Jennifer Maas: Last News

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Watching the third season premiere of Fox‘s mystery bakeoff competition “Crime Scene Kitchen” might have elicited quite a few “Come on!” groans from viewers at home. From missing clues under sinks and in trash cans to not reading explicit instructions closely to making dishes that completely ignored certain ingredients that were laid out plainly for them, the Season 3 contestants who made their debut in the Sept.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer “Starship Troopers” virtual reality game “Starship Troopers: Continuum” is set from Sony Pictures Entertainment, the studio behind the iconic 1997 sci-fi movie. Featuring Casper Van Dien reprising his role as Johnny Rico’ “Starship Troopers: Continuum” is set 25 years after the Battle of Klendathu in the original film. Per Sony, “The war between the Federation and the Arachnid is deadlocked, but the planet Janus-4 holds a secret that threatens to tip the balance of the war; The Continuum.” In “Continuum,” players take on the role of a PsyCommander, an “experiment” with advanced psychic powers including: control troopers, rank them up, and try to keep them alive; promote them to citizenship for big bonuses, and advance your own powers faster; and add psychic perks to build your perfect trooper.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Netflix used its fourth annual Geeked Week, a previously virtual five-day event during which the streamer rains down news about its new and returning YA, sci-fi and fantasy TV shows, games and movies, as its latest evolution in the live events business following more than 50 experiences in 25 cities worldwide. With more than 1,000 screaming attendees at Atlanta’s Dairies event space for the in-person experience on Sept.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Following its price increase earlier this month, indie streamer Nebula is launching a new initiative to up its subscriber count. Beginning Tuesday, current Nebula customers be given one “guest pass” per month for monthly subscribers, or three per quarter for annual and lifetime accounts, that they can offer to anyone for a week-long free trial of Nebula, as long as that person is new to Nebula.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer At 61 years old, Japanese game developer Hideo Kojima is far from retirement. Instead, the mastermind behind “Death Stranding” and “Metal Gear Solid” is charting a course that will expand his reach beyond the gaming world and into Hollywood as he signs with talent agency WME. Ahead of his appearance at the Tokyo Game Show this weekend, Kojima spoke with Variety about selecting WME as his liaison in the world of TV and film, his plans for upcoming video games “Death Stranding 2,” “Physint” and Jordan Peele collaboration “OD,” as well as an update on the “Death Stranding” movie adaptation and his insistence on remaining an indie game developer at Kojima Productions.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Top gaming streamer Rachell Hofstetter, best known by her handle Valkyrae, has launched her own media company, Hihi Studios, which will develop and produce IP for graphic novels, TV and film projects with a specific emphasis on anime content. At launch, Hihi Studios has set a co-publishing deal with digital comic book platform GlobalComix, which will see them fund, creatively develop, and distribute both physically and digitally the studio’s first IP. Per the company, “Hihi Studios will be all encompassing by releasing shows, merchandise and product through each IP.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer It’s time to return to Hogwarts for the holidays: Warner Bros. Discovery has released the first trailer for its new baking competition “Harry Potter: Wizards of Baking,” revealing the show will debut Nov. 14 at 8 p.m.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer A sequel video game to PlayStation‘s “Ghost of Tsushima” is set from developer Sucker Punch Productions. Titled “Ghost of Yōtei,” the game will debut in 2025 and follow a new protagonist, Atsu, with a whole new storyline.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer After previously being exempt from inclusion in the ongoing video game actors strike, Riot Games‘ massively multiplayer online role-playing game “League of Legends” has been added to the list of blocked titles by SAG-AFTRA amid the union’s accusation of unfair labor practices against Formosa Interactive. According to SAG-AFTRA, Formosa, a union signatory that provides voiceover services for “League of Legends,” is accused of trying to “cancel” one of its struck video games “shortly after the start of SAG-AFTRA’s video game strike” July 26.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer SPOILER ALERT: This story contains spoilers from Hazel Beck‘s “Truly Madly Magically,” which hit shelves Aug. 27. “Truly Madly Magically” authors Megan Crane and Nicole Helm, collectively known by the pen name Hazel Beck, have one more book in their “Witchlore” series to wrap up the stories of witch friends Emerson, Rebekah, Ellowyn, Georgie and their battle against the evil Joywood coven before the four-installment witchy saga ends.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer SPOILER ALERT: This story contains spoilers from the Season 1 premiere of Fox’s “9-1-1: Lone Star.” As we go on, we remember all the good times we’ve had with the 126 — and they aren’t over just yet. While Fox has confirmed that “9-1-1: Lone Star” will be concluding with its Season 5, the end is still a ways away as the “9-1-1” spinoff just debuted its final season premiere Monday following more than a year off the air.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Indie streamer Dropout has set the full guest-star lineup for the second season of its Vic Michaelis-hosted comedic interview series “Very Important People.” “Very Important People” features Michaelis as the host of a standard talk show series with a twist: all interview subjects receive makeovers before sitting down to chat and then must immediately invent a character to play during the interview. Following the Aug.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Gaming consoles are dead. Long live gaming consoles! For more than two decades, it’s been a regular topic of conversation: When might gaming consoles, the dedicated hardware that has been the core of the gaming biz, become obsolete — and be replaced by general-purpose platforms like PCs and smartphones? The debate has been stoked by the rise of cloud computing and mobile gaming, alongside dips in sales of the latest generations of Microsoft, Sony PlayStation and Nintendo devices. Questions about the longevity of the console model are back.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Zack Snyder revealed a first look at Netflix‘s upcoming video game set in the world of his “Rebel Moon” film franchise during the streamer’s “Geeked Week” event in Atlanta Thursday. Titled “Blood Line: A Rebel Moon Game,” the upcoming mobile offering is described as an “online co-operative action game takes on the role of a rebel, picking between a variety of classes to join a covert rebellion that’s fighting to take back their planet from the tyrannical Motherworld.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Adam Conover returns to his CollegeHumor roots this week with new standup comedy special, “Adam Conover: Unmedicated,” which delves into the comedian’s history with ADD and his subsequent Adderall addiction. The show, which launched Wednesday, is streaming on Dropout (the indie platform owned by the rebranded CollegeHumor company) as part of its new “Dropout Presents” series of standup specials, which debuted earlier this year with Hank Green’s special in June. Conover told Variety he’s been wanting to do this project for the past 15 years.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Amazon Ads is launching a new experience on gaming platform “Fortnite” that will offer marketing opportunities to brands and have guaranteed promotion through Amazon-owned streamer Twitch. Titled “The Glitch,” the project is described as “an integrated galaxy of brand-customized playable worlds” within “Fortnite” created by “Halo” co-creator Alexander Seropian and his Look North World game developer.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Dan and Eugene Levy took the stage at the top of the Emmys on Sunday night to kick off the awards show on ABC with jokes galore, including a roast of “The Bear.” The opening segment of the 76th annual Emmy awards saw the duo (who mark the first-ever father and son to host TV’s biggest night) playfully grill the FX on Hulu series (a Disney-owned show, and thus a prime target to get a jab when the Emmys are airing on Disney broadcaster ABC): “‘The Bear’ is nominated for 23 Emmys tonight, making it the most nominated comedy in history,” Eugene Levy said. “Now, I love the show, I love the show, and I know some of you will be expecting us to make a joke about whether ‘The Bear’ is really a comedy — but in the true spirit of ‘The Bear,’ we will not be making any jokes.” The jokes centering Disney properties didn’t end there, with the Levys noting that FX on Hulu’s “Shōgun” already took home 14 Emmys at last week’s Creative Arts awards show, making it the most-decorated show in a single season.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer YouTube star and content creator KreekCraft, best known as the most popular Roblox livestreamer, has been signed by UTA. The streaming star was previously signed with CAA.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Microsoft Gaming will lay off approximately 650 employees, or 3% of the Xbox owner’s global workforce, in a new round of eliminations following last year’s completion of its Activision Blizzard acquisition. The cuts will primarily impact staffers in “corporate and supporting functions,” per Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Actor John Cena recently lent his talents to a marketing campaign for Supercell‘s mobile game “Brawl Stars,” which has introduced a collaboration with Nickleodeon’s “SpongeBob SquarePants” amid the cartoon’s 25th anniversary. While a seemingly strange choice of star to promote the Paramount-Supercell teamup, Cena explained to Variety how his passion for mobile gaming and his history with the WWE makes him a good fit to lead promo for the “SpongeBob” tie-in.“Honestly, I don’t think it’s weird at all. I think I heard a stat that SpongeBob is talked about on social media just about every four seconds,” Cena said.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer PlayStation has officially confirmed the release of its next console, the PS5 Pro. The device will launch Nov. 7 and retail at $699.99 compared to its predecessor the PS5, which launched in November 2020 priced at $499 with a digital-only edition for $399.