Making words at the word factory. GQ UK. Occasionally elsewhere • jack.king@condenast.co.uk
Articles by Jack King
The 10 greatest movie jump scares, definitively ranked
People tend to think of jump scares as a gimmick — and yeah, they are. But done right, they can also be an art form. (Ah yes! The great artistic pursuit of making you drop your guts.) In horror movies, they're the cornerstone of eliciting good ol' terror, and also entertainment.
Streets are saying that The End of Oak Street is the summer's surprise banger
entertainment news 5 hours ago ‘The End of Oak Street’ is a nasty, effective exercise in dino terror Reason.com - Peter Suderman • 5h This lean, mean, late-summer romp is dino-mite. There's something primordially satisfying about watching a big-screen dinosaur get the what-for from … Culture 7 hours ago The 12 Best Dinosaur Movies That Aren’t Jurassic Park Vulture - By James Grebey, • 7h Dinosaurs ruled the Earth for millions of years, but they haven’t always dominated cinemas to the same extent.
Everything we know about the Game of Thrones movie, Aegon's Conquest
Following a resurgent third season of House of the Dragon and the debut of top-tier Medieval buddy-dramedy A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, the streets are united in voice: Westeros is so back. The Game of Thrones world hasn't felt this good a place to hang since, like, season five of the original run. It's a run of form we can now hope extents to the first fully-fledged movie in the franchise, which was announced by Warner Bros in April.
Robert Pattinson's Primetime is the weirdest biopic of the year
Albums 10 hours ago Heart have finished recording their first album in a decade. "It's what we were born to do, and do together" loudersound.com - Fraser Lewry • 10h Nancy Wilson says that Heart have finished recording a new album.
Ted Lasso season 4 is the death knell for the Cringe TV era
Apple TV 12 hours ago I had secret four-year love affair with TV heartthrob… until he ditched me for Brazilian mistress, reveals Keeley Hazell thescottishsun.co.uk - Ellie Henman • 12h AS a Page Three star who was once hailed the world’s sexiest woman, Keeley Hazell is no stranger to high-profile romances.
5 (Actually Good) Things Coming to Netflix in August
Netflix be damned, this has been a summer for the ages at the multiplex. Literally everyone has headed out to see Christopher Nolan go full Christopher Nolan in his mythic epic The Odyssey, indie horror has had its time in the sun with Obsession and Backrooms, and just a week into its run, the new Spider-Man film has already hoarded piles of cash bigger than the Himalayas.
Why Agamemnon (Almost) Never Shows His Face in The Odyssey
The following article contains major spoilers for The Odyssey. In classic Christopher Nolan fashion, The Odyssey revolves around a terrifying event that is frequently glimpsed through hazy flashbacks, but never fully revealed until its climax: the barbaric invasion of Troy, reimagined as a ruthless genocide that haunts Odysseus (Matt Damon), chief architect of the slaughter—being the guy behind the Trojan Horse.
How Samantha Morton made Circe the surprise MVP of The Odyssey
2 hours ago The two-time Oscar nominee reveals the magic behind her scene-stealing Circe sequence, how grounded Zendaya is, and a take that made Christopher Nolan’s crew burst into applause. Samantha Morton spent one summer decades ago working as a magician’s assistant. She never could have imagined that …
The Odyssey Is a Horror Movie, Actually
In a lot of ways, The Odyssey is pretty much what you expect it to be. Bigger than the Burj Khalifa, and just as impressive. In other words, it’s a nearly-three-hour flex from Christopher Nolan, who has surely now secured his place on the Mount Rushmore of modern filmmakers. You might well call it the movie he was born to make.
The Pitt season 3 will have a major shakeup
1:40 1 day ago ‘The Pitt': Where Have You Seen The Cast Before? Unbranded - unbranded - Entertainment • 1d With an impressive 25 nominations at the 2026 Emmys, 'The Pitt' has quickly become one of TV's biggest breakout hits. While some of its stars are familiar faces, others are just beginning to make a name for themselves. Leading the cast is Noah Wyle as Dr. Michael "Robby" Robinavitch, the senior doctor trying to hold everything together.
The Shards is the Ryan Murphy x Bret Easton Ellis collab that real sickos prayed for
Kaia Gerber 18 hours ago Kaia Gerber joins Richard Gere's son Homer in steamy first look at new series hellomagazine.com - Faye James • 18h Kaia Gerber and Homer Gere have teamed up for a raunchy new project, more than 30 years after their parents, Cindy Crawford and Richard Gere, ended … entertainment news 1 day ago The Shards: FX & Ryan Murphy's Bret Easton Ellis Adapt Gets New Poster bleedingcool.com - Ray Flook • 1d Last month, FX Networks and EP Ryan Murphy (American Horror Story,...
7 (Actually Good) Things to Watch on Netflix in July
Summer is usually for being outside. But if these Hans-Moleman-incinerating levels of heat keep up, you’d best believe we’re going to be spending a fair amount of time in front of the TV inside—and when the World Cup isn’t on, Netflix has a great crop of new arrivals to binge into the muggy evenings. For the horror fanatics, there’s Smile 2, the gnarly story of a Sabrina Carpenter-esque pop star who is terrorized by a murderous demon.
The Backrooms ending is a trippy nightmare
The following article contains major spoilers for Backrooms, including its ending. Backrooms stormed the box office over the weekend, anointing its 20-year-old director Kane Parsons as a wunderkind auteur to watch. (He is the youngest-ever filmmaker to debut at number one.) The film is a real trip, to say the least: it's essentially the feature-length adaptation of a series of viral YouTube videos created by Parsons when he was a teenager.
Lanterns could be the True Detective of superhero spin-offs
Human Interest 10 hours ago 54 Times People’s Normal Photos Turned Into Hilarious ‘When You See It’ Moments AOL - Jonas Grinevičius • 10h Photos that look completely ordinary at first glance might actually be extraordinary. At least if you have the Sherlock Holmes-like skills to look past the camouflage and confusing perspectives.
The Backrooms Ending Is a Trippy Nightmare
The following article contains major spoilers for Backrooms, including its ending. Backrooms stormed the box office over the weekend, anointing its 20-year-old director Kane Parsons as a wunderkind auteur to watch. (He is the youngest-ever filmmaker to debut at number one.) The film is a real trip, to say the least: it’s essentially the feature-length adaptation of a series of viral YouTube videos created by Parsons when he was a teenager.
Leo Woodall F*cking Loves It
Up Close Whether he’s playing a rom-com love interest or a prestige leading man, the Tuner star and White Lotus alum runs on pure, unadulterated enthusiasm. by Jack King May 21, 2026 It takes about 15 milliseconds in the presence of Leo Woodall to clock why he has become the go-to movie boyfriend of his generation.
We Need to Talk About the Rizless, Tedious Men of The Devil Wears Prada 2
The following article contains spoilers for The Devil Wears Prada 2. To give The Devil Wears Prada 2 its dues, there's a fair bit more to it than anyone might've predicted a month ago. First and foremost, it's a funny, well-crafted fashion-world satire, in the enjoyably throwback mould of the mid-budget studio comedies — like its predecessor — that were a dime a dozen up to the noughties.
Sounds Like The Batman: Part II Is Swinging For The Dark Knight's Crown
Mascara at the ready, Robert Pattinson—you’re headed back to Gotham City (Nirvana’s Version). Following a series of delays behind the scenes, The Batman: Part II is reportedly set to begin shooting in London next month. Quite remarkably for such a long-awaited comic book movie in the social media age—where productions tend to be leakier than a broken faucet, plot points and cameo appearances doing the rounds well in advance of release—story details remain firmly under wraps.
7 (Actually Good) Things to Watch on Netflix in May
Bonnie Blue outraging public decency charge dropped - what was she accused of doing at Indonesian embassy? After Bonnie Blue has the charges against her dropped - what she was accused of doing and why she won’t be going to court.
7 (actually good) movies coming to cinemas this summer
4 hours ago Sadly for the former "SNL" cast member, many people found his quite serious post truly laughable. It’s not a laughing matter: MAGA-supporting comedian Rob Schneider wants ABC to fire Jimmy Kimmel for making jokes. The former “SNL” cast member apparently didn’t like it when Kimmel joked last week that …
7 (Actually Good) Things to Watch on Netflix in May
As spring turns to summer and big coats are stuffed in the cupboard for another five months, you’ll probably want to spend more time sipping Aperol Spritzes in the sun than you will parked in front of the TV. Hell, give it a month, and it’ll be summer movie season, with a crammed schedule of blockbusters taking up the middle of the year. There’s the World Cup on the horizon, too. Nonetheless, there’s some fine streaming fare coming to Netflix in May.
The 10 best date night movies that won't destroy your vibe
Since the dawn of time, a ton of otherwise promising relationships have died a death because both partners proved chronically incapable of picking date night movies that work. (I hate to break it to you, but your parents told me it's the real reason they got divorced.) We've all been there on a quiet Friday night, ready to settle in for some obligatory “us time,” which then turns into hours of scrolling the Netflix carousel. Quiet resentment follows.
The 14 best post-apocalyptic movies, definitively ranked
The end of the world is all the rage. Just look at what has dominated TV ratings over the past couple of years: The Last of Us was all we talked about in the beginning of 2023, and a year later, everyone and their now glowingly radioactive nans caught Fallout fever. Paradise has proven a hit over on JioHotstar; Apple TV has even got on the post-apocalyptic craze with Silo.
8 great lonely space movies, definitively ranked
Growing up, every guy wants to be an astronaut. But at some point, usually around the time we start recognising our own mortality, the appeal really wears off, and the vastness of the cosmos begins to excite less than it engenders a sense of existential terror. It can't get much lonelier than drifting among the stars, hence why loneliness and isolation have been go-to themes of space movies since time immemorial. In space, no one can hear you scream, and that's probably because you're on your own.
The best fight scenes in movie history, definitively ranked
From full-throttle action flicks to moody boxing dramas, the best movie fight scenes tend to boast brutal physicality, world-class choreography and huge personal stakes. They're gladiatorial bouts between mortal enemies, pushing themselves to the limit to come out on top; they will always test the limits of our hero's endurance, and what they'll do in order to win, or just survive. Often it's with fists, sometimes with weapons. Occasionally, the entire set is weaponised.
Fallout Season-Finale Recap: Welcome to the Wasteland
Fallout The Strip Season 2 Episode 8 Editor’s Rating 5 stars ***** Fallout The Strip Season 2 Episode 8 Editor’s Rating 5 stars ***** The return of two iconic factions from the games moves the series beyond mere survival and into an all-out war for the future of the wasteland. I’ve expressed my view before that Fallout’s superpower as an adaptation lies in how it both excels as its own self-contained show and as a fan-friendly extension to popular IP.
Steph is Canadian & The Return of Mr. House
Fallout The Handoff Season 2 Episode 7 Editor’s Rating 4 stars **** Fallout The Handoff Season 2 Episode 7 Editor’s Rating 4 stars **** In the wasteland, you never truly know who if someone is a murderer, an executive, or secretly Canadian. Well, this was a classic penultimate episode of television: a lot of setup, new twists placed on a simmer, and a little self-contained action to make the whole enterprise worthwhile.
Ron Perlman and the Return of the Enclave Original
Fallout Uranium Fever Season 2 Episode 6 Editor’s Rating 4 stars **** Fallout Uranium Fever Season 2 Episode 6 Editor’s Rating 4 stars **** Was anyone else reminded of Pluribusthis week?
With The Rip, Ben Affleck and Matt Damon are having fun again
Five limited series to binge on Netflix this weekend Now that Stranger Things has officially ended, it feels like a part of our personality is paused. What are we even supposed to do now? Go outside? …
House’s Prediction & the Enclave’s Return
Fallout The Wrangler Season 2 Episode 5 Editor’s Rating 4 stars **** The wasteland’s true big bad is finally emerging from the shadows. Not only was this a wildly entertaining episode in which a lot of shit went down, but it’s hard to think of another — save for the season-one finale, perhaps — that has been more consequential for the series at large.
Fallout recap: Were gonna need a bigger strip
Ringa-ding-ding, baby! Well, its been a long four-episode road, but were finally in New Vegas. Fallout fans will have already seen the leaked photos of the (extremely public) Vegas set built atop a Los Angeles strip mall earlier this year; even so, its something else entirely to see postapocalyptic Sin City in all of its cinematized, VFX-augmented glory.
Fallout Recap: The War of the Two Caesars
Fallout Episode 3 Season 2 Episode 3 Editor’s Rating 4 stars **** Lucy, Max, and the Ghoul find themselves stuck in the middle of the Legion and Brotherhood’s impending civil wars. “War never changes,” or so goes Fallout’s famous tagline: a reminder that humankind has been locked into bloody conflict for as long as we’ve been able to throw fists, sling arrows, and drop nukes.
Fallout Recap: A Real F*ckin’ Ice Box
Fallout Episode 2 Season 2 Episode 2 Editor’s Rating 3 stars *** Fallout Episode 2 Season 2 Episode 2 Editor’s Rating 3 stars *** Lucy finds herself in the midst of one of the most dangerous factions in the entire series. I don’t remember any of the episodes in Fallout season one feeling especially like filler, but I suppose it’s not a bad return for a show to only just start feeling slow — and a little monotonous — in its tenth total episode.
Disclosure Day Is Already the Most Mysterious Movie of 2026
The best movies and TV of 2025, picked for you by NPR critics Whether you plan to head out to the theater or binge from the couch, our critics have gathered together their favorite films and TV shows of 2025. You can search by genre and where you can see it. Have at it!
Fallout Season-Premiere Recap: Viva Las Vegas
A big swirling bucket of the latest rumors, celebrity news and Hollywood gossip. The premier celebrity gossip app. The only apps that gives you a comprehensive real time celeb news stream. Gossip Bucket aggregates and streams the latest gossip news and headlines from the top sources in one place.
Fallout Season-Premiere Recap: Viva Las Vegas
Fallout The Man Who Knew Season 2 Episode 1 Editor’s Rating 4 stars **** Fallout The Man Who Knew Season 2 Episode 1 Editor’s Rating 4 stars **** The trail to Hank leads the Ghoul and Lucy toward New Vegas, one of the last remnants of prewar America, thanks to the multihyphenate tech genius Robert House. It has taken God knows how long to get there, but we’re finally in a place where video-game adaptations aren’t generally considered DOA automatically.
Fallout Season-Premiere Recap: Viva Las Vegas
Fallout Season 2 Is Better Than Ever That's the golden rule. To say that Fallout was a surprise hit when it premiered in April of last year feels like an understatement. There was a fair …
Every James Bond actor, definitively ranked
One of the many reasons that Bond has enjoyed such unique cinematic staying power — to the tune of 25 movies since 1962, with a 26th now in the works — is that the series has reinvented itself a number of times over the decades. Six times, to be precise, with every new actor who has picked up the PPK. Connery. Lazenby. Moore. Dalton. Brosnan. Craig.
What does Netflix buying Warner Bros. mean, exactly? The good, the bad, and the ugly repercussions
In “corporate drama so delicious it should be an episode of Succession” news, reports today emerged that streaming giant Netflix has coughed up a mammoth figure to purchase the film, TV and streaming businesses of Warner Bros., the Hollywood studio behind Harry Potter, the DC comic movies, and Lord of the Rings.
The best classic movies for your TCM fix
What makes a movie a “classic”? It's a tough one to nail down. But, first and foremost, the best classic movies—and for clarity, we're using “classic” to mean films from the ‘30s, ‘40s and ‘50s here—boast cinematic staying power that most films can only dream of. That we’re still watching them seven or eight decades later is a feat of endurance worthy of the best marathon runners; they’re handed down over generations as the greatest examples of their medium.
The 10 best movie remakes that are better than the originals
The conventional wisdom goes that most movie remakes suck — or, at the very least, are unnecessary cash grabs that exist solely to line the pockets of movie studios, who seek to profit from existing nostalgia for the classics.
10 Movies to Get Hyped for in 2026
7 hours ago It includes editor-approved picks and bestsellers. It's easy to get ahead of ourselves when Black Friday rolls around, which is why we're only highlighting the sales that are actually worth your time and money. For example, if you can't typically rationalize a pair of Vuori joggers for $98—but it's …
10 Movies to Get Hyped for in 2026
Despite all the talk of box office flops, the existential threat of generative AI, and Hollywood just feeling a little gloomy nowadays, 2025 has actually been a pretty good year for movies.
The Best Films You'll Only Want to Watch Once
When there are so many good movies in the world, and just not enough time to get through all of them, it sometimes feels like a fool's errand to commit to any rewatch. After all, why watch the same thing you've seen countless times before, when you can challenge yourself with something new — and expand your cinematic horizons in the process?
Hostage Finale Recap: People Want the Truth
Hostage Episode 5 Season 1 Episode 5 Editor’s Rating 3 stars *** It turns out the hostage crisis and coup are all over … budget cuts? In some ways, I’m sympathetic enough to Shagan’s motivations behind the plot to oust Dalton, as revealed at the end of the finale. One of the central themes of the show is family, and more specifically, how far we’re willing to go — and what we’re willing to lose — to protect our loved ones.
Hostage Recap: It’s The Least You Deserve
A big swirling bucket of the latest rumors, celebrity news and Hollywood gossip. The premier celebrity gossip app. The only apps that gives you a comprehensive real time celeb news stream. Gossip Bucket aggregates and streams the latest gossip news and headlines from the top sources in one place.
Hostage Recap: It’s The Least You Deserve
Hostage Episode 4 Season 1 Episode 4 Editor’s Rating 3 stars *** Hostage Episode 4 Season 1 Episode 4 Editor’s Rating 3 stars *** Toussaint finally tells the truth, ditches the right-wing extremist, and helps her political counterpart. So naturally, she’s not long for this world. Hostage giveth, and Hostage taketh away. Old James Bond might’ve been spared in the last episode, but now we’ve lost Julie Delpy and Toussaint. RIP to a real one.
‘Hostage’ Recap, Episode 3: Bonne Chance
Hostage Episode 3 Season 1 Episode 3 Editor’s Rating 3 stars *** bring the chaos directly to Dalton and Toussaint. With the titular hostage crisis out of the way, the captors So, ehm, well. The titular hostage crisis of Hostage is seemingly … over? Not without plenty of casualties, of course. But the important guy, Alex, is alive — as is Old James Bond, thank the heavens. It’s actually quite the bold, and refreshingly subversive, twist to resolve the series’ central conflict midway through.
Hostage Recap: Blood on Your Hands
Hostage Episode 2 Season 1 Episode 2 Editor’s Rating 4 stars **** We must protect Old James Bond at all costs. Hostage doesn’t half-cram a lot into a 40-minute episode, does it?
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