Apple is working on a new smart home product that would combine Apple TV, a HomePod speaker and a camera for FaceTime or Zoom-style video conferencing, Bloomberg reported Monday.
The company “has been a laggard in the smart-home space, but [this] versatile new device in early development could change that,” according to the story, which describes the in-development product as “Apple’s most ambitious smart-home hardware offering to date.”
In this week’s episode, Apple TV+’s alternate-history space show For All Mankind finally gets to the big, violent “what if?” it’s been building to all season. Is it too late to make any of the fireworks they’ve seen saving go off in spectacular enough fashion to save a dreary second season?
The answer … will not shock you.
It’s a relatively quiet Friday for Apple TV+, with just one single episode of a new show on Apple’s streaming television service. Fortunately, that show is the entertaining space-age alternative history For All Mankind, now approaching the end of its second season.
Episode 8 of 10 is titled “And Here’s to You.” The preview reads: “Gordo returns to space. Molly faces an unsettling new reality. Aleida confronts her first major hurdle at work.” If you’ve not yet tuned in, this may be your chance, with just a couple of weeks to go until the finale.
Fans of Mythic Quest won’t have to wait until May for season two of the comedy series to return to Apple TV+. A special pre-season episode will debut Friday, April 16.
It will explore the challenges the quirky characters experience returning to their office after the COVID-19 pandemic. Anthony Hopkins will have a voice role.
A new behind-the-scenes video on the making of Wolfwalkers shows that much of the animated movie was sketched and painted the traditional way. Kind of surprising — one might think an Apple TV+ film would be an intensely computer-driven production.
Watch the amazing video now:
Space-race soap opera For All Mankind drops a bomb this week that could ruin the chances of everybody here getting what they want — and definitely destroys whatever character work the writers and actors have done up until now.
The writers realized nothing exciting had happened all season and so just dropped a bunch of character arcs in favor of what’s convenient. I wish I was surprised.
There could soon be an alternative to the current, simple Apple TV remote. A schematic showing a rumored new version has leaked out, and it includes a wide array of buttons. It’s therefore likely to please those unhappy with the present version.
Apple hasn’t yet provided details of the subscriber numbers for Apple TV+. However, based on analysis it would be highly surprising if Apple’s not losing a whole lot of money on the service.
Apple is working on a new remote for its next-gen Apple TV, 9to5Mac reports. While the story doesn’t share specific details about the rejigged remote, it suggests Apple might move away from the controversial Siri Remote that debuted with the fourth-gen Apple TV.
People often single out the Siri Remote as one of the more controversial designs in Apple history. It sits alongside the “hockey puck” mouse of the iMac G3 and the dodgy, upside-down charging of the Magic Mouse 2 in Apple’s hall of infamy.
The Year Earth Changed is a fresh documentary showing how animals around the world recovered during the year COVID-19 kept humans in lockdown. The show, which will be narrated by David Attenborough, will premiere on Apple TV+ in time for Earth Day.
The streaming service is also about to air the second seasons of its documentary series Tiny World and Earth At Night In Color.
There’s a trio of Apple TV shows that critics absolutely love, according to review-aggregation site Rotten Tomatoes. The current seasons of each of them racked up 100% approval ratings.
The premiere season of Home Before Dark pleased critics and audiences alike, and Apple TV+ revealed on Friday that season two will play on the streaming service in summer 2021.
The show follows Hilde Lisko, who doesn’t let being a child stand in the way of being an investigative journalist.
The Russians are coming! The Russians are coming! Don’t bother they’re here … Apple TV+’s For All Mankind gears up for its historic moon handshake in typically laidback fashion in this week’s episode.
The commies are here to collaborate on a space mission meant to bring civilizations together. They’re of course mirthless, shifty cads because that’s just how Russians are written in fiction like this.
Until, of course, they get to eat red meat and drink American whiskey. Then they’re all smiles! Glad to know these jokes haven’t changed at all since the Iron Curtain went up.
For the first time ever, the Steve Jobs Theater is about to become a, well, proper theater through the airing of a play filmed at the Apple Park venue usually used for Apple keynote events.
The play, 12 Angry Men… and Women, is based on the book 12 Angry Men: True Stories of Being a Black Man in America Today. It will be available to watch for free via the Apple TV app from Friday, March 26 through April 22.
Oprah Winfrey will interview National Youth Poet Laureate Amanda Gorman on her show The Oprah Conversation this Friday. The 23-year-old inaugural poet, author, and activist wrote the poem “The Hill We Climb,” delivered at the inauguration of President Biden and VP Kamala Harris.
“Amanda Gorman is a young woman who stepped into a moment in history with enormous grace and dignity,” said Winfrey in a statement. “I was enthralled by her youthful spirit from the first moment we met, and very much looked forward to hearing her unpack all that has happened to her the past few months.”
Apple TV+ on Wednesday promised a third season of the comedy series Trying. And it announced the second season of the show about a couple undergoing the herculean trials of adopting a child will debut worldwide in mid-May.
Tom Hiddleston has signed on to star with actor Claire Danes in The Essex Serpent for Apple TV+. The drama series is based on a book about Victorian repression, science and faith, and fear of the unknown, which sold upward of 200,000 copies.
The Essex Serpent was originally due to star Keira Knightley in the lead. However, she dropped out of the project as the result of COVID-related scheduling issues. Knightley was replaced by Danes.
Ted Lasso is the gift that keeps giving when it comes to racking up awards for Apple. On Sunday, the hit Apple TV+ comedy — about a hapless football coach who journeys to England to ply his trade with a soccer team — was honored with a pair of 2021 Writers Guild of America Awards.
Ted Lasso won both the Best New Series and Best Comedy Series prizes, adding a couple more accolades to the impressive collection the popular show has racked up since debuting.
The characters in For All Mankind, Apple TV+’s space-race melodrama, all try to find their sea legs … or, uhh, space legs … in this week’s tense episode. Astronaut Ed Baldwin is under the sea. And his wife, Karen, is losing her cool. Meanwhile, Tracy Stevens is on the moon, and her ex Gordo is losing his mind!
Thriller fans should brace for an Apple TV+ binge-a-thon this week. They can watch all nine episodes of creepy new show Calls, which debuted on Apple TV+ Friday, or take in the first two full seasons of M. Night Shyamalan’s gripping Servant.
The Servant season finale arrived today alongside a new episode of alt-history space race show For All Mankind.
With new show Calls, Apple TV+ brings a French TV sensation to America and it’s three things in one. It’s a fascinating experiment, an old idea repackaged — and something of a missed opportunity.
The series, which premieres this Friday, hides its star-studded voice cast behind pixelated images and on-screen text, making it sort of an anti-event. That alone means Calls faces an uphill climb to find a new audience.
SNL alum Maya Rudolph will star in a half-hour comedy series on Apple TV+. The show is being created by Emmy winners Alan Yang and Matt Hubbard.
It’ll be part of a growing collection of comedies on Apple’s streaming video service.
Apple TV+ reportedly signed a first-look deal with Natalie Portman and her business partner Sophie Mas. The women recently formed a production company named MountainA that will develop TV series that Apple will have the first chance at.
The two are already working with Apple on Lady in the Lake, a series that was announced last week and will star Portman.
Survive the Attic is a new web-based game that takes players into the bizarre home that’s the setting of Servant on Apple TV+. There are 10 puzzles for fans of the show to solve, and easter eggs to discover.
Apple TV+ has picked up its first ever Oscar nominations — although it still looks like a bit of an underachievement for the Cupertino tech company.
With Academy Award noms now announced, Apple has picked up two: Best Animated Feature Film for Wolfwalkers and Sound Design for Greyhound. The results will be announced April 25.