with esteemed Metal Gear developer Hideo Kojima.

It was a series of unfortunate events that even had Guillermo del Toro – originally attached to produce the horror reboot – proclaim that he would distance himself from the video game industry entirely out of fear that he would doom another nascent project. Now, a few months later, the filmmaker has touched base on Konami’s decision to pull the plug, why it made “no sense at all,” and even how Silent Hills bore some similarities to Naughty Dog’s adorned PlayStation exclusive The Last of Us.

Speaking with Bloody Disgusting,...

Konami

Since September 1st, Metal Gear fans of all affiliations have been getting well and truly stuck into one of the greatest games of all time, but it’s the accompanying online component (released a month later, GTA V-style) that truly makes you realise just what an incredibly well-designed experience it really is.

From the satisfying gun controls to the meaty and visceral melee attacks and hugely controversial ending, The Phantom Pain looks like it took so long to produce simply because there were so many elements to the base game that needed testing and refining. Now that Mgo’s finally out and the servers are holding steady in the face of a few thousand intrepid fans battering it mercilessly, it’s time to pick apart everything that makes up the game from all angles; analysing the best ways to win, items to procure, weapons to spec and tactics to use.

Konami

It goes without saying that Mgs V is easily the most overblown and ridiculous Metal Gear yet, one filled with a supremely divisive plot and all manner of out-of-time weaponry like teleportatng mech-hands and bipedal walking robots – but it’s also one of the most detailed entries in the franchise, which is a lot considering Mgs 2 once let you shoot an ice bucket and watch the cubes melt in real time.

Seriously, this is the series that made you look at the back of a real-world CD case to obtain a radio frequency, recognised if you were gawping at posters of scantily-clad women, let you starve guards in Mgs 3 by destroying food supplies, and even let you watch Sunny play a real PSP game in Mgs 4 during her idle animation.

On top of this, Mgs has always existed to twin an uber-serious military tone with the sensibility of Japanese slapstick comedy,...

With it winning the Golden Globe for Best Picture last night, Boyhood is easily the frontrunner for Best Picture at the Oscars. There is almost unanimous praise heaped on to this film. I am no different. It will be making my top ten of the year, in a fairly high position. However, people need to calm down about the movie. Boyhood, despite what some critics will tell you, is not the second coming. Well, the folks over at Red Letter Media (Mike Stoklasa, Jay Bauman, and Rich Evans, to be specific) were not the biggest fans of the film. So, on episode 76 of their show "Half in the Bag", which was the episode that followed their review of Boyhood, took the time for a pretty great response to people who loved it. Obviously, I disagree with their opinion of the film, but that does not mean their opinion is invalid.

Rich Evans does not actually provide the voice for Mr. Plinkett in his infamous video reviews, but he does play him in the Red Letter Media "Half In The Bag" review segments...with me so far? Anyway, it doesn't matter -- all you need to know is that he's a big Star Wars fan and this past Monday he just got the chance to sit down and watch the trailer for The Force Awakens for the very first time. This is a bit on the Nsfw side for language and, er....lewd gestures.

Mary Portas is launching a new series on Channel 4, which will involve her opening an employment agency for Over 65s.

Portas believes there is a business opportunity in tapping the resources of Britain's "overlooked and undervalued pensioners".

The press release from Channel states: "Many over 65s find themselves on the employment scrap heap simply because of their age. But that doesn't mean they've lost the skills and experience to cut it in the modern world, and if they ran their own business, they could work as long or as little as they liked."

Portas will encourage her "grey army", who can be aged from 65 to 105, to return to the workplace in anything from catering to building, childcare to beauty.

Currently under the working title Mary's Job for Life, the show will air on Channel 4 later this year.

Channel 4's commissioning editor Rich Evans said: "I can't wait...