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The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf review: Essential non-required viewing

Premieres on August 23

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Whenever a piece of fiction gets adapted to either the small or big screen, one of the biggest worries that fans have is how much the adaptation strays from the original work. For some, like Fight Club and The Shining, adaptations can become an independent work of art on their own. For another group, like the highly controversial Game of Thrones, adaptations can sour how fans perceive the original work.

When Netflix’s The Witcher came out, fans from the book series and the games held their breath at the Henry Cavill-led series. Fortunately, the series took off and created more fans for the dark fantasy series.

Now that the first season proved how popular the series can be, showrunner Lauren Schmidt Hissrich is pushing the series to even greater heights. Besides the second season, the series is also getting a spinoff anime film, The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf, featuring series main character Geralt of Rivia’s father figure Vesemir. Of course, spinoffs tend to raise the most eyebrows since they are usually made from their own original stories.

Given that Nightmare of the Wolf is a spin-off, will it expand the series further or end up as non-required viewing for fans?

What happened before The Witcher?

The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf follows the adventures of a young witcher named Vesemir. As old fans of the series might have deduced, Vesemir was the older witcher who raised Geralt in their fortress Kaer Morhen.

The film is set well before Geralt’s time as a witcher. It shows how Vesemir became a witcher and how witchers were perceived in the past. By nature, witchers are monster hunters who work for coin. However, because of a strange new monster, Vesemir has to reevaluate how he hunts monsters amid political strife between human, monsters, sorceresses, and witchers.

Witcher’s got a brand-new style

As opposed to the previous titles (books and games included), Nightmare of the Wolf is done in an anime style. The franchise is often known for its realistic dark fantasy themes. Anime is a new frontier for the franchise.

Of course, anime might not be the first thing you’d associate with the franchise. It was certainly an eyebrow-raiser when they announced the style.

Nonetheless, the film’s animation brings out the horrors of the world potentially more than what the live action series can bring out. Anime allows the film to exceed the usual constraints of 3D visual effects. Nightmare of the Wolf is deliciously bloody. It’s what you would expect a Witcher title to look like.

A clever take on the lore

Despite creating a new story for the film, Nightmare of the Wolf is an excellent addition to the series’ lore. It adds to the story without changing any of the main canonical lore. If anything, the film adds more character to Vesemir beyond what we know from the books and the games.

Besides the story, the film adds in a lot of new elements and monsters to the world. For one, it introduces a grappling hook device that Vesemir uses to either get around or fight monsters with. Without spoiling how they came to be, the film’s clever take on introducing new monsters goes beyond the Conjunction of the Spheres or the in-world event that describes how monsters took over the world.

Figuring out the why

Undoubtedly, Nightmare of the Wolf is a very capable title able to hold its own amid the sprawling Witcher universe. However, it’s still important to figure out why the film exists in the first place. Was it made to be its own thing or to drum up hype for the second season of the live-action series?

It’s safe to say that it’s both. The anime film isn’t exactly required viewing if you’re a fan of the series. However, it does add a lot of worldbuilding to the lore. Nightmare of the Wolf fleshes out the world of the witchers to an amazing extent. Even if the film stands on its own right now, the producers can effectively use the new concepts from this film into future titles.

Though you might want to skip it, it’s probably best to watch it especially if you’re a Witcher fan.

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The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf premieres globally on Netflix on August 23.

Entertainment

Transformers One trailer: Get to know Optimus Prime, Megatron’s origin stories

In cinemas September 18

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Transformers One

Paramount Pictures has released the trailer for Transformers One, the upcoming latest installment of the Transformers film franchise.

Before fans get excited for the Transformers and G.I. Joe crossover, this animated film focuses first on Optimus Prime’s relationship with his adversary, Megatron.

The origin story is set in Cybertron, long before the transformers land on earth in the chronological timeline.

The trailer reveals Optimus Prime’s previous name, Orion Pax. On the other hand, Megatron was previously known by D-16.

Joined by Elita-1 and Bumblebee, the two main protagonists journey to Cybertron’s surface, which hasn’t been explored beforehand due to the dangers it is said to have.

On the surface, the crew realizes that right away, but are bestowed the power to transform. After some figuring, they manage to utilize this ability to defend Cybertron from intruders.

Overall, the three-minute trailer gives a lighter and funnier vibe. That’s in contrast to the previous iterations where the story is more serious from the get-go.

The transformers’ appearance also looks simpler and more toned down, giving an old school feel which is appropriate, considering this movie is set an earlier time when Cybertron was more intact.

Transformers One is showing on Philippine cinemas on September 18. The voice cast includes Chris Hemsworth as Optimus Prime, Brian Tyree Henry as Megatron, Keegan-Michael Key as Bumblebee, and Scarlett Johansson.

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Joker: Folie à Deux 1st trailer finally released

The world is a stage

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Joker Folie a Deux

Warner Bros. Pictures has finally released the first trailer for upcoming musical thriller Joker: Folie à Deux. The two-and-a-half minute trailer debuted at CinemaCon. The Todd Phillips masterpiece will hit the big screens in the Philippines on October 2.

Phillips’ own take on a story loosely based from famed characters from DC, Joker: Folie à Deux was originally intended to be standalone film given that it is a musical. However, it eventually became a sequel to the Academy Award-winning Joker movie from 2019. The short clip shows titular lead actor Joaquin Phoenix and, for the first time, Lady Gaga.

Joker Folie a Deux

The trailer aptly starts with Phoenix’s Arthur Fleck character in solitary confinement inside Arkham. If you can recall, the end of the 2019 movie showed the Joker walking with bloodied footprints. This means he presumably killed the therapist he was trying to tell a joke to.

Inside the asylum, Joker meets Gaga’s character Harley Quinn. This is one of the obvious changes to the iconic DC character’s origin story. The movie depicts Quinn as Joker’s fellow patient, instead of being a psychiatrist in the asylum who eventually falls in love and helps her partner in crime escape. The clip eventually transitions to the two protagonists dancing in the streets. Hal David’s “What the World Needs Now Is Love” plays along.

Joker Folie a Deux

Towards the end, Gaga then dons a red blazer with black-and-white diamond checkered top inside. It’s nowhere near the classic Harley Quinn jester costume that Margot Robbie once put on in the first Suicide Squad installment, but it’s obvious that the getup somehow takes some of those elements.

The trailer concludes with Harley Quinn telling Joker, “I wanna see the real you” as she draws the latter’s signature red lips on a glass divider separating the two. It can definitely mean that Fleck is incarcerated for that particular scene, and it could be the scene that jumpstarts the escape from Arkham. Who knows? We can only wait until October to find out.

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Fallout on Prime Video: What inspired producers to create series

From video game to TV series

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Prime Video-exclusive series Fallout is finally streaming next week. Based from the popular video game franchise that has spanned decades, Fallout is set in a post-apocalyptic wasteland world. It is quite reminiscent of the video games’ original environment that is damaged by nuclear war.

If you need quick refresher, Prime Video released the series’ official trailer a month ago. READ: New Fallout trailer dwells upon The Ghoul, brotherhood, more

So, what inspired the producers to come up with the sci-fi adaptation? According to Jonathan Nolan, who directed the first three episodes, the Fallout 3 game became his “entry point.”

“It’s dark, violent, but it’s also satirical and in some places almost goofy. It’s all these amazing things in one. I’ve never really experienced anything quite like it,” Nolan shared.

Bethesda’s 2008 action RPG was the third installment in the main Fallout video game series. The game featured the Great War of 2077, the several underground bunkers called vaults, and a vast wasteland set particularly in Eastern United States. Based on the trailers alone, the creators have worked with these elements for the series version.

Ten years after coming across the title, Nolan then met with Fallout 3 developer Todd Howard to explore the possibility of a TV series. Howard mentioned how Nolan played the game dedicatedly, and that the latter was “in sync” with what he was thinking.

Nolan’s vision led to the recruitment of the series’ two other directors: Geneva Robertson-Dworet and Graham Wagner. The creative trio crafted an original narrative within the Fallout universe that was consistent with the game’s storyline.

Robertson-Dworet added: “We’re not just adapting a game; we’re crafting a new story that delves deep into the complexities of humanity post-nuclear apocalypse.”

The Fallout series begins with a nuclear apocalypse, then a 219-year jump into the future – where life underground offers comfort and order, while the surface is a battleground for survival.

The series stars Ella Purnell as Lucy, Aaron Moten as Maximus, and Walton Goggins as The Ghoul, among others. Fallout premieres on April 11.

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