The electric-powered robot can sift through sand and detect small objects like cigarette butts, food wrappers, and bottle caps.

Here we go again.

Just when it seemed like Hollywood was successfully creeping back to theaters, a resurgent COVID-19 is here to smack us back into the grim reality of a debilitating pandemic. The Suicide Squad, which opened Friday, earned around $27 million in North America — a low number for a star-studded DC superhero movie directed by Guardians of the Galaxy mastermind James Gunn. Especially given the stellar reviews from critics and audiences alike.

We can’t discount other factors that may have been at play, of course. The Suicide Squad started streaming for HBO Max’s ad-free subscribers the same day it hit theaters, and it did quite well there. Maybe some people were also turned off by the R-rating, or the uneven quality of DC Comics movies from Warner Bros., especially since the unconnected 2016 take on Suicide Squad was such a mess.

But let’s be real, folks: People are scared. The same loud-mouthed anti-vax movement in the U.S. that’s fueled embarrassingly low vaccination rates in some parts of the country, and in the process helped COVID’s Delta variant gain a foothold, carries most of the responsibility for any disruption to our stumbling recovery.

I’d say that’s the main reason why theaters didn’t fill up for The Suicide Squad the way they did for F9 and Black Widow. The fear is back. After a hopeful stretch of weeks, grim headlines and rising case numbers are influencing consumer behavior, even though returning lockdowns and mask mandates are still a scattered patchwork of city- and county-level decisions.

Box office reports are about numbers, right? So let’s look at some numbers.

On Aug. 6, the day The Suicide Squad opened, a whopping 168,343 new cases were reported in the United States. That brought the 7-day average case count up to 106,723. The last time we saw numbers like that was in Nov. 2020, as cases started to rise sharply ahead of a deadly 2020/2021 winter.

That stretch of months, from Nov. 2020 through early Feb. 2021, was the worst phase of COVID in the U.S. so far. So seeing the numbers creep back up into that territory now, at a time when responsible citizens who masked up all along and got their jabs expected to be returning to some semblance of “normal” life, is alarming.

Theater chains should move to immediately institute vaccine mandates, with proof required.

In recent weeks we’ve seen a series of compounding backward steps. Back-to-office plans are being delayed. Mask mandates are coming back. Even some who adamantly opposed masking requirements are seeing sense and accepting reality. There’s a reason Paramount moved just days ahead of The Suicide Squad‘s premiere to delay Clifford the Big Red Dog‘s September release.

A July poll found that, among U.S. adults who aren’t yet vaccinated, a combined 80 percent of that number “probably” or “definitely” won’t get jabbed. Nearly two-thirds of unvaccinated adults — a stunning 64 percent — describe themselves as “not confident” that the vaccines offer protection against the variants, in spite of ample evidence that they do.

The inescapable conclusion after looking all the data is that vaccine hesitancy is propelling the ongoing and increasing spread of COVID. The anti-vax movement existed long before the current pandemic, but its adherents have been energized by a brutally partisan political environment that’s turned proven lifesaving measures into a subject of debate.

While some have valid medical reasons for skipping their jabs — a decision that should be made after consulting your doctor, to be clear — many of the justifications that have been offered for forgoing the vaccine simply don’t hold water. A lot of this goes back to the tribal state of U.S. politics, and, frankly, the conservative news networks that have directly influenced vaccine hesitancy.

It might seem odd to put all of this weight on a single blockbuster comic book movie, but really, that’s the point here. When we fail as a society to seize an opportunity that could have cut off a rampaging pandemic, it’s all the little things and experiences — like the much-hyped movie you really want to see — that suffer.

With any luck, Hollywood and theater exhibitors both will heed the lessons of the past year and half, and act early. The industry is hardly powerless. Mask requirements are, of course, a no-brainer. But theater chains could — and absolutely should — also move to immediately institute vaccine mandates, with proof required, for all attendees, instead of relying on local officials to make that choice for them.

There would probably be some anger, but so what? The anger is already here, and things are getting worse all over again. Vaccine holdouts, particularly the ones who are operating in bad faith for political reasons, aren’t going to get their jabs until it’s painful for them to go without. For everyone’s safety, it’s time to stop catering to that crowd and time to start forcing people to face the reality that reckless behavior has consequences.

That’s why we can’t talk about The Suicide Squad falling short at the box office without talking about COVID, too. For any other factors that may have influenced the weak opening, we can’t ignore the critical role anti-vaxxers have played in sending U.S. society hurtling once again into the dark abyss of a resurgent and rampaging pandemic.

Even in a world where online dating has become the norm and it’s now possible to skip the tiring process of scouring bars and events for other singles in order to get a date, sometimes it’s just the thought of going on the date that’s tiring. No matter what kind of encounter you plan, it will always require some sort of physical effort.

We’re going to put this simply: we all have sexual needs, and sometimes we’d just like to satisfy those needs with human connection that doesn’t require the extra effort of meeting someone in person. For that, we have sexting.

Sexting is the act art of sending sexually explicit photos or messages to one or more people. And there are apps specifically for sexting as well as sexting features in apps that are otherwise for dating in person. (Several dating apps began offering more virtual services as a result of the pandemic.)

SEE ALSO: iHookup review: A straightforward dating app that delivers

Sexting tips

If you’re considering downloading a dating app for the purpose of sexting, it’s important to remember a few basic rules. Yes, there are certainly fewer inhibitions than using a typical dating app to find a potential romantic partner, but there’s still a standard set of boundaries and rules of etiquette you should follow in order for all parties to feel at ease.

• No app can completely protect your privacy for you — that’s your job. Though apps like Confide and Dust have certain features that are designed to protect your identity/content, they don’t rule out all scenarios. For example, someone doesn’t need to take a screenshot to capture a picture you send. They could easily just use another phone or device to snap or record whatever you send. You should always keep this in mind before sending anything that could be compromising, and do your best to make sure you trust the person who’s receiving your messages.

• Assess the situation and know your audience. Usually it doesn’t take much more than a few pre-sext texts (or pre-sexts) to gauge whether or not someone is interested in doing the cyber-dirty with you. Take the time to figure that out before you lead with something raunchy and uncalled-for. AKA don’t just start throwing dick pics at people left and right if they didn’t ask.

• Be respectful: Privacy is sacred. The internet has the scary ability to make fleeting moments very permanent. If someone asks you to keep something to yourself, you’d better do it. While sexting can be light and fun, it also requires a serious level of trust. If you betray that trust, you’re ruining it for everybody.

Sexting vs. dating in real life

Real-life dating is obviously the best way to get to know somebody long-term, especially if you’re looking for any kind of serious, in-person relationship. And real sex will always be better than sexting. *However,* sexting is an alternative that may help you out in ways you didn’t even think about.

Convenience: Whether you plan on actually wining and dining your date or just meeting to hook up, it always requires some extra effort. For those with super hectic schedules or those who just don’t have room in their life (for whatever reason) for a steady in-person relationship, sexting is practically a saving grace. After all, your sex drive doesn’t go away just because you’re busy. Sexting allows you to take care of your sexual needs without putting yourself out.

Freedom: As is the case with most behind-the-screen activities, with sexting, you can let go of your inhibitions a bit and feel more comfortable exploring your sexual side knowing there’s a certain barrier between you and the other person. You can experiment with language and ideas that maybe you wouldn’t feel completely comfortable exploring in person.

Safety: We’ve touched on the reasons why sexting might not be completely safe in terms of privacy, but to its credit, sexting offers an element of safety that in-person meetings don’t. Sexting allows you to interact with both people you know and total strangers without putting yourself in dangerous or unwanted physical situations. Your experience should always be what you want it to be, and with sexting, if it’s not going in the direction you want, it’s just a matter of closing an app.

Exploring trust and intimacy: Getting comfortable with another person in close quarters doesn’t always come naturally for everyone — but opting for sexting gives way to a new level of exploration in terms of intimacy and trust. You don’t ever have to meet the person behind the screen if you don’t want to, but being able to practice feeling vulnerable without any strings attached can be a great lesson in being more open.

Fun: Let’s be honest for a second here. A night of sexting is always going to be a lot more fun than endlessly swiping right on a dating app and starting the same conversation over and over. Having the option of opening an app on your phone and engaging in a little virtual foreplay offers instant gratification and (almost) guaranteed pleasure.

What to look for in a sexting app

• Privacy features: What happens in a sexting app doesn’t always stay in a sexting app; there are no guarantees that your conversations or selfies won’t wind up screenshot on someone’s phone. That said, certain apps do delete photos and conversations after a certain amount of time if you’re hoping to try to help lessen the chances of something getting leaked.

• Safety: If you’re looking for a night of no-strings-attached fun online, it doesn’t really matter all too much if the person on the other end of your conversation has been verified — but if you do want to ensure you’re not being catfished or chatting with a bot, consider an app that links social media or verifies users.

• Ease of use: You don’t want to find yourself in a hot and steamy conversation trying to figure out how to attach an image or a voice note. When it comes to sexting, the more user-friendly the platform is, the better. You’ll want something that’s efficient and fast.

• Subscription pricing versus free features: How much are you willing to pay for bells and whistles? There are many apps out there that charge a couple of dollars a month for premium features if you’re looking for something a little more catered to your interests, but just as many offer excellent free platforms.

The best dating apps for sexting

Since sexting, by nature, comes with a lot of factors to consider (consent and privacy, for example), we’ve picked out the best sexting apps to get you off — to a good start, that is. Our number one spot goes to Plenty of Fish for covering the most bases. Its huge pool of singles and strategic new conversation features put it at the top. For privacy-wary sexters, our favorite is Confide, which we like for their Screenshield technology. (More on that later.) Here are the best sexting apps for all your NSFW exchanges.

SAVE $134.91: As of Aug. 9, the 32GB Samsung Galaxy Tab A7 is on sale at Walmart and Amazon for just $179 (normally $229.99) and includes two months of YouTube Premium plus six months of Spotify Premium for free (an $83.92 combined savings).

Need a new tablet for the upcoming school year? While Walmart’s iPad Air deal is still pretty tempting, both it and Amazon just gave shoppers a compelling reason not to side with Team Apple.

If you head on over to either retailer and pick up a 32GB Samsung Galaxy Tab A7 — both have it on sale for just $179 as of Aug. 7 (normally $229.99) — you’ll get two months of YouTube Premium and six months of Spotify Premium for free (worth $23.98 and $59.94, respectively).

With a combined savings of just under $135, this is basically the second coming of Amazon’s Prime Day deal on the Galaxy Tab A7, only it was $20 cheaper then.

Our favorite sub-$250 tablet on the market, the sleek Galaxy Tab A7 is an October 2020 release featuring a 10.4-inch, ultra-widescreen display and built-in speakers with Dolby Atmos surround sound. (In other words, you’ll be totally set if there’s no TV in your dorm room.) Making video calls home is easy thanks to its front-facing camera, while its long-lasting battery with a fast-charging feature is ideal for days that are jam-packed with lectures.

Perhaps best of all, the Galaxy Tab A7 is super portable at just over a pound, so it’s not a hassle to tote from class to class — we’d bet good money that most of your textbooks weigh (and cost) more.

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Welcome to Fix It, our series examining projects we love — save for one tiny change we wish we could make.

Watching a movie about an airplane infested with vampires, you have certain expectations. A heartbreaking ending probably isn’t one of them.

And yet, Netflix’s Blood Red Sky — which tells the harrowing tale of a woman named Nadja (Peri Baumeister) and her son Elias (Carl Anton Koch) fighting to survive an airplane hijacking — is a tear-jerker. In fact, it’s the gruesome thriller’s emotional center that’s cemented its reputation as a hidden gem among many Netflix subscribers. Look up reactions on Twitter and you’ll get a slew of horror fans not just gushing over the film’s bonkers premise, but, as one viewer so aptly put it, “crying over a small German child and his vampire mom” with remarkable fervor.

As the surprising grief of Blood Red Sky washed over me, I couldn’t help but question whether this movie had to be quite so sad. It’s not that I can’t appreciate a tragic conclusion to a hopeless horror story. But with a happy ending for Nadja and Elias seemingly just in reach, I completed director Peter Thorwarth’s blood-sucking action-adventure wondering why he and co-writer Stefan Holtz felt they “had” to finish things the way they did. (Blood Red Sky is really best enjoyed without any spoilers, so if you haven’t seen the movie, turn back now.)

Believe it or not, this is Nadja with everything under control.
Credit: netflix

Here’s a quick recap of how it went down. We know Blood Red Sky ends with a fraught final act from the beginning. In the film’s first shot, we flash forward to see good guy Farid (Kais Setti) seated in the cockpit of a grounded commercial passenger jet telling police about explosives on board.

By the time the jam-packed plot, which sees Nadja become a terrorist-fighting Noseferatu look-alike, loops back to that moment, however, we know the explosives are just one part of a hugely complex and volatile conclusion to our story. See, not only is the airplane rigged to explode but thanks to sadistic villain Eightball (Alexander Scheer) everyone on the plane — except for Elias and Farid — has been infected with Nadja’s violent strain of vampirism.

And, although Nadja has spent years fighting her urges and looking for a cure to her affliction (she was actually on her way to an experimental treatment when these plane-stealing assholes showed up), Nadja’s hungry new cohorts send our heroine into an uncontrollable feeding frenzy. So, once Elias and Farid are safe on the runway, Elias chooses to detonate the hijackers’ device, vanquish the vampires, and, consequently, kill his mother.

Yeah, the “vampires on an airplane” movie ends with a kid blowing up his own mom.

You guys really don’t got this.
Credit: NETFLIX

According to one interpretation from Looper, this devastating turn of events marks the collision of two of Blood Red Sky’s major themes. First, it’s the logical conclusion to the emotional arc of a mother’s undying love. Nadja would do anything for Elias, and in the end, Elias knew that included sacrificing her life for his — even if Nadja wasn’t in her right mind to suggest the idea. Second, Elias’ choice allows Nadja to vicariously claim victory over her mysterious illness. It may have taken her life, but this type of vampirism will presumably stop spreading thanks to Nadja’s sacrifice.

Ostensibly, that silver lining should be consolation enough for the viewers who spent more than two hours rooting for this mother-son team. But if our collective sorrow is any indication, it didn’t actually make this catastrophic ending sit all that well with us post-credits.

Because while Nadja did start the film in dire condition, the symptoms of her hematophagy regularly being confused for signs of leukemia, her health seemed salvageable, even manageable to the bitter end. The idea that, even as Elias held the detonator in his hand, Nadja might just “snap out of it” and return to her human form felt at the very least plausible. It could have been one of these subtle scenes where the color of Nadja’s eyes change just before she dramatically collapses to the floor, loses her fangs, and regains her soul. Or, at least, something like that.

Uh, hey.
Credit: NETFLIX

So why didn’t the writers go for the happy ending? Well, Blood Red Sky‘s commitment to executing a dark and gritty vampire movie is what makes its whackier elements work. I’d understand the argument that committing to this pessimistic finale helps drive home the realism of a movie you’d think would include Sam L. Jackson screaming about these “mother fucking vampires on this motherfucking plane” but is actually fairly gripping. Maintaining the tension between Nadja and the terrorists responsible for the hijacking is essential to the movie’s believability, and Elias being orphaned by this whole ordeal does seem likely.

Still, at this point in the story, I think giving these characters’ the ending they deserve should outrank suspending disbelief. I’m not suggesting we needed a peppy slideshow of Nadja and Elias celebrating holidays throughout the years, or even a particularly thorough explanation of what happens to them next. I just would have liked them to live, because it felt like they earned it.

Blood Red Sky is now streaming on Netflix.

Related Video: The best of Netflix 2021 (so far)

Before there was Geralt of Rivia, there was Vesemir.

Netflix’s upcoming anime film The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf is a prequel to The Witcher that tells the origin story of Geralt’s mentor, Vesemir (voiced by Theo James). The trailer gives us a glimpse into the painful process by which Vesemir becomes a Witcher, as well as his time as a monster hunter. Add a powerful witch named Tetra (voiced by Lara Pulver), terrifying monsters, and magical fight scenes to the mix, and it looks like we’ll be in for an epic journey across the Continent.

The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf is on Netflix August 23.

SAVE $40: Ready to learn more about what makes you, you? As of Aug. 9, grab an AncestryDNA Genetic Ethnicity Test for only $59.

Learning about your culture is a great way to connect with your family members, but if you’re not exactly sure which cultures you should be learning about, a DNA test kit can help. Whether you’re biracial, adopted, or your family just came to the United States a really long time ago, AncestryDNA’s genetic tests break down where in the world your DNA came from — literally.

With DNA testing across over 1,000 global regions, you’ll be able to find out a lot about your ethnicity, even if it comes from a bunch of different countries. You’ll be able to connect with living relatives if they’ve also taken an AncestryDNA test, so you just might find your long-lost cousin. With your results, you’ll get historical insights from the countries and regions you’re from, which will give you a head start on your cultural education journey.

The test is simple to take — it only requires a saliva sample — and you’ll receive your results in six to eight weeks. After that, you’ll be able to build your family tree online and access thousands of records that are linked to your relatives. Look through artifacts like passport photos, marriage certificates, birth certificates, and more to get a full look at how your ancestors moved around the world through the years.

While it’s not quite at the all-time-low price, this AncestryDNA deal is a solid one if you don’t want to wait until this year’s shopping holidays. Grab one for an upcoming birthday, anniversary, or treat yourself to a little self-discovery for only $59.

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For the first time in Olympic and Paralympic history, the podiums are made out of recycled plastic.

Save $20.99: The Cricut Joy DIY machine is on sale for $139, down from $159.99 for a limited time.

A Cricut machine is a fun addition to any school supplies list, whether you’re a teacher, parent, or student. With it, you can personalize masks, lunch boxes, bulletin boards, backpacks, and pretty much anything else you can think of.

And, through Aug. 14, the Cricut Joy is on sale for $139, saving you $20.99.

The Cricut Joy is compact and portable compared to some of the larger Cricut machines, making it nice for classrooms and dorm rooms. To start customizing, create or select a design from the mobile app and the Cricut will do all the hard work for you. Then just stick or iron the design where you want it and you’re done personalizing.

Head back to school this year with fun, customized supplies, and make sure to snag the Cricut Joy while it’s on sale for $139.

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Whether you’re taking a picture of a dazzling beach sunset or documenting your weekend brunch, capturing it with HDR on can ensure that you get the best photos possible.

HDR, which stands for “High Dynamic Range,” is a photography technique that combines multiple exposures of a scene for one high contrast, saturated photo. By taking photos on different exposures depending on the brightness of each part of the scene, photographers can ensure that no part of the photo is too dark or blown out. It’s especially ideal for backlit photos.

Traditional HDR techniques require a photo editing software to combine the multiple exposures into one photo. Luckily, iPhone users can skip that with a nifty iOS feature.

Here’s how to turn your iPhone’s HDR feature on and off.

First, check if your phone is automatically set for HDR already. Go to your phone’s General Settings and scroll or search for “Camera.” Make sure not to tap the option listed under “Privacy.”

Under Camera settings, scroll all the way to the bottom. If the slider next to “Smart HDR” is green, it means your camera has already been set to automatically take HDR photos depending on the lighting. You can tap that slider to turn the feature on (green) or off (grey) — leave it off here if you’d rather decide when you do and don’t use HDR.

If Smart HDR is on, it means you’ve been already taking HDR photos.
Credit: iphone screenshot

Then, open the Camera app. “HDR” should appear in the top right corner. You can control whether or not to use the feature by tapping “HDR.”

Control whether or not to use HDR settings.

Credit: iphone screenshot

Tapping it will turn the feature off.

Credit: iphone screenshot

Now you can toggle HDR on and off!