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Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SIST9t72kY

Disney just pulled a fast one. Star Wars movies and shows are typically announced years before being released, but the company just revealed a new TV program that premieres next month. Tales of the Empire is an animated show produced by Dave Filoni, the man who cut his teeth on cartoons like Star Wars: The Clone Wars and Star Wars Rebels before moving onto live action stuff like Ahsoka.

As the name suggests, this is something of a companion piece to 2022’s Tales of the Jedi. It’s an anthology series that spotlights different characters within the empire as they, uh, heroically try to defeat the nefarious rebels and bring order to the galaxy. You can expect appearances by many of your dark side faves, including Grand Admiral Thrawn, General Grievous and the Grand Inquisitor.

Just like how Tales of the Jedi put the spotlight on two characters, Ahsoka and Count Dooku, this new series will have its own duo to follow. There’s Morgan Elsbeth, a primary antagonist in Ahsoka and one episode of The Mandalorian, with the trailer indicating that Tales of the Empire will reveal how Thrawn and Elsbeth became besties. The show will also focus on Barriss Offee, a former Jedi Knight who fell to the dark side during the Clone Wars.

Despite being animated, the characters will be played by their live action actors. Lars Mikkelsen returns as Thrawn and Matthew Wood is once again portraying Grievous, the evil cyborg who is in dire need of some cough syrup. Diana Lee Inosanto is back as Elsbeth and Meredith Salenger is voicing Offee.

The show premieres on everyone’s favorite corporate-sponsored pseudo-holiday, May the Fourth, also known as May 4. All six episodes will be available to stream on Disney+ upon the release date. The live action Star Wars: Acolyte follows this with a premiere on June 4.

The Renaissance Men are coming. Smiling Friends S2 double-premiere May 12 @ midnight - next day on Max

Tyrannis, Hippocampus, and Stupendous accidentally start a war with nature.

Drew Goddard, the Oscar-nominated screenwriter of The Martian who also directed The Cabin in the Woods, has been set to write and direct a new Matrix movie at Warner Bros. The franchise’s original co-scribe and co-director Lana Wachowski is executive producing.

It’s still early days in regards to whether core cast members Keanu Reeves, Carrie Anne-Moss, Laurence Fishburne, Hugo Weaving and Jada Pinkett Smith are coming back.

“Drew came to Warner Bros with a new idea that we all believe would be an incredible way to continue the Matrix world, by both honoring what Lana and Lilly began over 25 years ago and offering a unique perspective based on his own love of the series and characters,” said Jesse Ehrman, Warner Bros Motion Pictures President of Production. “The entire team at Warner Bros Discovery is thrilled for Drew to be making this new Matrix film, adding his vision to the cinematic canon the Wachowskis spent a quarter of a century building here at the studio.”

Goddard received an Academy Award nomination for his adapted screenplay for The Martian, directed by Ridley Scott and starring Matt Damon. Goddard wrote such movies as Cloverfield and World War Z, and wrote and directed The Cabin in the Woods and Bad Times at the El Royale. Goddard began his career writing on the ’90s hit series Buffy the Vampire Slayer. His TV credits include Angel, Alias, Lost, Daredevil and The Good Place.

Saban Films has acquired worldwide rights to The 4:30 Movie, the latest film written and directed by Kevin Smith (Clerks). The film marks the second collaboration for Saban and Smith, on the heels of 2019’s Jay and Silent Bob Reboot, which scored one of the top-per theatre average openings of the year amongst titles like Parasite and Avengers: Endgame.

Set in the summer of 1986, the coming-of-age comedy follows three sixteen-year-old friends (played by Austin Zajur, Nicholas Cirillo and Reed Northrup) who spend their Saturdays sneaking into movies at the local multiplex. But when one of the guys also invites the girl of his dreams (Siena Agudong) to see the latest comedy, each of the teens will learn something serious about life and love before the credits roll.

The 4:30 Movie also stars Ken Jeong (The Hangover), Sam Richardson (Veep), Genesis Rodriguez (Tusk), Justin Long (Barbarian), Jason Lee (Almost Famous), Rachel Dratch (I Love My Dad), Kate Micucci (The Big Bang Theory), Adam Pally (Sonic the Hedgehog), Harley Quinn Smith (Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood), and Method Man (Power Book II: Ghost).

Smith shot the film at his Smodcastle Cinemas in New Jersey — the same movie theater he haunted every weekend when he was a teenager, which he now co-owns. Liz Destro, Josh Bachove and Jordan Monsanto produced alongside EPs Bill Bromiley, Shanan Becker and Jonathan Saba. Smith is set to embark on a multi-city national tour with the movie this summer, with its rollout in theaters nationwide to follow.

There’s a reason why The X-Files never continued beyond its 2016 revival. Long-term fans didn’t take well to the reboot of the ‘90s classic, but producers at Fox knew what they had. The X-Files in its prime was the rare left-of-field procedural, one that would go on to inspire everything from Supernatural and True Detective to Breaking Bad and Homeland. It would also make the studio exorbitantly rich, so Fox was prepared to greenlight the series for another season, ratings be damned. It was Chris Carter, the creator and longtime steward of The X-Files, who put his foot down.

“I needed some time off,” Carter tells Inverse. “I wanted to go surfing.”

Carter’s been a surfer much longer than he’s been in television. Apart from writing, Carter is also a multimedia artist, creating pottery, prints, and photo collages that stand almost in defiance to his legacy with The X-Files.

With or without Carter, The X-Files is too big a property to abandon outright. Fox is still keen to continue the series by any means necessary — but with Carter focusing on other projects, the studio has put its faith in a new director.

The fate of The X-Files now rests in the hands of Black Panther and Creed director Ryan Coogler. Carter isn’t involved in any capacity, but he’s content to cheer from the sidelines. “It’s interesting, people say, ‘Aren't you possessive of it?’ And I say, ‘No, I’m looking forward to seeing what somebody else does with it,’” Carter says.

The pair had “a really nice conversation” when Coogler first pitched the reboot to Fox: “I just asked him what his ideas were, and he told me, and I said, ‘Those sound like good ideas.’”

Daron Malakian of System Of A Down and Scars On Broadway was a guest on last week's episode of Royal Crackers. The episode aired on Adult Swim on March 29, where Malakian played three characters named King Omar, Prince Omar, and King Omar Senior.