Today is a double dose of pop culture news catch-up – hey, we had to get our Beetlejuice Beetlejuice review up last Friday.

We’re starting the weekly recap with the same day passing, on 9 September, of actor James Earl Jones (93), famous for his imposing voice (in Star Wars in The Lion King) and physical presence; along with Eisner Award-winning comic book artist John Cassaday at age 52. Cassaday’s impressive body of work includes Planetary, plus celebrated arcs of Astonishing X-Men and, coincidentally, Star Wars.

Lifestyle

On the back of bad news that Dan Fogler won’t be attended Comic Con Africa 2024 after all due to work commitments, an even bigger name has been added to the international guest roster.

Mr Universe bodybuilder and original 1970s Incredible Hulk, actor Lou Ferrigno – who also played Hercules and Sinbad in the 1980s – will be at the pop culture celebration from opening day Thursday (26 September) to the sold out Saturday, 28 September.

Meanwhile, a few more comic creators have been added to the show’s line-up last minute – and all are popular CCA returnees.

First, there’s French artist Guile Sharp, who will be introducing his South African superhero tale Dark Lion. He’s joined by by local illustrators Warren Louw, whose cover art and character designs have become sought after by the world’s biggest comics publishers; and Big Two veteran Sean Izaakse, who most recently had a standout run drawing Green Arrow for DC.

Guile and Warren will be present all four days of CCA 2024, while Sean is around for Saturday and Sunday signings and stage sessions. This is all happening, like the past two years, at Nasrec, AKA the JHB Expo Centre.

Look out for our CCA 2024 attractions rundown next week.

Series

Keeping the spotlight on South Africa, the country is getting its own version of beloved workplace mockumentary The Office. With production company Rapid Blue planning to film the comedy in 2025, the localised The Office is being developed for Showmax and kykNET, and will be shot primarily in Afrikaans.

This isn’t the first time The Office, created by Britons Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, has been remade for a different location. Along with the Emmy Award-winning US version, there have been 12 other adaptations, for audiences in the likes of Australia, France, Canada, Chile, Israel, India, the Middle East, and Poland.

In semi-related news, DStv Stream has received a new discounted 12-month contract for South Africans. The satellite-dish- and decoder-free version of broadcast service DStv will now cost you R699 a month if you sign up for the Premium package (1 stream + 1 mobile stream) for a year. Month by month pricing remains at R799.

The new 12-month contract – which brings back 2014 pricing – is only available via WhatsApp. To get started, “Stream Contract Deals” to 060 060 3788.

While the Primetime Emmy Awards ceremony is taking place this Sunday, 16 September, in Los Angeles, the 2024 Creative Arts Emmys winners have already been announced in two evenings of award shows, covering close on 100 categories relating to artistic and technical achievement.

In terms of notable results, Starz and Disney+’s samurai epic Shōgun made history when it won 14 awards, the most Emmy wins in a single year ever. Meanwhile, keeping things Japan-set, Blue Eye Samurai won Outstanding Animated Program, beating out the likes of X-Men ’97, Bob’s Burgers and more.

Check out all of the 2024 Creative Arts Emmys nominees and winners here.

This past fortnight the official trailer was unveiled for Arcane: Season 2, AKA the final season of Netflix’s massively acclaimed animated series, based on Riot’s League of Legends games. Made by animation studio Fortiche, Season 2 sees the conflict between sisters Jinx (Ella Purnell) and Vi (Hailee Steinfeld) come to a head — at the same time the inhabitants of oppressed undercity Zaun rise up to challenge the privileged citizens of utopian city Piltover.

Arcane: Season 2 joins Netflix at some point in November.

P.S. You can check out some character posters from Season 2 here.

The TV news tidbit that caught our eye this week:

While you can already watch almost all of the film adaptations on Netflix, the streamer is now bringing viewers a Twilight animated series. Midnight Sun is based on Stephenie Meyer’s 2020 companion novel, which revisits the events of the original YA romance from the perspective of sparkly vampire Edward Cullen instead of human heroine Bella Swan.

Film

Horror films centred on female bodily autonomy and the disturbing side of pregnancy are all the rage right now. Joining the likes of The First Omen, Immaculate and Birth/Rebirth is Apartment 7A, a psychological thriller prequel to Rosemary’s Baby. Set in 1965, the film centres on an ambitious young dancer Terry (Julia Garner) whose professional dreams are shattered after an on-stage injury. She’s shown kindness by an older, wealthy couple (Dianne Wiest, Kevin McNally) who invite her to live in their luxury New York City apartment building. However, as her fortunes start to change, Terry realises there may be a horrifying price for success.

Apartment 7A is streaming on Paramount+ from 27 September in the US and Canada, Latin America and Brazil, and from 28 September in the UK, France, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Italy and Australia. Availability in additional international Paramount+ markets will be at a later date. It’s likely that Apartment 7A will come to Showmax in South Africa.

More female empowerment than body horror is Nightbitch, a dark comedy based on the novel by Rachel Yoder. Amy Adams plays an artist who is unfulfilled as a stay-at-home mother, but then finds she may in fact be turning into a dog. It sounds bizarre, but looks like savage fun, and early indications are that Adams will be popping up on various Best Actress lists come awards season.

Nightbitch enjoys a limited cinema release starting in December.

Finally, we’re keeping things horror with the trailer for Salem’s Lot, the third on-screen adaptation of Stephen King’s 1975 vampire novel. Writer Ben Mears (Lewis Pullman) returns to his home town of Jerusalem’s Lot in search of inspiration, only to discover a vampire has settled there and is expanding its blood-thirsty kind.

Salem’s Lot is going straight to streaming, finally making its debut on Max on 3 October this year, after originally setting a September 2022 release date.

Gaming

After months of speculation, not to mention a few leaks, Sony officially revealed the PS5 Pro, a performance upgrade to the PS5 console, with a special focus on visuals enhancements.

The PS5 Pro features an improved GPU which enables up to 45% faster rendering for a smoother gameplay experience; along with more powerful ray tracing that casts rays at double, and at times triple, the speeds of the current PS5 console. Then there’s AI-driven upscaling that provides sharper image clarity by automatically adding more detail. The combined result is a console that runs even higher fidelity graphics with smoother frame rates at 60FPS.

The PS5 Pro console launches on 7 November, and has a suggested retail price of $699.99 USD, £699.99 GBP, €799.99 EUR, and ¥119,980 JPY (includes tax). South African pricing has yet to be announced, but predictions are in the R17,999 to R21,999 bracket.

While the PS5 Pro comes with a 2TB SSD, a DualSense wireless controller and a copy of Astro’s Playroom pre-installed, the console is disc-less and isn’t bundled with a vertical stand. Both drive and stand must be purchased separately.

Finally, in a developing story, the entire staff of respected indie game publisher Annapurna Interactive has resigned. Apparently the team had been negotiating with Annapurna owner Megan Ellison to become their own independent entity, and when negotiations broke down, the employees all walked.