Quick News: Guardians, Lord, Trap, EA, Mario

By
Garth Franklin
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Marvel

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3
Marvel Studios’ “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3” is confirmed to be hitting Digital on July 7th and will be coming to 4K and Blu-ray disc on August 1st. The disc will also feature eight deleted scenes, featurettes, a gag reel, and a director’s commentary. [Source: Marvel]

The Lord of the Rings
Sweden’s Embracer reportedly paid nearly $396 million for the rights to the “Lord of the Rings” franchise. The figure was revealed this week in Embracer’s annual report, which follows in the wake of its announcement of a restructuring a few days ago – one involving layoffs and closures of some divisions.

At the time the deal was announced, no financial figure was placed on the agreement, which gives Embracer movie, video game, board game, merchandising, theme parks and stage production rights relating to “The Lord of the Rings,” “The Hobbit” and other Middle-earth-related literary works as authorized by the Tolkien Estate and HarperCollins. [Source: Deadline

Trap
M. Night Shyamalan’s next movie, “Trap,” has been described as a psychological thriller set at a concert, the description revealed as part of Warner Bros’ CineEurope presentation in Barcelona this week. [Source: Deadline]

EA
Electronic Arts has announced it’s restructuring its studios into two organisations – EA Entertainment and EA Sports. EA Sports will be responsible for the company’s sports and racing games, including “FIFA,” “Madden NFL,” “F1,” “NHL” and more.

EA Entertainment will contain all the publisher’s owned IP and licensed games including the likes of “Star Wars,” “Battlefield” and its various lifestyle franchises, blockbuster single-player games and mobile games. [Source: VGC]

The Super Mario Bros. Movie
Legendary Japanese video game designer Shigeru Miyamoto, who created Mario and Zelda, took to Twitter to share his gratitude to the fans who have supported “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” – the highest-grossing movie of 2023 thus far.

In a video statement, he says it was the first film with which Nintendo “was directly involved in production” and “we feel very fortunate that so many people around the world have watched this movie. Thank you all so much.”