Latest news with #gore
The Guardian
27-06-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Summer sizzlers! It's the 20 hottest TV shows of the season
The big one. The uberviolent South Korean juggernaut – still Netflix's most popular show ever – reaches the end point … and Player 456 is still in the game. What will happen after the armed rebellion? Will he figure out he's playing alongside Frontman? And will he make it out alive? The show's creator Hwang Dong-hyuk opened up about the denouement this week, telling fans it's bleaker than ever. Apparently after watching, we'll be left shaking and asking ourselves: 'How much humanity do I have left in me?' One thing's for sure: there'll be no let-up. Expect gore galore. Out now, Netflix The one Lena Dunham fans have been waiting for. Eight years after the end of Girls, she makes a welcome return to television. The ever-excellent Megan Stalter – AKA the hilariously ditzy agent Kayla in Hacks – plays Jess, an American ad executive who is obsessed with classic British love stories. When her deadbeat boyfriend leaves her for an influencer who makes lipgloss – 'no one is fucking an influencer in the works of Jane Austen!' – she decides to take her broken heart to London in 'the Kingdom of United' and start over. When she arrives, she's devastated to discover that her new 'estate' isn't quite the verdant paradise she dreamed it would be. Promptly, of course, Jess meets her very own Mr Darcy – indie rocker Felix. 10 July, Netflix A teenager is panicked to find himself waking up in a mysterious institution full of youngsters who possess special abilities, and he has every reason to be scared – he's in a Stephen King adaptation. Given that the author was one of the inspirations for Stranger Things, and this tale of a totalitarian bootcamp for telekinetic children feels as though it's drawing on Eleven's backstory, it has the sense of the author coming full circle. But if this stays true to his 2019 novel, we are in for plenty of creeping dread and commentary on Trump's America. 13 July, Prime Video A gorgeous will-they-won't-they romance that spans decades. Daniel is a music journo who has harboured a secret lifelong devotion to his first love Alison, who mysteriously disappeared from their home town Sheffield when they were teens. Decades later, they find each other online and, though they're both married, start sending each other tunes from their youth. The stars – Jim Sturgess and Rory Walton-Smith as older and younger Daniel, and Teresa Palmer and Florence Hunt as older and younger Alison – are wonderful across the board, and the soundtrack is stuffed with 80s bangers from New Order to the Cure. It's a yearning look at what it's like to marry the wrong person – and why first love might be right all along. 15 July, BBC Two Such is the prevalence of cosy crime – and the star wattage of Mark Gatiss – that this postwar comedy-drama has been recommissioned before the first season has even started. Gatiss stars as Gabriel Book, owner of Book's bookshop, a kooky gent with a passion for puzzles – what else! – who helps the police solve murder cases. But the plot thickens when he gives mysterious ex-con Jack a job in the shop and lets him move into their attic ('He's like Mrs Rochester – only slightly more butch!'). An arch, high camp slice of crime-solving fun. 16 July, U&Alibi Based on the beloved novel by Esi Edugyan, this is the story of how a boy called George Washington 'Wash' Black escapes from slavery. At the age of 11, he is spotted poring over a feat of engineering and plucked from the cotton fields by a white scientist named Titch who is trying to make an almighty flying machine. Soon Titch spots his talent for drawing and keeps him on as an aide until he's grown up – but when he tries to leave, Titch's brother sets a bounty hunter on him. Sterling K Brown stars and executive produces what is clearly a passion project. 23 July, Disney+ Keeley Hawes is a retired assassin on holiday with her son (Freddie Highmore) – and he wants answers. The questions he's nurturing on their tense Greek island sojourn: Why are you so frustratingly distant? How do you explain this unexpected new information on my paternity? Wait, who are those terrifying people? And what do you mean we have to go on the run? Should be lots of tense, action-packed fun. July, Prime Video Bereft fans who are desperately missing Race Across the World and those who are giddy with anticipation for The Celebrity Traitors in autumn – ie, all of us – should look no further than Destination X. This wild adventure gameshow overseen by Rob Brydon takes contestants, lumps them in a 'blacked-out' bus and drives them to a mystery location somewhere in Europe. Turning the whole continent into essentially a giant chess board, they have to take on challenges to try to establish where they are – and the closest guess gets to stay in the game. July, BBC iPlayer Yes, humanity is the dominant animal on Earth. But since homo sapiens' development 250,000 years ago in Africa, we have no written record of 98% of our journey. Paleoanthropologist Ella Al-Shamahi tries to change that in this five-part BBC science series, by using DNA breakthroughs and fossil evidence to dive into our deep historical past. If its claim that it will provide a totally new perspective on what makes us human is to be believed, this will be a gamechanger. July, BBC One From Cracker to Time, a Jimmy McGovern show is always a must-watch – even one as harrowing as this. Anna Friel stars as Anna, whose brother Joe (a truly devastating Bobby Schofield) sexually assaulted his young nephew Tom a few years ago. As we meet Joe, he is leaving prison a shell of a man and goes to stay at a halfway house run by Sister Katherine, played by Anna Maxwell Martin, for therapy and horrifying realisations about the abuse he himself has faced. A brutal look at a family torn BBC One This super fun buddy-comedy starring Seth Rogen, Rose Byrne and their incredible chemistry has flown under the radar but it's well worth catching up ahead of its second outing. Best mates Sylvia and Will have always got up to high jinks … and this season, there will be mishaps from exploding eyeballs to kayaking through rivers of excrement, plus one of the funniest scenes of the year courtesy of Sylvia's rogue dog. 6 August, Apple TV+ The hotly anticipated follow-up to Tim Burton's staggeringly popular Addams Family spin-off sees Steve Buscemi join as the new headteacher of Wednesday Addams' school, Nevermore Academy, and Joanna Lumley pitch up as her grandmother. Paired with the return of Jenna Ortega's award-winningly intense take on the titular character, yet more creepy, kooky and altogether ooky fun awaits. 6 August, Netflix Noel Hawley, the brains behind the ace TV adaptation of the Coen Brothers' Fargo, takes the helm for this small-screen leap into the world of Ridley Scott's sci-fi classic. It's set on earth and serves as a prequel to the original 1979 movie, Alien. When a space ship crash lands, the contents turn out to not exactly delight people who like to go through life without an alien clasped to their face. Given what Hawley achieved with Fargo, this could go down as the greatest outing for Scott's franchise in decades. 12 August, Disney+ Disney's dramatisation of Knox's 2007 conviction and later acquittal of the murder of Meredith Kercher sees Knox herself feature as an executive producer, alongside Monica Lewinsky. Sharon Horgan stars as Knox's mum and Grace Van Patten plays Knox, after her recent role in steamy US drama Tell Me Lies. Given how gripped the world was by the last telling of this tale – Netflix's 2016 film, Amanda Knox – it is sure to be all anyone talks about for a month. 20 August, Disney+ Suranne Jones and Julie Delpy star as the liberal British prime minister Abigail Dalton and populist French president Vivienne Toussaint in this classic slice of globetrotting Netflix fare. When Dalton's husband Alex is abducted on a Médecins Sans Frontières mission in French Guiana, the only one who can ensure his release and safe return is Toussaint. But the abductors have something dodgy on her too … 21 August, Netflix Move over, Elton! The most excitable man on social media, trainspotter Frances Bourgeois, ditches his biggest passion – squealing with glee at passing locomotives – to pursue his other childhood obsession: becoming an astronaut. He gets G-force training from none other than Tim Peake, Mr Space Oddity himself, and sees if he has what it takes to pass muster in space. Sure to be hours of unadulterated joy in a non-gravity environment. August, Channel 4 Like The Traitors meets probate (stay with me), this Channel 4 show sees contestants compete to inherit a fortune left by a glamorous benefactor known only as 'the Deceased'. Viewers will know her better, however, as 'Liz Hurley'. Rob Rinder draws on his legal past to play her will's executor, and leads contestants through challenges, while they attempt to convince each other that they should be the sole heir to the cash. Made by the company behind the Winkleman smash, expect big, backstabby things. August, Channel 4 Jaime Lannister is William the Conqueror in this BBC historical epic. Or at least Game of Thrones's Nikolaj Coster-Waldau dives back into the land of dingily lit castles to tell the tale of the events leading up to the Battle of Hastings. James Norton, Juliet Stevenson and Clémence Poésy also star in an eight-parter that shows the clash that set the course of a continent for 1,000 years. Brace yourself for the arrow through the eye scene! August, BBC One Jacob Elordi is Dorrigo, a young medic engaged to be married and about to be shipped off to war when he has a love affair with his uncle's wife, Amy. He falls for her utterly when she shows him her favourite three-word Sappho poem, 'You burn me'. Across two timelines, we see the horrors of war as he ends up a PoW in Thailand forced to build the train lines that became known as the 'death railway'. We also see him as an older surgeon (played by Ciarán Hinds) still haunted by the hell of his capture and the love of Amy. Tender, sexy TV that almost throbs with desire – for what you can't have, and what you once had. TBC, BBC One/iPlayer Like ER crossed with 24, this thrilling medical drama plays out in real time hour by hour in one busy and very bloody shift for the doctors and nurses of Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Hospital. Created by John Wells of ER renown, and starring Noah Wyle (ditto – Carter fans assemble!) it's a high-octane reunion indeed. Wyle plays Dr 'Robby' Robinavitch, the attending who has to contend with constant calamities, rats on the loose in the ward and multiple newbies who are out of their depth … and then there's an emergency at a festival nearby. Already one of the most gushed-about shows of the year in the US, The Pitt urgently needs a UK air date – and stat! Date and channel TBC
The Sun
15-06-2025
- The Sun
Deviant Scots mum at heart of monkey torture ring ‘watched beheading videos' before getting involved in sick plot
A SICKO mum who helped arrange the torture killings of baby monkeys got hooked on 'gore' by watching videos of beheadings, we can reveal. Natalie Herron, 39, told fellow sadists how she binged on horrendous online clips of humans being decapitated, boasting: 'It goes beyond a hobby. It's almost a way of life.' 3 3 3 Her depraved hobby emerged after she was j ailed for helping to lead a worldwide monkey abuse ring, which paid thugs to rip tiny macaques from their mothers in Indonesia then butcher them on camera. The terrified animals were killed in agonising ways dreamt up by the group, including by crucifixtion, with the videos shared for kicks. Herron, of Airdrie, opened up to lowlife pals on encrypted messaging apps where she traded her stash of over 1,000 vile images and videos. She told other fiends: 'It's been a pleasure getting to know you all. 'I've built up a few amazing online relationships. 'Our private mails would have the normies turning in their graves. 'Before I got into monkey hate I always had a fascination for gore. Used to watch beheadings. 'Makes life much brighter knowing I'm not the only one who has monkey serial killer thoughts. 'Watching monkey torture always lulls me to sleep in the best way.' It is feared Herron has amassed an army of twisted followers, with thousands of others thought to be hooked on animal kill films. Her harrowing videos also saw young primates being hacked with machetes, dipped in boiling oil and having their skulls drilled. Katie Price slammed for 'putting puppy in danger' as fans warn 'you need to keep your pets safe!' Mother-of-two Herron hid her evil obsession by pretending to be an animal lover. She swapped pictures of pets, describing another brute's Staffie as 'a looker'. Herron wrote: 'I had a Staffy bef- ore I got my little furrball I have now. Rayne. 'She was the most tender, loving and loyal dog ever. They don't call them 'nanny dogs' for nothing. They're amazing with kids.' The Scottish Sun yesterday unmasked Herron by printing the first picture of her since she was caged for two years and three months at Airdrie Sheriff Court last Tuesday. As her group's administrator, she ran polls for monsters to vote on torture methods — including glueing the baby monkeys' hands and feet together before pepper spraying them, or force-feeding them until they died. She took warped delight when one bewildered primate was stuffed in a jar filled with biting fire ants, telling followers: 'We've got our ants in jars. Phenomenal!' We can reveal she also boasted how she did not 'give a s**t who knows I hate monkeys' and of her joy at seeing them 'blitzed in a blender and scalped'. And she bragged to pals about seeing one be crushed and suffocated. She said gleefully: 'Haven't you seen the video where the cellotape it into a ball? It's awesome.' And she added: 'People go around as if it's some ardinal sin, like we're committing the worst atrocities by watching monkey abuse vids.' Herron hid her debauched online life telling cronies family and friends would 'never look at me the same again'. She said the sadistic circle 'goes beyond a hobby — it's almost a way of life now lol.' But she was finally snared when US cops took down group ringleader Michael Macartney, 51, whose alias was 'The Torture King'. Scots cops found 1,084 images and videos of monkey torture on her iPhone. She admitted possessing and distributing obscene material between October 2021 and September 2022. But last night campaigners warned her ties to the torture network could have been over a longer period. Sarah Kite, of advocacy group Action for Primates, said: 'Natalie Herron has been involved in depraved and vile activity.' 'There are thousands of people involved in looking at this type of content, whether it be in any of the private Telegram groups or on Facebook. 'I would be concerned about them having contact with animals or children, seeing what they're capable of and what the sort of things that they enjoy. 'I think it's highly disturbing. I hope more people will be caught. 'I'm sure there'll be more both in the US and hopefully in the UK as well.' Nina Jackel, of Lady Freethinker, said: 'The torture and killing of helpless, infant macaques is among the most disturbing abuse cases I have seen in more than a decade.' Detective Inspector Mark Harrison, of the National Wildlife Crime Unit, warned: 'There are proven links between those involved in animal cruelty and violence towards people.' And the Scottish SPCA said: 'These videos are part of a broader culture of cruelty that must be tackled."
Yahoo
09-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
‘Final Destination: Bloodlines' Is the Highest-Rated Series Installment on Rotten Tomatoes. Here's Why You'll Love It
Gorehounds rejoice, for Final Destination is back and better than ever. After a whopping 14-year hiatus, the Rube Golderbergian Death-as-slasher horror franchise, a progenitor to the Saw mill and subsequent run of dubious 'torture porn' titles, returns to cinemas just in time for the franchise's 25th anniversary. Final Destination: Bloodlines is the sixth installment in one of the horror genre's most consistent franchises, in which attractive teens survive a deadly disaster only to meet their demise as Death works to balance his scales. There are some less-than-interesting sequels, but most of them are terrifically entertaining and all are eminently rewatchable. This one is better than most, and it's resolutely the best installment since Final Destination 2 (2003). Mild spoilers heralds a fresh direction for the series, which last graced cinema screens in 2011. Fans of the franchise will still get what they came for, namely a succession of truly icky kills, but those less familiar will be surprised to find the story more nuanced and compelling than your average gore epic. But worry not, mayhem is still the name of the day. There's a positively hysterical gag involving a soccer ball and a garbage can; and the sequence in which a super-magnetized MRI machine attracts both a wheelchair and someone's bodily piercings will make you squirm with delighted anguish. The picture opens with a well-produced flashback to the 1950s. A young woman and her boyfriend head to the grand opening of a building which greatly resembles Seattle's Space Needle but is emphatically, legally not the Space Needle. Of course, because this is a Final Destination movie, things go terribly wrong. We then awaken with college student Stefani (Kaitlyn Santa Juana), who's been haunted by a recurring nightmare showing her grandmother and grandfather killed in a building closely resembling (but assuredly not) the Space Needle. Though she's been estranged from them since her mother left the family, Stefani returns home to her father, brother, and extended kin to find out the reason for her disturbing visions. Stefani tracks down her reclusive grandmother, Iris (Gabrielle Rose), who's living the life of Laurie Strode circa 2018 in a wooded bunker. Iris reveals that Stefani's dream was Iris's own vision of a disaster, which she averted decades earlier. Because she saved so many lives, Death has spent the ensuing decades picking off members of their family — those who were supposed to die in the initial tragedy, and those who would never have been born if not for Iris's intervention. With the help of her bickering clan, Stefani must somehow break Death's chain of death. Really, it's all just dressing on which to hang the increasingly ghoulish murder set pieces, the franchise's raison d'être, and the reason we're all fantastic opening sequence, which comes remarkably close to surpassing the opening-disaster highlight of Final Destination 2 (2002), succinctly and rather brilliantly shows the audience how this installment will be different while reassuring them it will still be nominally the same. It's a bit of a thrill to see a Final Destination film with proper costumes and set design, where the characters aren't just early-to-mid aughts teens with accompanying fashions. As it moves into its modern-day sections, the younger characters are aided by a cast of older and middle-aged adults, which adds an unexpected and welcome layer of emotional resonance to the proceedings. Far from the anonymous teen ciphers of the recent Until Dawn (2025), these are well-developed individuals whom the script takes time to flesh out before they're flayed. Whereas the previous Final Destination movies operated with an unerring, ghoulish cynicism, Bloodlines takes a decidely more heartfelt path. This is most clear in the appearance of Tony Todd, who's played the Death-savvy coroner William Bludworth in five installments. (He doesn't physically appear in part three, but does have a vocal cameo.) Candyman star Todd, who died last November at 69, is synonymous with the series and here is given a respectful goodbye. His single scene culminates in a sendoff which is so straight-faced you'll expect some sort of nasty punchline, but blessedly it never arrives. The movie plays the moment completely straight and pulls it off better than expected.A look behind the scenes gives some context to this ambitious jump in quality. The screenplay was co-written by Guy Busick, who's recently penned the horror hits Ready or Not (2019), Scream (2022), and Scream VI (2023). Though the execution of those movies was lacking, Busick's writing saved the day in each case. (Writer-director Lori Evans Taylor joined Busick at the keyboard). Most interestingly, Jon Watts, who directed three Marvel Spider-Man movies, including No Way Home, is credited with writing the story and with producing. Busick and Watts understand what works about the series and don't wish to change it, but they're not afraid to get a bit subversive. Directors Zach Lipovsky and Adam Stein, who helmed the nifty sci-fi flick Freaks (2018), mostly do them proud. Bloodlines does have its issues. It may be a great Final Destination movie, but it's not a perfect motion picture. At 110 minutes (the longest franchise installment to date), it could stand to lose about 15 minutes. There's a bit too much running back and forth in the middle movement, and the film lacks the pared-back, sub-90-minute satisfaction that so many of the sequels achieved. And despite the clever design behind the death scenes, CGI blood and gore are never as satisfying as their practical counterparts. A theoretically grisly lawnmower gag plays with muted effect and would have had more heft with the inclusion of some proper latex and rubber. Ultimately, though, Bloodlines is exactly what fans of the Final Destination series are after. It's fun, it's bloody, and it'll make you look at vending machines, revolving doors, and bottles of beer with renewed suspicion. And above all, it's always a delight to see a horror reboot treated with respect by the filmmakers, rather than as a cash-grab one-weekend wonder. What more could you ask But let's not go 14 years without seeing each other again, all right?
Geek Tyrant
24-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Geek Tyrant
Brutal and Gory Claymation Short Film CLAYCAT'S DOOM THE DARK AGES — GeekTyrant
Here's an incredibly entertaining clamation stop-motion short film Claycat's DOOM: The Dark Ages and it's awesomely savage and gory, and we warch a cat warrior slay a bunch of deadly demons. It's a lot of fun to watch the cat brtually rip and devastate through a horde of demons! It certainly delivers some badass carnage!
Telegraph
12-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
Final Destination: Bloodlines – Michelin-star-worthy carnage for connoisseurs
It's 14 years since the last Final Destination film – not the final one, then. That was the fifth. This is the rare horror franchise that resets each time, and gets away with casting cheap, since surviving it is a rarity. You could watch them in any order. The durable concept is Death being cheated by one person's premonition of a horrific tragedy… and Death then coming round to collect. Death, on this outing, proves to be a deranged psychopath who even goes in for extracurricular trolling. He's playing a long game: the twist in Final Destination Bloodlines is a half-century gap between sprees of extreme gore. The film's entertainment value remains at all times gleefully visceral, though. It is carnage for connoisseurs. Nothing in the series so far can quite prepare you for the intricate sadism of these set pieces. Jaws might drop, if they weren't busy being severed or pulverised. Anyone with a summer barbecue planned, a tattoo appointment, or (be afraid) an MRI scan, could miss this imminent trash classic and remain blissfully ignorant of the mortal dangers they are dicing with. We start in 1968, with Iris (Brec Bassinger) fielding a proposal from her boyfriend at the opening of a brand new sky-rise restaurant, essentially a bulb on a stalk. The soundtrack is rich with foreboding (that's to say, Johnny Cash's 'Ring of Fire' comes on). Fire will feature. So will cracking glass, lift malfunctions, and dozens upon dozens of screaming VIPs tipped out to go splat. It's a lot. We have a moment to catch our breaths before the next ordeal, because somehow, in 2025, the elderly Iris (Gabrielle Rose) has managed to stay alive, by barricading herself in a ludicrous 'safe house' that actually looks like the biggest death trap imaginable. Her premonition – ie, the prologue – stopped that disaster happening. It is now being experienced by her granddaughter Stefani (Kaitlyn Santa Juana) as a recurring nightmare. Meanwhile, Death is playing catch-up. Young Iris was pregnant at the moment she was meant to die, meaning her entire family have gate-crashed existence, and he isn't letting that slide. He comes after them in order of their births, using everything but the kitchen sink. The motif of a bad penny, which keeps lodging itself evilly in all the worst crevices, tops and tails proceedings almost elegantly. But no one is inviting Final Destination Bloodlines to the Met Gala. This thing is savage. You'll need to discover how, say, a trampoline, a lawnmower and a hidden glass shard tessellate into an uncle-shredding combo attack not easily forgotten. It's extremely funny that the non-blood-relatives in the family just sit out the whole affair, smugly chilling. Winking callbacks (especially to the infamous log-truck quietus in Final Destination 2) prove that the makers of this are interested in nothing but fan service. Staggeringly grisly, Michelin-star-worthy fan service. It's like the lid being whisked back on a silver tureen full of mashed body parts. Hideous, hilarious, and – boy oh boy – not for the squeamish.
