Category Archives: Blog

Commentator Bill Maher disparaged Stan Lee, the seminal creator of iconic comic book superheroes like Spider-Man, The Hulk, and The Fantastic Four, in an unsolicited 293-word Saturday morning blog titled “Adulting.”

Twitter was quick to rebut Maher’s cultural musings after he mocked the late Lee’s widely-appreciated work, belittled millions of people who value comics, and broadly labeled comics as “stupid stuff.”

“I’m not saying we’ve necessarily gotten stupider,” Maher wrote, before adding, “The problem is, we’re using our smarts on stupid stuff.” 

Distilling decades of comic book history, culture, and meaning down to a short, oversimplified opinion is naturally going provoke the ire of the public, especially those who possess a greater familiarity of both comics and Lee’s intellectual influence.  Read more…

More about Entertainment, Comic Books, Stan Lee, Marvel Comics, and Bill Maher

Critics everywhere have slammed the latest Harry Potter spin-off, Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, as there’s an absurd amount of confounding plot crammed into the 134-minute film. 

Yet, the film carries a problematic canonical oversight, too: Minerva McGonagall briefly appears as a young-adult wizarding instructor at Hogwarts in 1927. The trouble is, according to Harry Potter lore, she wouldn’t have even been born at that point.

More about Entertainment, Movies, Harry Potter, Fantastic Beasts The Crimes Of Grindelwald, and Entertainment

Dogs is the smartest six-hour Netflix binge anyone can commit to. It’s also, notably, a safe watch for all dog-lovers.

If you, like anyone who has ever owned and/or loved a dog, saw the Dogs announcement and immediately wondered if any of the documentary’s sweet good boys and girls die, Netflix has an answer for you. No. No one dies.

Netflix confirmed the happy detail on Twitter.

More about Tv, Netflix, Dogs, Entertainment, and Streaming Services

What is Star Wars without the iconic theme music from John Williams?

The legendary composer who’s been so essential to the life of space fantasy series has added his name to yet another big project: Disney’s Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge theme park attraction. A newly released video delivers a snippet of the main theme Williams composed for the park.

As you can see, the video also contains looks at various corners of the unfinished park. I definitely spotted an interior from the Millennium Falcon. There are also looks at the alien world of Batuu and the Black Spire trading outpost, which together make up the bulk of the themed Star Wars area. Read more…

More about Entertainment, Disney, Star Wars, John Williams, and Star Wars Galaxy S Edge

Oakland, a Northern California city with a population of over 425,000, had the worst air quality in the world Saturday morning.

Wildfire smoke wafting over from the still-growing Camp Fire — by far the deadliest wildfire in state history — had inundated many heavily-populated California cities and towns with small bits of pollution thinner than the width of a human hair, called Particulate Matter 2.5, or PM 2.5.

Berkeley Earth, a scientific climate organization, keeps tabs on air pollution around the globe. As of Nov. 17 at 9:30 a.m. ET, Oakland topped the global list with particle concentrations of 167 μg/m3  (meaning micrograms per cubic meter) — which are levels deemed “Very Unhealthy” by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Coming in a distant second is Kanpur, India with particulate levels of 132.  Read more…

More about Science, Global Warming, Climate Change, Air Pollution, and California Wildfires

It’s happening. The Black Friday ad scans have started to come through.

The big day is Friday, Nov. 23, which is still a few weeks away — but stores certainly have fun teasing customers as early as possible. They probably think this is funny. 

We’ve been doing our lurking via BlackFriday.com (owned by the same parent company as Mashable) and BestBlackFriday.com — both basically police scanners for Black Friday sale drops. Most of the deals we’ve found so far are on toys, but adult and tech stuff is definitely coming soon:

• Best Buy: Sale items include the Oculus Rift VR headset, drones, Beats headphones, Samsung smart TVs, laptops, HP printers, refrigerators, washers and dryers, Legos, and more.

• Target: Sale items include Nintendo Switch items, PlayStation consoles and games, smart TVs, Instant Pots, vacuums, free gift cards with iPhone XS or Google Pixel 3 activation, Funko Pops, Hatchimals, the Barbie Dreamhouse, and more, with a new coupon for up to 40% off every day and 25% off a single toy using Target’s cartwheel app.

• Walmart: Sale items include smart TVs, laptops, VR headsets, gaming consoles, Nintendo Switch bundles, Bose headphones, iPads, Instant Pots, Magic Bullets, hoverboards, Hatchimals, Paw Patrol toys, Disney princess toys, Hatchimals, air mattresses, bedding, tires, and more. Read more…

More about Mashable Shopping, Shopping Ziffdavis, Black Friday 2018, Lifestyle, and Work Life

Read more…More about Gaming, Reviews, Review, Tamagotchi, and Tech

The “How do you microwave a turkey?” prank is breaking our mothers’ hearts.

With Thanksgiving just around the corner, young people are pranking their poor mothers by asking them for advice on one of the greatest sins against the holiday season: microwaved turkey.

Microwaving a turkey, by the way, is totally possible — Mashable tested it, and made a surprisingly good Thanksgiving dinner a few years ago. But to many mothers, who wield family recipes like a sword, microwaving a turkey is an abomination to tradition. 

Which is why people are poking fun at their moms by asking.  Read more…

More about Turkey, Thanksgiving, Pranks, Culture, and Web Culture

One of the good things about shopping for a gamer on Black Friday: it’s really easy to find some stocking stuffers. This could include games, a basic headset, extra cables, or even a gift card.

One of the best stocking stuffers you can get in today’s connected world (specifically for a PS4 owner) is a PlayStation Plus membership. They’re cheaper than paying monthly and you won’t need to put in any credit card information. That may not sound like much, but at least you’ll rest easy knowing your kids aren’t racking up your credit card bill on V-Bucks.

SEE ALSO: Best gifts for gamers: What to get for the gamer in your life Read more…

More about Gaming, Sony, Black Friday, Mashable Shopping, and Shopping Amazon

U.S. Cellular just got a nice head start on their Black Friday game, and we’re thinking it’s the perfect time to finally splurge on a new Apple device. Through Nov. 26, you can get $50 off the Apple AirPods with the purchase of any new iPhone, iPad or Apple Watch.

If you haven’t yet snatched up a pair of Apple AirPods, chances are you’ve been waiting for the right deal. (As cool and innovative as they are, their normal $159 price tag is still pretty hard to swallow for a pair of wireless earbuds.) 

What you’ve probably realized is: the deals aren’t usually that great. Generally speaking, you’ll be lucky if you catch them at $15 off.  Read more…

More about Apple, Black Friday, Airpods, Mashable Shopping, and Consumer Tech