ENTERTAINMENT

In landmark entertainment news that left James Bond fans feeling shaken, not stirred, Amazon MGM Studios has taken full control of the 007 franchise from long-time producers Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli. While there are plenty of reasons to worry here, the fact of the matter is that there are already spinoff books, games, comics, etc, etc, not to mention the original novels by Ian Fleming. Dozens of writers, actors, artists, and more have tackled James Bond and his extended cast. And with Amazon’s reported ambitions to turn James Bond into a “universe,” a la Marvel and Star Wars, and billions of dollars at stake, the Bond franchise has no time to die.

Naturally, this was one of Broccoli’s concerns in giving up the rights, that Amazon MGM would try to expand too quickly or cast a name actor in the role of the secret agent. Will Amazon hold true to these ideals, or are we about to get Timothée Chalamet as the next 007? Likely not the latter (all apologies to Chalamet), but Amazon has already tried to create their own spy franchise with the Russo Brothers produced Citadel, and international spinoffs Citadel: Diana and Citadel: Honey Bunny. Those have generally lacked critical acclaim (except for Honey Bunny), and at least domestically haven’t really broken through to audiences in the same way as other Amazon hits like The Boys.

…Or more to the point, Amazon’s dudes with guns shows like Reacher, Jack Ryan, and Bosch. In fact, one could posit this is a large part of the reasoning behind Amazon shelling out a billion dollars more to own Bond: some of their most successful series have already been white men, with guns, their names in the title, based on book series. Unlike the money Amazon plunked down for Lord of the Rings (your mileage may vary on how successful Rings of Power has been), buying James Bond outright based on the data available is one of the safest purchases Amazon could make. Prime Video audiences already flock to shows about guys like James Bond, so why not James Bond himself?

One other detail you might not be aware of: Amazon already made a James Bond TV show. Seriously. Titled 007: Road to a Million, the reality game show streamed in 2023, was hosted by Brian Cox, and was picked up for a second season before the first even hit Prime Video. Only tangentially related to Bond by the idea that Cox is playing a pseudo-Bond villain while contestants race to win one million pounds, the series wasn’t a big hit but it does show that Amazon has already played in the TV space with 007. And as just one extra funny tidbit, Cox thought he was signing up for the next Bond movie. He was not, so maybe Amazon could do right by him in the future.

But wait, there’s more! Back in 1954, an anthology series titled Climax! aired the first-ever adaptation of “Casino Royale,” the Ian Fleming novel, before it was later committed to film multiple times. Point being, there’s not much of a history of TV for James Bond, but just as the franchise has had some of its most lauded installments in video games (have you ever played GoldenEye for the N64?), comics, and more, James Bond isn’t quite the sacred cow we think of, when it comes to adaptation.

Mind you, there have been no announcements that Amazon is forgoing film entirely, and likely they won’t. MGM isn’t the studio it once was, but for every Red One that hits theaters, they still have the Oscar-nominated Nickel Boys. There’s plenty of reason to believe that even without the Broccolis, Amazon MGM will aim to do right by the Bond franchise.

And frankly, is there anything that is out of left field about the idea of a franchise extension? While perhaps cutting Bond theatrically entirely and instead doing a TV streaming version of Bond might be the ultimate nightmare of cinephiles, there is a wealth of fascinating characters who revolve around Bond that often have far more chance of character growth than the main character himself. Bond, over decades, has remained relatively static – the recent Craig movies aside – while Q, M, Moneypenny, and even Felix Leiter always seem to have a lot more going on between the scene or two Bond spends checking in with them per film.

Would a series where Q has to go out of the lab and use his own gadgets be so terrible? How about Felix having to deal with the fallout of Bond blowing up the latest supervillain plot on the American side? And given the wealth of villains and henchmen in the Bond universe who have inspired dozens of fanfics, tributes, and knockoffs, an anthology series that gave them each more time in the sun could be a lot of fun. Who hasn’t wondered how Jaws got those jaws?

There’s also an opportunity here to flesh out the character of James Bond through a serialized TV show in a way that has not, for the most part, been afforded the character on the big screen. Aside from the rare instance where Bond suffers a sprained ankle at the beginning of the movie, the character has been functionally immortal, down to switching his face like a Time Lord. It wasn’t until the recent Daniel Craig films that Bond was allowed to have some sort of growth, though even then it was relegated to “bummed about the death of his girlfriend” for the majority of the Craig movies, and “old” in the last one.

The lone exception is Skyfall, arguably the best Bond movie of all time… Because it truly challenged James emotionally and moved the series forward to almost a logical conclusion. The next movie reset things in many ways, but imagine being able to see that kind of arc over 10, 20, or even 30 episodes (we’re not going to go crazy and suggest a streaming show go a full 22 episodes a season or anything like that)? You likely won’t get 10 Skyfalls in a row, but if you can get some nods to the ambition of that film in there, viewers could be in for something truly special.

The flip side is that Amazon could not look to the obvious – i.e. their dudes with guns shows – and instead take the route of Lord of the Rings, and deliver a prequel all leading up to the birth of James Bond. To that, perhaps they need look no further than Pennyworth, a goofy show with a host of loyal fans that nevertheless confused casual viewers as to why we were getting a show about Batman’s future butler. Or, for example, The Rings of Power, a show with a hot Sauron and virtually no rings in the first season that tested the patience of even the most loyal fans.

That’s the potential nightmare scenario, that Amazon will think with their algorithm instead of their heart. Even at their worst, there’s a charm the Broccoli family and others managed to bring to the Bond franchise, with the same rhythms, the same big explosion, the same good girl gone bad and bad girl gone good, time and again. In the streaming era, we’re far from the place where you could deliver the poetry of a Bond movie on an episodic basis. To turn it into yet another serialized spy drama (or worse, a serialized prequel spy drama) risks making it lose that specialness and instead slot in with Netflix’s The Night Agent, The Diplomat, and The Recruit, or god help us Citadel, instead of being its own, unique thing.

This is the trick, really, and it is with any potential cinematic universe: what makes it different? In Bond’s case, up until now, it was that it existed mostly on the big screen, every few years, and delivered a level of action spectacle and plot comfort that TV has been creeping on for decades. If Amazon does want to turn the house Ian Fleming built into a multi-platform franchise, then they need to reckon with what makes Bond so unique. If they can figure that formula out, and perhaps build out that supporting cast, too (Ben Whishaw in a Q series? Come on!), then rather than the death sentence some fans have called this deal, the Bond franchise will die another day.

Here are best deals for Friday, February 21. The highlights today include an excellent deal on a Nintendo Switch OLED (so long as you’re comfortable buying an import model), and the popular Final Fantasy Magic the Gathering crossover.

Check out “the best deals under $30” for any impulse buys on items that you never knew you needed until you visited this page. Read on lower for some great deals that cost over $30 and may require a bit more involved decision-making.

Nintendo Switch OLED for $223.61

AHOY Comics made waves in 2024 by reviving cult hero The Toxic Crusader in comic book form. This year, they’re celebrating an event dubbed “Toxic Mess Summer” by having Toxie team up with the heroes of the AHOY Universe. And that includes Jesus Christ.

Toxic Mess Summer kicks off in May with the release of The Toxic Avenger Pinup Special, featuring various artists lending their own takes on Toxie and the gang. From there, AHOY will release the miniseries Toxie Team-Up, which pairs Toxie with Project: Cryptid’s Jersey Devil, My Bad’s Acid Chimp, The Wrong Earth’s Dragonflyman and Stinger, Justice Warriors’ Swamp Cop and Schitt, and, yes, Second Coming’s Jesus Christ.

I think the first time I really understood what Moroi was, I mean the down-in-your-bones feeling you get when you’re playing something and the lighting bolt of understanding strikes you right on the noggin, was when my character fed himself to a talking meat-grinder because “something inside [him] screams let’s do it!” Admittedly, it would have probably been funnier if Moroi had flashed a game over screen, and most games might’ve as a gag, but Moroi plays it straight. Into the meat-grinder you go, head-first. It chews for a bit and spits you out. You taste terrible, you see, and the grinder’s palate for manflesh is, for whatever reason, a bit more refined. Later on, you can offer it a severed hand (don’t ask) and it’s happy about that, and to grind up the bones and turn the leftover dust over to you so you can use it to help an old woman make “soup” (again, don’t ask), but eating the hand causes it to explode. “You are on fire,” your character remarks glibly as the machine spits binary. But you have your bone dust and it’s not your job to save sentient meat grinders who have developed a taste for longpig, so off you go to break some more stuff. And I said, out loud, “Ah, it’s a game like that.” And I was intrigued.

The word moroi comes from Romanian folklore; it’s used to describe a vampire or ghost, or in some cases, a phantom that rises from the grave to draw energy from the living. I don’t know which part of the definition Moroi the game draws from. What I do know is this: your character, a bearded bear of a man, wakes up in a strange prison, in pain, with no memory of how he got there. Everyone else seems to know him, but he doesn’t recognize any of them. But maybe, as a very tall man in a very strange hat tells him, that’s for the best.

Your first order of business is to get out, and that means solving simple puzzles, many of which boil down to “acquire item, take it somewhere.” Go talk to the cannibal eating himself as performance art who asks that, if eating himself isn’t his magnum opus, lightning strikes him dead. When lightning strikes him dead, take his severed hand and bring it to the sentient meat grinder, who gives you bone dust before catching fire. Then you take that to the tall man in the funny hat, who tells you to take it to the old lady making soup (she needs some salt; you have bone dust. Same thing, right?) before reminding you that “Death will meet you soon enough” and weirdly offering up that his name is Edgar. So it’s off to the old woman, who gratefully accepts your “salt” and is pulled headfirst into the cauldron by the soup to see what’s on the other side. “I’m starting to think that wasn’t soup,” your character says. Noticing a pattern here?

On and on it goes, whether it’s a toenail from an overfed corpse still being pumped full of… something, or taking the old woman’s spoon and using it to wake up the rat with the important job of running in his wheel and powering The Horrors (and the doors). But then something strange happens. Moroi gives you a sword, and throws a bunch of enemies at you, and that’s where the magic happens. Combat is simple — the top-down, twin-stick perspective seems a little weird when you’re solving puzzles, but then you get to a combat section and it’s like “Oh” — but it’s fast and hits feel weighty and satisfying and it’s got Doom’s Glory Kills, which quite literally teleport you across the screen for very satisfying slow-motion executions that drops health. And then you get a minigun that shoots harpoons. And that’s rad.

When Moroi is flipping between the two — quick, simple puzzles like using the number of corpses in a freezer to work out a door code, and combat sections against multiple enemies howling for blood like it’s Black Friday and you’ve just snatched the last George Foreman grill — it’s pretty grand. But there’s also plenty of weird stuff beyond that, too. At one point, you save a duck with human teeth from being turned into a wide variety of duck-based cuisine and he rewards you with his teeth so you can reinforce your weapon, and then explains the way out through bloody gums.

Sometimes messages pop up on-screen offering cryptic hints at something more. Other times, story details are left to collectibles scattered around the environment. I particularly liked the one that listed Duck of Eternal Torment as a type of potential meal prepared from our toothy friend, and the one where the cleaning lady resigns because the furniture is upside down every day and she’s convinced the place is cursed and/or haunted.

And it’s never afraid to be weird. One of my Moroi demo’s last segments thrust me into the role of a strange, winged doll tasked by his mother (another doll) with helping his brothers – an increasingly rude group of trees – survive some incoming horror that’s killing all of them by literally giving away pieces of himself to do it. It’s an odd segment, but a compelling one, and when the credits rolled shortly thereafter, I wasn’t quite sure what to make of it, but I am interested in seeing where it goes from here.

There are some things about Moroi that concern me: my demo was buggy (It crashed once;I got stuck between a door and a bookcase a couple times; once I fell through the floor) and some of the writing is uneven. But those are things that can be ironed out. Moroi marries the macabre and the mysterious, and it often went to places I didn’t see coming in my half-hour demo. I’m still not sure what a moroi is in this context, but I would like to find out. After all, who can resist a game with a meat grinder that lusts for the flesh of men and a duck with human teeth?

January is always a quiet month for video games, and 2025 was no exception. With only one new game release cracking the top 20 and the predictable domination of Call of Duty, there’s little to crow about from last month… except, perhaps, what may be a comeback story for one of last year’s alleged sales disappointments: Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth.

Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth debuted February 2024 to No.2 on Circana’s charts, which rank video games by dollar sales in the U.S. It dropped to No.7 the following month, and finished out the year at No.17. While those numbers are respectable, post-launch there were numerous questions about whether or not the game had done well enough for Square Enix’s tastes, or even especially well in comparison to other major RPGs in the same year like Dragon’s Dogma 2 or its predecessor Final Fantasy 7: Remake. Square Enix ultimately came out saying the game failed to meet its sales expectations, and never even announced a sales figure, suggesting it hadn’t done well enough to brag about.

But notably, Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth launched as a platform-exclusive on PS5, and exclusives usually face an uphill battle compared to cross-platform releases when it comes to sales. As of January 2025, Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth is exclusive no more, finally debuting on Steam and shooting up to No.3 on the Circana charts for the month from No.56 in December. The Final Fantasy 7: Remake & Rebirth Twin Pack similarly rose from No.265 in December to No.16 in January thanks to the Steam release.

That’s not all. Circana analyst Mat Piscatella pointed out on Bluesky earlier this month that Rebirth had a “fantastic” Steam launch: “Across physical & tracked digital, Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth was the best-selling game of the week ending Jan 25th in the US market ($ sales), while the FFVII Remake & Rebirth Twin Pack ranked 3rd.”

Now that’s just the U.S., but it’s likely this is emblematic of similar sales abroad, which when combined could signal to Square Enix that change is needed. This success inevitably invites speculation that swelling sales thanks to a PC launch may shift the company’s plans for future Final Fantasy releases to a cross-platform launch. I asked Piscatella for his opinion on the situation, and here’s what he said:

“I mean it’s hard for me to say what impact the Steam release has on publisher perception of overall title success. That’s subject to all kinds of internal planning and expectations I’m not privy to, of course. But purely looking at consumer response, it was a very good launch month on Steam. This launch does provide yet another benchmark that shows releasing on PC makes a ton of sense at this point regardless of genre or historical release strategies.

“For 3rd party publishers, it’s looking harder and harder to release exclusively on a single platform without significant incentives provided by the platform holder.”

We’ll just have to wait and see what Square Enix’s reaction is at its next relevant earnings call…in May. Stay tuned.

As for the rest of the charts, it will surprise no one that Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 was the best-selling game of the month again, followed by Madden NFL 25. The only new release cracking the top 20 in January was Donkey Kong Country: Returns on Nintendo Switch, which reached No.8 purely on the basis of physical sales (Nintendo does not share digital sales data for its eshop).

Also notable was the return of It Takes Two to the top 20, in spot No.20. There’s no single reason for this, Piscatella told me. “There has been promotion happening during the month, including the last week of Jan on both the PlayStation store and eShop,” he said. “But really, It Takes Two had pretty steady sales all month. But it was in December that It Takes Two really started its latest rally with both sales and engagement upticks that extended into January.”

Notably, much of the promotion for It Takes Two comes ahead of the release of Hazelight Studios’ next game, Split Fiction, releasing in March.

Overall, games spending numbers actually look a bit sad in January compared to last January, but there’s one potential reason for that. This year’s tracking period for January was four weeks long, while 2024’s January was five weeks long, so that’s a whole extra week to make money. But as a result, overall spending was down 15% to $4.5 billion for the month this year (it was 0.3% ahead of January 2023’s four-week period). Accessories spending was down 28% year-over-year.

Content spending was down 12% compared to last year, with console content down 35%. Hardware spending was down 45%. PS5 hardware spending was down 38% year over year, Xbox Series was down 50%, and Switch was down 53%. PS5 was the best-selling hardware of the month in dollars and units, with the Xbox Series second in hardware spending, and Switch barely second in unit sales.

The top 20 best-selling games in the U.S. for the month of January 2025, based on dollar sales:

1. Call of Duty: Black Ops 6
2. Madden NFL 25
3. Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth
4. EA Sports FC 25
5. Minecraft*
6. Marvel’s Spider-Man 2
7. EA Sports College Football 25
8. Donkey Kong Country Returns*
9. Hogwarts Legacy
10. Sonic Generations
11. Helldivers II
12. Astro Bot
13. Dragon Ball: Sparking! Zero
14. Super Mario Party Jamboree*
15. Elden Ring
16. Final Fantasy VII Remake & Rebirth Twin Pack
17. Mario Kart 8*
18. The Crew: Motorfest
19. UFC 5
20. It Takes Two

* Indicates that some or all digital sales are not included in Circana’s data. Some publishers, including Nintendo and Take-Two, do not share certain digital data for this report.

Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. You can find her posting on BlueSky @duckvalentine.bsky.social. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.