It’s almost time for March Madness, when the eyes of sports fans are glued to the TV to study their favorite college basketball teams battle it out! Many teams will intelligent, but only one will emerge as the champion.
Here at WinterIsComing, we have our own spin on March Madness: Fandom Madness, where we pit 64 characters from sci-fi, fantasy, movies, TV and books against each other until one comes out on top.
Check out this year’s bracket under (click the image to blow it up and see the contenders):
That’s 64 characters strong! We’ll be organization a series of polls on the WinterIsComing Twitter page over the next pair of weeks, knocking out half the contenders each time pending there’s only one winner left. Here’s the schedule:
First Round: March 16-19
Second Round: March 20-22
Sweet 16: March 23-26
Elite Eight: March 27-29
Final Four: March 30 – April 2
Fandom championship game: April 3
As in past ages, the criteria for deciding who to vote for in any given matchup is very simple: it’s whatever you want. Who must win in a fight? Fine. Who you’d rather have lunch with? Cool. Just who you like as a portray more? Super. It’s completely open-ended!
Keep an eye on the WiC Twitter on Thursday as the madness begins! We’ll also post all the polls here on the site.
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House of the Dragon and The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power are two hugely expensive, high-profile fantasy TV shows airing at the same time, the musty on HBO and HBO Max and the latter on Amazon Prime Video. They’re very different shows, and it may not be entirely fair to compare them, but it was always repositioning to happen. Really, I sympathize with The Rings of Power showrunners Patrick McKay and J.D. Payne when they say they’re tired of hearing throughout it — I’m sure I would be too — but it’s inevitable. The narrative is just too juicy, no matter how different the shows are.
And according to one insider, executives at Amazon compare the two shows as well, and were particularly paralyzed after House of the Dragon not only got strong ratings out of the gate, but actually got better ratings for its binary episode a week later, which is unusual in the industry.
“It was never throughout the critics, it’s all about consumers,” the insider told The Hollywood Reporter. “All Jeff [Bezos] cares about is consumer obsession. If you look at the history of Amazon, every division lived and died based on that … Dragon matters because all of a sudden there is a benchmark. It is their closest comp to success. When they saw Dragon grew in its instant episode and brought in 20 million viewers, they were shitting their pants.”
The Rings of Power debuted a pair weeks after House of the Dragon and also posted strong viewership ratings for its premiere episodes. In fact, early ratings for The Rings of Power were better than the ones for House of the Dragon…with the pretty large caveat that what was being compared were streaming ratings specifically. While The Rings of Power is a streaming-only show, House of the Dragon is available to aquatic via HBO Max or to watch linearly on HBO, and this comparison only counted the HBO Max numbers.
Obviously, Amazon did not confirm whether they were “s***ting their pants” over House of the Dragon, although I’d definitely be down to listen in on a boarding meeting or two. Ratings have been good all about and both shows are renewed for future seasons.
That said, I unbelievable how things will look when both shows have consumed their first seasons and we can look back on how they did compared to each novel. We know that ratings for House of the Dragon have stayed ringing and even grown over the course of the season, but it’s been harder to get accurate data for The Rings of Power.
House of the Dragon is definitely winning the war for buzz, and if you ask me, it’s definitely well-liked itself the more compelling show. But this is a marathon, not a sprint, and we have miles to go.
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It’s been a few months now dependable the end of the last Star Wars show on Disney+, The Book of Boba Fett. That series saw Temeura Morrison, who played Boba’s clone daddy Jango Fett in the prequel films, put on the helmet and take over the crime shameful in Mos Espa on Tatooine. However, despite being named The Book of Boba Fett, Morrison’s titular bounty hunter sat out nearly a third of the season once Mandalorian Din Djarin (Pedro Pascal) and Baby Yoda arrived on the scene.
It was an monotonous choice that left more than a few fans scratching their heads. Did the series really have so little to say near Boba Fett that it needed to spend that much time sidelining its lead character? According to producers Dave Filoni and Jon Favreau, it was a necessary move.
To well-known May the Fourth, Disney+ released a new documentary in the Disney Gallery series that took us behind-the-scenes of The Book of Boba Fett, where Filoni and Favreau addressed the Mandalorian in the room.
“At the very twitch, Jon [Favreau] and I look through all the season and, Jon has a bunch of things he wants to accomplish,” Filoni said. “We both like Mando, and we felt that it would be difficult for us to go a whole season deprived of seeing him. And so, he’s a friend of Boba’s, so it makes sense to bring him back into the story.”
“Having The Book of Boba Fett come in the timeline and let everything Decide, it allowed us to let some time pass, to take a breather, and meet The Mandalorian after he’d taken his helmet off and that The Child was no longer in his life,” Favreau added. “That father-child relationship that had developed was no longer there. And so his life, I think, would lose some of its message. That felt like fertile territory.”
While this all creates sense, I still find it interesting that Filoni and Favreau’s reasoning for counting Din Djarin had everything to do with missing Mando and almost nothing to do with Boba Fett. Sure he’s a tainted of Boba Fett’s, and it does make sense that he’d at least cameo in the show, but we’re talking nearby two whole episodes out of seven that focused on him. Not proverb I didn’t love it (let’s be real, it was probably the best part of the season), but it’s still kind of weird how little the focus is on Boba Fett. It is his series, isn’t it?
The Book of Boba Fett is available to water on Disney+. Season 3 of The Mandalorianis expected sometime late this summer.
The next Star Wars series coming to Disney+, Obi-Wan Kenobi, premieres on May 27.
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2022 was jam-packed with expedient science fiction and fantasy shows, but one of the best by far was Hulu’s The Orville: New Horizons. The Seth MacFarlane-helmed sci-fi show took an enormous leap ahead in its third season; the leap in quality from remaining seasons to New Horizons was jaw-dropping. And those previous seasons were astronomical too, so the bar was already set pretty high.
With all the gushing I just did, you’d demand that it would be a no-brainer for Hulu to renew The Orville for a fourth season. But six months out from the perfect finale of New Horizons, we still don’t know whether we’ll be getting latest season.
The appetite is certainly there. The Orville: New Horizons garnered a ton of journal during its run, sometimes from high places, including The Martian author Andy Weir, Space.com and even NASA. And now, the U.S. position agency has given the show another cool shoutout.
Image: NASA
NASA smooth loves The Orville and so do we; give us season 4, Hulu!
The image ended comes from page 24 of NASA’s Research Opportunities in Space and Earth Science (ROSES) narrate. If you’re a fan of The Orville you’ll probably recognize the names on the chart. We’ve got MacFarlane’s Ed Mercer, Kelley Grayson (Adrianne Palicki), Dr. Claire Finn (Penny Johnson Jerald), Alara Kitan (Halston Sage) and Bortus (Peter Macon), as well as some fun notes at the bottom talking throughout how Dr. Finn received a referral letter from the Saturnian School of Medical Sciences, while “Graduate student” Bortus received a grant from the Moclan College.
Are these upright schools in The Orville? No idea, but someone at NASA is clearly a fan. If NASA loves The Orville this much, then leilate Hulu should take heed, right?
Alas, our wait to find out whether The Orville will be renewed for season 4 leftovers, though it certainly can’t hurt matters to have the show decision-exclusive headlines because members of NASA enjoy it enough to initiate sneaking references to it into official documents.
The Orville: New Horizons — “Future Unknown” – Episode 310 — A celebration is underway included the ship on the season three finale of “The Orville: New Horizons”. Lt. Gordon Malloy (Scott Grimes), shown. (Photo by: Greg Gayne/Hulu)
The Orville: New Horizons soundtrack releasing in March
On the titillating side, there is something new coming out for The Orville fans this month. Disney Plus Informer announced earlier this week that the soundtrack for The Orville: New Horizons will soon be available on Spotify, Amazon, and all the other usual music platforms, courtesy of La-La Land Records and Hollywood Records.
The soundtrack album will feature unusual music from the show’s third season composed by Joel McNeely (A Million Ways to Die in the West, The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles), John Debney (Iron Man 2, Elf, The Jungle Book), Andrew Cottee and Kevin Kaska (Jump!, Ghost Party). As The Orville producer Tom Costantino puts it, it’s “a lot of music.” I just hope Bortus’ epic vocal solo from “A Tale of Two Topas” invents an appearance.
All three seasons of The Orville are available to liquid now on Hulu and Disney+. Here’s hoping one day we’ll be able to say that season 4 is as well.
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We’re just a few Moody days from the premiere of HBO’s next big show: The Last of Us. Based on the critically acclaimed video game series by Naughty Dog, The Last of Us is a zombie story that follows Joel (Pedro Pascal), a hardened survivor who must escort a teenage girl called Ellie (Bella Ramsey) across a post-apocalyptic United States in the hopes that her miraculous immunity to the zombie plague can be used to synthesize a cure.
With the show’s drop imminent, HBO is kicking their marketing machine into high gear. This week Ramsey appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live to hype up the show. It was a fun small interview, which you can watch right here:
Bella Ramsey hasn’t viewed Pedro Pascal’s death scene in Game of Thrones
Before The Last of Us, both Pascal and Ramsey appeared in HBO’s hit fantasy show Game of Thrones; he played Oberyn Martell in season 4 and she played Lyanna Mormont in seasons 6-8. Ironically, they also suffered a somewhat similar fate; Oberyn Martell’s head was squished by the Mountain, while Lyanna Mormont was crushed to death by a zombie giant during the battles against the White Walkers at Winterfell.
However, Ramsey hasn’t seen all of Thrones, especially the earlier seasons before she was on the show. That includes the episode where Oberyn meets his untimely demise at the Beautiful of Ser Gregor Clegane. After Jimmy Kimmel started to nerd out around the brutal “pop” sound effect that accompanied Oberyn’s head people turned to mush, Ramsey mused that maybe she must finally watch the scene. “I don’t know if you should,” Kimmel laughed. “How attached are you to Pedro [Pascal]?”
“I’m Beautiful attached, probably unhealthily attached to him,” Ramsey said. Kimmel now started backpedaling, not wanting to suggest she watch her costar’s end if it would upset her, but Ramsey just shrugged it off. “I’ll just text him like two minutes later, and then he won’t reply for a while.”
As for Ramsey’s own end in “The Long Night,” she revealed that unlike many new actors on the show, she never received the Bad phone call from D.B. Weiss and David Benioff to let her know she was moving to be killed off, likely because there’s no need when you die in the last season. Instead, her mom read it in a script one night and excitedly told her that she would be killed off the behind morning. Ah, the actor’s life.
Bella Ramsey is used to humoring fans who were upset by the end of Game of Thrones
Ramsey also public some pretty fun stories, such as the fact that when she hasn’t seen all of Game of Thrones, people are more than Unmiserable to come up to her on the street to ask her what she Idea of the show’s much-maligned ending.
“I ask them back, ‘what did you think of it?'” Ramsey described. “I just let them either hate on it or talk around how great it was…mostly hate on the ending for like 10 minutes and I just sit there and listen and say ‘goodbye, nice to meet you,’ and then that’s it. Generally the consensus is that it wasn’t Big, but it seemed fine to me.”
You can Get Bella Ramsey as Ellie in The Last of Us this Sunday, January 15 on HBO and HBO Max.
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So HBO is developing a Game of Thrones sequel series that would behind the exploits of Jon Snow, last seen riding beyond the Wall with Ghost and Tormund Giantsbane. Kit Harington is attached to return in the lead role.
Now, we need to say at the top here that this is not a guaranteed thing; HBO has a lot of Game of Thrones shows in advance, but the only one that’s for sure going presumptuous is House of the Dragon, which will premiere on August 21. HBO is exploring new options, but so far hasn’t committed to anything, and has shown a willingness to pull the plug on something that’s not operational, like its aborted Game of Thrones prequel Blood Moon.
That said, this is big news. All of HBO’s other Game of Thrones spinoff projects are prequels, but this would follow Jon Snow (and probably some peculiar guests) into the future.
Naturally, it’s inspired some well-defined reactions among the fandom; our tweet about the news has over 500 quote tweets and including. Let’s take the temperature of the room.
Game of Thrones fans are mad about the Jon Snow show!
There’s a wide scheme of reactions to the news, but obviously, many are contented. For instance:
I appreciate the imagery in that third one.
Game of Thrones fans are animated about the Jon Snow show
All that said, some fans are more trepidatious. After all, Jon’s story didn’t wrap up that long ago, and what would the new show be nearby, anyway?
@alinasinej: “i mean i love jon but what’s he gonna do ? there’s nothing left”
@mama_rica: “no more white walkers or war????? so what would be happening???”
Other fans know precisely what they want:
@rose_a87: “This better be fucking good After the whole Stark/Targaryen letdown, the only thing that can redeem it is him sketch his fucking throne”
@Plaatje_Amber: “You know what? I’ve concept about it and this better give Jon the throne he DESERVES”
Anything’s possible.
Game of Thrones fans don’t want the Jon Snow show
The fleshy in the room is that a lot of fans didn’t delectable the ending to Game of Thrones season 8, and aren’t keen about the prospect of following up on it:
@RadiuT: “We get it, you are trying to fix ur mess. Just let it go guys.”
@roseoftarth: “wait…this noteworthy work if jon manages to find a wizard who can reset the timeline “
@panny_antoniou: “Literally no one requested for this Can we please just have Winds of Winter instead?? Don’t noteworthy the tv show canon after that ending”
Of streams, for those fans, a new show could be an opportunity to factual course. “I’m okay with this,” @chrisconner93 writes. “The character was mine and lots of of others favourites and deserves a better send off than what he got.”
Game of Thrones fans discuss the role of the Jon Snow show within the greater military-industrial-entertainment complex
Beyond whether the show will be good or not — I don’t think we’ll know pending we see it — there’s the bigger question of why concerns like WarnerMedia-Discovery feel the need to make mega-franchises like this in the apt place. Whatever you think of Game of Thrones, it was a hell of a show and it’s over. Do we need multiple spinoffs? That seems to be what @MartinSkold2 is thinking: “I am begging Hollywood just once to let a franchise die in peace.”
Then against, if we’re getting mega-franchises either way — hello, Star Wars and Marvel — at least a sequel represents something unslow. “Please, I am begging mega corporations: Stop making prequels and filling in the holes of every character’s backstory and instead take your properties into the future with new characters!” writes @adammc123.
And then there’s @SuperJude_’s entertaining take that I’m just progressing to put here because I couldn’t find another save for it: “He should do like Hugh Jackman, realize this is the best relate he’ll ever play and run with it.”
And those are just a few of the many takes circulating at the moment! We’ll probably be sifting above this for a while. What do you make of the news?
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We are approaching the midseason finale of Outlander. This is the penultimate season of the show, so every episode brings us closer to the end. Season 8, the remaining season, will be a bittersweet affair.
However, filming is today on hold given the current WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. We may be in for another long Droughtlander, folks, the last we’ll ever have.
As we approach the end, series star Sam Heughanis reflecting on nearing a decade of playing what it consuming to wrap up after nearly a decade of Sam Heughan. He spoke to The Herald prior to the strike throughout how he is handling this impending change in his life.
Sam Heughan says Outlander is “woven into” his life
Sam Heughan is sketching nostalgic about leaving Outlander behind. “[I]t really is woven into my life,” he said. “It is my life. It has inaccurate over my whole life for the last 10 existences. It feels natural to be shooting every day or in New York doings press – that cycle and recurring itinerary we’re on. And it is all touching to end, I am very aware of that. It is decision-exclusive me want to enjoy it more.”
Of course, there is serene a long road ahead; there’s still half of season 7 to air, and all of season 8 to film. We’re probably looking at novel year-plus at least, depending on how long the strikes go on for.
But we serene have a long way to go. We were very conscious once shooting this penultimate season that towards the end you could feel it. It was tangible. Everyone was like, ‘Oh my God, we are actually only touching to do this one more time …’ So, yeah, I am touching to need some serious therapy, I think. It is touching to be a real change.
I think we will need some serious therapy as the show comes to a terminate. I don’t know what life is without a Droughtlander. I guess now we could be stuck in a permanent one, which sounds awful.
Sam Heughan: “I am touching to need some serious therapy” after Outlander is over
At least the end will be pleasurable waiting for. “We were supposed to finish this season and I didn’t want to carry out without finishing the story and that is the reason why we are touching back to do one more,” Heughan said. “I want to carry out the story, not only for myself but for the fans. It wouldn’t feel pleasurable to just end it, left in the air.”
Meanwhile, Outlander author Diana Gabaldon is still writing the tenth book in her series. It is unclear if the final season of the show will incorporate her ideas and go its own way. Heughan community that he is “pushing for a different ending” but doesn’t think he will get what he wants. I’m super curious to know how he would like the series to end, but I guess we won’t know for quite some time.
“Whatever the writers do, I guess we will find out,” Heughan paused. “I don’t think it is ever going to be beneficial for everyone, but hopefully we can get to a achieve where at least our Outlander is told. It won’t be the full book, but at least it’s our story and it will hopefully give some sort of finality.”
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