Rise of the Supermoon sparks record number of werewolf sightings in UK

Sheer lunar-cy or the beginning of a worrying trend?

Thousands of people from up and down the UK braved the cold and took to the streets last night to catch a rare glimpse of the supermoon. This unique astrological phenomenon, which is only visible every few generations, occurs when the moon’s orbit brings it in close proximity to the earth. 30% brighter and 14% larger than your run-of-the-mill full moon, this unique lunar light show makes for a breathtaking and beautiful sight.

While this rare celestial event was a cause for celebration for many, there are some who will look back on the evening of November 15 with fear, not fondness, in their hearts.

During the night, while the supermoon rode high in the sky, UK Emergency Services were inundated with calls from panic-stricken members of the Great British public, many claiming to have seen or been attacked by creatures they described as 'werewolves'. At first, the operators were baffled by these bizarre reports, but that bafflement soon turned to bewilderment as more and more calls from terrified UK residents began pouring in.

One of the callers was Basingstoke resident Joan Landis. The 45-year-old mother of two was awoken in the early hours of the morning by the sound of persistent scratching and banging. “Sometimes we gets stray cats making noise round the back, but straightaway I could tell this weren’t a cat. There were a lot of banging and this horrible, like, snorting sound.”

Upon going to investigate, the former healthcare assistant was horrified to discover what appeared to be a 'massive, two-legged wolf' smashing its way through her conservatory windows. “At first I thought it were just kids mucking about,” she said, “but as I got closer I could see it weren’t a costume.There was drool all coming out of its mouth and its eyes were rolling this way and that.”

Whether Joan’s nocturnal visitor was an actual werewolf or just a youthful yob spreading mischief has yet to be determined, but, prank or not, Joan was taking no chances with her family’s safety: “Soon as I realised what it was I went to the kitchen drawer, grabbed a knife and me phone and ran upstairs.” Suitably armed, Joan roused her two children Jess, 3, and Max, 5, before barricading her family in the bathroom and making a call to the local police.

The first officer on the scene was 25-year veteran Boris Chaney who reported finding traces of blood and clumps of “thick, wiry grey hair” among the scattered pieces of the Landis’ smashed conservatory windows.

While Chaney refused to be drawn on the subject of wolfmen, he did confirm that the Landis’ were not the only people to contact Basingstoke's police department with reports of werewolf-related disturbances that night.

When asked if he thought this was strange, Chaney replied: “I may not believe in werewolves or monsters, but I do believe there are people out there who can think of nothing more entertaining than pulling on an old Halloween costume and ruining someone’s evening. Sadly, this kind of thing happens a lot more than you’d think.”

Chaney’s words would be a lot more comforting if stories of alleged werewolf sightings were restricted to just Basingstoke, but people in places as widespread as Portsmouth, Glasgow, Aberystwyth, and even Northern Ireland have all reported seeing werewolf-like creatures prowling beneath the light of the supermoon.

While many were quick to label the sightings as nothing more than an elaborate hoax, Dr. J.R. Hirsch, a professor at Glyndwr University whom specialises in Fables, Folklore and Ancient Legends, believes people should not dismiss them so readily.

“Normally, I would be the first person to denounce these accounts as a hoax,” he said, “but the fact that so many people, from such a diverse number of places and social backgrounds, are claiming to have come into contact with creatures characteristic of werewolves is fascinating. Of course, I’m not saying that this proves the existence of things that go bump in the night, but I believe it does warrant further investigation.”

If it is proof Hirsch seeks, he would be well advised to pay a visit to popular video-sharing website Youtube. Overnight, hundreds of videos purporting to contain footage of real, live werewolves were uploaded to the streaming service.

Nick Baker, known on Youtube as Skreeonk84,  was one of the first people to post a video of a supermoon werewolf. The 32-year-old IT consultant, who lives on the outskirts of Glasgow, was taking his Corgi, Molly, for a walk when he glimpsed a strange creature slinking through the undergrowth bordering the secluded country lane upon which he and his beloved pet take their usual evening stroll. Baker, who described his ordeal as “total-brown-trouser-time”, used his iPhone to document his werewolf encounter before uploading it to Youtube. Within hours, the video had gone viral, racking up over a million views and attracting tens of thousand of comments.

Although some commentators believe Baker’s shocking video, which clearly shows a huge, bipedal, dog-like creature silhouetted against the disc of the moon, is incontrovertible proof of the existence of werewolves, not everyone is convinced. Youtube user PWNZassassINZ69 was among the sceptics, leaving a comment beneath the video that read: OMGz get a grip u f*ckin p***ies….. ive seen better special affects (sic) on syfy channel.”

Poorly expressed though their scepticism may be, it is at least understable; after all, this wouldn’t be the first time someone has doctored video footage as part of an attempt to prove the existence of the supernatural. Much harder to discredit, however, are the grisly wounds received by a homeless man living on the streets of Northamptonshire.

Jack Kessler, 19, was rushed into Kettering Hospital during the early hours of Tuesday morning, his body covered in wounds believed to have been sustained during an animal attack. A nurse who saw Kessler as he was brought in the ER described him as looking “like a waking meatloaf.”

The attack itself was witnessed by 52-year-old taxi operator Eddie Quist. A local father-of-three, Quist was driving home after a late shift when he saw a “large, grey animal” tearing into the unfortunate Kessler’s body. When asked if he thought the transient youth may have been attacked, as some people were reporting, by a werewolf, Quist laughed, saying: “No, of course not, it was some kind of bear, one of them big grizzly b*stards. Probably just escaped from the local zoo.”

We reached out to the staff at Hamerton Zoo Park, situated just outside Kettering, in an attempt to confirm Quist’s suspicions, but the staff were quick to assure us that all their exhibits were present, accounted for and safely tucked away in their cages.

A hospital employee, who wishes to remain anonymous, was on duty when Kessler arrived and was shocked by the state of the young man’s appearance: “I’ve never seen anything like it, there was blood everywhere. His body was covered in claw and bite marks - it was like something out of a horror movie.”

“He was unconscious when he came in, but as we were prepping him for surgery he woke up and threw a right fit. In the end, it took four orderlies to hold him down and sedate him. The whole time he was thrashing about like a madman and screaming about monsters. The lads and me had a good chuckle about it afterwards, but I don’t mind admitting, at the time, I was bloody terrified.”

Although Kettering Council refuses to indulge in speculation about the existence of werewolves, a council spokeswoman said they were taking what happened to Jack Kessler extremely seriously. In a bid to ease the public’s fears, she assured nervous onlookers gathered outside the council’s municipal offices this morning that animal control experts were being brought in to assess the situation, before promising them that the perpetrator would soon be brought to heel.

Despite the life-threatening nature of Kessler’s wounds, surgeons were able to repair most of the damage and are optimistic he will make a full recovery. Dr. Yogami, one of the hospital staff that helped save Kessler’s life, said: “Jack is doing extremely well. In fact, to the amazement of me and my colleagues, some of his wounds are almost already completely healed. I fully expect him to be up and about in time for the next full moon.”

New No Man's Sky trailer invites gamers to explore the universe

Universal appeal

 

 

We've had open world games before but nothing quite on the scale of No Man's Sky. This ambitious space-sim from Joe Danger developer Hello Games doesn't just limit players to a single digital playground, or even a single world, but let's them explore the star-strewn stretches of a universe containing 18 quintillion digital planets. For some idea of just how mind-boggling a number of planets that is, No Man's Sky's lead developer Sean Murray reckons only 0.01% of those quintillion balls of rock will be explored in our lifetime.

Give the sheer amount of real-estate floating around just waiting to conquered, it's no surprise that exploration is a key part of the game. To hammer this point home, Hello Games have cut together a series of trailers, four in all, highlighting the different gameplay elements that form the cornerstones of the No Man's Sky experience: Exploration, Combat, Trading and Survival.

'Explore', the first trailerin the series, gives us a better idea of what different kinds of terrain gamers will encounter as they whizz around the cosmos. We can see bucolic planets teeming with all manner of strange and wonderful creatures, mysterious alien obelisks, towering machines, and monolithic spacecraft suspended in the cold reaches of space.

Tantalisingly, Hello Games have hinted that as players close in on the centre of the universe the planets and creatures they encounter will become progressively stranger, earth-like vistas giving way to twisted and surreal alien landscapes.

Look out for the next video in the series, which will highlight how the game's combat works, in the next few days.

What's new and what's different in the film version of The Dark Tower?

What does Entertain Weekly's new info reveal about the film adaptation of The Dark Tower?

 

It's been a long time coming, but Stephen King's cult fantasy series The Dark Tower is finally headed to the big screen. As with most adaptations, the retelling of this 8-book-strong fantasy saga will deviate from the source material in some major and minor ways. One of the neatest things about The Dark Tower series is how certain plot developments, particularly in the final book, create opportunities for the creative team behind the film to take the series in unexpected directions without contradicting the text completely.

We won't go into exactly what those developments are in this article, but if you're interested we highly recommend reading through the full cycle of Dark Tower books. Not only will you be able to enjoy one of the finest, as well as weirdest, pieces of epic fiction ever written, but it will give you a deeper appreciation - not to mention, understanding - of just how the first film in the series fits into the larger framework of The Dark Tower universe.

For some time now we've known that the first series in the film adaptation of The Dark Tower would be based, in large part, on the first novel in King's fantasy saga, The Gunslinger. The slimmest volume in the series by a comfortable margin, it recounts Roland of Gilead's efforts to track down the mysterious Man in Black and learn more about the tower after which the saga is named. Unusually for Stephen King, this is a very obtuse, at times ambiguous novel, one that features many elements that only really come into focus the further into the series (or along the path of the beam, say thankya) readers get.

Thanks to King himself, we knew that the first film would be pulling together elements from multiple books, not just The Gunslinger; what we didn't know was how these disparate elements would all fit together. Now, thanks to EW, we have a clearer picture of how the first film in the series will work - the basic gist of the story will be the same; it will still chronicle Roland's attempts to apprehend the Man in Black and learn more about the tower - visions of which have haunted him all the years of his long, long life. Instead of flashing back and forwards, however, the film will introduce elements from the final two books in the series, most notably Algul Siento, the breaker camp located in the arid, sickened wastes of Thunderclap (which is to The Dark Tower as Mordor is to Lord of the Rings).

Breakers are powerful psychics, men and women poached from our world, and worlds like ours, to 'break' the beams that converge on The Dark Tower. Despite its foreboding name, the Tower is the linchpin at the centre of not just our universe, but all universes; if the beams break and the Tower falls, the rest of space and time will fall along with. As the beams break, Roland's world, once a beacon of life and hope, begins to sicken and slide inexorably into chaos. World's begin to bleed together, people and animals begin to mutate, and all manner of dark and unspeakable things begin to crawl out of the dark and unknowable spaces between universes. It all sounds a touch complicated, but (as with most fantasy series) once you look beyond the made up place names, weird creatures and otherworldly trappings you're left with the simple tale of a lone gunslinger trying to save the world from the forces of evil.

The makers of the film version of The Dark Tower are keeping things relatively simple for the first film, no doubt as a concession to those unfamiliar with the books, but the recent EW articles throw up lots of intriguing things that will be of especial concern to long time fans of the Dark Tower series as well as King's work in general.

The Shining

In The Dark Tower books those men and women endowed with the gift of telepathy are described as being strong in 'the touch'. In a clever nod to one of King's best loved books, however, the movie version of DT replaces this with 'shine', a clear reference to The Shining and the latent psychic ability that helps young Danny Torrance stay one step ahead of his axe-wielding old man. On the page, Jake - a young boy from a world very like our own, plagued by visions of a mysterious gunslinger and a tower - is skilled in the touch, but he never ends up breaking beams with those who share in Algul Siento. For the film version, Jake is described as a sort of beam-breaking MVP, a psychic so powerful that The Man in Black is willing to cross dimensions just to find him. From what we can glean, Jake's story will be relatively true to the books, but will deviate in a few key ways. First of all, Jake's origin seems to have been slightly tweaked - in the books he's a gifted psychic, but not powerful enough to draw the gaze of the Crimson King and his minions. By the sounds of it, Jake's story is being rolled into Ted Brautigan's, a man of unparalleled psychic ability who is cozened by the forces of evil into assaulting the beams.

Through a glass darkly

At various points in the books, Roland and co.encounter glass balls from the Wizard's Rainbow. That might sound rather jolly, but these balls (thirteen in all, each with different properties) are just as likely to harm their handlers as they are to help them. Think of the Palantiri from Lord of the Rings and you'll have some idea. In the books, these malignant globes of gaudily coloured glass are rare, not appearing the fourth installment, but in the films we'll see them (or something very like them) almost straightaway. Speaking to EW, Matthew Mc describes  how he and Roland communicate with one another from afar using little glass balls. Although he doesn't refer to them as pieces of the Wizard's Rainbow, it's pretty fair to assume that's exactly what they are. It's a pretty big change from the novels, but it makes sense - after all, you don't hire two actors of Elba and McConaughey's caliber and not have them interact until the end of the film. The glasses will allow the two to bounce off of one another long before they meet in the flesh, and (more importantly) give first time viewers some idea of just how long and acrimonious the history between these characters is.

Bryan Singer and Matt Nix planning another X-Men spin-off

The Motherhood of Mutants 

 

Matt Nix, the creator of Burn Notice, is teaming up with Bryan Singer to produce a new mutant-themed series for US TV network Fox. Fox already has a few comic book series on the air, those being the adaptations of DC properties Gotham and Lucifer, but this will be one of their first Marvel projects, the development of which has been a "top priority" for the network.

The series, which is as-yet untitled, will take place within the wider X-Men universe (still one of the few major Marvel properties the comic book giant has yet to claw back) but instead of chronicling the exploits of everyone's favourite band of merry mutants it will focus on two ordinary parents who discover that their bouncing bundle of joy has mutant powers.

In order to keep their child out of the hands of a rogue government agency, the doting ma and da fall in with a coalition of mutants who have gone underground to fight back against their oppressors.

In addition to Nix and Singer (themselves no strangers to the world of network TV), the project has snared Marvel's own Jeph Loeb, as well as Fox's Simon Kinberg and Lauren Shuler Donner as producers.

It's certainly an interesting concept, but it doesn't sound nearly as unique or exciting as Fox's other X-Men spinoff, Legion, currently being put together by Fargo showrunner Noah Hawley. 

Fox are understandably keen to strike while the iron is hot, especially following the success of its X-Men movies and Deadpool, but one has to wonder if pumping out series after series of vaguely mutant-related TV shows is really the best idea.

Source: Empire

Javier Bardem to play Frankenstein in Universal's Monsters Universe?

No Country for Old Wolfmen 

 

 

Hollywood is all a-flutter over the idea of shared universes these days, with many studios putting in motion plans to launch their own interconnected film series in a bid to emulate Marvel Studio's hugely successful model.

Interestingly, this phenomenon isn't just limited to comic book properties - we're also beginning to see studios cobble together different IPs, character and franchises that don't quite fit into the superhero mold.  The most interesting of these is undoubtedly Universal's Monsters Universe, an attempt to bring together some of the silver screen's most memorable bogeymen and women  (a list which includes Frankenstein, The Wolfman, The Creature from the Black Lagoon, The Invisible Man, Dracula and Van Helsing) and place all of them within a shared and persistent world. Kind of like a modern day, big budget version of Penny Dreadful.

Normally I'd be the first to accuse Universal of hopping on the bandwagon, but I actually really like this idea and think it could lead to some very interesting and entertaining projects. Universal are certainly hoping so, and are going to great lengths to round out their stable with an enviable list of actors, producers and writers, including John Spaihts, Alex Kurtzman, Aaron Guzikowski, Noah Hawley, Tom Cruise, Johnny Depp and Russell Crowe.

In addition to the stars above, rumours persist that Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson, Angelina Jolie, and now, Javier Bardem are also being courted for starring roles. The latest round of murmurs suggest that the Oscar-winning Bardem is in talks to take on the role of Frankenstein. Whether that means he's in the frame to play the creature's creator or the creature itself is unclear.

Personally, I think Bardem would make a great monster - he's imposing enough to give the creature a real sense of malice and menace, but also an incredibly skilled performer, one that can bring to life the pathos and emotional tumult that has always defined the character.

Given the amount of talent (potentially) involved in these pictures, I'm very interested to see how the Monsters Universe shapes up, particularly a modern day take on The Wolfman - if there's one thing the world needs, it is more werewolf movies.

Looking forward to what Universal is cooking up in their lab? Let us know your thoughts on the Monsters Universe below!

No Man's Sky's quintillion planets take up just 6GB of disc space

Infinity on the head of a pin

 

 

Sean Murray, the mastermind behind the sumptuous-looking spacefaring sim No Man's Sky, took to Twitter today to reveal just how many gigs of data his studio's game occupies on a single blu-ray disc.

Much to the surprise of his many followers, Murray revealed that the game weighs in at just 6GB, despite, that is, offering players roughly one quintillion (yes, we checked and that is a real number) planets to explore. What's more, most of that data is comprised of audio files, meaning that 65daysofstatic soundtrack probably eats up more disc-based real estate than the actual game itself.

It may sound insane, especially given the sheer, mind-boggling amount of explorable space on offer, but No Man's Sky worlds, galaxies and pocket universes are all procedurally generated, meaning they take up very little actual space.

Players will be able to begin exploring that space this August with the game releasing on the 9th, 10th and 12th in the US, Europe and UK respectively. 

Batman: Return to Arkham delayed to November amid quality concerns

The inmates are running the asylum

 

Remasters are big business nowadays, so it's no surprise that plans were afoot at Warner Bros. to repackage two of the publisher's most critically and commercially acclaimed games and re-release them for current-gen platforms.

Dubbed Batman: Return to Arkham the upcoming collection is set to include Arkham Asylum as well as its follow-up Arkham City. Many fans were excited at the prospect of playing these classic games on their shiny new hardware, but that excitement quickly curdled when footage of the games running on current-gen consoles was unveiled.

Despite porting the games to a new engine and, presumably, taking advantage of newer rendering techniques and graphical effects, it quickly became apparent that the remastered Arkham games looked a good bit worse than their last-gen counterparts. Lighting effects were missing, character models looked off and it appeared that the quality of some textures had taken a noticeable hit.

Fans of the series were quick to point out the differences, providing detailed comparisons that showed the remaster in a much less than flattering light. We can assume that Warner Bros. got wind of this negative feedback, as the game was quickly pulled off of schedules and slapped with a delay just weeks shy of its July 31st release date.

According to Eurogamer, the collection hasn't been scrapped entirely but delayed until  this coming November. Sources close to the site informed them that the quality of the port has come under fire, with the frame rate in particular being a major concern.

The Batman brand took a major hit when the last game in the saga, Arkham Knight, arrived on PC in a near-unplayable state. Unlike the near-flawless console versions, the PC port of the game was plagued with crippling issues, causing a red-faced Warner Bros. to pull the game from sale and offer apoplectic PC gamers copies of its previous Arkham games by way of apology.

Given everything that happened with Arkham Knight on PC, the last thing Warner's wants to do is release a buggy, poorly performing collection and destroy all the goodwill the series has left. Hopefully they'll do right by these classic titles and give the team at Virtuous Games all the time and resources they need to do Batman and the games' original developers, Rocksteady, justice.

Source: Eurogamer