Ex Machina and Civil War director is retiring from filmmaking after losing passion despite great reactions to his latest film

Cardy, Mat, and Emma are here to share their picks for some of the best games you can finish in 5 hours or less this week. A mix of well-known indies and hidden gems, maybe you'll find something new to play this weekend. Before that, though, there's time for some more thoughts about Alex Garland's Civil War and flower-puzzle game Botany Manor. Plus, a nail-biter of an Endless Search.

Jesse Plemons is a brilliant actor. He’s also one of our most memeable stars. It’s not that he’s super expressive — quite the opposite, in fact. He’s usually quite placid, and almost hesitant in his line deliveries. He takes his time. But, whether he’s playing a timid everyman in The Power of the Dog or season 2 of Fargo or a stout lawman in Judas and the Black Messiah orGame Night, there’s always something going on behind his narrowed, watchful eyes. His stillness, his pauses, and his plain, unvarnished way of speaking act as a gravitational force, drawing the camera and other actors into his orbit. He’s also, in a low-key way, extremely funny.

Ubisoft and developer Massive Entertainment haven’t spoken as much about Star Wars Outlaws’ space sections as they have about its many planets and moons and the gameplay opportunities they will present, but what little has been said so far has certainly indicated that the game’s grand scale and ambition will be reflected in the parts of its intergalactic map where protagonist Kay Vess will be piloting her ship, the Trailblazer.

If you're looking for something new to watch this weekend, you're in luck: whether you're in the mood for a movie night or a new binge-watch, Netflix, Disney Plus, Hulu, and more are stacked with new releases.

Stardew Valley 1.6 landed nearly a month ago, but the follow-up patches are continuing to deliver piles of new content and upgrades. 1.6.4 is now here, and developer Eric 'ConcernedApe' Barone's promise of "some new mining-related stuff" might have undersold what we're getting here.

Publisher Bohemia Interactive has had a large impact on PC gaming over the past decade or so, with major genre-defining titles like Arma and DayZ to their name. But did you know Bohemia also has another major game it’s currently supporting that’s never been on PC? Initially released back in 2019, the free-to-play Vigor has attracted over 20 million players on Xbox, PlayStation, and Switch, but it's never been released on PC. Why? Honestly, I don’t know! Obviously, not every game has to come to PC, but Vigor is the type of experience that specifically does well on the platform, so it doesn’t make much sense.

A new adaptation of Isuna Hasekura's beloved Japanese light novel series Spice and Wolf has arrived – and with two of the original voice actors from the English dub of the 2008 anime.

Horror master Mike Flanagan has high praise for The First Omen, the sixth installment in the cult classic franchise.

A fifth season of True Detective is on the way from Night Country creator Issa López  – and the filmmaker is keeping it vague when it comes to prior season connections.

Even though Alex Garland’s near-future catastrophe movie Civil War takes place during an American insurrection aimed at forcing an autocratic, democracy-destroying president out of power, it focuses more on the journalists covering the war than on who’s fighting who. That, Garland tells Polygon, was a choice he made because he wanted the story to be about why reporters are a critical part of a functioning society. That same agenda also shaped the look of Civil War: The movie is largely seen through the eyes of two photojournalists, veteran Lee Miller (Kirsten Dunst) and cub reporter Jessie (Cailee Spaeny). Their intent focus on capturing the perfect image made it important for Civil War to be visually striking.

A24’s Civil War had a strong $25.7 million opening weekend, the best ever for an A24 picture, per Deadline. Those numbers topped the opening of political thrillers such as Zero Dark Thirty ($24.4M) and World Trade Center ($18.7M) and also marked a career-best for director Alex Garland.

Alex Garland’s new movie is a fascinating little thing. comes to us from the director of Ex Machina, Annihilation, and Men. He has had a strong career, and this movie marks one of A24’s first big-budget films. $50 million went to the production of their most expensive film to date, and it had a positive reception at its SXSW premiere. This dystopian thriller follows a group of photojournalists making their way through a wartorn American landscape to interview the President of the United States.