A Golden Crown Oh Viserys, it was always inevitable wasn’t it? If you must insist on threatening your sister, it’s probably best not to do it in front of her man-mountain of a husband, who has been drinking. Everyone knows that if you threaten a Dothraki’s wife, as well as his unborn child, bad things will happen to you. Granted, you might have thought you had an ace up your sleeve, thanks to the fact that no blood is allowed to be spilt in the Dothraki capital....

Release Date: October 11, 2016Platform: XBO (reviewed), PCDeveloper: The CoalitionPublisher: Microsoft StudiosGenre: Third-person Shooter Gears of War 4‘s main ingredient is nostalgia. From the opening prologue, which not only introduces newcomers to the series’ combat mechanics but also revisits much of Sera’s war-torn history, it’s apparent that the game will spend a lot of time looking back. Developer The Coalition isn’t as concerned with reinventing the wheel or creating something fresh for Gears of War 4 as it is returning the franchise to its roots....

This week, we’re handing this column over to the brilliant Louisa Booth (she’s @louisabooth on Twitter). Louisa’s story has since taken a happier turn, but her first pregnancy ended in miscarriage. She’s written a few words about how she and her husband got through such a brutally difficult time… But the next day always has a shadow. I have been pregnant twice in my life and now I’m a mother to a wonderful daughter....

This week, we’re handing over to the mighty Craig Thomas, who wants a chat about unemployment… Then there’s the social stigma and emotional pressure that emanates, intentionally or not, from every angle (friends, family, Job Centre, but most of all, yourself), not to mention the isolation and loneliness that can result. All of which gets worse as time goes on, making finding a job feel ever more daunting and impossible....

Hospitals can be scary, lonely, boring places, with slow moving days, leading to what can be a troubling environment for children. Gaming can be a great icebreaker. Whether played online, or with friends, games help connect people and have been shown to aid in pain management. I experienced this as a shy child on the ward, when kicking ass at Tekken 3 made the bigger kids my friends! That’s the kind of interaction Get-Well Gamers aims to foster....

Girls Season 5 Episode 3 Girls is not just a sitcom. It’s a dramedy, I suppose, but that word feels reductive for what this show can accomplish when at its best. It’s a show that isn’t (or at least wasn’t) afraid to wildly change tone and the darkness it sometimes indulges in when it’s not being funny. That is what initially drew me to the show and made it a regularly exciting watch....

2.19 Azrael When this episode worked, it really worked. For example, the shot of David Mazouz’s young Bruce Wayne looking up at Azrael in awe truly hit the right notes, and felt like a natural step in the inception of the Batman. That tableau of Azrael looming large atop the Gotham bridge at the end of the episode had a similar effectiveness, as did the moment when he smashed through a window at the GCPD....

We’ve heard precious little since, but now some new details have emerged from the original film’s director, Tommy Wirkola, who also directed the cult horror hit Dead Snow. Wirkola went on to outline his new position in the series’ development. “I will be involved in that whole process, andI will direct the pilot, so I think it’s very exciting, it’s an idea that really suits television, just the nature of it, in that world you can really go to a lot of different places and have fun with it, so it’s exciting, we’re writing a pilot right now and we’re having fun with it....

Hap and Leonard Season 2 Episode 4 To talk again in this space about Hap and Leonard’s friendship would be to beat a dead horse. And yet, SundanceTV’s wonderful show goes out of its way to remind us of the bond these two men share. This is not a bad thing. Their mutual, unconditional love is the backbone of this raw and gritty series. The worse things get for the pair, the more resolute they become in their support of one another....

So far, Image Comics has released two of the four books in the series, with number 3 slated for release December 5 and number 4 releasing December 19. This new series is definitely a unique concept; a maniac foul-mouthed ex-cop has a near death experience after a hit gone wrong and now thinks he is hallucinating and sees a small flying blue horse with wings named Happy. Happy says that he is on a mission to rescue a little girl and only Nick can help him....

Hard Sun Episode 1 With our world inching daily closer towards a mass extinction event, a show about Earth being slapped with an imminent expiry date should probably feel like gritty realism rather than escapism. Hard Sun doesn’t, though. It’s impeccably escapist, because it isn’t set in the real world but in the decidedly more exciting world of the action thriller. That means there’s an explosion and a punch-up and an international conspiracy every ten minutes, making it exactly the thing with which to fill your eyes in the drizzly, grey month of January....

I must admit that I was a little behind in my viewing. No big deal, some hot DVR binge watching would catch me up. Only, when I started Episode 11, I thought I must have missed an Episode 10.5. What the heck is going on at Arctic Biosystems? What the heck is going on in the writer’s room? The plot had gotten so disjointed that I felt like I was watching a completely different show....

1.10 11.53 To Odessa At the centre of the action this week is the concept of the ‘time bridge’, Renautas’ method of saving a portion of humanity from global catastrophe by relocating them to the future. The idea is a classic, if unoriginal, sci-fi trope and the question of who gets saved and who doesn’t is the reasonably compelling moral dilemma at the heart of Heroes Reborn’s final set of episodes and the conundrum that continues to divide the characters....

The new Hitman movie doesn’t do that. In the inevitable push to be a mainstream movie franchise – yep, there’s a mid-credits sting setting up a future film – it more than edges away from those margins, and ups the action ante. Not quite to the extent that the gunfire-filled trailer hinted, but still enough for at least a few people to cry sacrilege. Arguably rightly. Hitman: Agent 47 does have many of the modern hallmarks of the modern action film, mind....

“From A to B and Back Again” served as a 50-minute con job of tracking Aayan to his fateful meeting with Saul Berenson. There were other subplots—one particularly bad one involving the ambassador’s husband—but it was all about causing Aayan to go running to their target. This was actually executed in a wickedly cruel sequence where Carrie stages a Pakistani intelligence attack on her safe house, tricking the young man and the audience simultaneously....

Homeland Season 7 Episode 2 When last week pinned the seeming fate of the republic on Carrie Mathison’s shoulders, I for one did not see that turn season 7 would take in its second episode. Carrie—already being dubiously questioned as “crazy”—ended up on one of the most perverse and unexpected narrative tangents this side of Stranger Things Season 2: While trying to prove that the White House Chief of Staff was in on the covert murder of the lead conspirator against President Keane, Carrie wound up getting molested and almost raped by an internet troll who she then beat within an inch of his worthless life....

Terry Deary’s famous books were an obvious choice for a CBBC adaptation, but it was a bold choice to assemble a writing team and cast known for their work in the adult comedy world to bring his historical books to life. What resulted were record ratings, a loyal audience of children and adults alike, live BBC performances and television awards aplenty. Horrible Histories is a show that respects the intelligence of its young audience....

There’s a supporting character whose role I think is an interesting one, as well, because—though he goes through a journey of growth—he remains a secondary character. This is Agent Ross, one of the two Americans, and one of the two white characters, in the film. What is an ally? While in the MCU, talking about an ally could be discussing whether you’re on #TeamCap or #TeamIronMan, in this case, I’m working with the real-world term as I understand it....

When it comes to callbacks and continuity from one season to the next, Rick and Morty co-creators Roiland and Harmon play the larger mysteries of the universe close to the vest and let past ideas and themes return only if it naturally fits the story they’re telling. The fact that fans almost immediately cling to anything new from the show (Roiland cited people are already yelling “Pickle Rick,” a two-second thing from a season three trailer as an example) gives them some cover to move the show forward without constantly looking back on what worked in previous seasons....