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Top OTT Releases This Week: Ae Watan Mere Watan, Lootere, Fighter and More

This week, we have a piping hot buffet of new digital releases across genres. We have two Indian originals, post-theatrical releases, a high-budget sci-fi saga, and Marvel Studio’s hit series making a return.

One of the major releases of the week is Sara Ali Khan’s Ae Watan Mere Watan which will take you to the pre-Indepence Bombay. Khan is seen playing the celebrated freedom fighter, Usha Mehta. While the gallant leader dedicated her entire life to India, this Amazon Original will take you to the Quit India Movement, when the college-going Usha started an illegal radio station to broadcast messages from prominent leaders from various secret locations.

Next in Line is Hansal Mehta’s Lootere which will revolve around a cargo ship hijacked by Somalian pirates in Africa. The show gives a refreshing break from repetitive plotlines in crime thrillers and will keep you guessing what comes next.

Netflix’s 3 Body Problem is another big-budget release of the week. It offers an impressive cocktail of cultural, social, and scientific conundrums.

Marvel Studios also have a big release in the form of X-Men’ 97 which is a revival of sorts for the long-running hit show, X-Men: The Animated Series. However, whether the show sets the stage for other live adaptations is yet to be confirmed. Another major release by Marvel lined up for release this year is Wolverine & Deadpool.

Besides the ones listed below, Netflix’s biography film Shirley is also a good binge-watch option for the weekend, which brings from the page of American history the rivetting tale of Shirley Chisholm, the first black woman to be elected to the United States Congress.

True crime documentary enthusiasts could watch Netflix’s Homicide: New York, in which investigators, officers, and detectives discuss some of the most notorious murder cases.

With that, here are the top OTT releases of the week that we recommend.

Ae Watan Mere Watan

When: Now Streaming

Where: Prime Video

During the Quit India Movement of 1942, a young college student in Bombay recognised the power of radio and started an illegal secret radio station to broadcast messages from Mahatma Gandhi and other prominent leaders across India, with the help of a few amateur radio operators.

While this endeavour lasted only three months, it played an important role in India’s struggle for Independence.

In this biopic, Sara Ali Khan plays the college student Usha Mehta, who later emerged as an important figure in Indian history. The film will tell you in detail how the rebellious freedom fighter started and continued to operate this station from various undisclosed locations and the various challenges she faced.

The fact that she was a Gandhian and her father, a judge under the British Raj, opposed her actions is also portrayed.

Fighter

When: Now Streaming

Where: Netflix

Fighter is a visually striking patriotic drama about a few fighter pilots of the Indian Air Force who have vowed to protect their nation against all threats and dangers. Among these valiant officers are Hrithik Roshan, Deepika Padukone, Karan Singh Grover and Manushi Chillar, headed by squadron leader Anil Kapoor. Hrithik’s character is a rebel who doesn’t shy away from bending the rules when it comes to justice, an attitude that doesn’t sit well with Anil Kapoor’s squadron leader, putting the two at loggerheads with each other in almost every scene.

If you find yourself amazed at the mannerisms of a few characters coming off as too professional, that’s because those are real-life Indian Air Force cadets bringing a slice of their everyday lives to the silver screen. You’ll also find plenty of references to the 2019 Pulwama attack, the 2019 Balakot airstrike and the 2019 India–Pakistan border skirmishes.

Since Fighter has used the same cinematographic techniques as Dune and other James Bonde movies, it offers plenty of jaw-dropping aerial action sequences, some of which are likely to remind you of Tom Cruise’s Top Gun: Maverick.

Lootere

When: Now Streaming

Where: Hotstar

Hansal Mehta’s (Scam 1992) will take you to the Somalian waters where a cargo ship with an Asian crew gets hijacked by Somalian pirates. The ship is owned by Vikrant, a nicotine-addicted businessman of Indian origin who has a lot more on stake than what appears at the surface and is desperately counting on it being retrieved. Rajat Kapoor plays the captain of the ship and delivers a fine performance.

The eight-episode-long show will give you a taste of crime, corruption, and dark secrets harbouring in African waters, with a special focus on Indian businessmen established there for decades. Get ready for thrill, knotty twists, a flavour of dark murkiness of the crime world.

The first two episodes have been released, and the other eight will be out every week. Shot in Hindi, Lootere can also be streamed in Telugu, Tamil, Bengali, Marathi, Malayalam, and Kannada.

3 Body Problem

When: Now Streaming

Where: Netflix

3 Body Problem is a Sci-Fi drama adapted from Chinese engineer-author Liu Cixin’s novel of the same name, which serves as the first in the Remembrance of Earth’s Past trilogy.

The show begins with an astrophysicist witnessing her father’s public execution during the Chinese Cultural Revolution. Cut to the future, she is taken to a secret radar base by the military. Meanwhile, in the present, a lot of strange unexplained phenomena are happening – many physicists committing suicide, prominent research being discovered as wrong, and all the stars blinking on and off!

All in all, the show offers plenty of complex scientific problems, cultural challenges, extra-terrestrial dangers, and lots of suspense. The show has been adapted for television by Game of Thrones creators David Benioff, D. B. Weiss and Alexander Woo.

X-MEN ‘97

When: Now Streaming

Where: Hotstar

X-Men ’97 is a spiritual sequence to X-Men: The Animated Series, which ran on air from 1992-1995. The show picks up right after the events of the original series and introduces the viewers to a world where the X-Men leader, Professor X, is no longer in charge – leaving his proteges, Cyclops and Jean Grey, in charge.

The world still somewhat dislikes the mutant X-Men, who are anyway hell-bent on saving the world from all the dangers, irrespective of the bigotry they face on a daily basis.

Many actors from the original series have lent their voices, including Cal Dodd, Lenore Zann, George Buza, Catherine Disher, Chris Potter, Alison Sealy-Smith, Adrian Hough, Christopher Britton, Alyson Court, Lawrence Bayne, and Ron Rubin. The first two episodes have now been released, while the rest will be out every Wednesday at 12:30 pm IST.

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Here’s Your Binge Watch Guide for the Weekend: Killer Soup, Lift, Tiger 3 and More

With the biting cold winters lingering on our heads, binge-watching through the weekend in the warm comfort of your blanket, with a hot saucer of soup sounds like the perfect plan! To save you the hustle of scrolling through endless titles to stream, we have hand-picked a few OTT releases of the week for you.

If you are looking for that adrenaline rush, we would recommend Konkona Sen Sharma and Manoj Bajpayee’s Killer Soup. Another pick could be Comedian Kevin Hart’s money heist drama Lift, where he tries to steal millions of dollars up in the air in a commercial plane.

Reacher Season 2 has also released its 45-minute-long penultimate episode. However, if you are in the mood for some superhero drama, Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Echo could be a good choice (spoiler alert: she has different superpowers from comic books).

Salman’s Tiger 3 and Tom Cruise’s Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One, (both of which had a theatrical release), are also now available to stream on Amazon Prime. While at it don’t forget to check the extended version of Tom Cruise’s Dead Reckoning Part 1.

Happy binge-watching!

Killer Soup

When: Streaming

Where: Netflix

Abhishek Chaubey’s dark comedy thriller Killer Soup is a broiling pot of intense emotions, crimes, lies, cover-ups, poetic references, brilliant cinematography, and too many criss-crossing subplots!

Swathi (Konkona Sen Sharma) is a terrible cook and housewife to the chauvinistic Prabhakar Shetty (Manoj Bajpayee). When the latter learns about her illicit affair with his look-alike masseuse, things get heated up. One thing leads to another, and Swathi decides to disguise her lover as Prabhakar and present him in front of the world. As expected, many twists and turns follow.

Lift

When: Released Today

Where: Netflix

Stand-up comedian Kevin Hart returns to Netflix with this crime comedy. He is playing a heist crew lead who conspires to steal $500 million gold bullion being transported on a 777 passenger flight from London to Zurich. As he stages this mid-air crime, he is being suspected of identity theft by the authorities.

Break Point Season 2

When: Now Streaming

Where: Netflix

The second season of this sports docu-series comes with plenty of behind-the-scenes looks into the life of select tennis players. From dramatic injuries, candid moments, and on-field performances to some of the older players reminiscing their good old days, the show has it all.

Echo

When: Now Streaming

Where: Disney+ Hotstar

Marvel’s Cinematic Universe officially enters 2024 with its limited series Echo – although the series is quite different from the comic books (she even has different powers here).

After shooting Wilson Fisk (Vincent D’Onofrio) in Hawkeye, Maya Lopez (Alaqua Cox), returns to her hometown. Here a galley of Fisk’s men are waiting to make her and her family’s life a living hell.

Cheran’s Journey

When: Now Streaming

Where: Sony LIV

The five-time National Award winner Cheran makes his OTT debut with this nine-episode-long web series. Here we meet five characters competing for a lucrative well-paying job at an automobile company – all with different motives. As Cheran’s character assesses potential candidates, he tests them for their true capabilities.

Reacher Season 2

When: Now Streaming

Where: Amazon Prime

The seventh episode of Amazon Original Reacher Season 2 was released on January 12. It begins with Reacher trying to come up with a rescue plan and find a safe place to send Jane — the child witness for whose protection Detective Gitano sacrificed himself — and her mother, New Age executive Marlo Burns. Action sequences, hospital scenes, serious calls, and a lot of chasing follow. The final episode drops on January 19.

Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One

When: Now Streaming

Where: Amazon Prime

Tom Cruise’s international spy character Ethan Hunt is back for yet another world-saving adventure along with his IMF team. This time they are fighting “the Entity”, a powerful rogue AI. The film serves as a sequel to Mission: Impossible – Fallout (2018) and is the seventh instalment overall in the Mission: Impossible film franchise. A ten-minute long extended preview is also available to stream on Amazon Prime.

Tiger 3

When: Now Streaming

Where: Amazon Prime

Box-office hit Tiger 3 is now finally available to stream. In this third instalment of the spy franchise Tiger, a new threat emerges in the form of Aatish Rehman (Emraan Hashmi), the head of a terrorist military group who has a personal vendetta of his own against Tiger (Salman Khan). The protagonist must now embark on a dangerous mission to protect his family as well as the nation, whilst clearing his name.

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Marvel Reportedly Considered Bringing Original Avengers Cast for New Movie, Replacing Jonathan Majors, More

Marvel Studios reportedly held talks to bring back the original cast members for a new Avengers movie. As per Variety, studio executives, including President Kevin Feige, recently discussed the idea of reviving Robert Downey Jr.’s Tony Stark/ Iron Man and Scarlett Johansson’s Natasha Romanoff/ Black Widow for a new saga — albeit they aren’t committed to it. It’s not even surprising to see something like this happen in a superhero movie, given comic books are notorious for killing off characters and resurrecting them. However, doing so in Hollywood could require a big investment, with the report noting that Downey’s salary for 2013’s Iron Man 3 was $25 million (about Rs. 208 crore).

Marvel has released some stinkers this year, with both its slate of films and TV shows like Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania and Secret Invasion releasing to widespread negative reception. With films in Phase Four failing to impress despite commercial success, and its Phase Five faltering, it’s hardly surprising that Marvel is considering getting the old band back together. But betting on something this monumental could be risky — even if the fans would be excited about it.

You see, the reason the Russo Brothers’ Avengers: Endgame performed well at the box office was partly because of its conclusive ending. The movie was fitting culmination of years of hype and character development over 22 preceding films. Reviving characters just out of the blue would raise questions about canon events, in addition to being an extremely obvious attempt to capture the long-lost Marvel magic that had audiences lining up at theatres at midnight. The superhero movie fatigue has never been so clear, and the MCU is still trying to salvage what they can to deliver a proper ending to the Multiverse Saga.

According to the Variety report, discussions also focused on the franchise’s current main villain Kang the Conqueror, played by Jonathan Majors, who’s been involved in legal issues this year. The actor was arrested in March on charges of domestic violence, with Disney seemingly in wait to see how the ordeal plays out. Majors’ upcoming film Avengers: The Kang Dynasty isn’t slated to begin filming until 2024. The actor was eventually dropped by his managers and hit with more allegations, as he now prepares to stand for a trial in November. The controversy has caused Marvel executives to consider another key villain, the genius Dr. Doom — a huge shift, considering the studio has built up Kang to be the ultimate adversary through both seasons of Loki and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. Variety’s sources, however, insist that Marvel had considered building up a new villain regardless of Majors’ legal run-ins, owing to Quantumania’s poor box office performance.

A chunk of the film’s criticism stemmed from subpar CGI, with VFX artists pointing fingers at Marvel Studios for diverting all its major resources towards other films like Black Panther: Wakanda Forever — thereby leading to time constraints. Long working hours and unrealistic deadlines caused the VFX department to unionise in September, with some claiming that the VFX head Victoria Alonso was responsible for the lacklustre effects. She was fired in March, citing a contract breach, albeit insiders believed that quality assurance was freefalling since they began dishing out Disney+ Marvel shows. Meanwhile, another group claims that Alonso was simply a ‘scapegoat’ and that the CGI issues in the She-Hulk: Attorney at Law show stemmed from scripting and scheduling conflicts, causing artists to fix them in post-production.

The studio prepares for its newest film on November 10 — The Marvels starring Brie Larson, Iman Vellani, and Teyonah Parris, which was made on a $250 million (about Rs. 2,081 crore) budget. The report notes that the film warranted four weeks of reshoots, with its director Nia DaCosta heading out to work on another movie during the post-production stage. “If you’re directing a $250 million movie, it’s kind of weird for the director to leave with a few months to go,” Variety’s source claimed.

Furthermore, the long-gestating Blade reboot film starring Oscar-winner Mahershala Ali, which has cycled through multiple writers and directors, is being tweaked from the ground up. Turns out, the vampire tale once morphed into a ‘narrative led by women and filled with life lessons,’ while the lead was buried way below. Ali, at one point, was willing to leave the project due to script issues, but Feige then hired Logan writer Michael Green to whip up a fresh story, which will be developed at a $100 million (about Rs. 832 crore) budget. Blade is now eyeing a release sometime in 2025.

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Daredevil: Born Again Gets Major Creative Reboot With Original Writers Being Let Go

Daredevil: Born Again is reportedly undergoing a massive creative overhaul. As per The Hollywood Reporter, during the writers’ strike production break in mid-June, Marvel executives, including President Kevin Feige, reviewed shot footage from the soft reboot and came to the conclusion that the ‘show wasn’t working’. Its effects were seen in September when the studio quietly let go of head writers Chris Ord and Matt Corman, alongside directors for the respective 18 episodes. Turns out, the duo took a new direction with Daredevil, switching from its violent Netflix origins to a legal courtroom procedural, where returning lead Charlie Cox didn’t even show up in costume until episode 4.

It is worth mentioning that merely half of the first season was shot prior to the Hollywood labour strikes, but it seems to have been enough for Feige to call off production. The team is currently looking for new writers and directors for Daredevil: Born Again, which would also reunite Cox with Jon Bernthal as Frank Castle/ The Punisher and Vincent D’Onofrio as Wilson Fisk/ Kingpin. The THR report notes that Marvel, as a whole, is looking to reset their TV series development process by having creators deliver a pilot for approval, instead of spending over $150 million (about Rs. 1,247 crore) on seasons, right away. “We’re trying to marry the Marvel culture with the traditional television culture,” Brad Winderbaum, Head of Streaming, Television, and Animation at Marvel Studios said in the interview. “It comes down to, ‘How can we tell stories in television that honour what’s so great about the source material?’”

While Marvel shows had a great start, with the Emmy-nominated WandaVision and Loki, the franchise struggled to keep audiences invested with its new lineup of superheroes and hollow stories, thereby affecting metrics. It appears now that instead of having showrunners run the TV series, the studio got executive producers to do the job, in addition to fixing any issues during post-production and via reshoots. For what it’s worth, Daredevil: Born Again will still keep some of the recorded scenes, albeit it’s expected to have a ton of changes. Meanwhile, original writers Ord and Corman will stay on as executive producers on the two-season series.

For now, it’s unclear whether the Disney+ reboot will follow the eponymous 1986 comic book run — written by Frank Miller — in which Matt Murdock’s former secretary Karen Page, who’d turned into a heroin addict strapped for cash, sold out Daredevil’s identity. Upon learning this information, the Kingpin uses his influence to meddle with Murdock’s life personal life — closing his bank accounts and such — and driving him to the brink of insanity. There is no official synopsis for the show yet and neither Deborah Ann Woll nor Elden Henson is confirmed to be part of it. They played Page and lawyer Franklin “Foggy” Nelson in the original Netflix series.

Daredevil: Born Again currently does not have a release window, but when it does, it should be out on Disney+ and Disney+ Hotstar.

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MCU’s Thunderbolts casts Oscar-nominated Steven Yeun: Report

Hollywood star Steven Yeun is set to make his debut in Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) with the upcoming movie Thunderbolts, according to a report.

The film, which was officially announced at Disney’s D23 Expo in 2022, is based around a team of Marvel supervillains — in what seems like Marvel’s attempt at its own Suicide Squad — reported American outlet Deadline.

Yeun, known for his performances in The Walking Dead show and movies such as Okja, Minari, and Nope, will play a key role in the Marvel Studios film, which could further extend to other related projects.

He joins an ensemble cast that includes Florence Pugh as Yelena Belova, Sebastian Stan as Bucky Barnes, David Harbour as the Red Guardian, Hannah John-Kamen as Ghost, Wyatt Russell as John Walker, Olga Kurylenko as Taskmaster, and Julia Louis-Dreyfus as Contessa Valentina Allegra de Fontaine.

A report from last year suggested that Harrison Ford (Indiana Jones movies) was joining the cast of Thunderbolts as well, replacing the late William Hurt as Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross. But before that, he will make an appearance in Captain America: New World Order as the blustering General, which marks the penultimate entry in MCU’s Phase 5 — releasing May 3, 2024. Thunderbolts is the final entry in the phase.

Jake Schreier of Paper Towns-fame will direct the film from a script by Black Widow writer Eric Pearson. The movie is scheduled for release on July 26, 2024.

In the Marvel comics, the Thunderbolts is a team of villains, anti-heroes and reformed baddies.

Yeun will next be seen in Oscar-winning director Bong Joon-ho’s next feature film Mickey 17, starring Robert Pattinson in the lead.

After facing headwinds in India last year, Xiaomi is all set to take on the competition in 2023. What are the company’s plans for its wide product portfolio and its Make in India committment in the country? We discuss this and more on Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast. Orbital is available on Spotify, Gaana, JioSaavn, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music and wherever you get your podcasts.
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Marvel’s Armor Wars Series Being Turned Into a Movie: Report

Armor Wars is being reportedly turned into a movie. As per The Hollywood Reporter, Marvel Studios will now redevelop the upcoming Don Cheadle-led Disney+ series into a feature film, suited for the big screen. The Marvel Cinematic Universe show was in early development, with the studio eyeing a 2023 start of production. But this move essentially delays the title further down the MCU production schedule. THR’s sources claim that the change was undertaken to tell the story in “the right way.” This might also have to do something with the fact that the upcoming Secret Invasion series is going to lead directly into Armor Wars.

It turns out, Marvel initially planned on a series to fully flesh out Colonel James “Rhodey” Rhodes aka War Machine’s character. However, midway through, they realised that a feature film adaptation would be the right fit. Cheadle (Boogie Nights), who made his debut in the Marvel Cinematic Universe with Iron Man 2 — replacing Terrence Howard (Prisoners) — will reprise his role in the upcoming film. Yassir Lester, who served as creator and head writer of the Armor Wars series, will remain the scribe for the movie adaptation. Currently, there is no word on an attached director for Armor Wars.

According to THR, the crew gearing up for a 2023 production schedule, were notified of the change in direction just this Thursday. Currently, there isn’t enough information on the plot, though Cheadle did make an appearance with Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige, during Disney’s D23 Expo, earlier this month. At the time, the pair revealed an Armor Wars logo, for what was then touted as a six-episode series.

Armor Wars hails from a seven-issue Iron Man storyline, running from 1987 to 1988. Written by David Michelinie and Bob Layton, the comic book series functioned around the idea of various armour suits falling into the wrong hands. The Disney+ series was set up to address the aftermath of Tony Stark’s (Robert Downey Jr.) death in 2019’s Avengers: Endgame.

This wouldn’t be the first production shake-up at Marvel Studios in recent times. Late Wednesday, Bassam Tariq, director of the upcoming Mahershala Ali-led Blade film confirmed his exit from the project. He will now serve as executive producer, on a troubled MCU movie that has seen its schedule reportedly shift several times. As per insider Jeff Sneider, lead Ali is “frustrated” with the film — a screenplay that’s roughly only 90 pages long, and features two “lacklustre” action sequences.

Currently, there is no release window for Marvel’s Armor Wars. The MCU film calendar is packed to the rafters — the only available slots as of now are February and July in 2025, and February, May, July, and November in 2026.

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Farhan Akhtar to Appear in Ms Marvel Series, Out June 8 on Disney+ Hotstar

Actor-filmmaker Farhan Akhtar will be making an appearance in Ms Marvel, the first Muslim superhero series from Marvel Studios. The Disney+ show will be the first Hollywood project for Akhtar, who is known for starring in hits like Rock On!, Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara, Bhaag Milkha Bhaag and Dil Dhadakne Do. Akhtar has also directed critically-acclaimed and commercially-successful films such as Dil Chahta Hai, Lakshya, Don and Don 2.

According to Deadline, which first reported the casting, the details of his character in Ms Marvel have been kept under wraps, even though it is said to be a guest appearance. The 48-year-old actor also shared the news of him joining the cast of Ms Marvel in a post on Twitter.

Ms Marvel will premiere on June 8 on streaming service Disney+ Hotstar, where it will be available in English, Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, and Malayalam languages. It is part of the blockbuster Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), is fronted by newcomer Iman Vellani as Kamala Khan aka Ms Marvel, a Muslim American teenager growing up in Jersey City.

Kamala is an avid gamer and a voracious fan-fiction scribe with an oversized imagination — particularly when it comes to Captain Marvel (played by Brie Larson in the MCU).

“Yet Kamala feels she doesn’t fit in at school and sometimes even at home, until she gets superpowers like her idols,” the official plotline read.

Bad Boys for Life helmers Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah, Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, a two-time Oscar winner in the documentary short category, and Meera Menon, who has worked on shows like The Walking Dead, have directed the episodes of the series.

Bisha K Ali, a scribe and stand-up comic known for her personal-political comedy, serves as head writer on the project.

The cast also includes Aramis Knight, Saagar Shaikh, Rish Shah, Zenobia Shroff, Mohan Kapur, Matt Lintz, Yasmeen Fletcher, Laith Nakli, Azhar Usman, Travina Springer and Nimra Bucha.



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