Nacelle Unveils Wave 2 of Biker Mice From Mars Action Figures  Nacelle is expanding its NacelleVerse with a new wave of Biker Mice from Mars 1/12 scale figures, now featuring iconic villains and fresh heroes. The lineup includes Charley, Carbine, Lawrence Limburger, Doctor Karbunkle (with Fred the Mutant) and Greasepit. Each action figure will be packed with eccentric accessories and interchangeable parts. Following strong fan demand, production was fast-tracked to bring more characters and long-awaited villains to shelves. The beloved animated series is also being revived by Nacelle alongside Maximum Effort’s Ryan Reynolds.  Check out the full lineup here  Kevin Bacon and Kyra Sedgwick Reunite Onscreen for The Best You Can  Kevin Bacon puts his dancing shoes back on for Michael J. Weithorn’s new film The Best You Can, which premieres at the Tribeca Film Festival on June 7. This new Bacon feature, however, is far from a musical, and it will be the first time in over 20 years that Bacon and his wife Kyra Sedgwick reunite on the screen.  The new film will follow Stan (Bacon), who is home security guard, and Cynthia (Sedgwick), a doctor who forms an unlikely bond with Stan after her home gets invaded. Their friendship is formed entirely over text following their initial encounter.  Of course, working with actors who are married in real-life can throw off the illusion of an unexpected connection that Weithorn is trying to achieve. His solution? Weithorn tells Entertainment Weekly that he asked Bacon and Sedgwick to avoid rehearsing together; he also decided to put Sedgwick in a wig (brilliant) to hopefully make her appearance foreign to Bacon, and set the scene for the two meeting for the first time– and not that they’ve been married for like 36 years.  “For Weithorn, the experience opened him up to the idea of writing a film where texting is one of the primary modes of communication between his protagonists, reflecting its prevalence in day-to-day life. ‘With new people we find that, especially someone who’s a potential friend or someone you might be dating, sometimes it’ll be very awkward and you’re trying to struggle to figure out what they meant or why they didn’t text back,’ he notes. ‘All of the politics and the nuances of texting, it’s more often than not a little clunky.’” Read more at Entertainment Weekly  Nouvelle Vague Could Be France’s First Best International Film Winner at the Oscars in Over 30 Years   It’s been over 30 years since France has received a statuette for best international film, and in 2026, it might just be an American filmmaker to make that change.  Richard Linklater’s Nouvelle Vague recently premiered at Cannes, and has since been acquired by Netflix. Despite speculation, the film is eligible to be selected by France’s Oscar committee since it was shot mostly in French. Furthermore, Linklater employed a local artistic and production team, which heavily factors into the selection committee’s decision, given the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences requires the creative control of the film be mostly in the hands of the country’s citizens. The only opposing force would be the film’s current release date, which falls after AMPAS Sept. 30 deadline.  If you’re thinking: I think I’ve seen this film before– you’re not alone. France was just inches away from scoring best international film at the 2025 Oscars with Emilia Pérez, which Netflix also acquired; it only cost them $12 million, and was one of the most controversial films of the year. One almost certain deterrent from it winning best international film was a brewing controversy over lead actress’ Karla Sofia Gascon’s offensive tweets just in time for award season.  Still, following its Cannes premiere, though it did not win any prizes at the festival, critics have been abuzz with glowing reviews for Nouvelle Vague. The premiere even visibly moved Quentin Tarantino, who then led a burst of enthusiastic applause and a long standing-ovation from the audience.  Join our mailing list Get the best of Den of Geek delivered right to your inbox! “It would certainly be ironic — and hard to swallow for some — to finally see an American filmmaker score France’s first international feature film Oscar after more than 30 years (the last one dates back to 1993 with Regis Wargnier with ‘Indochine’).’” Read more at Variety  Warner Bros. Delays Animal Friends Release  Reviving a beloved ’90s classic about animated space mice is not the only thing Ryan Reynolds has been up to– he’s also set to star in an upcoming live-action hybrid movie directed by Peter Atencio, Animal Friends.  The film was set to premiere in theaters on Oct. 10, but that date has since been moved to May 1, 2026. Alongside Reynolds will be Aubrey Plaza, Jason Momoa, Dan Levy and TikTok star/rising pop-princess, Addison Rae.  “The road trip adventure feature is now set to hit theaters May 1, 2026, after previously having been scheduled for Oct. 10, 2025. Peter Atencio directs the film from a script by Kevin Burrows and Matt Mider.”  Read more at The Hollywood Reporter

This review contains spoilers for The Last of Us season 2 episode 6. After last week’s brutal and violent installment, The Last of Us season 2 takes us back in time for episode 6. “Feel Her Love” teased the return of Pedro Pascal, and now we get to see what memories Ellie might be looking back on as she avenges Joel’s death. That’s right, it’s time for a flashback episode. It may seem a little strange to pause the action of the season for an entire episode dedicated to Joel and Ellie’s recent past, but this episode is actually taking a page straight out of The Last of Us Part II. While not all of the flashbacks here are replicated exactly as they are in the game, flashbacks are used periodically in The Last of Us Part II as a sort of palate cleanser to all of the violence the player experiences and as a narrative device to show us key moments of Joel and Ellie’s relationship in the time between the first and second games. This episode essentially serves the same purpose. The first flashback of the hour takes us back to Austin, Texas in 1983, and we get to see Tommy and Joel as kids for the first time. Tommy was buying pot and got into an altercation with the dealer, Joel saw and came to his brother’s defense. Tommy is worried about getting the belt from their dad, so Joel offers to take the fall for him. Their police officer father (played brilliantly by Tony Dalton) takes a break from his shift after hearing about what happened. He sees through Joel’s lie, and the two have a heart-to-heart. He tells Joel about how hard his father was on him, and admits that although he tried to do better, he knows he’s still been harder than he should be on Joel and Tommy. He tells Joel that if he ever becomes a father, he hopes he does a little better than he did. In the next flashback, we get to see a little bit of that. Two months after Joel and Ellie arrived in Jackson, we see Joel trading LEGOs with Seth for some kind of surprise for Ellie. He then goes home and works on refurbishing a guitar for her, the very same guitar we see in the season 2 premiere. While he’s working, Tommy brings Ellie home because she deliberately burned her arm while on kitchen duty to cover up evidence of her immunity. After Tommy leaves, she’s apologetic to Joel, saying, while slightly loopy on pain meds, that she just really wanted to wear short sleeves again. A cake arrives at their house moments later, and Joel gives Ellie her birthday surprise, which she happily digs into. She asks him to play a song for her on the guitar he made for her, and he plays the song “Future Days” by Pearl Jam. As mentioned in last week’s review, this song becomes an important part of their relationship. A year later it’s Ellie’s 16th birthday, and Joel is taking her into the woods for a surprise. Fans of The Last of Us Part II will recognize this scene, and it’s one of the game’s best. Joel has found an abandoned museum with a space exhibit that’s still somewhat intact. He invites Ellie to join him in the capsule on display, and he even found a recording of an actual shuttle launch to really give Ellie an immersive experience. But even though Ellie seems overjoyed at this surprise, we can start to see the tension brewing between them. Ellie wants to start going on patrol and Joel is still hesitant. And on their way back, Ellie sees fireflies – the insect not the people – and pauses, something clearly on her mind even if she doesn’t admit it to Joel. The next year, Joel arrives home from patrol early, bringing home another cake to surprise Ellie. To his surprise, however, he finds her alone in her room with Cat, who is giving her a tattoo over her burn scar. Joel gets upset and chases Cat out. Ellie responds by angrily moving her stuff into the garage while Joel is asleep. He stops her, but instead of forcing her to stay in the house, he offers to help clean up the garage for her to help her move. Pedro Pascal is so good at Joel’s subtle expressions that we can tell this bothers him, but he’d rather give Ellie the space she wants than lose her entirely. Two years later, Ellie is in her garage apartment, rehearsing how to ask Joel about what really happened in Salt Lake City. Joel knocks on her door, offering to finally take her on her first patrol for her 19th birthday. While on the trail, Joel tells Ellie that he’d like to do this more often, spend time together like they used to. It’s clear that Ellie still has her questions about Salt Lake on her mind, but Joel is barely able to ask her what’s on her mind before they’re interrupted by a radio call – Eugene and Adam are in trouble and need help. Joel tells Ellie to go back, but she replies “I’m not your fucking kid, Joel, I’m your partner. We stick together.” When Joel and Ellie arrive, Adam is already dead and Eugene has been bit. He begs for them to take him to Jackson’s gates so he can tell Gail goodbye, but Joel refuses. Ellie pleads with him too, and Joel appears to relent. He tells Ellie to go get the horses and bring them down the trail. He looks her in the eye and promises that he and Eugene will meet up with her. But while Ellie is gone, he takes Eugene to a clearing and shoots him. They return to Jackson, and Ellie watches Joel lie through his teeth to Gail about what happened, that Eugene shot himself to save them. Furious, she tells Gail the truth, and we can see on her face that she doesn’t have to ask Joel about Salt Lake City anymore – she’s already confirmed that Joel lied to her about what happened. When she says “You swore,” to Joel, she’s not just talking about his promise that day. Join our mailing list Get the best of Den of Geek delivered right to your inbox! Nine months later we’re back to where the season started – New Year’s Eve. We get to see the party and its aftermath from Joel’s perspective. The scene on the porch plays out a little differently this time around – when Ellie storms past him she comes back around. The two have a heart-to-heart. Ellie demands that Joel doesn’t go behind her back and take her off patrol, which he agrees to. He then asks her about Dina, and her feelings for her. Ellie then calls Joel an asshole and confronts him about his lies. She tells him that that day with Eugene confirmed what she already knew, and gives him one last chance to tell her the truth about what happened with the Fireflies. Joel admits to everything, though his face says more than his words. He tells Ellie that he would do it all over again. Ellie thinks it’s because he’s selfish, but Joel replies with a variation of what his father told him at the beginning of the episode. He says “Because I love you, in a way you can’t understand. Maybe you never will. But if that day should come, if you should ever have one of your own, well then, I hope you do a little better than me” Ellie’s last words to him in that moment are “I don’t think I can forgive you for this, but I would like to try.” And we now know that these were likely her final words to Joel before his death. It explains why she was willing to go on patrol with him that morning – she was trying to take a step toward forgiving him. Getting to watch Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey on screen together again is such a treat, even if they are dealing an immense amount of emotional damage to each other and the audience. The way they capture Joel and Ellie’s physicality and emotions is spot on. These characters aren’t great at communicating verbally – we see it takes years for Ellie to ask Joel about Salt Lake City. But there’s still so much language in what they don’t say that defines their relationship. This episode may have given us a break from the violence of the last two, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t still a little brutal to watch. Just because we’re not actively watching Joel get beaten to death again, doesn’t mean these flashbacks don’t drive the broken golf club in even deeper into our hearts. We watch Joel and Ellie’s relationship break and start to mend itself again, knowing that they won’t have a chance to fully reconcile. Ellie’s desire for revenge makes all the more sense knowing that Abby took away her chance to forgive Joel – all she has left to forgive now is his memory. New episodes of The Last of Us season 2 premiere Sundays at 9 p.m. ET on HBO, culminating with the finale on May 25, 2025. Learn more about Den of Geek’s review process and why you can trust our recommendations here.

Bella Ramsey and Pedro Pascal in "The Last of Us." Credit: Liane Hentscher / HBO If you thought the death of Joel (Pedro Pascal) would be the most heartbreaking part of The Last of UsThat honor falls to Season 2, episode 6, a flashback episode all about Joel and Ellie's (Bella Ramsey) years in Jackson — and why they grew apart.The episode's heartbreak comes in waves. Early sequences of Joel and Ellie's happiest memories become tragically bittersweet with the knowledge of what's to come. And of course, watching the two fall out is a surefire recipe for sadness. By the end of the hour, your eyes will be damp and your heart will have shattered into a million tiny pieces. But hey, at least we got Joel back for a bit!Here, in chronological order, is every time The Last of Us Season 2, episode 6 broke our hearts. When young Joel's father gets vulnerable about parenting.Episode 6 opens with a flashback to Austin in 1983, when young Joel (Andrew Diaz) tries to protect Tommy (David Miranda) from a beating from their father (Tony Dalton). But instead of physically punishing either of his sons, Joel's father decides to tell him about the warped blueprint of fatherhood he inherited from his own abusive dad, and how he hopes to improve upon it, bit by bit. "I'm doing a little better than my father did," he tells Joel. "When it's your turn, I hope you do a little better than me."That line proves to be the thesis of the episode, with Joel trying to do a little better than his own father during his time with Ellie. Knowing how limited that time is — and how the two ended things — kickstarts episode 6's heartache. And guess what? It's not about to let up anytime soon. When the opening credits change to bring back Joel.After Joel's death, The Last of Us' opening credits made a devastating change. Instead of ending on the image of two fungal silhouettes, meant to represent Ellie and Joel, they ended with just the Ellie silhouette, highlighting her new loneliness. In episode 6, however, the Joel silhouette is back! It's both a welcome return and a reminder that we're on borrowed time with this pair. Who knew a shadow of a fungus could make me so emotional?When Joel sings "Future Days" to Ellie. Bella Ramsey and Pedro Pascal in "The Last of Us." Credit: Liane Hentscher / HBO So many elements of Ellie's 15th birthday tug at the heartstrings, from Joel's reaction to her burning her arm to hide her bite mark to him customizing a guitar for her. But the moment that opens the floodgates is undoubtedly Joel's rendition of Pearl Jam's "Future Days" (teased by Ellie herself back in episode 5).The song's lyrics — "If I ever were to lose you / I'd surely lose myself" — are a resounding reminder of how much Ellie and Joel have come to mean to each other. (It's also a dark portent of how Ellie may be losing herself on her revenge quest.) But the performance is also a payoff of a story thread from all the way back in Season 1, when Ellie asked Joel to sing for her and teach her to play guitar. Well, it's finally happened, and I wouldn't blame you for getting teary-eyed. When Joel and Ellie visit the museum. Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey in "The Last of Us." Credit: Liane Hentscher / HBO After a full season and a half of watching Joel and Ellie run from Infected and human enemies alike (and in Joel's case, you know, dying), any scene where these two can just relax and enjoy themselves is a blessing. And what a blessing Ellie's 16th birthday is!Joel brings Ellie to a museum, where she spends the day clambering on dinosaur statues and blasting off to space in an old capsule. In one of the season's most poignant moments, her imagined space flight becomes reality, with the light of the real world fading around her until she's drifting in the dark void of space.The entire sequence is Joel and Ellie at their happiest. She gets to actually be a kid for once, and Joel revels in her joy, knowing he's doing a good job as a father.Of course, the scene also serves as the calm before the storm. Ellie's insistence that she goes on patrol is a reminder of the dangers Jackson faces, as well as the fateful patrol that will one day rip Joel from her forever. For now, though, we get to enjoy Joel in dad mode, attempting to give Ellie "the talk," all while being clueless about her sexuality. Talk about bittersweet.When Ellie moves out of their house.If Ellie's 16th birthday celebration is Joel's dream, then her 17th birthday is his nightmare. He walks in on her smoking pot, getting a tattoo, and hooking up with Kat (Noah Lamanna). "All the teenage shit all at once," as he puts it. Mashable Top Stories Stay connected with the hottest stories of the day and the latest entertainment news. Sign up for Mashable's Top Stories newsletter By clicking Sign Me Up, you confirm you are 16+ and agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Thanks for signing up! While Joel's exasperated dad act seems funny at first — what's worse, dodging Clickers or teenage rebellion? — it moves into upsetting territory pretty fast. Dismissing Ellie's relationship with Kat as an "experiment" is awful, plain and simple, as is his assertion that Ellie isn't currently herself. No wonder Ellie wants to move into the garage: Having her own father figure refute her identity like that marks a major blow to their bond.Thankfully, Joel recognizes the error of his ways and tries to help by giving Ellie more space, but this fight and subsequent move mark the beginning of the end for Joel and Ellie. You want to grab them through the screen and yell at them to communicate with each other, that they only have a few years left. Instead, all you can do is watch the tragedy snowball.When we learn what Ellie's moth tattoo means. Bella Ramsey and Pedro Pascal in "The Last of Us." Credit: Liane Hentscher / HBO One of Joel's attempts to bond with Ellie post-fight is to ask her about her moth tattoo. It echoes her drawings, which he used as inspiration when decorating her guitar. Ellie says she chose the moths because of what they represent in dreams. Joel mistakenly believes they're symbols for change and metamorphosis, but therapist Gail (Catherine O'Hara) reveals the truth: They represent death.That means Ellie has been carrying around the deaths of everyone she's lost, like Riley (Storm Reid), her mother (Ashley Johnson), and more. As seemingly the only person in the world who's immune to Cordyceps, there's also a layer of survivor's guilt here. Ellie's surrounded by death, yet protected from it too. That's a crushing burden to bear, one that's defined her entire coming-of-age — and one that Joel will never truly understand.When Ellie questions what happened in Salt Lake City. Bella Ramsey in "The Last of Us." Credit: Liane Hentscher / HBO On Ellie's 19th birthday, she gets what she's wanted since moving to Jackson: to go on patrol with Joel. But now, she wants something else, too: answers about what really happened in Salt Lake City at the end of Season 1.Before she and Joel head out to patrol, she sits in her room, rehearsing questions she has about Salt Lake City. "If the Fireflies spotted us a mile from the hospital, how did they get surprised by an entire group of raiders?" she wonders. "If the raiders could kill all those soldiers and Marlene, and you had to carry me the whole time, how did we get away?"These brief moments signal how much Ellie has replayed that pivotal day, how these discrepancies have been eating at her for years. Deep down, she knows that Joel lied to her. Perhaps that subconscious knowledge influenced her need for space from Joel, further widening the rift between them that Joel may have just attributed to teenage rebellion. Based on episode 1, we know that that rift is about to get a whole lot wider, so the inclusion of Ellie's questions here suggests the other shoe is about to drop.When we finally learn what happened with Eugene. Joe Pantoliano in "The Last of Us." Credit: Liane Hentscher / HBO This is the big one, folks. Ever since episode 1, The Last of Us has been talking about Joel killing Gail's husband Eugene (Joe Pantoliano). Now, we finally get to see it play out.Eugene is marked for death from the moment he gets infected on patrol. He accepts that, but man, do his final moments sting. It all starts when Ellie insists that Eugene has enough time to make it back to Jackson and say goodbye to Gail before he fully turns, and she makes Joel promise that he'll help. But Joel, thinking to protect Ellie and Jackson, goes back on his promise and shoots Eugene anyway. It's a brutal betrayal not just of Eugene, who gets a few seconds of false hope before reality sets in, but also of Ellie, who realizes that Joel's promise mirrors the very promise he made to her after the events of Salt Lake City. Related Stories "You swore," she says, all the weight of years of pain and questioning coming through in just two words.Ellie's discovery of Joel's lie plays out differently in the show than in the game, where Eugene is already dead from a stroke. Still, watching her put the pieces together — and watching Joel betray her even after their relationship seemed to be tentatively mending — is nothing less than devastating.When Joel and Ellie take steps towards healing in the porch scene.Up until now, episode 6 has revealed why Joel and Ellie aren't on speaking terms by the start of Season 2, as well as what happened with Eugene. There's only one major question left to answer: What happened the night before Joel's death to make Ellie say she and Joel were "better now"?The answer plays out in episode 6's gorgeous final scene, a continuation of the porch scene from episode 1. Here, The Last of Us reveals that Ellie didn't just turn in for the night after seeing Joel out on the porch. Instead, she came back to ask him, point blank, about what he did to the Fireflies. Her line of questioning serves as a direct parallel to Abby's (Kaitlyn Dever) interrogation of Joel right before his death: The two both know the role Joel played in the massacre, but they want to hear him confess it for himself.The conversation that follows is full of lines that double as gut punches. Upon learning that making a Cordyceps cure would have killed her, Ellie says, "Then I was supposed to die! That was my purpose. My life would've fucking mattered. But you took that from me, you took that from everyone."Joel's response? "Yes, and I'll pay the price." Little does he know he'll pay the ultimate price the very next day. In fact, the whole scene hurts even more knowing that the journey of forgiveness that Ellie hopes to embark on will be cut short in a matter of hours. Episode 6, you've already made me tear up several times before, but this might take the cake.Adding salt to the wound is one last callback to the Austin flashback. "If you should ever have [a child] of your own, well, then, I hope you do a little better than me," Joel tells Ellie. The line hits especially hard after Ellie's reaction to Dina's (Isabela Merced) pregnancy: "I'm gonna be a dad."With that, The Last of Us comes full circle, making episode 6 a stunning, heartbreaking story of parenthood — and a season highlight.New episodes of The Last of Us Season 2 premiere on HBO and HBO Max Sundays at 9 p.m. ET. Belen Edwards Entertainment Reporter Belen Edwards is an Entertainment Reporter at Mashable. She covers movies and TV with a focus on fantasy and science fiction, adaptations, animation, and more nerdy goodness.

en pointe Ana de Armas is caught in Wick’s crosshairs in final Ballerina trailer "When you think of me, you should think of fire. Risen from ashes, again and again." Jennifer Ouellette – May 13, 2025 10:08 am | 0 Credit: Lionsgate Entertainment Credit: Lionsgate Entertainment Story text Size Small Standard Large Width * Standard Wide Links Standard Orange * Subscribers only   Learn more One last trailer for From the World of John Wick: Ballerina. We're about three weeks out from the theatrical release of From the World of John Wick: Ballerina,  starring Ana de Armas. So naturally Lionsgate has released one final trailer to whet audience appetites for what promises to be a fiery, action-packed addition to the hugely successful franchise. (Some spoilers for 2019's John Wick Chapter 3: Parabellum.) Chronologically, Ballerina takes place during the events of John Wick Chapter 3: Parabellum. As previously reported, Parabellum found Wick declared excommunicado from the High Table for killing crime lord Santino D'Antonio on the grounds of the Continental. On the run with a bounty on his head, he makes his way to the headquarters of the Ruska Roma crime syndicate, led by the Director (Anjelica Huston). The Director also trains young girls to be ballerina-assassins, and one young ballerina (played by Unity Phelan) is shown rehearsing in the scene. That dancer, Eve Macarro, is the main character in Ballerina, now played by de Armas. Huston returns as the Director, Ian McShane is back as Winston, and Lance Reddick makes one final (posthumous) appearance as the Continental concierge, Charon. New cast members include Gabriel Byrne as the main villain, the Chancellor, who turns an entire town against Eve; Sharon Duncan-Brewster as Nogi, Eve's mentor; Norman Reedus as Daniel Pine; and Catalina Sandino Moreno and David Castaneda in as-yet-undisclosed roles. The first trailer was released last September and focused heavily on Eve's backstory: Having been orphaned, she chose to train with the Ruska Roma in hopes of avenging her father's brutal death. Wick only made a brief appearance, but he had more screen time in the second trailer, released in March, in which the pair face off in an atmospheric wintry landscape. This final trailer opens with Eve looking up while directly in Wick's crosshairs. Much of the ensuing footage isn't new, but it does show de Armas to her best deadly advantage as she takes on combatant after combatant in true John Wick style. Her vow: "This isn't done until they're dead." From the World of John Wick: Ballerina hits theaters on June 6, 2025. Jennifer Ouellette Senior Writer Jennifer Ouellette Senior Writer Jennifer is a senior writer at Ars Technica with a particular focus on where science meets culture, covering everything from physics and related interdisciplinary topics to her favorite films and TV series. Jennifer lives in Baltimore with her spouse, physicist Sean M. Carroll, and their two cats, Ariel and Caliban. 0 Comments