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The antitrust lawsuit against Apple that could dethrone the iPhone, explained

The Biden administration filed a sweeping antitrust lawsuit against Apple Thursday that targets a product that has long been the major revenue driver for the company’s $2.76 trillion business: the iPhone. The Department of Justice, joined by 16 state attorneys general, accused Apple in a New Jersey federal court of maintaining a monopoly on the US market for smartphones, of which the iPhone makes up 65 percent. The complaint alleges that Apple has deliberately thwarted apps, products, and services that would make it…

X-Men: The Animated Series was defined by censorship

After much anticipation, X-Men ’97, a direct continuation to X-Men: The Animated Series from the 1990s, hits Disney Plus this week. But it’s not the first time Marvel has dusted off the old series and revived it for a nostalgic new millennium. Marvel Comics itself took a swing with X-Men ’92, published in 2015 and technically a Secret Wars tie-in (but don’t worry about it). For ’92, writers Chad Bowers and Chris Sims and artist Scott Koblish had to figure out how to make a comic book story that felt like a beloved…

How Morph from X-Men ’97 evolved from cannon fodder to cartoon canon

If you were a fan of X-Men: The Animated Series, there’s a lot to look forward to with the reboot, X-Men ’97. Is Charles Xavier truly dead? Will Cyclops ever find out that Cable is his son from the future? Will the show introduce any characters we’ve met over the past couple decades? Oddly enough, one lingering question involves Morph, a character most casual comics or MCU fans might not even know. Kevin Sydney, aka Morph, is the original X-Men animated team member that time forgot, a minor character seemingly killed…

Reddit’s biggest risk ahead of its IPO is its own users

Reddit, the launchpad for many meme stocks, could now become one: The social media giant makes its debut on Wall Street this week in one of the most highly anticipated initial public offerings of the year. The nearly 20-year-old company is seeking to raise up to $748 million in its IPO on March 21, putting its valuation at about $6.4 billion. It’s the first time that a major social media company has gone public since Snap (i.e., Snapchat) in 2017. It will sell approximately 22 million shares priced at $31 to $34 each…

The Wendy’s controversy shows Uber-style pricing is coming for everything

In the future, the ideal time to eat a burger won’t be when you’re hungry and really hankering for one. It’ll be the oddest, most awkward hours — late mornings or afternoons, the middle of the night on a Tuesday — the slices of time when prices will be lowest. Not unlike your Uber ride, fast food prices will go up or down depending on demand. At least, this is the world people imagined when fast food chain Wendy’s revealed it would be tinkering with “dynamic pricing,” a broad term that describes any strategy where…

Loungefly’s new One Piece apparel collection is coming soon

Prices taken at time of publishing. While this backpack is small, it’s packed with little details, including all of the main characters of One Piece, and a map of the open seas that are sure to be filled with treasure and opposing pirates. Prices taken at time of publishing. While this backpack is small,…

Who could buy TikTok if Congress enacts a ban?

The Senate is now considering a bipartisan bill that could force a sale of TikTok, with the House having already passed a similar measure and President Joe Biden throwing his support behind it. If the legislation is signed into law — and if it survives likely legal challenges — the question then becomes: Who would buy TikTok? The bill would require the app’s Chinese parent company ByteDance to sell the social media platform within 165 days of the law going into effect or else the platform will be banned from US app…

Dragon Ball creator Akira Toriyama dies at 68, manga world pays tribute

Dragon Ball creator Akira Toriyama has passed away. On Thursday, March 7, a statement published on the official Dragon Ball website announced that Toriyama had passed on March 1 due to an acute subdural hematoma. He was 68 years old. Toriyama was an acclaimed manga artist and character designer who first gained mainstream recognition in Japan through his sci-fi comedy manga Dr. Slump, published in Weekly Shōnen Jump from 1980 to 1984. In 1984, Toriyama began publishing Dragon Ball, a martial arts adventure manga…

Artists and animators pay tribute to Dragon Ball’s Akira Toriyama

It will take decades for the world to fully unpack all the ways Akira Toriyama shaped our culture. The legendary artist and author, whose death was publicly announced Thursday, was a pioneer in manga, comics, anime, and video games, and his work formed a foundation for everyone in those industries who followed him. But Toriyama’s presence and importance can be felt far wider than in just the fields he excelled at. It’s hard to think of any single work that’s been as consistently important in the lives of kids growing…

Mariko Tamaki will write Zatanna: Bring Down the House for DC Comics

The books in DC Comics’ Black Label imprint are defined by top-of-their-game writers and artists telling standalone stories too big for continuity at a high production value. And Zatanna: Bring Down the House, coming this summer from Mariko Tamaki and Javier Rodríguez, checks all of those boxes with a big marker. Tamaki is one of the most versatile comics writers in the biz these days, crafting everything from multiple multi-award winning queer coming-of-age YA graphic novels to a run on no less than Wonder Woman and…