Marvel's Luke Cage: Episode 6 Review

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Is this the end? Not quite.

By Terri Schwartz

Full spoilers for Marvel's Luke Cage continue below.

Luke Cage set out to arrest Cottonmouth, and he did exactly that less than halfway through Season 1. When we entered this season, it seemed like Cornell Stokes would be Luke's primary antagonist, even with the breadcrumbs scattered about Diamondback. But he's been so consistently ineffective, it seems like he must just be an opening act for whoever the real threat to Harlem is going to be. (RIP, Scarfe.) Will it be Diamondback? Or could it be that Mariah is going to finally step from the shadows and continue Mama Mabel's legacy?

Though she's been delivering a fantastic performance all season, this was Alfre Woodard's standout episode. Everything else felt like set up for seeing the multi-faceted and angry person trying to do right by Harlem. That's what's most compelling about her; she really does want to do right by her town, but by any means necessary. She is the hero of her story, and people like the reporter trying to pull back the curtain on her criminal inclinations are the villains. Because of that she'll fight tooth and nail to get what's hers, and now her reputation is in tatters she's ready to fight dirty.

Marvel's Luke Cage has done a great job folding in the events of the other Netflix shows and the larger MCU, and this episode underlines in. We open with a Trish Talk (!!!) voiceover, using Trish Walker to offer some insight into how New York City as a whole is viewing Luke's exploits. Claire Temple's interactions with Luke in Marvel's Jessica Jones are a key jumping off point for their relationship here and going forward. The parallels between Cottonmouth and Wilson Fisk prove to be a major problem for Misty Knight and the Harlem police department. This is larger world building done well, showing how each standalone series can enrich the other as we explore the street-level heroes.

And Luke Cage defines that terminology well. He's never afraid to go to a coffee shop, or walk the streets of Harlem, or do anything that a normal person would do. Part of that ties back to his ongoing identity crisis where he doesn't consider himself special -- something that's getting a little old, six episodes into his standalone superhero series -- but it is striking. Matt Murdock isn't out as Daredevil, so he still walks the street as a different person. Jessica Jones never broadcast her superhero abilities. But Harlem knows Luke Cage is the bulletproof man, and he doesn't set himself apart from the people he protects. It's an interesting dynamic, and one that feels fresh considering how many superhero projects are in the mix.

While this episode had some really great action set pieces, it was the scene where Mariah and Luke stood on the street in a rare unmonitored moment and Luke essentially said "I'm going to stop you" that stood out in "Suckas Need Bodyguards." As Cottonmouth became more and more neutered and one dimensional in each episode, Mariah has become a more interesting threat. Neither side is hiding from one another. And Mariah is probably more likely to find a way to debilitate and eventually kill Luke than her cousin is; poison and drowning seem like likelier options than expensive and rare explosive bullets.

Regardless, now with Cottonmouth behind bars and Mariah's reputation ruined, this feels like an oddly clean capstone on this part of Luke's story. Cliffhangers do enhance the binge-watching experience, making you want to click on to the next episode because you just can't wait to happen next, so I'm curious why showrunner Cheo Coker chose to wrap this up so succinctly when we're only on episode 6. Yes, there's Misty trying to change the perception of the police department and yes, there's an angry, vengeful Mariah to contend with, but Luke saying, "Cool, think I'm done here" doesn't exactly beg you to immediately click on to find out what happens next. Fortunately we're all going to do exactly that anyway, so here's to discovering what episode 7 has in store.

The Verdict

"Suckas Need Bodyguards" was a great episode of Marvel's Luke Cage, but the fact that it left few narrative ties to keep the story pushing forward did diminish the momentum the show's built up so far this season. Cottonmouth is defeated, Mariah's reputation is ruined, Scarfe is dead and the dirty side of the police department has been outed. Now Luke is looking to find some new ground to figure out whether he is special or not (spoiler, Luke: you are) and Claire is still trying to convince him to let her help him. Knowing there are seven more episodes to go this season is the biggest incentive to keep us plunging on ahead.

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Marvel's Luke Cage: Episode 5 Review

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A hero in the open.

By Terri Schwartz

Full spoilers for Marvel's Luke Cage's fifth episode continues below.

Finally, we're getting to the good stuff. All of the best parts of Marvel's Luke Cage came together in its fifth episode, as Luke stood up as a hero and fought for the sake of Harlem. Like Daredevil was about saving Hell's Kitchen, so Luke Cage is simply about Luke standing up for the people of Harlem. Here, there's no confusing the two sides of this battle. Luke and Cornell Stokes are not only aware of one another, but the people of Hell's Kitchen are aware that there are two sides to this fight.

The bulk of this episode featured Cottonmouth trying to turn the people against Luke, and within an episode our hero was -- seemingly -- able to win them over. Luke's big coming out party at the end of the last episode let the people of Harlem now know to come to him when they have an issue. Cottonmouth's big plan was to send them all running to him and have him disappoint them, which didn't work out quite the way he planned.

Cottonmouth is spiraling pretty quickly this season, which seems like it's just paving the way for Diamondback to show up and set things right. As a big bad, Cornell Stokes seems to be pretty ineffective; he's compelling as a character, but beyond the first few episodes lost a lot of his bite. His relationship with Shades has become pretty interesting, especially now that Shades knows Luke Cage = Carl Lucas, but this episode really underlined how the power dynamic has shifted to Luke being the one with the upper hand. Now Cottonmouth knows about the bullets that work on superheroes, but even that doesn't seem like a big enough McGuffin to make us concerned for Luke.

Claire Temple finally showed up more than a third of the way into Season 1. While Misty Knight is a compelling enough leading lady all on her own, it's welcome to have Claire back in the mix. Her big revelation to her mother in this episode is that she wants to be a nurse for powered people, like she was with Matt Murdoch and, previously, Luke.

Luke Cage: Season 1 does a much better job with picking up her story in the aftermath of Daredevil than it did carrying over Luke's from Jessica Jones, and you can feel how the Hand's attack on the hospital left a deep impact on her. There's still a slow burn with the storytelling in reconnecting her with Luke, but that's a relationship to look forward to the show exploring.

The recurring themes and topics of Marvel's Luke Cage are coming to the forefront five episodes in. The music is exceptional, both the score and the in-episode song choices. Intercutting violent scenes with performances at Stokes' club is a smart stylistic choice by showrunner Cheo Coker, heightening both and bringing through the heart of Harlem.

That was especially underlined in this episode when one of Cottonmouth's lackeys mentioned how he was reading a book about the politics that led to the rise of hip hop. It's an intentional irony that Cornell has a massive painting of Biggie hanging in his office yet he had a deaf ear for the legacy of hip hop and how it could apply to his situation. Contrast that with Luke, who is constantly reminding himself and those he's with about the legacy of black Americans, particularly those who came out of Harlem.

In the show, it's Pop's legacy that hangs a large shadow over Harlem, and over Luke's journey. He is still deciding what type of hero to be himself; currently, he's a man of the people. He won them over to his side, but how long will that last? What sort of target has he put on his back now that they know a superhero is in their midst? What sort of trouble is he brewing with Cottonmouth, who preaches that he stands for the neighborhood but is quick to demolish a street corner with a rocket launcher when it suits him? Luke Cage is just getting more compelling as it brings its titular hero out into the open.

The Verdict

Marvel's Luke Cage is getting to the good stuff as we get into the second act of the season. Now that Luke is out in the open as a hero, he's in new territory. Coker was smart to not show us another superhero show where the villain and hero are hiding from each other or from the public; it's far more interesting to see them battling it out with words in front of the city they're sworn to protect instead of in the shadows. Bringing Claire Temple into the mix also promises good things to come as Luke's story gets more complicated.

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Destiny: What's Xur Selling This Week?

Xûr, Agent of the Nine, is a merchant within Destiny social spaces. Xûr sells Exotic weapons, armor, engrams, and consumables in exchange for Strange Coin. He can be found around the Tower or the Reef in different locations every weekend (Friday 9AM UTC to Sunday 9AM UTC).

With the release of Rise of Iron, Xûr continues to accept Strange Coin as currency for everything except Weapon Ornaments, where it will cost Silver Dust.

Xur can currently be found in the depths of the Tower Hangar underneath FWC in the bar area.

• As of Dec. 5, 2014, Xur now sells Exotic Shards in exchange for Strange Coin. Exotic Shards are used to Upgrade Exotic Weapons/Armor now.
• As of Dec. 12, 2014, Xur now offers Level Upgrades to specific Exotic Weapons/Armor in exchange for your existing Exotic Weapon/Armor, Glimmer, and Exotic Shard. Xur's stock of sellable Exotic Weapons/Armor now have the Level Upgrades that were introduced with Expansion 1, The Dark Below.
• As of May 22, 2015, Xur no longer offers Upgrades to specific Exotic Weapons/Armor in exchange for your existing Exotic Weapon/Armor, Glimmer, and Exotic Shard (Exotics can be upgraded anytime now by Ascending them). Xur also now offers Mote of Light in exchange for 2 Strange Coin.
• As of Sept 11, 2015, Xur no longer offers Exotic Shards or Weapon Telemetries for sale.
• As of Sept 18, 2015, Xur only accepts Strange Coin for all items. Xur will offer either an Exotic Weapon OR Armor, not both at the same time anymore. Three Of Coins consumable has been added that increases chance of exotic engrams to drop at Ultra Enemy Kills. There is also a Legacy Engram available that will convert into Year 1 exotics.
• As of Oct 16, 2015, Xur now offers the Glass Needles consumable in exchange for Strange Coin, Mote Of Light, & Exotic Shard. Glass Needles is used to "reroll" perks on Exotic Armor.
• As of Sept 23 2016, Xur now offers 2 Weapon Ornaments a week in exchange for Silver Dust.

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Westworld Review

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Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy deftly expand upon Michael Crichton's great sci-fi concept in the new HBO drama.

By Eric Goldman

I’ve been very excited about Westworld since it was announced, which made me both anxious and nervous to sit down and actually watch the pilot episode. After a lot of build up and some much-discussed production delays, would it deliver? The answer is a big yes, as those high expectations were met with a terrific, gripping premiere episode (airing October 2nd on HBO) that quickly draws you in.

Based on the 1973 film written and directed by Michael Crichton, Westworld focuses on what was clearly a favorite topic of the Jurassic Park author – a high concept theme park. In the park that gives the show its name, the Wild West has been painstakingly recreated. But this goes beyond the buildings to those who inhabit Westworld – human-looking robots/androids who have been “Built to gratify the desires of the people who come to visit” as one character puts it. Want to find a local to give you a tour of the area? There’s a robot for that. Want to shoot a bad guy? There’s a robot for that. Want to have sex with a prostitute? There’s a robot for that. And so on…

In Crichton’s movie – which not only feels like a precursor to his own Jurassic Park but to The Terminator – the robots abruptly turn on the guests, attacking and killing them, as our main character attempts to escape. As an ongoing TV show, Westworld can’t go for such a straightforward scenario though, and so while it’s clear from the start that something is going wrong (or at least unplanned) with some of the robots, it’s not erupting into any kind of war just yet. But what we get instead is enthralling.

The series is co-created by Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy, and it should be no surprise for those who watched Nolan’s last series, Person of Interest (and if you didn’t, you missed an awesome show you should go check out!) that we’re getting a much bigger exploration of the robots and their AI personas than in the film. While we meet several important characters in the pilot, our main focus initially is on Dolores (Evan Rachel Wood), one of the androids “living” in Westworld and it’s a credit to Nolan and Joy’s writing, Nolan’s directing and Wood’s excellent performance that Dolores quickly becomes a fascinating character.

Dolores, like most of those in Westworld, is living a Groundhog’s Day type existence, experiencing variations on the same day over and over again (though without realizing it) – reenacting the same moments each time, until a guest might send her in a different direction. And the role for many of these residents is, as one guest describes it, to be “the loser” – to fall before the guest, who gets to stand tall as a hero or a villain. As one guest brags about a previous experience, “I went straight evil,” and we can only imagine what that included. Humans can be pretty messed up and Westworld doesn't shy away or endorse that this is essentially a sanctioned place to indulge in their worst impulses. Indeed, it's difficult to not hope to see some of these androids fight back against some of the more notably sadistic guests, which is a credit to the storytelling here and how it establishes this scenario.

Joining Wood is a stellar cast, including none other than Anthony Hopkins as Robert Ford, the architect of Westwood; Jeffrey Wright as head programmer Bernard Lowe; Shannon Woodward as Elise Hughes, who works on Bernard’s team; Thandie Newton as Westworld’s madam, Maeve Millay; James Marsden as a newcomer to Westworld, Teddy Flood; and Ed Harris as Westworld’s mysterious and menacing man in black/gunslinger. Even with the focus so much on Dolores in the pilot, we get a chance to see how many of these characters interact and there’s plenty of compelling ground set – from seeing which of those working behind the scenes dismisses the robots as “creatures,” to who steals a kiss of one of them, to seeing what kind of existence those inside Westworld have been programmed to lead and how that can change over time.

It’s all in the midst of a fantastic-looking series, which juxtaposes the more overt sci-fi, tech-filled setting of the Westworld programmers with Westworld itself, which looks like one of the most beautifully shot westerns ever, complete with some stunning scenery - until things turn dark, as the Westworld guests help make things ugly because that's what they've paid a lot of money to do.

In the midst of this, Dolores is beginning to show some odd behavior that has gotten her creators’ attention – and she’s not the only one. Why is this occurring? Where is it going? And is it a good thing for the Westworld residents to potentially be evolving in some manner -- especially if it might help them fight back against some of the more vile customers -- or something very, very scary? Those are questions the pilot episode begins to raise, setting the scene for what looks to be an exceptional series.

The Verdict

Westworld makes a big impression with its first episode. From its standout cast to its excellent visuals to one hell of a hummable score by the great Ramin Djawadi (the composer of Game of Thrones and Person of Interest), this is top-notch television in every respect. The juxtaposition of life inside Westworld and life for those who are creating Westworld allows for an excellent entry point into the show, allowing us to invest with these artificial life forms from the start, while getting to also see the motivations of those behind-the-scenes. This is obviously not the first story to explore the idea of man’s robotic creations from a thoughtful, sympathetic manner -- interestingly, Ron Moore’s wonderful Battlestar Galactica, like Westworld, also took a 1970s-originated story that was much simpler in its “evil robot”/us vs. them depiction and upended it to make the robots fully realized characters -- but it quickly establishes its own unique world and characters that let it stand on its own. This is my favorite of the many new fall TV series, and I suspect I won’t be the only one who feels that way.

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Jurassic World 2: No Militarized Dinosaurs

"I'm not that interested in militarized dinosaurs."

By Alex Osborn

Jurassic World director Colin Trevorrow has come forward to shed light on the upcoming sequel, which he say swill be "more suspenseful and scary" than the original.

Thanks to his involvement in Star Wars: Episode IX, Trevorrow isn't directing Jurassic World 2. Instead, horror director Juan Antonio Bayona is helming the film, and according to Trevorrow, he's the perfect fit for the film's darker story. "It will be more suspenseful and scary," Trevorrow told Jurassic Outpost. "I knew I wanted Bayona to direct it long before anyone ever heard that was a possibility, so the whole thing was just built around his skill set."

Even though Trevorrow isn't directing the sequel, he still has a major role in the project as producer and wrote the script with Derek Connolly. With regard to the film's story, Trevorrow said the sequel won't center around the militarization of dinosaurs, a plot point that was set up in the first film. "I'm not that interested in militarized dinosaurs, at least not in practice," he said, noting that it's best served "as the pipe dream of a lunatic" rather than a major focus of the film.

In fact, the idea of militarized dinosaurs was a major story point in an earlier script that was later rewritten by Trevorrow and Connolly. According to Trevorrow, the pair's initial reaction to the idea of Chris Pratt's character Owen Grady pursuing such a thing was, "if anyone’s gonna militarize raptors that’s what the bad guy does, he's insane."

He also addressed the lack of animatronics in the first film, citing "the physicality of the Indominus," as well as its "very fast and fluid" movements as a major reason why the creature wouldn't work without computer-generated effects. That said, fans can expect more practical effects in the sequel, with Trevorrow saying they've "written some opportunities for animatronics" into the script and that Bayona "is all about going practical whenever possible."

Jurassic World 2 will open in theaters on June 22, 2018. Both Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard will return for the sequel, which will serve as the second chapter in a new trilogy.

Via Collider

Alex Osborn is a freelance writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.

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The Top 10 Scrubs Episodes

Our favorite visits to Sacred Heart.

By Jonah Krakow

It's a big anniversary for Scrubs this weekend, with October 2nd marking 15 years since we first met the men and women of Sacred Heart. The impressively durable series -- it ran for nine years on two different networks (including that weird pseudo-spinoff Season 9) -- helped usher in a new era for network TV comedy, with its then-rare use of a single camera format and more multilayered storylines. With that in mind, we're taking an updated look at the Top 10 episodes of the series.

The best episodes of Scrubs are those that have plenty of goofy humor, an imaginative daydream sequence or three and a stomach punch at the end to remind viewers the show still takes place at a hospital... where people occasionally die. So without further ado, here are the Top 10 episodes of Scrubs.

"My Half-Acre" (Season 5)

Released February 7, 2006

Okay, so they don't all have to be gut-wrenching episodes - this one was just flat-out silly, but in a good way. The games of romantic musical chairs that J.D. and Elliot played over the years didn't always work, as it was easy to predict (correctly) that they would wind up together in the end. However, Julie (Mandy Moore), a female version of J.D. (only even clumsier), was a nice distraction for a while until they inevitably broke up a few episodes later. She was a different type of woman than J.D. had dated before, mainly because they shared a lot of the same interests, including daydreaming and a fondness for Harry Potter. She didn't come with the same baggage or lack of self-assuredness that prior girlfriends had, as evidenced by the portrait of the two of them atop a horse wearing wizard's hats. That visual was easily the third-funniest part of the episode (the second being Elliot, dressed like J.D., with wig and all, having a "lesbian" kiss with Julie).

But first prize for this episode has to go to Chris Turk, for his Air Band prowess and lip-synching finesse. As part of the subplot, the Janitor wanted to enter an Air Band competition for water park tickets and held auditions in the hospital. Turk easily won the lead role after an inspiring audition to Bel Biv Devoe's "Poison" and finished up with a performance of Boston's "More than a Feeling," backed by the full Air Band. There were no emergencies or moral dilemmas in this episode. This was just a great example of Scrubs having a lot of fun.

"My Cake" (Season 4)

Released October 12, 2004

Unlike most of the emotional episodes on this list, in "My Cake," we got the bad news right up front. J.D.'s brother Dan (played by Tom Cavanagh) showed up to announce that their dad had died. (Actor John Ritter, who had played their father, died a year earlier.) Dan then spent the next few days living at his brother's house, sitting in the bathtub and drinking beers while J.D. tried to work through his mourning at the hospital. Meanwhile, Turk learned he had Type II Diabetes, which led to a funny scene where both he and J.D. felt like they'd lost their bad news "thunder" to the other.

This episode had a nice balance of weight and goofiness, a staple of the best episodes from the series. While J.D. and Turk were dealing with life and death, the Janitor pulled a number of pranks on Kelso to make him believe he was losing his mind. He utilized a rented crane and poor Ted (and his Bozo-fro) to pull off the stunts, each one more daring than the last. In the end, Kelso got revenge on the Janitor and Dan, Dr. Cox and J.D. shared beers, sports and an evening on the couch together reminiscing about their dead fathers. There would be other, better episodes that proved Cox's endless complaints about J.D. were just lip service, but this was a good start.

"My Life in Four Cameras" (Season 4)

Released February 15, 2005

This one had a candy-colored shell and a surprisingly dark center. The hospital was facing budget cuts and Dr. Cox was tasked with firing a cafeteria worker. Meanwhile, a former Cheers writer was diagnosed with a serious condition. All of these events led J.D. to imagine his life as a sitcom, where everyone gets healthy at the end and every budget can be fixed in a half-hour. And that's when we heard the words any classic TV fan is familiar with: "J.D.'s sitcom fantasy was filmed before a live studio audience."

J.D.'s extended fantasy turned the dark hallways of the hospital into a brightly lit sitcom set like Everybody Loves Raymond or The King of Queens. And along with his fantasy came every nuance and cliché from that style of show. From the "set-up, set-up, punchline" dialogue and exaggerated costumes to a hokey talent show featuring guest star Clay Aiken, everything was letter perfect. Even the Janitor received applause worthy of Fonzie or Al Bundy upon his entrance. But once J.D. snapped back to reality, he realized life wasn't a sitcom and problems take more than a half-hour to solve. People get fired, patients die, and we were left with another powerful episode that caught us off guard at the end.

"My Old Lady" (Season 1)

Released October 16, 2001

Early on in its run (the 4th episode to be precise), Scrubs figured out exactly what it wanted to be - a sitcom with depth. Sure, this episode featured its share of silly moments, like a game of wheelchair bowling and a fantasy sequence with J.D. and Death playing Connect Four. But we also saw the flipside, as J.D.'s voiceover informed us that the odds of a patient dying at Sacred Heart were pretty good - about one in three.

J.D. met a patient facing those odds, Mrs. Tanner, whose kidney failure meant certain death unless she went on dialysis. Rather than undergo the lengthy procedure for the rest of her life, she decided her time was up and she was ready to go. (This prompted a classic sight gag as Lloyd delivered a "ton of bricks" to Dr. Dorian.) In the wrong hands, this episode could've become a syrupy mess. However, both the script and Kathryn Joosten's turn as Mrs. Tanner kept everything on point. There have been tons of episodes where J.D. learns a tough lesson about life, but Joosten's honest performance prevented this one from becoming over-sentimental and helped point Scrubs in the direction it's been heading for eight-plus seasons.

"My Musical" (Season 6)

Released January 18, 2007

At this point in Season 6, the show had been cruising along nicely, so it was time to change things up a bit. A patient was brought to Sacred Heart with a curious condition: all spoken conversation sounded like singing to her. Those weird symptoms (caused by a brain aneurysm) kicked off a half-hour crammed with choreographed dance numbers, medleys and solos.

There was really no middle-ground with this episode. Either it was going to be great or it was going to fail miserably. Fortunately, they nailed it. The tone and spirit of Scrubs was captured in each of the eight songs, from the remorseful, "Gonna Miss You, Carla," to the obvious, "The Rant Song," to the downright juvenile, "Everything Comes Down to Poo." And J.D. and Turk's show-stopping duet, "Guy Love" took the essence of their relationship over five seasons and boiled down to a tight two-and-a-half minutes. Without the added difficulty of trying to force a musical into a half-hour sitcom, this episode would've been solid, but the fact that they actually pulled it off makes it worthy of this top ten list.

Continue on for the Top 5 Scrubs episodes...

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Dishonored 2: Messing Around With Emily's Crazy Powers

Don't mess with Emily.

By Vince Ingenito

The sheer anticipation of seeing the next cool gadget, spectacular spell, or awe-inspiring environment can be a driving force on its own, and the most recent demo I played Dishonored 2 conjured that feeling up for me. If I were to sum up my latest turn with it in one sentence, it would be, “What will I see next?” The striking art style, Emily’s crazy powers, and the spectacular transforming walls of the Clockwork Mansion all left me wondering what treats the rest of Dishonored 2 might have in store.

The mission I played, The Clockwork Mansion, takes place roughly half way through the game, tasking Emily or Corvo with two possible objectives: find and rescue your old friend Anton Sokolov and deal with his captor, Kirin Jindosh, whose clockwork mansion has more hidden rooms than Wayne Manor.  The original Dishonored was full of beautiful architecture, but the shifting walls in Jindosh’s estate take things to a new level. With a single pull of the many levers I found throughout the area,  stair cases transformed, floors broke away, and walls did flip-flops, transforming the landscape around me. It felt like the kind of spectacle many games would save for a finale. If this is an environment halfway through the game, I can’t even imagine what might follow or top it.

Both Corvo and Emily wield supernatural powers, but right now Emily’s are just too interesting to resist. Obviously she can blink about in a similar, if less potent manner to her father, but she really sets herself apart with Shadow Walk and Domino. Shadow Walk turns Emily into a virtually invisible wraith-like being, allowing her to rapidly and stealthily advance on unsuspecting guards to either knock them out or execute them instantly.

It felt like the kind of spectacle many games would save for a finale.

Domino allows her to create an invisible link between multiple human targets. When she kills or incapacitates any one of them, the others will be felled as well. Shadow Walk seems like a must-pick for anyone wanting to strictly adhere to a stealthy approach, as it allows you to escape undetected in situations where you’d otherwise be caught red-handed. Silently marking multiple targets with Domino, then stealthily slinking up to, and incapacitating the nearest one to take the whole lot of them down is immensely fun. Again, if these are the kinds of powers and upgrades you have access to at the midway point, I can’t even imagine what might be farther along the skill tree.

That’s not to say that playing Corvo is at all boring. This is still Dishonored, so even with Corvo’s familiar power set, there’s plenty of fun to be had and decisions to be made. For instance, you might opt to find Sokolov first, escorting him to safety before you stalk Jindosh. Even if you choose to go straight for Jindosh, there’s always more than one way of besting him and his retinue of clockwork soldiers. Head-on is certainly one way to do it, but in typical Dishonored fashion, there are other less direct, perhaps more disturbing ways to skin the proverbial cat as well. That’s a little treat I wouldn’t want to spoil though.

I felt like I was only just getting back into the swing of things by the time my demo was over, so I didn’t get to explore this undeniably cool locale or the many gadgets at my disposal to quite the extent I would have liked, but now that I’ve gotten a sense of how imaginative Dishonored 2 can be, I’m definitely ready to see the rest.

Vincent Ingenito is IGN's foremost fighting game nerd. Follow him on Twitter and help him sort out his Street Fighter 5 character crisis.

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Marvel's Luke Cage: Episode 4 Review

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"My name is Luke Cage."

By Terri Schwartz

Are you ready for some flashbacks? Because Luke Cage's origin story was finally told in the fourth episode of Marvel's Luke Cage.

Full spoilers for Marvel's Luke Cage's fourth episode continue below.

Luke Cage... or should we say Carl Lucas? Netflix and Marvel went back to the early days of Luke's incarceration in Seagate Prison, before he changed his name to protect his identity. That alone answers the big question of why Shades doesn't recognize this person he was in prison with -- and, of course, the fact that Luke has lost that pretty insane fake beard. (Sorry, Mike Colter.)

The bulk of the fourth episode was flashbacks to Luke's time at Seagate, setting up how he became the man he is in the present. More important than just establishing how he knew Shades, the flashbacks deepened our understanding of Luke's relationship with his late wife Reva and how the two of them fell in love.

There are a lot of Easter eggs stowed away in this episode, from the classic Power Man outfit he's wearing after his Seagate escape to Reva's ill-fated USB stick that brought about her eventual death, which we learned a significant amount about in Marvel's Jessica Jones. Though it was exposition heavy, this episode did about as much important heavy lifting as Luke did in the present when he rescued Connie from being trapped under her destroyed restaurant and apartment complex.

In the flashbacks, we see Luke being formed emotionally and physically into the superhero we met him as. While in Seagate, he was forced into a prisoner fighting ring orchestrated by the guards, and when he tried to get away, he was beaten by Shades and another complicit prisoner to within an inch of his life. Reva begged Seagate's doctor to save Carl by any means necessary, but time in a healing tank gone awry resulted in Carl becoming the ultra-powerful man he is in the present. When he escaped Seagate, he went straight to Reva, where we learned there's more to her than meets the eye too.

That's perhaps the most exciting thing about learning about Luke's origins at this point in the story. A flashback episode seemingly was supposed to resolve a lot of questions about Luke Cage's title character, but instead it revealed many more compelling ones. What happened to Luke to get him imprisoned to begin with? What did Reva know about Seagate? What did she do before she was a psychiatrist?

Those big picture questions coupled with Luke's coming out at the end of the episode offer some solid forward momentum for Luke Cage in a refreshing new way. It was nice to have an episode that focused in on Luke instead of the other characters, like Cornell Stokes and Misty Knight, surrounding him. Star Mike Colter did a great job showing Luke's simmering rage in prison, and it helps us appreciate who he is in the present by seeing him so far in the past. He and Parisa Fitz-Henley infused Luke and Reva's relationship with a great chemistry that makes you understand why he was so torn up about her death in Jessica Jones.

The Verdict

Marvel's Luke Cage pressed pause on the present day storyline to dive into Luke's past. As much an origin story for his personality as it is for his superhero abilities, the fourth episode of Luke Cage: Season 1 pulled back the curtain on the show's title character in some meaningful ways. His relationship with Reva stood at the center of the episode, and there were a handful of interesting surprises and new mysteries there considering how well covered it already was in Jessica Jones. This episode proved to be a refreshing pause from the main Cottonmouth storyline as viewers got to get to know Luke Cage a bit more personally.

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Batman, Joker Are 2016's Top Adult Halloween Costumes

Marvel characters are fourth on the list.

By Alex Osborn

Despite the negative critical reception garnered by Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and Suicide Squad earlier this year, popularity for the Batman franchise is quite high this Halloween, as the top costume choice among adults between the ages of 18 and 34-years-old is a character from the Caped Crusader's universe.

According to the National Retail Federation's list for this year's top costumes (via TIME), superheroes in general were the top choice among children, just ahead of princesses and animals. Meanwhile, Batman characters, including The Joker, Harley Quinn and Batman, were the top choice among adults under 35 years of age (the list groups related characters together rather than individually rank each of them).

Meanwhile, the rest of DC's heroic lineup, as well as Marvel's crew of crime-fighting heroes, placed fourth among adults under 35, just below witches and animals. Star Wars characters ranked fifth among children, but down in ninth place among adults.

NFR's list is based on a survey conducted by Prosper Insights & Analytics that polled 6,791 consumers of various ages what they plan to dress up as for Halloween. You can see the top 10 breakdown for each age group below.

Children (under 18 years-old):

1. Action/Superhero
2. Princess
3. Animal (Cat, Dog, Lion, Monkey, etc.)
4. Batman Character
5. Star Wars Character
6. Tie: Witch AND DC Superhero (excl. Batman)
7. Frozen Character (Anna, Elsa, Olaf)
8. Marvel Superhero (excl. Spiderman)
9. Zombie
10. Spiderman

Adults (18 to 34-years-old):

1. Batman Character (Batman, Harley Quinn, The Joker, etc.)
2. Witch
3. Animal (Cat, Dog, Bunny, etc.)
4. Tie: Marvel Superhero (Deadpool, Spiderman, etc.) AND DC Superhero (Wonder Woman, Superman, excl. Batman)
5. Vampire
6. Video Game Character
7. Slasher Movie Villain (Freddy, Jason, Michael Myers, etc.)
8. Pirate
9. Star Wars Character
10. Zombie

Adults (35-years-old and up):

1. Witch
2. Pirate
3. Political (Trump, Clinton, etc.)
4. Vampire
5. Batman Character (Batman, Catwoman, etc.)
6. Animal (Cat, Dog, Bunny, etc.)
7. Tie: DC Superhero (Superman, Wonder Woman, excl. Batman) and Star Wars Character
8. Tie: Ghost and Zombie
9. Scary Costume/Mask
10. Marvel Superhero (Iron Man, Hulk, Spiderman, etc.)

Warner Bros. is gearing up for a new solo film starring Ben Affleck as the Dark Knight and Joe Manganiello as the film's villain, Deathstroke.

Alex Osborn is a freelance writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.

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Timeless: Series Premiere Review

Share.

Let's do the Time Warp again.

By Matt Fowler

Timeless, from Supernatural creator Eric Kripke and The Shield creator Shawn Ryan, is a big, broad adventure series that, unfortunately, feels more or less designed to play it safe. Time travel is all over the TV right now -- from CW's Legends of Tomorrow and Syfy's 12 Monkeys to Hulu's recent 11.22.63 miniseries to ABC's upcoming Time After Time (and, in a way, the CW's upcoming Frequency) -- so it's evident that it can hold an audience and be a viable gimmick for serialized TV, but you're not going to see anything new here. Not based on this first episode.

Timeless isn't going to break the mold. It has its specific time travel rules in place (you can't ever travel back to any time or place you once existed, which prevents our heroes from simply going back to take another try at the weekly mission if they botch it) and the ramifications for failure are what you might expect. The past changing causes the present to change. It's all very rudimentary from a sci-fi perspective.

The silver lining here is that the show is designed for an audience that might not be able to handle anything more complex. It's goofy, glossy and it gets right into the time travel elements immediately. There's a time machine. It exists. And our three heroes -- played by Abigail Spencer (Rectify), Malcolm Barrett (Better Off Ted), and Matt Lanter (Star Wars: The Clone Wars) -- need to go back in time and stop a villain (Goran Visnjic) from changing the course of history. Boom. And off we go.

Timeless pretty much is able to exist on a simple baseline level because of all the time travel stories that have come before it and woven themselves into our pop-culture absorbing brains. It can get right into the craziness of the premise without too much exposition. Here, in the series premiere, our mismatched trio of Spencer's historian, Barrett's tech, and Lanter's soldier zoom back to 1937 New Jersey in order to prevent bad things from happening to... an already bad thing that happened. The Hindenburg disaster. The mystery here, which is sort of fun, is what could the villain be after at a notable event that's already filled with death and fire?

All the while, our heroes also have to get to know one another and rely on each other as a team. The most interesting element here is the fact that Rufus is black and readily knows that "there is literally no place in American history that will be awesome for me." It's actually an intriguing premise, but one I'm not sure won't get tiresome after a few episodes. Here though, initially, it plays well. How can one member of the team even contribute when he has to act in a certain way and/or isn't welcome most places? This premise could actually give rise to some pretty deeps stories. Deeper than Timeless is probably willing to go though.

Yes, the series seems to be made for the case-of-the-week crowd, but there are seeds planted here for an ongoing arc.  What we'll get, ultimately, is one of those types of shows that gives you tiny nuggets at the top, or end, of each episode throughout the year while the bulk of the story is still about the craziness and chaos of going back to Lincoln's assassination, the Alamo, or what have you.

The Verdict

Timeless is fun, but also fairly skin and bones. Given how labyrinthine and complex some time travel odysseys can be, this is a chewable vitamin. It's not bad, it's just not challenging - and that more than anything else seems to be the hallmark of a "network" series, unfortunately. Escapism, but without too much depth. Still, that's not to say the show can't grow and become more than just one-off jaunts through American history.

Timeless premieres Monday, October 3rd on NBC.

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2 New Gears of War 4 Xbox One S Bundles Announced

Microsoft unveils the "deep blue" Xbox One S.

By Jordan Sirani

Microsoft has unveiled two new Gears of War 4 Xbox One S bundles ahead of the shooter's October 11 release.

The first includes Gears of War 4 and a 1 TB white console, according to Xbox Wire. This standard bundle will be available worldwide October 11 for $350 USD.

The second, "special edition" bundle features a 500 GB "deep blue" console and will only be available in the US and Australia for $300 USD. This bundle, exclusive to Microsoft Stores and GameStop (EB Games for Australian shoppers), hits stores November 1.

The deep blue Xbox One S Gears 4 bundle. Image via Xbox

Xbox Wire notes bundles purchased at GameStop will include a physical copy of the game, which excludes it from the Xbox Play Anywhere program.

A third, custom-themed Gears of War 4 bundle was revealed earlier this year. According to The Coalition's Rod Fergusson on Twitter, that bundle will be available October 6.

Yesterday, The Coalition released a video showcasing the first 20 minutes of Gears 4. For spoiler-free coverage, check out all of our info from last month's IGN First.

Jordan is a freelance writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @jdsirani.

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Ranking Halloween Horror Nights' Awesome Mazes

A standout year includes Freddy, Jason, Michael, Leatherface and more.

By Eric Goldman

As a huge fan of Halloween Horror Nights at both Universal Orlando and Universal Studios Hollywood, I love visiting each park every year to see the various mazes. While many of the mazes at the two parks are based on the same property, they are never the exact same, as they are made by different teams for completely different types of configurations and buildings, often resulting in wildly different experiences.

A few days ago, I did my ranking for this year’s Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Orlando, and if you compare my new list below ranking the 2016 mazes at Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Hollywood, you’ll find several shared titles with Orlando that have quite different positioning.

Overall, this was an incredible year for HHN at Universal Studios Hollywood – one of my favorites so far. There was no true dud among any of the six mazes, and I’d call four of them outright great or better, as the annual event tackled some truly huge horror franchises, including The Exorcist and mazes featuring the likes of A Nightmare on Elm Street's Freddy Krueger, Friday the 13th's Jason Voorhees, Halloween's Michael Myers and Texas Chainsaw Massacre's Leatherface.

Suffice to say, I’ll be going again in the weeks to come.

Halloween: Hell Comes to Haddonfield

Last year, HHN offered an absolutely fantastic maze based on John Carpenter’s original Halloween, making me especially excited to see them do a follow up – one based on the events of 1981’s Halloween II. Perhaps those high expectations hurt a bit, as Halloween: Hell Comes to Haddonfield is fine, but not a standout. However, this maze does end in a strong, notably offbeat manner, as we veer off of the movie’s storyline and into a surreal landscape that includes a trippy, unsettling room filled with pumpkin-headed creatures (representing Samhain) that evoke Halloween II’s poster – and from there travel inside Samhain, as an awesomely warped version of “Mr. Sandman” plays, while Michael Myers attacks you inside a pumpkin gone oh-so wrong.

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: Blood Brothers

While only having a few noteworthy scares, Texas Chainsaw Massacre offers a really impressive, immersive experience thanks to how wonderfully repugnant it is. You feel like you are in the Sawyer house in all of its grimy, gory, disgusting glory – as the combinations of sights, sounds and, yes, smells surrounding you is nearly overwhelming in all the right, horrific ways. It's very cool how this maze was conceived as a sequel to the original movie (bridging it towards The Texas Chainsaw Massacre Part 2’s events) and the cast seems to be having a ball – especially the gentleman playing the Cook who heard me make a joke about how gross it felt inside the place and put his finger on the “meat” in front of him, before licking his finger. Sick, dude! (Nicely done!).

American Horror Story

As I wrote in my Universal Orlando Horror Nights ranking list, American Horror Story feels like the perfect TV series for HHN, offering a non-stop barrage of bizarre, outlandish, visually evocative moments. Culling from Murder House, Freak Show and Hotel, the AHS maze had a lot of memorable scenarios, as you pass through one twisted room to the next, as a ton of characters from the show attack. Bonus points for the last room, which has a final scare, involving curtains, that is especially clever and playful.

I was legitimately shocked by how much I loved this maze. I wasn’t that into Krampus the movie or, really, Krampus the Universal Orlando maze, but wow, this was the version of Krampus I’d been waiting for. It takes the film’s Christmas setting and amps up the intensity, as the holidays go to hell. The kitchen, filled with attacking Gingerbread Men, is hysterical and the scares throughout the maze plentiful and highly effective – rarely has the tried but true “very loud noise” been used so well. The final sequence, taking you into an outdoor setting, awesomely uses high-pressure air conditioning to hit you with a sudden blast of cold, as you walk into the "snow" – where some Snowmen are there to unwelcome you. From start to finish, Krampus offers an inspired mix of horror and comedy.

Freddy vs. Jason

A really strong take on this villain vs. villain concept, Freddy vs. Jason only uses the core conceit of the 2003 film, essentially going in its own direction. From Elm Street to Crystal Lake, we travel through the familiar worlds of both iconic characters, and get cool appearances from the likes of Mrs. Voorhees or Freddy in his snake form from A Nightmare on Elm Street 3 – only here, he’s devouring the child version of Jason! There are a ton of Freddys and Jasons in this maze, and would you have it any other way? And they are commendably scary, with one great bit including Jason behind a scrim that has him “magically” appear behind a wall you’re walking alongside, before bursting out right in front of you.

The Exorcist

One of the greatest horror movies ever (many would say the greatest ever) gets the presentation it deserves, with one of my all-time favorite HHN mazes. This maze brings you right into the world of The Exorcist, from the moment you pass by Father Merrin standing outside the exterior of the house, recreating the famous poster image for the film. Overcoming the challenges of a adapting a film set mostly in a single bedroom into a walkthrough maze, The Exorcist intermixes the demon Pazuzu with the possessed Regan to provide lots of additional scares, while taking you through almost all the huge moments from the movie in some phenomenal recreations that bring the film to life before your eyes. Some of the rooms aren’t about anything leaping out to scare you as much as they are about beholding the appropriately disturbing artistry at work, as we see Regan levitate above her head, or her head spin around as she vomits. While many actresses play Regan, there are also some beautifully made full size figures that look creepy as hell.

Simply put, The Exorcist maze is a triumph from start to finish.

Halloween Horror Nights 2016 is now underway on select nights at Universal Studios Hollywood.

Eric Goldman is Executive Editor of IGN TV. You can follow him on Twitter at @TheEricGoldman, IGN at ericgoldman-ign and Facebook at http://ift.tt/LQFqjj.

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War for the Planet of the Apes Coming to NYCC

As well as a fan Q&A with Andy Serkis.

By Alex Osborn

Those attending New York Comic-Con next week will have the opportunity to get an early glimpse of War for the Planet of the Apes, as 20th Century Fox will showcase a sneak peek of the upcoming film at the convention.

According to Deadline, director Matt Reeves will be joined by motion-capture master and Caesar star Andy Serkis as well as the film's producer, Dylan Clark, to provide a behind-the-scenes glimpse at the next installment in Fox's Planet of the Apes series. The event will take place at the Regal E-Walk Theater on Thursday, October 6 at 8:30pm.

The following day at 3pm at the Theater at Madison Square Garden, Serkis will hold a Q&A session with fans, as well as a "career conversation."

War for the Planet of the Apes opens in theaters on July 14, 2017. In addition to Serkis, Woody Harrelson will star as the film's villain.

Alex Osborn is a freelance writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.

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Our Favorite Anime From Summer 2016

There's a dictionary anime!!

By Kallie Plagge

This week on IGN Anime Club, Kallie, Mike, and Meghan discuss which summer shows they'll miss most and which of the upcoming fall anime they can't wait to see. Be sure to check out IGN's official list of the 5 best summer 2016 anime for more! In this week's Watch Party, the club discusses Psycho-Pass episodes 11 and 12 (available on Blu-ray, Funimation, and Hulu). We'll be back next week to talk about episodes 13 and 14. To join in the discussion, tweet or post a message on Facebook with your thoughts on the episodes and use the hashtag #IGNime or email IGN Anime Club at ign_animeclub@ign.com.

Download IGN Anime Club Episode 66 (right click to save)

Don't use iTunes? Subscribe to the IGN Anime Club Libsyn Feed

Subscribe to IGN Anime Club's YouTube channel for let's plays, unboxings, and more.

Catch up on the last five episodes:

Shows mentioned in this episode

• My Love Story!!
• One Piece
• Dragon Ball (manga)
• Re: Zero - Starting Life in Another World
• Food Wars: The Second Plate
• Mob Psycho 100
• One-Punch Man
• Amanchu
• JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Diamond Is Unbreakable
• Berserk
• Tiger Mask W
• Haikyuu!!
• All Out!!
• Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans
• Sound! Euphonium
• Fune wo Amu (dictionary anime)
• Psycho-Pass

Kallie Plagge is Promotions Editor at IGN. She's also a host of IGN Anime Club and IGN's resident Poké Kid. Follow her on Twitter @inkydojikko for cute things, FPS adventures, and lots more about Pokemon.

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Top 25 PlayStation 4 Games

Older, wiser, better.

By IGN Staff, Daniel Krupa, Marty Sliva and Vince Ingenito

Editor's Note: List last updated September 28, 2016.

With a lot more time having passed since the PlayStation 4's launch, its library has expanded, and strengthened, considerably. With so many new contenders showing up, it seems like an ideal time to re-visit IGN's list of the top 25 PS4 games.

This year, your selection committee is: Marty Sliva (Senior Editor), Jonathon Dornbush (Associate News Editor), Alanah Pearce (Toys & Culture Editor), and Andrew Goldfarb (Executive Editor).

Our criteria are as follows:

Before we jump in, a quick word on criteria. The primary question this top 25 list is intended to answer is simple: "What are the 25 best games we played on this platform?" How much fun we had with the games is obviously our primary concern, but we also considered elements like longevity/staying power, influence, and innovation. Also, this list consists of games released before September 1, 2016.

What do you think of our selections? Let us know in the comments, and sound-off with your own Top PS4 Games lists.

And now, without further ado...

Broken Age is an absolute joy of an adventure. It’s a gorgeous, impeccably written adventure that simultaneously tugs at my nostalgic core, while ushering in a new era for the point-and-click genre. Any fears that Double Fine’s pioneering Kickstarter would disappoint were immediately dispelled the moment I set foot into director Tim Schafer’s beautiful fever dream. It takes the classic mold created in games like Monkey Island and Day of the Tentacle, and modernizes it through smoothed-out design and gorgeous aesthetics.

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Supergiant’s follow-up to Bastion is a gorgeous, deep, and memorable action-RPG. Transistor’s confident art style helps create a unique and memorable world, and its stellar soundtrack is one of the strongest in recent memory. The story is great, especially the ongoing narration of your talking sword who may or may not contain the spirit of a former lover inside of it. But Transistor’s beauty isn’t only skin-deep. Its combat system is a unique beast that rewards you for taking the time to master it. Stopping time, carefully planning a series of attacks, and watching them be executed perfectly provides an impossible amount of satisfaction.

Doom takes everything we loved about the original 20 years ago, and injects it with 2016 beauty and insanity. Exploring the depths of hell is every bit as gorgeous as it is terrifying, and nods to the classic games are much appreciated. The combat is aggressive and punishing, but the power curve and upgrade paths are so, so satisfying.

Street Fighter V sports a wonderful, diverse cast of characters and places a clear emphasis on strong fundamental play. It gives competitive players a great online experience, and does it all while looking gorgeous. Strictly in terms of mechanics and competitive features, Street Fighter 5 is just about peerless.

Deus Ex: Mankind Divided improves upon its excellent predecessor in nearly every way. Its impeccably designed environments are flush with possibility, remaining completely coherent while supporting a wide variety of routes and character builds. And Jensen’s prodigious new feats of techno-wizardry add new dimension to both combat and exploration.

It came as little surprise that a game from Finnish developer Housemarque would create an excellent PlayStation 4 game. What came as a bigger surprise is that it's still one of the most dominant and enjoyable games on the console, even nearly a year out from its release. Housemarque is the undisputed master of the twin-stick shooter, and Resogun takes advantage of that know-how to create an experience markedly different from the likes of its previous games like Super Stardust HD and Dead Nation. Yet, at its core is the same hook that rests at the heart of its previous titles: high-score chasing and leaderboard climbing. PS4 doesn't have another game even remotely as addictive as Resogun.

Final Fantasy XIV isn't the best massively multiplayer online roleplaying game on PlayStation 4 just because it's the only game of its type on this platform. It earns that title, and its place on this list, because it's an excellent MMORPG no matter where you play it. It has all the usual trappings of a beautiful world to explore, traditional but nuanced combat that requires deep team coordination to succeed, and even your very own pet chocobo. But Square Enix's liberating class and skill system sets FFXIV apart. Simply swap out your weapon, and you'll instantly become the class associated with that weapon. That allows for more variety than most MMORPGs, especially when you mix in some secondary abilities and dynamic FATE events.

Until Dawn is a gleefully cheesy homage to horror movies, set in a world built by a developer that clearly adores the genre. Its robust choice-and-consequence system and keen eye on horror’s most ridiculous tropes makes Until Dawn ultimately worth playing. Watching the ripple effect of your decisions, and seeing how many of the trope-y, but still likeable cast can survive the night makes it one of the most entertaining horror games of this young generation.

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Paramount Explains Ghost in the Shell's Glitch Teasers

Capitalizing on social media.

By Alex Osborn

Several brief teasers for the upcoming Ghost in the Shell live-action film aired during the Mr. Robot: Season 2 finale, and a Paramount Pictures exec has come forward to explain why.

According to Paramount president of worldwide distribution and marketing Megan Colligan, the strategic placement of these 10-second clips was to stir up buzz on social media. In fact, Deadline reports that the studio's marketing team persuaded the sales executives at NBCUniversal and USA to go along with these unconventionally-short and nondescript TV spots.

"We knew with the Mr. Robot finale we'd get that extra boost of people who would be sharing on social," Colligan said, noting that season finales are like sporting events in that the audience is active in real time and conversing over social media.

"Ghost in the Shell is so original in its own right that it had to have a special execution to kick it off," she explained, going on to tease that more information regarding "the glitch" will be revealed soon, as "it’s one of the most important parts of the film's storytelling."

As such, Colligan believes "it was important to present the earliest advertising for this film as a glitch instead of something more traditional." In fact, the studio plans to continue with similar teases in the future, with Colligan saying, "We're going to have some more fun with this for a little while longer."

Paramount co-president of domestic marketing Rebecca Mall also spoke to the studio's decision to air the teasers during Mr. Robot, noting that because Ghost in the Shell is "a movie about glitches and technology," it aligned well with the themes of USA's popular drama series.

According to social media monitor RelishMix, Paramount's efforts paid off, as Ghost in the Shell's ad campaign generated a whopping 12.3 million views on the studio's official channel.

Ghost in the Shell opens in theaters on March 31, 2017.

Alex Osborn is a freelance writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.

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Ash vs Evil Dead: 7 Reasons Ash Rules

Part bozo, part badass - all Ash!

By Matt Fowler

Ash vs. Evil Dead's Season 2 premiere airs on Starz this October 2nd, and to honor the show's gloriously gory return we're taking a quick look at what makes the franchise's battling bonehead of a hero, Ash Williams (iconically portrayed by Bruce Campbell), so damn awesome.

First appearing in 1981's The Evil Dead, Ash, along with his girlfriend, sister and a couple of friends, visited a remote cabin in the woods where he accidentally awakened demonic spirits from beyond. Ash, bloody and disremembered, would survive the night, but then he'd go through all of it again in Evil Dead II - the horror/comedy reboot-quel.

The swashbuckling Army of Darkness would follow in 1992 and then Starz' Ash vs. Evil Dead would resurrect Ash decades later for a new rambunctious run. So how can one man be such an ass and an ass-kicker? How can a hero be so dense but then also be so diabolically good at demolishing deadites? Ash has always been the "reluctant hero," never really stepping up until pushed too far. Selfish to a fault, Ash's own idiocy usually causes the actual trouble he has to clean up. Good thing he's the Boomstick Butcher with the Chainsaw Hand.

Here are Ash's 7 best moments from the Evil Dead-verse...

Biting the Hand that Feeds

Evil Dead always played fast and loose with its demonic rules, creating an atmosphere where you never quite knew what would happen next. This included things like a malicious spirits inhabiting everything from lamps to picture frames to  - you know - your hand. And Ash was not about to be beaten and humiliated by his own appendage. Oh, hell no. Ash would cut off his nose to spite his face - or in this case, painfully chainsaw off his hand to show it who's boss. WHO'S LAUGHING NOW, DUMB EVIL HAND?

Get into the Groove

With some extra space on his body to play with, Ash now had options when it came to arming himself. First and foremost, he'd cap his stump with the very chainsaw used to create it. In Army of Darkness (below), he'd fashion himself a metal hand powerful enough to crush a metal goblet. Both times, after an awesome assembling montage, he'd take a pause to look at his new part, declaring it - and the general state of things - "Groovy!"

Carry a Big Stick

Perhaps the most memorable Ash moment of all, Army of Darkness' boomstick scene elevated our hapless hero to new heights of jerk-dom. To be fair, he wasn't being treated very well by the quick-to-judge denizens of medieval England and thought it was time to teach these "primitive screwheads" about 20th Century weaponry. In this case, his twelve-gauge double-barreled Remington. Everyone cowered in fear as Ash, essentially, took over the castle and bullied his way into being treated like royalty. Great job if you can get it.

I Have the Best Words

The fact that Ash reeeeally wanted to get back to his own time but also reeeeally didn't want to make any real mental commitment to memorizing the exact chant to safely retrieve the Necronomicon stands as one of his best, buffoonish moments. Instead of helping out the poor demon-ravaged people of England, he accidentally unleashes hell on earth by trying to flub his way through three words - adding a cough at the end. As if he could somehow trick the ancient dark forces lying in wait.

Kingdom Come

While not the original Army of Darkness ending (which depicted a Rip Van Winkle'd Ash awaking in a post-apocalyptic London), the reshot S-Mart ending stands as the better, more satisfying of the two - especially if you consider that franchise didn't continue until more than 20 years later. This action-packed, quotable showdown in Ash's place of work saw S-Mart's housewares attendant go from stockboy braggart to demon slayer in matter of seconds, delivering the epic "Hail to the King, baby" moment right at the end.

A Hello to Arms

Ash splashed back onto the scene in 2015 with Ash vs. Evil Dead, which saw our once-powerful hero humbled as a trailer park lothario haunted by his days as a deadite smasher. After (once again) awakening the ancient evils of the world, Ash was shoved back into the war against damnation and had to battle evil monsters inside his own homestead. The boomstick and the chainsaw returned in epic fashion as Ash leaped from once side of his trailer, arm outstretched, and connected with his darling 'saw (which was hurled by Ash-devotee Pablo).

One Man's Trash...

We never really knew all that much about Ash in the movies, and the first season of Ash vs. Evil Dead was the first stab at trying to turn Ash into an actual character with (some) layers. Season 2 will dig even deeper into Ash's past and family history, but back in Season 1 we caught a glimpse of Ash's version of paradise: Cold beers, a quiet pier, and... Jacksonville, Florida. Yup. Ash's drug-fueled trip at the behest of Pablo's uncle revealed our that our hero's dream was to live a fairly tacky life nestled in 70s nostalgia and a spring break atmosphere.

Matt Fowler is a writer for IGN and a member of the Television Critics Association (TCA). Follow him on Twitter at @TheMattFowler and Facebook at http://ift.tt/2aJ67FB.

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