During the golden era of Western films, several big names were born. The likes of John Wayne and Clint Eastwood became masters of the big screen, each with their own idea of what a Western should be. That golden era of Western films came to an end in the late 1960s and the market for such movies has dwindled for over 40 years. Few movie studios have been willing to make them since, with only a handful here and there—like Clint Eastwood’s award-winning Unforgiven ....

When Seinfeld came to an end in 1998, it had changed how sitcoms were made—most notably in how it didn’t have one communal location as its story base (like the bar in Cheers ), but instead followed its core characters around 90s New York. Jerry, Elaine, George, and Kramer all led expansive lives involving all kinds of situations. Every week, millions of people tuned in to see the group’s antics, which always felt close enough to reality to be relatable....

Xbox Game Pass is full of awesome shooters, RPGs, and racing games—but what if you’re more into strategy games over action games? At first glance, you may not think you have many options since strategy games usually end up as PC games, but Xbox Game Pass is packed with more strategic goodness and tactical candy than you might realize. We’re talking traditional strategy games here. That includes turn-based strategy games and real-time strategy games, while excluding not-quite-strategy games like city builders and simulation-style games....

Twitch, the most popular video game streaming platform in the world, has millions of viewers. That means a huge population of people enjoy watching other people play video games. YouTube is saturated with its own form of watching people play video games: the “Let’s Play” video. Gamers like PewDiePie and Markiplier have built massive fanbases doing this. A strange phenomenon, isn’t it? Even if you like playing video games, the idea of watching someone else play video games might be outlandish....

Video games seem to be getting longer with every year. This makes sense, of course. With prices going up all the time, you want to be sure a game is going to last you a long time—long enough for you to feel like the price was worth it, at least. But there seems to be a growing mentality among gamers that views shorter games as inferior to longer games. I would argue the opposite: with the occasional exception, shorter games are often better and more rewarding than longer games....

People often deride movie adaptations because most of them fail to encapsulate their source material within their runtime. Huge chunks of plot and lots of details are frequently left out, leaving many viewers wishing for a TV adaptation instead. But then you have the other side of the coin: works that are adapted into TV series when they actually should’ve been movies. Sometimes, the narrative element of a particular source work can fit within the average 2....

House of the Dragon , HBO’s latest hit TV series, is living up to the legacy of Game of Thrones and its earlier seasons. There’s plenty of political intrigue, morally gray characters, and lots of awesome dragons. This prequel series is based on George R. R. Martin’s Fire & Blood novel about the rise and fall of House Targaryen, set 172 years before the birth of Daenerys and centering on the Targaryen civil war that would later be known as the “Dance of the Dragons....

D&D campaign settings are more than just a location (or group of locations) for D&D adventurers to explore and conquer. If we broaden our minds, we can start seeing different D&D campaign settings as unique sandboxes with special traits—and these traits come together as a toolset that DMs can use to craft deeper, more intricate, and more interesting stories. And few D&D campaign settings have introduced as much depth and narrative magic as Eberron....

There’s a lot that happens from session to session in Dungeons and Dragons . Between the monsters, the villains, the artifacts, and the threat of apocalypse every week, adventurers often have their hands full no matter the campaign. One thing that never changes? Adventures are usually profitable, if you survive. For players, that means they’ll need somewhere to spend their ill-gotten gains. Enter, the merchant! Related: The best YouTube channels for D&D players...

Anime is no stranger to princesses, but these princesses share little in common with the Western princesses most of us know. If you’re like me, you’ve grown up with classic fairy tales that involve princesses who are always “damsels in distress” at the mercy of cruel witches, wicked stepmothers, and dangerous dragons. In anime, princesses often live their own unique princess stories, from those who are badass swordswomen to those who are high-ranking mages of a kingdom to those who command legions....

In any discussion about today’s best actors, the same names tend to pop up: Leonardo DiCaprio, Christian Bale, Gary Oldman, Bryan Cranston, Joaquin Phoenix, Tom Hanks. But there’s one actor who’s consistently underrated: Jake Gyllenhaal . I’ve been a fan of him since I saw him in The Day After Tomorrow in 2004, and he’s impressed me in every film I’ve seen him in since—even in films that fell short of expectations, like Life and Enemy ....

Amusement parks, theme parks, water parks, resort parks—they’re all pretty much the same with a few variations between them. One thing’s for sure: they’re all packed with excitement! When summer rolls around, what better to do than fly down water slides and loop round roller coasters? But even if theme parks aren’t your cup of tea, these fun-filled theme park movies will be! Here are my picks for the best movies about amusement parks, which involve all kinds of themes: dinosaurs, zombies, robots, and more!...

The 1970s were quite a decade for cinema! New Hollywood was booming, blockbusters were block-busting, and the Vietnam War had triggered a series of acclaimed war epics. With so many amazing movies to choose from, it’s hard to narrow down the most iconic films of the decade… but I’m going to try. Here are my picks for the best movies of the 1970s! 10. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975) Directed by Miloš Forman...

Video games have evolved in so many ways—not just with respect to graphics and gameplay, but also with respect to their characters, stories, and cinematic qualities. Many game developers go to great lengths to ground their characters, deepen their backstories, and expand their worlds. Sometimes, those worlds are rooted in real life and the annals of history. Historical events can make for compelling settings in video games. Sadly, most of the time, you only see them in war games where players get involved in missions based on real-life skirmishes....

Animation studios love to insert easter eggs—small details that can easily slip under your radar but have meaning if you’re able to spot them—into their cartoons and movies. For example, Pixar loves littering their films with easter eggs that hint at a broad connection between all of the movies in the Pixar universe. It’s come to be known as the “Grand Unifying Theory of Pixar Movies.” The existence of easter eggs has caused fans to rewatch and more closely analyze their favorite films, leading to all kinds of theories and conclusions based on details that may or may not be red herrings....

Most films, especially horror films, are usually only remembered for one or two scenes—the moments that really impacted us, whether by making us crack up, sob ourselves dry, or scare the wits out of us. In horror, the scariest scenes are the ones that make us hide behind our fingers, jump out of our seats, and make our skin crawl whenever we think back on those scenes later. Scary scenes linger in our psyche because they successfully touched on something unsettling, terrifying, or disturbing....

Tabletop Simulator is a board game lover’s dream—it requires no setup or cleanup, and allows you to play with friends regardless of distance. Not only that, but it gives you access to dozens of free board game mods on top of the 15 classic games it already comes with. You can easily add these mods through the Steam Workshop. Some of the player-created mods here don’t come with instructions, so you might have to prepare before playing....

Most of us associate—whether rightly or wrongly—the hood with gangs. Movies set in the ghetto tend to feature street fights, drugs, and shootouts. However, that isn’t always the case. Hood movies exploded during the 90s, carving out their own “ghetto-centric” corner of urban cinema, then evolving into something greater after the turn of the millennium. From buddy cop movies like End of Watch (2012) to cult classics like The Warriors (1979), the hood movie genre is brimming with different stories and perspectives that go beyond gangs and guns....

Abuse can take many forms: verbal, emotional, physical, sexual. It can occur in the workplace, at home, in public, or in arbitrary and unfamiliar places. One of the sad facts of life is that most people will experience some form of abuse in their lives. The effect this can have on us can’t be overstated. Abuse can leave us insecure, depressed, crippled with anxiety, or more. It’s not unusual to need help in overcoming the lasting effects of trauma, and it’s important to get professional therapy when the abuse is severe....

The anime medium is far stranger than most TV series, if only because the foundation of animation makes it so much easier to do things that break the laws of nature and physics. But the weirdness of anime—even mainstream anime—goes beyond simply being able to depict unnatural events and phenomena. Anime is home to all kinds of unusual tropes that stem from Japanese culture as well as the willingness of anime to explore extreme niches....