Five Knights Releases The Final Two Installments in the Kin Fables Trilogy

The first installment in Seb and Ben McKinnon's beautifully atmospheric multi-media project Kin Fables was an immensely satisfying and tantalizing glimpse into an alien world of myth back when we covered it two years ago. In the time since then, Five Knights Productions (Ben's talented company of filmmakers) has been hard at work and the fruit of those labors is finally here in the form of the highly-anticipated release of the two-part finale to the Kin Fables trilogy.

Salvage opens with a shot of a starkly bright yellow bi-plane soaring across a vast ocean before plunging into a wall of storm clouds. The lone aviator pilot of the plane manages to survive a terrific crash along the shores of what we can presume to be the same mythic world of the previous film. What he discovers there may both save and invariably change his life forever.

Requiem presents a compelling new dimension into the true nature of the world of Kin and its inhabitants. The film opens with a close-up shot of the unconscious boy who was abducted (saved?) at the conclusion of the first film. An abrupt change in focus shifts our attention to who we can presume to be the very same boy, now a grown man, waking up to a world seemingly indistinguishable from our own. What is the nature between these two, seemingly disparate realities? Nothing is as it seems.

Though this chapter of the Kin Fables story has reached its conclusion, the series' companion graphic novel is still in the works. and I'm all but certain that the McKinnon Brothers have more rapturously-moving installments up their sleeves. If not, I sincerely hope this will not be the last collaboration of Clann's sensational music with the Brother's incredible cinematography. Check out the project's website for more insights into the world and world behind the films, and be sure to follow Five Knights on facebook and twitter for more awesome shorts!

This 30-Second 'Apocalypse Now' Student Trailer is Ridiculously Impressive

Apocalypse Now is one of Francis Ford Coppola's most storied and critically-acclaimed films and a sobering depiction of the ravages of war on the human psyche. The only thing more iconic than the film itself is it's subsequent documentary Heart of Darkness, wherein we get a glimpse at the process behind producing the film that nearly drove Coppola himself to the brink of insanity.

The best part of waking up is napalm in your cup!

A class of students from The Animation Workshop,Denmark's leading animation institution, have released this epic 30-second trailer depicting Captain Willard's journey into the dark heart of the jungles of Vietnam to kill the demented Colonel Kurtz. I think it manages to succinctly capture the psychological gravitas and iconic imagery of one of cinema's most enduring classics. Great job guys!

Vitaliy Shushko's 'X-Story' Already Looks Incredible

I couldn't rightly tell you what X-Story is about, which is wholly owed to the fact the only information released so far about Russian-based animator Vitaly Shushko's first independent short film is the trailer above, a broad tentative '2015' release date and...the announcement that it's his first film.

Quite the climb.

Still, this teaser offers more than enough to wet our appetites before the main course drops later this year. The teaser flashes images of a young man with a robotic arm riding through the desert on a crimson hover-bike, delving into the catacombs of some ancient underground labyrinth facing off against some lumbering anonymous monstrosity. Sounds like one hell of a ride, can't wait to see it in full!

It's Happening: Starr Mazer Launches Kickstarter Campaign!

Last April, I did a write-up for Jérémie Périn's epic concept-game trailer Starr Mazer before shouting from the rooftops into the vacuum of space hoping against hope that this ludicrously entertaining mash-up of bullet-hell Shoot 'em up and pulp sci-fi point-and-click mechanics manifested into something actually playable. 

Well, it looks like the long arch of the universe is smiling in my favor because Imagos Softworks has finally launched a kickstarter campaign to bring this modern-day opus of retro gaming to fruition.

I think my spaceship knows which way to go...

The team includes Périn who's back on-board doing concept-art; The pledge page promises an original chip-tunes soundtrack courtesy of the talented Alex Mauer (Serious Sam: Random Encounter), Manami Matsumae (Mega Man), The Protomen, and Virt (Shovel Knight), a colorful host of characters, and a multi-choice branching storyline that results in interesting subsequent play-throughs.

I really don't know if it gets much cooler than this. It's like if Space Ace, Commander Shepherd, Space Dandy, and Guybrush Threepwood got mashed all up into one guy who was then thrown into a black hole and then spat out into a Gradius Level. Go back this asap!

Marvel's 'Run The Jewels' Variant Covers Are Unbearably Cool

Holy cow, Run the Jewels are just moving from strength to strength nowadays! A scant three months after releasing one of last year's best hip-hop albums, coordinating a massive world-wide graffiti project, and embarking on a tireless tour across the U.S., The abrasive rap-duo are set to be canonize into the annals of comic-book stardom with the announcement of two radically awesome variant covers courtesy of Marvel!

Run Them Jewels Fast!

The collaboration between the group and Marvel was spearheaded by none other than Editor-in-Chief Axel Alonso who, after witnessing his son's appreciation for the group during a football game, got in contact with Jaime and Mike to make it happen. The covers, seen above, are set to release later this month. I'm still picking my jaw from off the floor in awe that this is happening.

Flying Lotus - Coronus, The Terminator

Coronus, The Terminator is the latest installment in Flying Lotus' ongoing onslaught of masterfully directed music-videos. One of the most celebrated highlight tracks off of You're Dead!, Coronus needed an appropriately epic and ominous video to accompany the track's narrative of an harbinger of death coming down to lay waste to the Earth.

What we got was the story of man's premature passage through the bardos of the after-life, fleeing from the specters of death and regret that inhabit his home, and chasing the image of his son through the catacombs of otherworldly highways before ultimately submitting to the inevitable conclusion of his mortality.

Try though you might, you can't run forever...

This video is so chocked-full of symbolism it's intimidating. There's the destination of "Pleroma" and "You're Dead!" scrolling on the bus' LED screen, the eruption of lotus flowers, the one-armed son who can't place his hand on the chest of his father.

After watching it multiple times, I can't seem to shake the timeliness of this quote from one of my favorite horror movies Jacob's Ladder, "...if you're frightened of dying and... and you're holding on, you'll see devils tearing your life away. But if you've made your peace, then the devils are really angels, freeing you from the earth." Young Prodigy has joined the ranks of Hiro Murai, David Lewandowski, Kahlil Joseph, and David Firth as one of Flying Lotus' most formidable collaborators.

This Mad Max Fury Road Trailer will Inherit the Earth Long After the Apocalypse

I don't want to get into the practice of lobbing overly-gracious superlatives at every pretty trailer that walks my way, but Gotdamn. This new trailer for Mad Max Fury Road is a high-octane sensory overload of bondage-clad brutality and enough freak sandstorms to rend an apocalyptic siege campaign to the bone.

After a severely protracted twenty-five year stint in development hell, thirteen of which spent under the helm of director George Miller, it's exhilarating to finally see the fruit of these cinematic labors come to bear. All three of the Mad Max films are science-fiction classics in their own right (Personally, I think The Road Warrior was the Dark Knight of its time), so let's see if Fury Road has the metal to stand alongside the series' forebearers.

This screenshot does not do the trailer justice.

This trailer follows on the heels of other high-profile triple-A sci-fi films like Terminator Genisys, Avengers: Age of Ultron, and Star Wars The Force Awakens. Couple that with the Wachowski's Jupiter Ascending,  Batman v. Superman (that v is stupid), Jurassic World, The Fantastic Four Reboot, Del Toro's Crimson Peak, Insurgent, Ex Machina, and Mission Impossible V (phew!) and it looks like 2015 is shaping up to become the next great year of sci-fi. So much film, so little hours in the day.

Bloodborne Gameplay Trailer is Dark, Dreary and Full Of Terrors

Bloodborne is a game I've been eyeing with covetous anticipation ever since it was announced at this year's E3. The unruly brain-child of Hidetaka Miyazaki (Armored Core, Dark Souls), Bloodborne is another third-person action-RPG in the same vein as the Souls series, this time set within the walls of a labyrinthine city gripped by a demonic disease that transforms its victims into nightmarish abominations. You, a traveling demon-slayer, must plunge into the dark heart of Y'harnam and find a cure for the disease that eats away at your own life. But can you make it out alive?

Something that is starkly apparent in this trailer is the radical shift in game-play pacing between this game and the aforementioned Souls series. Whereas Demon's and Dark Souls relied on lumbering, tension-soaked hack-and-slash chipping away at a monster's enormous health bar, Bloodborne appears just as brutal though with a greater emphasis on faster feedback between you and your opponents.

It's almost like a more horror-centric take on Devil May Cry meets Vampire Hunter D meets, of course, Dark Souls. I'm sure this won't be the last time From Software wets our appetite for information before the game's March 24th release next year, so stay tuned!

Army of Frogs: The Rainbow Serpent Trailer

I'm typically not a fan of book trailers, but this one here is a real treat. The talented folks at Secret Sauce Studio have released this impressive extended animated trailer for the equally beautiful children's book penned by Trevor Pryce and Joel Naftali. The original 30-or-so second trailer is attached to select showings of Mockingjay: Part 1, but this one is twice that length and made all the better for it.

Army of Frogs follows a band of anthropomorphic amphibians as they fight to protect their home in for a vicious host of scorpion marauders. Jamie Lewis' sound direction is on-point and Sanford Greene breathes the awesome fight scenes and gorgeously-rendered mythic anime aesthetic of the books to life. I wouldn't mind an actual show spawning out of this!

Go check out the studio's youtube page for more awesome animated gems to come, and why not give Army of Frogs a read-through too!

Jurassic World's First Trailer Features Hybrid Dinos, Gyrospheres, and Megalodons. Hell Yeah.

Chris Pratt is on one hell of an upswing these days. Following on the momentum of his starring role in this year's Guardians of the Galaxy, the little sci-fi comedy epic that could, he's now snagged yet another lead in the long awaited follow-up Steven Spielberg's blockbuster Jurassic Park series.

Directed by Colin Trevorrow, known for his off-beat 2012 debut Safety Not Guaranteed, Jurassic World takes place 22 years following John Hammond's disastrous first attempt at a eugenic theme-park in the original. Now brought into the 21st Century, Jurassic World is a booming financial success with the very latest in preemptive security. But no amount of technology can curtail the fatality of eugenic hubris as a a monstrous hybrid is loosed upon the park, sparking a deadly chain of death and destruction that only the chief security officer Owen (Pratt) can hope to prevent.

Somehow, I feel like this is going to be a whole lot less nonsensical when the film comes out.

Jurassic Park is a film and franchise that means a great deal to my generation. As an avid movie-goer, it was my first childhood introduction to Steven Spielberg's seminal oeuvre of cinematic classics. The fact that there's a new installment, featuring an astounding up-and-coming actor, fills me with a deeply impatient anticipation. Andy Dwyer's come a long way. Jurassic World comes out June 12, 2015. I can't wait to see more.

Interstellar's Final Trailer Slings Us To The Farthest Corners Of The Universe

Christopher Nolan's Interstellar sci-fi odyssey is looking phenomenal. The promotional material and each subsequent trailer leading up to the film's November release date never fail to ramp up the stakes and make the anticipation of waiting increasingly more unbearable. Interstellar's latest trailer shows us glimpses of a world caught in the grip of a global dust storm, crop-dusting predator drones and futuristic robots skirting across snow-capped planetscapes.

While I could jokingly call this "The Farmer Astronaut 2", I am genuinely pumped to see this when it comes out in theaters. I've been starved for an awesome sci-fi epic lately and from the looks of it Nolan is clearly delivering on that. November 7th can't come soon enough.

The Insane Illustrations Of Xiao Botong

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Xiao Botong is the type of foreign illustrator that strikes fear in the hearts of fledgling artists- With an extensive background in fine arts followed by a seamless transition into digital arts, the 29 year old Taiwanese illustrator is a veritable juggernaut of talent. What I particularly am fond of is his very understated usage of saturation in his pieces, which show an incredible sense of restraint when it comes to coming up with palettes for his sweeping fantasy illustrations.

Artists that we've featured in the past like the incredible Zhong Fenghua with his epic Journey to the West pieces and Jian Guan come to mind  when checking out Xiao's work. They all share a similar love for historic Chinese mythology and folk art, which they translate into some absolutely stunning work that showcases the best of what modern Chinese illustration has to offer. More of Xiao's incredible work after the break. Enjoy.

Woodkid - "The Golden Age"

Woodkid has always been an artist recognized, if not best known for his visually audacious music videos and thundering orchestral production. The visuals for his previous singles Iron and Run Boy Run were windows into an alternate epic fantasy world of feudal warfare and childlike whimsy, while I Love You toned down the fantasy elements in favor of a more somber meditation on loss and devotion.

The Golden Age gathers up all those thematic threads and, for the most part, strips away the excess to pierce at the heart of the song's namesake; Childhood. The Golden Age is a beautiful, eleven-minute epic bemoaning the loss of innocence yet celebrating its existence, all the while punctuated by Lemoine's gorgeous track.

"Manners In Public" - A Korean Action Manner Short

Dubbed as a 'subway action short' by Korean director Han-Jae Park, Manners In Public is an action packed short about an eye patch donning bear losing his cool during a train commute filled with some rather rude patrons. A pig playing his videogame at unbearable volume levels, a kid picking his nose and taking pictures of anyone nearby, a rabbit lady gabbing away on her phone at ear splitting levels.

When his attempts to sleep are disturbed and the polite route draws no results, we're treated to a pretty epic subway beatdown. Park successfully channeled the types of annoyances that are commonplace with anyone used to public transport, although beating obnoxious people up is typically something we fantasize about rather than acting on it. Mind your manners, folks.

Supermonk And The Legend Of Holypop

Directed by SupamonksBelieve it or not, this is an ad for some sort of indie French soda called 'Holypop,' although if more ads were this over the top the world would probably be a funner place. Featuring a character called Supermoine (Moine is French for 'monk'), we witness an invasion of some absolutely ruthless, hyperviolent viking marauders meet their match when a glowy eyed monk drinks a dose of his own potent concoction. Stylized ultraviolence featuring a badass monk with nothing to lose? Sign me up for more, please.

Supermoine is back to get the Vikings! Legend has it that a mysterious abbey of the Bugey county, many times assailed by blood-thirsty Vikings, never fell. Its indomitable monks are fearless, they brew a potion whose recipe is still a secret to this day...

Million Dollar Extreme Returns With "Stuff"

The folks at Million Dollar Extreme have been quiet, but just recently appeared again with a new faux film trailer simply called Stuff. While it starts off pretty slow with Sam Hyde simply talking nonsense about different types of weed, we quickly transition into some absolutely insane territory. A whirlwind of madness unfolds: Buxom babes, switchblades, slow motion, spraying blood, gnarly romance, domination, ultra violence and everything in between set to Parachute Ending by French electro outfit Birdy Nam Nam.

The entire thing feels like something that Harmony Korine and the collective creative force of the 80's would put out, and at the end of it I was kind of left wishing it was something real. That's the power of Million Dollar Extreme, they always leave you wanting more. I really hope these guys someday get the chance to direct something more long form, their carefree attitude to everything they make is refreshing in the Youtube landscape of overproduced, overly thought out garbage.

The Art of Yang Qi

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Yang Qi is immensely talented at crafting picturesque panoramic vistas populated by the earth shattering conflict between warring nations and terrifying deities. An experienced concept artist based out of South China, the majority of his work online have been character sheets and promotional art for the fantasy MMO Asura Online. He certainly knows his way around Wuxia myths and high fantasy action. Check out more of his impressive work after the break!

The Art of Yong

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If there's one thing that Yong is able to capture in his work, it's scale. This thirteen-year veteran concept artist from South Korea excels at depicting fantastic and painterly moments of both inspiring beauty and impending destruction. A UN mecha patrolling through the derelict streets of a war-torn metropolis, a Chernabog-esque giant reeling back to deliver a crushing blow to a cathedral city. New worlds hatched from eggs, Giant teddy-bears run amok, titans grapple for supremacy, and the last fleeting moments before the end of days. I can't wait for you to check out more after the break!

The Art of Ivan Khomenko

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Ivan "Hamen" Khomenko is a master of romantic heroism. And before you ask, you already know what I'm talking about. The lone hero, with his back turned to the viewer, charging into the precipice of great mystery and terrible danger. The archetype of Caspar David Friedrich's Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog. Ivan also happens to be wildly talented at depicting detail-riddled environments and dynamic mid-motion fight scenes. Just check the detail on that ribbon-hook in the top image. Too badass.

Ivan is currently enrolled at the Kostroma Technological University in Russia with a focus in Jewelry designing. If you think the featured image is dope, wait until you see the rest of his work after the break!

The EVE Online Asakai Conflict - A Cataclysmic Battle That Cost Players $300,000

EVE Online is a true anomaly in this current game industry. A hardcore space sim with nearly infinite leveling capabilites, with skills that take up to months in real time to master. The game is noteworthy for it's deep political climate, steep learning curve, player driven economies and numerous scandals over the years, ranging from high level sabotage to player bank economic fraud that would rival Bernie Madoff's pyramid scheme.

Each dot represents an active ship or drone during the Asakai conflict.

When I retired from playing the game a few years ago following the events of Band of Brothers, which was once one of the biggest player coalitions in t he game, I thought that I'd witnessed the biggest battles that EVE had to offer. I was quite wrong. Just recently a battle broke out between two factions that resulted in some of the most catastrophic losses of player assets I've ever seen. The ultimate ship to attain in EVE is a 'Titan' class, which take months to build, hundreds of hours of skill training and costs thousands of dollars each. Over the course of 14 hours, 3,000 players from 2 factions fought nonstop in the Asakai system, and when the dust cleared over 100 of Titans were lost in battle - An unprecedented level of carnage. Check out the official CCP article for more details regarding this incredible event.