One very dedicated Avengers fan has put forth a pretty wild theory, suggesting Doctor Strange was behind Thanos’s snap.

Well, Thanos was behind Thanos’s snap, but did Stephen Strange have more of a hand in it than we once thought, pulling Thanos like a puppet?

Oh lordy, lord, it’s a big call to suggest one of the Avengers was the reason we lost half the population (for few years, anyway) and, ultimately, Black Widow and Iron Man.

That’s some collateral damage, Steve.

Our allegiance to the sorcerer was tested recently when a Reddit user by the name of @Arc_the_lad came up with a hefty theory supporting their idea.

Essentially, the tl;dr of it read: ‘Dr. Strange engineered the snap in order to ultimately eliminate Thanos, Stark, Vision, Hulk, Thor and the Infinity Stones as threats to earth with what he considered an acceptable amount of collateral damage.’

From there came six reasons (and 22 points) outlining their theory which has understandably split the fandom in half as they wondered how on Earth this could happen/open to thinking this could very well be a thing.

The reasons why this fan believes Strange was to eliminate the Avengers and Thanos made sense in regards to the latter – with Strange possibly wanting to rid Earth of the Mad Titan who wreaked ‘intergalactic genocide’ once before.

Who wouldn’t?

Then it went on to suggest Tony Stark was a ‘reckless “hero” who creates as many problems as he solves and nearly ended the human race one time already’.

Essentially Strange wanted to get rid of Stark, finding him untrustworthy – and in Thanos could so without the use of the Infinity Stones.

Because who would suspect Strange?

As he went on, Vision was a threat due to its nature of being a ‘ticking time bomb’ – poor Ultron – while they deemed Hulk ‘a loose cannon that cannot be contained, controlled or killed’.

Backing up their idea, they reminded us of that theory about Strange looking at all possible theories to see ‘the one’ that ended with the Avengers winning. The end result saw Thanos and Iron Man dead, didn’t it?

The stones were also destroyed, and, as they say, ‘Hulk was also nerfed and Thor removed far from Earth’.

And in the end?

‘Strange got everything he wanted. Thanos and Stark are dead. Vision and the Infinity Stones are destroyed. The Hulk is crippled and Thor is finished as rival protector of earth,’ the theory concluded. ‘Some heroes are dead, the Avengers are no more, half of the universe was temporarily erased, but it was all acceptable to the protector of earth and reality, the man with the strongest will.’

They added: ‘Three are dead. That leaves three loose ends for Dr. Strange: Wanda, Loki and Capt. Marvel. However, Capt. Marvel is just overpowered and not a threat to reality. Wanda’s very power it bending reality and Loki is running around the past changing it. Is it any surprise that Loki and Wandavision will both tie into the Dr. Strange 2?’

Ah gahd. So many layers.

Some fans were a little quizzical and sceptical, as a punter added: ‘I could actually see Strange being this chess master psychopath, but that’s not the case. This is an incredible stretch. But fun to read.’

But others were open to the idea, as they offered: ‘Sign me up for the next 3 phases of Strange is the eventual big bad. Strange v Capt Marvel would be a great next Thanos v Stark.’

Guess we’ll leave this up to interpretation and see what comes from Strange’s next instalment.

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We’re still shaken by the heartbreaking ending for Tony Stark in Avengers: Endgame, however it’s been suggested his final moment may have been a whole lot more gruesome.

In all honesty, it was hard enough – not sure how our little hearts would have coped with more grief lobbed Iron Man’s (Robert Downey Jr) way.

As he saved the world, Tones pulled the ultimate move and assembled all the Infinity Stones in his gauntlet to snap Thanos (Josh Brolan) and his army into dusted existence.

According to VFX supervisor, Matt Aitken, of Weta digital, they’d gone to Joe and Anthony Russo, the directors of the Marvel Cinematic Universe film, with a range of ideas that included Tony losing an eye.

‘We gave the filmmakers a full range [of looks] to choose from and one of those was where the energy from the stones had acted right up into his face and popped one of his eyeballs out and it was hanging out on his cheek,’ he told Insider.

‘They didn’t go for that one.’

Hmm, we’re not all that surprised. While the film is action packed, we’re still not sure they’d go all Hostel and pop the poor man’s eye out for its younger audience to digest for years to come.

Marvel VFX producer Jen Underdahl said: ‘We did go several rounds on that guy from grisly to not so grisly to more light of a touch, back to ok this is the spot where we think the audience is not going to get too freaked out, but also really understand that Tony has reached the point of no return.’

What the filmmakers evidently settled on was a depleted Iron Man, who had a slightly-burnt face but nothing that would scare the kidlets into nightmares.

No Two Face from the DC world, is what we’re saying. (Which was an option, with the artists admitting they did put forward a version where you ‘saw the sinews and you saw them in the teeth and that’.)

They added there was a tool they employed to warn us that Tony may be heading for a grisly death should he snap, with both Thanos and Hulk (Mark Ruffalo) sporting injuries and burns after their respective snaps in the film.

Look, eyeball popping and Two Face or no eyeball popping and Two Face, we were still left utterly bereft when Tones bit the bullet.

But good to know we were spared a grisly distraction in one of the most poignant moments in the MCU.

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Robert Downey Jr has revealed what superhero he would have played if he was not Iron Man.

It’s hard to imagine the actor as any other hero from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but he seemed to have the perfect answer.

In an interview with Radio 1, Robert was posed with a series of questions submitted by children, and one of them asked which character – other than Tony Stark – would he have been keen on taking over.

‘I can’t think of any red-blooded American boy that didn’t imagine themselves as Spider-Man growing up,’ he replied.

Which is fair enough.

He continued: ‘However, looking back on it now – also because I’m just such a Jeremy Renner fan and he made it so cool, particularly when he turns into Ronin [in Avengers: Endgame] – I would say Hawkeye would be my go-to.’

And when asked what his favourite pair of underpants was, Robert admitted that he actually owns his very own pair of Iron Man underwear.

‘But I would never wear them two days in a row,’ he stated.

The 54–year-old previously hinted at the idea he could return to the role of Iron Man, aka Tony Stark – despite his character being killed off in Avengers: Endgame – and admitted that ‘anything could happen’.

Speaking to Extra TV alongside his wife Susan Downey, he said: ‘As far as I’m concerned, I hung up my guns and I’m good to let it go.

‘I also think that Marvel is on this journey now, they’re trying a bunch of other stuff and you know, I’m excited for them to see how that all goes.’

He added: ‘It’d be hard to project. But you know, we’ve got a bunch of other stuff.’

You never know, we could be seeing Iron Man back in the near future…

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Tony Stark is probably the most famous Marvel superhero of all, but over in Dubai a team of engineers and pilots are giving the fictional hero a run for his money.

The company Jetman Dubai managed a remarkable feat this week as one of their pilots successfully transitioned from a ground-level takeoff into high altitude flight.

The pilot, Vince “Jetman” Reffet is strapped in to a wingsuit and attached to four mini jet engines that can propel him over 3,000 feet (1,000 meters) in 30 seconds.

‘After becoming airborne at the aerial centre by Jumeirah Beach, Reffet hovered five metres above the waters of the Arabian Gulf for 100 seconds,’ the company explained in a statement detailing the flight.

‘Having demonstrated his full control of the flight by performing stops, turns and backward moves, he landed smoothly back onto the Skydive Dubai runway.

‘Reffet then took off again and headed south towards Jumeirah Beach Residence, building speed and height. Travelling at an average speed of 240kmh, he climbed 100m in the air in eight seconds, 200m in 12 seconds, 500m in 19 seconds and 1,000m in 30 seconds.

‘At the end of his three-minute flight, Reffet performed a roll and a loop at 1,800m altitude, before opening his parachute at 1,500m and landing back at Skydive Dubai.’

Thankfully, the team had the presence of mind to shoot some amazing drone videos of this milestone as it occurred. The footage was uploaded to YouTube yesterday and has already amassed over 250,000 views.

‘We are so happy we achieved this incredible flight. It’s the result of extremely thorough teamwork, where each small step generated huge results,’ Reffet said after his successful landing.

‘Everything was planned to the split second, and I was overjoyed by the progress that was achieved. It is another step in a long-term project. One of the next objectives is to land back on the ground after a flight at altitude, without needing to open a parachute. It’s being worked on.’

In the meantime, we can’t stop re-watching the footage of the moment he just takes off and zooms across the water. Iron Man would be proud.

Marvel Studios confirmed a sweet Avengers: Endgame Easter egg just in time for the film’s one-year anniversary.

Their official Twitter page shared the moment surviving character prepare to journey back into time through the Quantam Realm.

Standing in a circle, the superheroes hold out their fists and the camera pans on them from a birds-eye view reflecting Iron Man’s arc reactor belonging to Tony Stark.

Fans guessed the possibility before, but the Russo brothers confirmed it was a conscious decision via the Marvel page.

Iron Man (played by Robert Downey Jr) was basically the heart of the Infinity Saga, so the Easter egg means that much more.

Fans got emotional noticing the resemblance, with many sharing gifs of crying faces and facepalms.

Cue the ‘I love you 3,000’ comments.

In July last year, Avengers: Endgame finally beat the record Avatar had held for 10 years, becoming the highest-grossing movie of all time.

It beat Avatar’s $2.78 billion (£2.2 billion) global box office takings in just 13 weeks, and it was well-deserved.

Meanwhile, Robert has hinted that Iron Man could make a return to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Marvel fans were distraught when Endgame killed off Tony Stark in the battle against Thanos.

Even though we witnessed his funeral on screen – with pretty much every single MCU character present (other than the ones who died of course) – Stark could still return in a future film to help out his friends as the star teased ‘anything could happen’.

But don’t get too excited, as even though Tony could make a comeback, the Hollywood star added that he might not be the one playing Shellhead.

During a recent interview with extratv to promote his new film Dolittle, he said: ‘As far as I’m concerned I’ve hung up my guns and I’m good to let it go.

‘I also think that Marvel is on this journey now where they’re trying a bunch of other stuff.

‘I’m excited for them to see how all of that goes. It’s hard to project but we got a lot of other stuff we want to do.’

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Directors Anthony and Joe Russo revealed some rather insane alternate versions of the Avengers films as they celebrated the respective one and two-year anniversaries of Avengers: Endgame and Avengers: Infinity War with social media watching parties.

Film screenwriters Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely took over Comicbook.com’s Twitter page to share behind-the scene secrets, and were later joined by the Russo Brothers in a live Instagram feed for the first hour of Endgame.

They revealed many little gems, including the fact the beer that Thor (Chris Hemsworth) drinks in the ‘Lebowski’ scene is actually Joe’s favourite beer.

However, it was the darker BTS ideas and changed scripts that made us want to re-watch them all over again.

Stephen revealed that there were many versions of Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr) and Spider-Man’s (Tom Holland) rescue of Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) from Ebony Mar (Tom Vaughan-Lawlor).

One of the versions saw Stark sending a nano-suit to Strange, which would have made a – you guessed it – Iron Doctor Strange. An Iron Doctor Strange!

This would have had the Eye of Agamotto in the middle of his chest instead of the Arc Reactor.

Infinity War had Thanos (Josh Brolin) kill half the universe using six infinity stones.

The Soul Stone is watched over by the Red Skull (Ross Marquan) on a remote planet called Vormir.

The stone requires a sacrifice, which saw Thanos kill daughter Gamora (Zoe Saldana) to unlock the stone, while Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) uses herself to spare Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) from death in Endgame.

However, the writers and directors confessed that early on in development they ‘considered making’ Captain America the Soul Stone!

That idea ‘fell away rather quickly’ though. Phew.

The Russo brothers and the writers revealed way too much in a 48-hour period and we need a break from all the chaos that could have been. The Avengers films could have turned out very, very differently… and we’re not sure if we’re here for it.

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The latest Marvel superhero exclusive for the PlayStation 4 is a VR game where you are Iron Man.

It’s easy to argue that Sony’s success this generation hasn’t been because of what they’ve done but because of what they haven’t done. Avoiding any mistakes, while standing back and letting Microsoft make plenty, has been the secret of the PlayStation 4’s success. On the more proactive side of the equation though Sony’s first party games have been especially good this generation. And yet their most laudable achievement has been to push VR, something which is probably much less profitable, and far less certain to have long-term benefits, than anything else they do.

PlayStation VR has been around for almost four years now and while Sony has made relatively few games themselves, they have ensured a steady flow of indie titles for the headset. But now, as we wait to see what their next gen VR plans might be, they’ve gone to the unexpected length of using what is one of the biggest licences in the entertainment industry on a game that the majority of fans will probably never get the chance to play.

The nature of Sony’s relationship with Marvel has never been made clear and while this has the same branding as Marvel’s Spider-Man it doesn’t seem to be set in the same universe. Oscorp is referenced a couple of times, and there are name drops for things like Hulk and the Savage Land, but this is solely an Iron Man game, heavily inspired by, but not canon with, the movies. And despite a few technical issues it’s really very good.

Iron Man has appeared in a few solo games over the years, but none of note, as until the movies he was a second-tier hero and really just part of the furniture when it came to the traditional Avengers roster. Until now, the best representation of movie Iron Man has been the flying mech suits in Anthem, which would’ve been a great basis for a third person game. But the minute you hear this is a VR title it’s obvious what the inspiration was: the parts of the movies where you see Tony Stark talking away in the Iron Man helmet, with all the holographic displays around him.

The game’s control system demands you use two PlayStation Move controllers – there’s no option for the DualShock at all – which immediately had us worried, given their lack of precision. But they work a lot better than we expected and the controls are kind of genius, in that the developers have worked back from how Iron Man flies in the films and made it so that you move by holding the controllers down by your side and jet yourself around simply by titling your wrist and directing yourself with the thruster coming out of the palm of each hand.

Although it does mean you have to stand up all the time, this allows for some surprising subtle movements, regardless of whether you’re using free look or not, and means that to use your weapons all you need to do is raise your hands and aim. You’ve got repulsor blasts in your hands, a unibeam in your chest, and a variety of unlockable secondary weapons on your wrist, that range from an armour-piercing missile to what is essentially a shotgun.

Despite all the 3D movement, which is much more complex than most normal games, we didn’t have a second’s problem with nausea. And while the action stages are basically just high-tech shooting galleries the freedom of movement and inherent coolness of being Iron Man never gets old, even when the game starts reusing level maps and enemy encounters to pad out its six to eight hour running time.

But this isn’t just a straight shooter and a lot of effort is made to show Tony Stark outside of the suit, interacting with Pepper and two holographic AIs – who act as a little devil and angel sitting on your shoulders, personifying the two extremes of Tony’s personality. There are quite a few sequences where you’re not fighting at all but just talking or solving simple puzzles and saving people. So there’s a good attempt to show Iron Man as an actual superhero and not just a video game shoot ‘em-up character.

The dialogue for all this goes overboard with the Marvel style quips, with almost every sentence ending with an attempt at a joke. The hit rate is very low but it’s never as obnoxious as it could’ve been and there are a few good gags in there (the one about what to give the man who has everything made us laugh out loud) and the voice actor does a very creditable interpretation of Robert Downey Jr’s performance.

One of the problems with Iron Man as a character though is that he has a laughably poor rogue’s gallery, and that’s one area where this game struggles. Ghost is the main antagonist and while she’s a cross between her comic book self (where the character is male) and her appearance in Ant-Man and The Wasp she spends most of the game just taunting you as a hologram. Another Iron Man villain, who hasn’t been in the movies yet, also shows up but he’s also intangible for a lot of the time and never seems much of a threat.

The bigger issue though is that the only other things you ever fight are mindless drones, which not only don’t talk but are just represented as boring geometrical shapes. On a visual level they’re bizarrely unimaginative enemies to fight and we have no idea why they’re like that, other than maybe the developer wanted to keep the polygon count down and the frame rate up.

We’re going to guess that is the reason, as the graphics suddenly get a lot better during the slower sequences, when the game doesn’t have to worry about frame rate, and yet can be distractingly bad in levels where all you do is fight. The map used for Singapore, for example, is especially bad and looks like you’re flying around a bunch of painted cardboard boxes.

Arguably the biggest technical problem though is the load times, which are horrendous. If you thought waiting a minute or more for a game to load was bad when you’re sat in front of your TV it’s a hundred times worse in VR, where even dying and restarting can take a good 20 seconds or so.

Almost all of Iron Man VR’s issues stem from the technical limitations of the PlayStation 4 and its headset. But while the enemy variety is definitely a problem the way the game embraces the Iron Man mythos, and really makes you feel like Tony Stark himself, is at least as good as Spider-Man. Frankly, we’re now far more interested in seeing a next gen sequel to this than we are old web-head.

Formats: PlayStation VR
Price: £34.99
Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment
Developer: Camouflaj and Darkwind Media
Release Date: 3rd July 2020
Age Rating: 12

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A new line of Lego Art Sets has been announced, recreating iconic artwork and celebrating everyone from The Beatles to Darth Vader.

It may have started out as just for kids, but a lot of Lego sets nowadays are clearly aimed at adults, from a Lego Aston Martin to the 1989 Batmobile.

The new Art Set line is a bit different though as it’s not a model of a vehicle or set from a movie but 2D artwork meant to go on your wall.

Each set comes with a canvas and a whole lot of tiny coloured Lego bricks, which can be put together to create different images. Although in typical Lego style they can be rebuilt in multiple different ways or customised according to your own preferences.

There are four sets so far and they all cost £114.99 each (Lego is many things but cheap is not one of them).

For that you get 3,000+ pieces each and multiple different design instructions to build. There’s also an online soundtrack provided for each, so you can listen while you work.

Lego Andy Warhol’s Marilyn Monroe (31197)
Based on the iconic 1967 screenprint, which is currently hanging in the Tate – if only coronavirus allowed you to see it, the Lego version allows you to remake the image in one of three different colour schemes.

Lego The Beatles (31198)
You’re going to need four sets to get the whole band but assuming you have a favourite you can remake The Beatles set to portray John Lennon, Sir Paul McCartney, George Harrison, or Sir Ringo Starr.

Lego Marvel Studios Iron Man (31199)
Getting a bit more recent, the Iron Man set can be built to show either the iconic Mark III suit, the Hulkbuster or the newer Mark LXXXV. As with the other sets it also comes with its own thematically relevant soundtrack to listen to on your smartphone.

Lego Star Wars The Sith (31200)
Because the bad guys are always more fun, the Star Wars art set includes the option to build the main bad guy from each of the three Star Wars trilogies: Darth Maul from the prequels, Darth Vader from the original trilogy, and Kylo Ren from the sequel trilogy. You can already guess what the soundtrack is.

The four sets aren’t due to launch until 1 August, but you can already order them from the Lego website using the links above.

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Robert Downey Jr has splashed ice cold water on the possibility of him returning to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, just in case anyone was still holding out hope. 

As you *should* all know by now, Robert, 55, bowed out of the MCU in Avengers: Endgame last year after his OG character Iron Man sacrificed himself to save his fellow superheroes. 

However recent rumours have swirled that perhaps Tony Stark could make a cameo in the upcoming standalone Black Widow movie alongside Scarlett Johansson. 

Well, either Robert is truly over starring in the MCU or he’s taking us for a ride because he’s pretty much shut that possibility down. 

RDJ caught up with actors Jason Bateman, Will Arnett and Sean Hayes for their SmartLess podcast this week and set the record straight on the comeback rumours. 

Ozark star Jason asked: ‘I’m assuming that the Marvel thing is at a slower speed now, or are you done with that now?’ 

Robert then stated: ‘That’s all done.’ 

He doesn’t mince his words does he? 

It comes after Robert explained there was no coming back for Iron Man in January. Speaking to Extra, he said: ‘As far as I’m concerned, I hung up my guns and I’m good to let it go. 

‘I also think that Marvel is on this journey now, they’re trying a bunch of other stuff and you know, I’m excited for them to see how all that goes.’ 

It’s widely speculated that RDJ could appear in the prequel movie Black Widow, which will centre on Johansson’s heroine Natasha Romanoff who, like Iron Man, was also killed off in Endgame. 

Marvel fans are speculating that Robert could appear in flashbacks and honestly, we’re not taking his word for it. 

It’s a devastating time for the MCU family after the shocking death of Black Panther star Chadwick Boseman, who had secretly battled colon cancer. 

Robert paid tribute to his Avengers co-star and tweeted: ‘Mr. Boseman leveled the playing field while fighting for his life… That’s heroism. I’ll remember the good times, the laughter, and the way he changed the game… #chadwickforever.’ 

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Fans were left heartbroken and pretty much sobbing into their popcorn when Robert Downey Jr’s character Tony Stark aka Ironman sacrificed himself in order to beat Thanos once and for all.

Yup, Stark died a real hero in Avengers: Endgame and while the movie sets up his legacy to live on in future Marvel films, fans have been questioning whether Iron Man himself could return.

Hollywood star Robert has made it pretty clear that he’s hanging up his Iron Man suit after starring in 22 movies over more than a decade and now Marvel chiefs have finally addressed whether a potential comeback could happen.

Speaking to Clarín, the executive vice president of Marvel Studios, Victoria Alonso, who has produced all of the superhero movies in the MCU from the very first Iron Man to Black Widow and Captain Marvel, confirmed that sadly Stark is very much dead and won’t be coming back.

His funeral that aired in Endgame, attended by his wife Peppa Potts and their daughter, as well as a whole host of superheroes including the Hulk, Thor, Captain America, Spider-Man, Doctor Strange and Black Panther, therefore, is pretty final.

‘Tony Stark is dead. And that’s our story,’ Alonso told the publication in an interview translated from Spanish.

‘Resurrection I do not know , I do not know how we would do it. It seems to me that the story of Tony Stark is told.’

Confirming Marvel currently has ‘no plans’ to bring back Iron Man, Alonso instead pointed out that Stark will live on through other characters in the MCU.

‘He has left his inheritance, who he is… for example, in Spiderman, because Peter Parker has been a false son, you see a lot of what Tony Stark would have been in Peter Parker,’ she said.

‘And it seems to me that you see that constantly in how one person influences the other. But no, at the moment we don’t have any plans.’

Her comments come after actor Robert confirmed he is ‘done’ with Marvel.

He had been addressing rumours Iron Man could make a cameo in the upcoming Black Widow movie, that takes place prior to Avengers: Endgame, while appearing on Ozark star Jason Bateman’s SmartLess podcast.

Jason asked: ‘I’m assuming that the Marvel thing is at a slower speed now, or are you done with that now?’

‘That’s all done,’ Robert responded – reiterating what he had said before in an interview with Extra in January.

‘As far as I’m concerned, I hung up my guns,’ the star revealed. ‘I’m good to let it go.’

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Jack Black’s neighbours have been treated to another dance in his pants as the actor turned into a sexy Iron Man for his fans. 

The Tenacious D and School Of Rock star, 51, stripped down to just a pair of red Speedos, shoes, socks and an Iron Man mask as he danced around his yard. 

He arrived from the sky thanks to a clever edit, before shooting fire out of his palms when he landed. 

The visual extravaganza was far from over, however, as Jack was then seen skipping around his garden with a red and yellow flare billowing out colourful smoke in each hand. 

Jack had previously shown off his dance skills when he took on Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion’s WAP dance routine, and he even incorporated a few of his best moves from that into his new video. 

After a few high kicks, chest shimmies and some hip thrusting, Jack got down on the floor and humped the pavement in the iconic WAP move as his grand finale. 

We can only imagine Jack’s neighbours look forward to the next instalment of his hilarious Instagram videos as much as we do, given he has got quite a few under his belt now. 

As well as the WAP dance and Iron Man, Jack also did an epic routine in a Spider-Man outfit – once again with some editing making it look like he managed to scale the side of his mansion just like the superhero himself. 

Jack also got involved with the Elf on the Shelf rhyming challenge, posting a snap of him mid-jump on his trampoline in a pair of tiny blue pants with Jack Nicholson photoshopped on his shoulder, with a whole heap of famous Jacks on every subsequent star’s shoulder to follow. 

Thank God the winters in Los Angeles are balmy, that’s all we have to say. 

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Jay-Z, Tina Turner and Kate Bush are among the nominees for the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.

The nominations for 2021 have been revealed, and some of music’s biggest stars are vying for a place in the Hall of Fame.

Sixteen acts are on the ballot this year – Jay-Z, Foo Fighters, Iron Maiden, Tina Turner, Kate Bush, Rage Against the Machine, Carole King, Mary J Blige, Chaka Khan, Dionne Warwick, the Go-Go’s, Devo, LL Cool J, Fela Kuti, New York Dolls and Todd Rundgren. 

It is the first time nomination for seven of the acts – Foo Fighters, The Go-Go’s, Iron Maiden, Jay-Z, Carole King, Fela Kuti and Dionne Warwick – the second for Kate Bush, Devo and the New York Dolls, the third for Rundgren, Chaka Khan and Rage Against The Machine, and the sixth appearance for LL Cool J. 

Foo Fighters and Jay-Z have landed nominations in their first year of eligibility.

To be eligible this year, each nominee’s first single or album had to be released in 1995 or earlier.

Carole King, Tina Turner and Dave Grohl could enter the Hall of Fame for a second time if they are inducted this year – King was inducted alongside Gerry Goffin in 1990 as a non-performer, Turner was inducted in 1991 with Ike Turner, and Grohl was inducted in 2014 as a member of Nirvana.

Should the bands nominated be inducted, individual band members have been selected to enter the Hall of Fame.

Iron Maiden have cited their current line-up of Bruce Dickinson, Steve Harris, Nicko McBrain, Adrian Smith, Dave Murray and Janick Gers, as well as former singer Paul Di’Anno, former drummer Clive Burr, and ex-guitarist Dennis Stratton.

Dave Grohl, Taylor Hawkins, Nate Mendel, Rami Jaffee, Pat Smear and Chris Shiflett will be inducted if Foo Fighters enter the Hall of Fame, with original drummer William Goldsmith and former guitarist Franz Stahl not included.

Devo have cited Mark Mothersbaugh, Gerard Casale, Alan Meyers, Bob Casale and Bob Mothersbaugh.

The late Sylvain Sylvain is nominated with David Johansen, Arthur ‘Killer’ Kane, Johnny Thunders, Jerry Nolan and Billy Murcia for the New York Dolls; Johansen is the sole surviving member. 

Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Foundation Chairman John Sykes said: ‘This remarkable ballot reflects the diversity and depth of the artists and music the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame celebrates.

‘These nominees have left an indelible impact on the sonic landscape of the world and influenced countless artists that have followed them.’

The acts inducted will be announced in May, followed by a ceremony in Cleveland, Ohio, later in the year.

Last year, Whitney Houston, Nine Inch Nails, Depeche Mode, The Notorious B.I.G, T. Rex and the Doobie Brothers were inducted in a virtual ceremony.

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Warning: spoilers ahead for episode 1 of Loki.

The director of Loki has revealed the ‘deliberate’ reference to Robert Downey Jr’s Iron Man featured in the first episode of the new Marvel series on Disney Plus.

Episode one of Loki, starring Tom Hiddleston as the MCU’s resident trickster, was full of references to previous Marvel releases, from Loki witnessing his own death in Avengers: Infinity War to discovering a drawer full of Infinity Stones at the TVA (Time Variance Authority).

While some nods may have been coincidental – such as the supposed appearance of Peggy Carter in the background – others were put there on purpose, with director Kate Herron confirming that a parallel to 2008 film Iron Man was completely intentional.

Loki opens with the Avengers: Endgame scene when the 2012 version of Loki steals the Tesseract, vanishing away from the Avengers’ grasp.

Using the Space Stone, he’s transported to a desert, landing in the sand in a similar way to Tony Stark in the first Iron Man film, after he escapes from his captors wearing his first armoured suit.

Film critic Ali Plumb shared a tweet with an image of Tony’s landing in the sand in the first Iron Man film and Loki’s similar landing in the sand at the beginning of his eponymous show, pointing out the similarities.

Loki director Kate responded to the tweet, writing: ‘“Iron Man” was a deliberate one :).’ Our minds are blown!

Following the launch of Loki on Disney Plus, a Reddit user shared a fascinating theory about how the show could link to the massive cliffhanger in the WandaVision finale.

In the post-credits scene for WandaVision’s final episode, Wanda Maximoff (Elizabeth Olsen) is seen reading through the Darkhold, the Book of Spells, when she heard her twin sons calling out to her.

The Marvel fan therefore drew the conclusion that at the end of Loki, Wanda may be shown travelling through different timelines trying to find her children.

In Loki, the Asgardian is apprehended by the TVA after stealing the Tesseract, as his escape act resulting in him causing a breach to the timeline.

Rather than have Loki ‘reset’, they decide to use him to their advantage to help them catch another ‘variant’ who is causing major disruptions to the timeline – who happens to be another version of Loki.

Loki returns next Wednesday and is available to watch on Disney Plus.

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British actress Rebecca Hall, 39, on ghosts, why a Marvel comeback is unlikely and why she’s not on Instagram.

Do you miss England now you’re based in New York?

I miss loads of English things, though it’s bit of a false misconception about me that I’m so very English, because my mum is from Detroit and I’ve always spent a lot of time in America.

I have tried to recreate an English cottage garden, which doesn’t really work in an American climate, so there are a lot of wilting foxgloves that make me think of home.

What’s the elevator pitch for new film The Night House?

It would probably be – woman grieving her husband loses mind, or does she?

It’s very scary – did you get scared watching it? Oh yes! It premiered at a midnight screening at Sundance, where you are all delirious from the altitude anyway, so by midnight everyone is very raw and vulnerable and ready to scream.

I was truly terrified, even though I knew what was happening, because I hadn’t appreciated just how palpable and alarming the jump scares would be because of sound.

This is your second scary movie after The Awakening

I have a soft spot for ghost movies, I am not really sure why, because
I don’t particularly believe in paranormal activity.

I haven’t had any personal experiences with ghosts, despite doing the Ouija board at school, but I believe in the potency of the story.

When genre films are done well they address subject matters in an indirect way that can be more powerful than films that tackle something head-on. I think ghost movies exorcise certain human anxieties around death.

Which film haunted you most?

I’m not a huge fan of a lot of contemporary horror, because a lot of it seems to be a bit more like torture porn, which I find a bit harrowing, so the films I love tend to be a bit older.

There is a 1960s film with Claire Bloom called The Haunting, directed by Robert Wise, and a movie from 1980 called The Changeling and the 1940s version of Cat People always sticks in my mind as being quite chilling and weird.

You have 101k followers on Instagram but only posted three times. What happened?

I just decided to go cold turkey but I didn’t actually delete the account because I felt bad about it somehow.

I probably should. I was momentarily persuaded on to social media because everyone kept telling me how good it was for marketing independent films. So, I did give it a try and I hated every second of it.

I know it is incredibly unfashionable and unpopular to say this, but as an actor I’ve always believed in maintaining a certain amount of mystery so that people can believe what I do on screen.

What was your first acting gig?

I voiced Lucy in The Tale Of Mrs Tiggy- Winkle. She is the one who loses her pocket-handkins and then finds that the hedgehog is ironing them. I was nine.

My daughter is three and she has a lot of imaginary play with two actors as her parents [Hall’s husband is actor Morgan Spector].

She likes doing the casting, so there’s a lot of, ‘We are going to play Winnie the Pooh and Mum you are Winnie the Pooh and Papa is Tigger.’

You got burnt by Marvel over Iron Man 3 when your part got heavily cut. Would anything tempt you back to the superhero universe?

It was a big stipulation I had on Godzilla Vs Kong that if you are going to change the story halfway through shooting, I would like to know about it well in advance and I would like to be heard if I don’t agree with it, which they were really respectful about.

As actors, we make endless leaps of faith on films that we have no control over whether they’re going to come out good or not.

So it is frustrating and unfair if you sign up to do one job and then halfway through filming it you find out you’re a completely different character from what you imagined.

That said, this industry is too crazy and unpredictable and there is so much nonsense I don’t think it’s worth bearing grudges.

I don’t go around saying I will never work with Marvel again, though I don’t think I could, because they killed off that character [Maya Hansen].

Do you get typecast as ‘the brainy girl’?

I have a running joke – every time I open a script, it’s ‘an attractive, yet brilliant, scientist’. The industry has become a little bit more self-aware now.

For a long time it was much sillier and the description of how beautiful the scientist was always preceded her intelligence.

You were a very shy child, how did you overcome that?

I honestly don’t know that I have. I don’t think that it is something that you can actually change about yourself.

As I’ve got older I have a different language for it. I don’t think that it’s exactly shyness, it is just that I am by nature quite introverted and need quite a lot of time on my own.

People don’t think of actors as being that way, they think of them as being the life of the party.

I can be the life of the party for a bit but then I have go to and sleep by myself for two days to recover.

The Night House is in cinemas today

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Warning: spoilers ahead for episode 6 of What If…?

Ever since Iron Man was released in 2008, Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr) has been one of Marvel fans’ favourite characters in the MCU, going from being a big-headed, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist to a hero willing to sacrifice it all.

But what would have happened if Tony had never become Iron Man, thanks to an intervention made by Black Panther villain Killmonger (Michael B Jordan) in Disney Plus series What If…?

In the latest episode of the animated show, Tony (voiced by Mick Wingert) is never kidnapped as depicted in the first Iron Man film, as he is instead saved by Killmonger in the desert, thus avoiding being injured by a weapon created by Stark Industries.

Tony is immediately taken by Killmonger, who also reveals Obadiah Stane’s plan to have Tony assassinated, earning Tony’s trust while a suspicious Pepper Potts watches from the sidelines.

Has Killmonger turned over a new leaf?

In Black Panther, Killmonger, the cousin of T’Challa (Chadwick Boseman), commits atrocious acts in order to achieve his aim: to claim the throne of Wakanda and use the country’s technological advances to overthrow those in power around the world.

In What If…?, Killmonger makes his big entrance when he takes a missile that is just about to explode and throws it into the air away from Tony, while also shooting down those targeting him.

Having gained Tony’s trust, Killmonger is made his head of security, which is when the pair start working together to create an autonomous robot drone using vibranium, which looks extremely similar to the drones created by Justin Hammer in Iron Man 2.

However, when Tony’s closest friend James Rhodes (Don Cheadle) goes to strike a deal with the villainous Ulysses Klaue (Andy Serkis) for more vibranium, Killmonger’s true intentions are made clear, as he kills both Rhodey and T’Challa, who arrived as Black Panther at the scene.

Tony and Killmonger go head to head

While Tony may not be Iron Man in this universe, he still has some tools at his disposal.

At first, it seemed as though Killmonger was going to get away with killing Rhodey and T’Challa in cold blood. However, he wasn’t aware that Tony had the technology to watch what was going on, thanks to Jarvis.

Tony tries to use one of the drones he created with Killmonger against his former saviour.

Nonetheless, Killmonger lives up to his name, destroying the drone and using a vibranium spear from Wakanda to gruesomely kill Tony in his own home.

Killmonger returns to Wakanda.

Just like in Black Panther, Killmonger uses a sneaky technique to earn the Wakandans’ trust – killing Klaue, known for his theft of vibranium from the country.

Killmonger meets his uncle, his aunt and his cousin Shuri, before warning them of a drone attack coming from the US army to avenge the deaths of Rhodey and Tony.

He manages to earn the trust of his estranged family by leading a successful attack against the drones, bringing them down from inside Wakanda’s force field.

While he then becomes the next Black Panther, T’Challa’s younger sister Shuri – who was always suspicious of Killmonger – goes to see Pepper in the final scene of the episode, proposing an alliance to bring her cousin down after learning of his deception.

What If is available to watch on Disney Plus with new episodes released on Wednesdays.

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A boy born with only one hand is delighted to have ‘become Iron Man’ after being given a superhero-themed bionic arm.

Jacob Hyatt, seven, can now ride his bike safely thanks to the new limb, which his family were delighted to buy for him after a superhuman fundraising effort.

Mum Bernice Hyatt, from Bedfordshire, says her son is ‘over the moon’ and keen to high-five anyone he meets.

The schoolboy, who fell in love with a high-tech prosthetic last year – was given the custom-made limb after well-wishers came together to raise £13,000.

Bernice, a 33-year-old florist, explained: ‘He keeps asking me to put on music so he can clap along – and he wants to high five or fist-bump everyone he meets.

‘I have always taught Jacob it’s good to be different – you don’t have to fit in.

‘But despite that, there are things he has always struggled with, so the second he tried on the bionic arm, he was desperate to get one.

‘Leading up to the day he got the arm, every day he would ask “Mummy, why is it taking so long?”’

Jacob, from Eaton Bray, got his arm from Open Bionics after being given a new bike for Christmas.

And now the youngster can cycle with his friends without wobbling or worrying about falling off.

Bernice continued: ‘When we got the call to collect the arm, he was jumping around with excitement saying “I’m going to be Iron Man!”

‘Since he got the arm, he’s worn it every day and wanted to show it off to anyone he meets.

‘Every day he realises there are more and more things he can do now – especially now he can finally ride a bike’.

Bernice, also mum to nine-month-old Blake, first learned her eldest son Jacob’s hand was missing at her 20-week pregnancy scan.

His arm had stopped developing early in the pregnancy.

Jacob’s mum vowed to help him grow up feeling confident and unique, finding ways around potential problems by making the youngster as independent as possible – like buying clothes with zips instead of buttons.

But Bernice said that as he grew up, she found her son becoming more aware of things he struggled to do – after first asking why he only had one hand when he was just four.

Then she saw a post on Facebook last year mentioning a trial of Open Bionics’ new bionic ‘hero arm’ and put Jacob’s name forward.

He was invited to attend and came away desperate for one of his own.

‘I nearly cried when he began picking up and dropping tennis balls and doing the “OK” hand sign – his eyes completely lit up’, Bernice recalled.

‘I remember him saying “Mum, look what I can do!” and I knew we had to get one for him.

‘He still does things in his own way, but he doesn’t get frustrated now. It still takes a lot of effort for him to do some things, but he’s able to do so much more.’

It took just a few weeks for the fundraising target to hit its goal – and Jacob went on to collect it on February 24.

Bernice, who lives with partner Jamie Buchanan, 44, and his two children, said of her son’s life with own arm: ‘Although it was all he had ever known, he could get a bit frustrated at times because there were things he couldn’t do the same way as other children.

‘Simple things like opening the car door, and opening a packet of crisps – he does it all by himself now.

‘Every day there’s something new he learns how to do, and gets excited shouting “Mummy I can do it!”.’

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New rumours suggest that EA has not one but two new Marvel games in production, and they’re both single-player adventures.

EA recently made a big fuss about how much they support single-player games, a major U-turn considering how they used to talk about them. The only problem is that they currently don’t have much to back that up, with the only confirmed single-player titles being Star Wars Jedi: Survivor and the Dead Space remake.

There’s also BioWare’s new Dragon Age and Mass Effect games, which although nothing has ever been confirmed are assumed to be single-player titles similar to the originals. In fact, Dragon Age is believed to have course corrected away from being a multiplayer game.

If you add in other rumours though there’s also believed to be a single-player Apex Legends spin-off, a Black Panther game, and, according to the latest information, a second Marvel game starring Iron Man.

The second Marvel game was mentioned in passing by serial leaker Jeff Grubb, during his latest podcast, which is the same way he originally revealed that EA are working on a Black Panther game.

‘They’re making another Marvel game that’s single-player,’ is all he said, while reeling off a list of EA single-player titles he allegedly knows about.

After that bombshell was dropped though, Tomb Henderson, who has proven himself a reliable source in the past, particularly when it comes to EA games such as Battlefield, made the suggestion that the game is about Iron Man.

‘I’ve heard a few rumours that it’s Iron Man but I never had anything concrete to fully report on,’ he said. ‘Put this heavily under the ‘rumour’ category for now and if I hear/see more information that’s concrete I’ll report on it properly.’

It’s not that surprising to hear that EA would have more than one Marvel licence, although it’s unclear which developers are working on them.

What’s perhaps more surprising is that the Iron Man licence used to belong to Sony, although the game they made was never much of a hit as it was only for PlayStation VR.

If it’s true that EA are making a new, non-VR game it’s worth noting that the flying robot suits from BioWare’s Anthem looked and handled very much like Iron Man, to the point where even at the time people were saying they should have just made a superhero game.

Whether they’ll be repurposed for the new game remains to be seen, but if these rumours are correct then EA really wasn’t lying about having a renewed commitment to single-player games.

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The first big budget Marvel game was set to be an Iron Man game by the makers of Just Cause but it was cancelled due to studio interference.

For over a decade Iron Man was the most popular character in the MCU and there were various attempts to make games based around him, including a couple of early low budget efforts from Sega, a VR-only game from Sony, and his appearance in Square Enix’s much maligned Avengers game.

He never got a normal big budget game of his own, which is a little odd, but apparently that wasn’t for want of trying. According to Avalanche Studios co-founder Christofer Sundberg, who left the company in 2019, the Just Cause developer was working on a standalone Iron Man game for two years before it was canned.

Apparently, the game was cancelled around 2012, so that’s long before Sony’s Spider-Man game in 2018 and only four years after Sega’s first game, and indeed the first Iron Man movie and the start of the MCU.

Sadly, the reason for the game’s cancellation seems to have been interference from Disney/Marvel, who apparently wanted the game to be completed more quickly – a whole year faster than was originally intended – and demanded that Avalanche hire more staff to achieve that.

As Sundberg tells YouTube channel MinnMax, suddenly adding 70 to 80 new people to a team would’ve ‘broken the studio’, especially as it would have been difficult to find them all work after the game was complete.

The game is only described in broad terms, but according to Sundberg you could have taken off and flown anywhere, in the style of the Just Cause games, which are famed for their large open world environments.

There was also a lot of melee combat involved, with Sunberg talking about Iron Man punching characters through walls.

It’s not clear what the story or villains would’ve been though, as despite Disney’s rush to get the game released Sundberg doesn’t remember it as having anything to do with the Iron Man 3 movie, which came out in spring 2013.

Given the time frame involved, it’s unclear what formats the game would’ve been released for but it’s likely it would’ve been a cross-gen title, as pushing for a quick release doesn’t make much sense if it was only going to be for the Xbox One and PlayStation 4, which launched in late 2013.

Considering the problems, Sundberg doesn’t seem too upset the game was cancelled, even though he suggests it could have been ‘really, really good’.

Current rumours suggest that EA is working on a new attempt at an Iron Man game, as well as a Black Panther title, but so far that hasn’t been verified and their only recent collaboration with Marvel has been for FIFA 23, of all things.

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Rumours of EA making an Iron Man game have been proven true, with the game set to be a third person action adventure with an original story.

In further proof that it’s only Nintendo rumours that never turn out to be true, EA’s much rumoured Iron Man game has been officially announced.

EA has revealed very little about it so far, and there are no screenshots or videos, but they have confirmed the fact that it’s an ‘all-new single-player, third person, action adventure.’

There was a time, not long ago, when EA was telling anyone that would listen that single-player games are dead, but the success of Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order has helped to change their mind on that.

The new game, which doesn’t yet have a name (but will probably just be called Marvel’s Iron Man) will be developed by the Montreal-based Motive Studio, set up in 2015 by Assassin’s Creed co-creator Jade Raymond.

As well as the story campaign for Star Wars: Battlefront 2, Motive made the excellent Star Wars: Squadrons and are currently working on the remake of Dead Space.

The team for Iron Man will be led by Guardians Of The Galaxy co-producer Olivier Proulx, which is another good sign, as that game’s great too.

It’s implied that, like Sony’s Spider-Man games and Square Enix’s Avengers, that the game will be set in its own unique universe, that is similar to but not identical to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

‘We have a great opportunity to create a new and unique story that we can call our own. Marvel is encouraging us to create something fresh. We have a lot of freedom, which is so engaging for the team,’ says Proulx.

The game is currently in the pre-production phase, so it’s not going to be out any time soon (probably at least three years) but will apparently feature an original story that ‘taps into the rich history of Iron Man, channelling the complexity, charisma, and creative genius of Tony Stark, and enabling players to feel what it’s like to truly play as Iron Man.’

EA is also believed to be making a Black Panther game, but that hasn’t been confirmed yet. In fact, it was rumoured before Iron Man, so it’s possible the leaker could’ve been confused by the recently announced Captain America and Black Panther team-up by Uncharted creator Amy Hennig.

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Meta has made some new investments in its VR business, as they acquire the developers behind Resident Evil 4 and ReCore.

Most of the VR talk recently has been about Sony’s PlayStation VR2 and the peculiar amount of emphasis they’re putting on it, but the fact remains that it’s the Meta Quest 2 (née Oculus Quest 2) that is the most successful VR headset so far.

It’s still unclear when there might be a Meta Quest 3 – late 2023 seems to be the very earliest possibility – but Meta itself seems to be getting ready for something big, as they’ve just bought three talented VR studios: Camouflaj, Armature Studio, and Twisted Pixel.

Camouflaj was founded by Metal Gear Solid producer and Halo creative director Ryan Payton and was responsible for 2020’s Iron Man VR on PlayStation VR, which will now be coming to Meta Quest 2 on November 3.

It was always assumed that Sony had acquired the Iron Man licence for the game, and that Camouflaj were simply a work for hire, so it’s a surprise to find out that they own the licence and are taking it with them.

The VR rights and those for ordinary video games appear to be treated separately, as EA recently announced its plans to make a single-player non-VR Iron Man game.

Armature was founded by a number of ex-Retro Studios staff but apart from Xbox exclusive ReCore have been largely stuck making ports of other games, until they found success with the VR version of Resident Evil 4 last year.

Twisted Pixel were a popular indie studio during the Xbox 360 era, with games like ‘Splosion Man and its sequel, before dire Xbox One launch game LocoCycle saw them pivot to VR.

That’s not the only Meta Quest announcement this week, as the company also revealed that Xbox Cloud Gaming is coming to the headset.

The games will just be projected on a big 2D virtual screen, like watching a movie, but it’s still better than nothing.

It’ll also be interesting to see whether it will inspire any new interest in VR from Microsoft, who have studiously ignored the technology, just as much as Sony has gone all in on it.

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