SciFi and Fantasy
SciFi and Fantasy

SciFi and Fantasy

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If You Love ‘80s Fantasy Films, Go See The Mandalorian and Grogu Right Now
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If You Love ‘80s Fantasy Films, Go See The Mandalorian and Grogu Right Now

Movies & TV Star Wars If You Love ‘80s Fantasy Films, Go See The Mandalorian and Grogu Right Now Also if you love Star Wars animation and the weirdness contained therein. By Emmet Asher-Perrin | Published on May 22, 2026 Image: Lucasfilm Comment 0 Share New Share Image: Lucasfilm Going straight in, I’ll be brutally honest: I didn’t have particularly high expectations for The Mandalorian and Grogu. I’m not sure that anyone does, being that it’s a film-length version of a television series that, while enjoyable in general concept, has been pretty thin on the ground for narrative. Even knowing that Dave Filoni and Noah Kloor were going to help creator/director Jon Favreau unspool a healthier script wasn’t enough to assuage my doubts. The opening didn’t do much to help the film’s case, but that was a very specific bugaboo for my sort of brain. You see, the opening sequence shows Din Djarin and Grogu taking out an Imperial garrison being run by a two-bit official who’s using his position for extortion, the next on the New Republic’s list of Empire diehards that they’ve asked their bespoke Mando to bring in. The trouble is, this specific scenario is one that was used to even more emotional effect in one of my favorite Boba Fett stories from the anthology Tales of the Empire. I’m that kind of fan. It bugs me to no end that they keep giving the Mandalorian a lot of Fett’s greatest hits. But the film continued, and Sigourney Weaver popped up as Colonel Ward to give Din a new ship (which looks exactly like his old ship, minus a paint job) and a new mission: Go to Nal Hutta to talk to the late Jabba’s relatives because they’re worried about their nephew, Rotta. When Din retrieves the kid and brings him home, he’ll receive intel on a major Imperial remnant leader named Janu Coin (Jonny Coyne because, yeah, they did that). Instantly, I perked up. We’re going to see Nal Hutta on a movie screen? We’re going to go get Jabba’s kid, who hasn’t been seen since the first episode of the Clone Wars series, when he was rescued by Anakin, Obi-Wan, and a newly commissioned Ahsoka Tano? And Garazeb Orrelios (Steve Blum)—one of the Ghost crew of the beloved Rebels series—is going to be their teammate for the mission, which means he’s not just a bit part in all this? Image: Lucasfilm The Mandalorian and Grogu is not a movie for any old Star Wars fan, or perhaps any old audience. It exists at a weirdo fever dream intersection of specific desires and interests: Did you like The Mandalorian? Well, this is basically one of their better seasons on film, odd though that choice may be. Did you like the Star Wars animated series, but more specifically, the weird grubby little corners those shows were more free to explore? That is exactly where this movie lives. Do you love ‘80s fantasy films full of puppets and silliness and the occasional grotesquerie? Did you, perhaps, adore… the Ewok Adventures as a child? Oh, strap in, friend, we’re going for a ride. I make this argument endlessly, but I think it bears repeating here more than ever: Part of the reason why the animated shows are so good at creating Star Wars narrative is because they’re aimed at children. You know what children don’t care about? If something is weird or goofy or absurd or embarrassing. You can spend hours talking about Banking Clan criminal activity, and no one is complaining. You can devote reams of story to the idea of using a rare alien species to create weapons of war and make a King Kong pastiche while you’re at it. You can go on about Hutt politics, endlessly. Plenty of adult fans do not want this version of Star Wars when that is, frankly, the only reason to watch it. Yes, I know, we can also have Andor. And I loved Andor, okay? It’s still not why I watch Star Wars. I can get plenty of realistic sci-fi resistance narratives elsewhere, and they’re far more common than what I get in this sandbox. I’m here for alien planets and robots with personalities and puppet friends with heartbreakingly beautiful faces and gnarly zombie resurrections from termite people. No one else is currently giving me that on screen, and it’s frankly baffling that we need to ask for it nearly half a century into this fictional universe’s tenure. To wit, when Din goes to see Jabba’s relatives, there’s definitely a Hutt orgy happening in the background. (The creative team are going to claim that they’re eating, and definitely arranged it as such for plausible deniability, but I know what I’m looking at.) The Hutt palace is sporting architecture that lines up directly with Jabba’s on Tatooine, so now we know that he didn’t move into a place built by a former crime lord or work with architecture already found on the desert world. There are robot guards at the Hutt palace that are scavenged bits from nearly every kind of droid you’ve ever seen. Many of them have Separatist battle droid faces, which means that droids who figured out how to break away from organic masters are constantly upgrading themselves, and there’s a market for those parts. When Din is shown a picture of Rotta, it’s woefully out of date, and looks exactly like the baby that got rescued in The Clone Wars premiere. Why do you need an endless array of action sequences? You could have this. Which is one way of saying that the action in this film is nothing exciting to write home about. Co-leads Lateef Crowder and Brendan Wayne—the stunt performers who portray the Mandalorian while helmeted—are still doing incredible work, and the lion’s share of it; Pedro Pascal’s face is still only visible for a few precious minutes of screen time and, my qualms about the Death Watch cult rules aside, I adore the commitment to this bit. The score by Ludwig Göransson is the show’s score amped up for big screen dazzlement, and you can tell how much fun the composer is having messing around with all his previous good work. Image: Lucasfilm And Grogu? The chance to showcase the range of the puppet is precisely what you should be using big movie budget bucks for. He has whole side quests that play out entirely without dialogue. (There’s so much good slapstick comedy that comes of this.) Everyone in the movie is giving the kid snacks, whether they intend to or not. He hitches a ride with a group of Anzellans—that’s Babu Frick’s species—and we learn that hyperspace-worthy ships for tiny people do exist. Oh, and Jabba’s kid, Rotta (voiced, so wonderfully and inexplicably, by Jeremy Allen White)? He’s super jacked and but also super kind. Yet again, we come back around to the idea that being a good parent is the greatest thing you can be in Star Wars, and find out what becomes of beings who… don’t get to have that. And sure, he’s a CGI slug guy, but his plot is genuinely moving?? What am I supposed to do with that? Martin Scorcese has an extended cameo as a CGI food seller and goes 5000% all out. There are sea serpents, and Zeb gets to fight with his bo-rifle against a hail of stormtroopers (his favorite pastime), and the New Republic are actually behaving like the good guys for a change. We get some just comeuppance against the Hutts for constantly using imprisoned wild animals to do their dirty work. A send up of the gladiator games in Thor: Ragnarok is made instantly unique when you hear Coin say that it’s going to be a Dejarik Match. You either know what it means, or you don’t. It’s going to be fun regardless, but if you do know, you get that smart little hit of serotonin in a way that, for once, doesn’t feel cheap and unearned. My complaints are few and far between, and they’re mostly wrapped up in the difficulty of animating certain characters in CGI and then having trouble with the mechanics of these renderings on screen. Zeb suffers the most in this; the guy is supposed to be big and also has decidedly non-human limbs, but they scale the lasat way down, likely for the purposes of the human actor stand-in. This is only truly a disappointment because the advent of CGI was meant to free us up from those sorts of restrictions. But you still can’t be too sad over a character like Zeb actually being able to enjoy a sizable part in a film like this thanks to the technology. Image: Lucasfilm It’s not going to be everyone’s cup of tea, for sure, but I’m astounded that there are any intended mega-blockbusters going this route in the year of 2026. I haven’t seen one of The Mandalorian and Grogu’s like in ages, and I’m worried that I may never see it again. If you’re missing this sort of journey from your movie-going life, I recommend that you get to a theater with a friend or child in tow as soon as possible.[end-mark] The post If You Love ‘80s Fantasy Films, Go See <i>The Mandalorian and Grogu</i> Right Now appeared first on Reactor.

What Happened to The Mandalorian Season 4?
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What Happened to The Mandalorian Season 4?

News The Mandalorian What Happened to The Mandalorian Season 4? Will we ever get a new season of The Mandalorian? By Matthew Byrd | Published on May 22, 2026 Screenshot: Lucasfilm Comment 0 Share New Share Screenshot: Lucasfilm The Mandalorian and Grogu is not The Mandalorian Season 4. The Mandalorian and Grogu is, however, essentially a scheduled replacement for what would have been (or could have been) The Mandalorian Season 4. The two otherwise have little to do with each other (except, of course, that they are both based on the first three seasons of The Mandalorian show). If you are confused, then welcome to the wild world of modern Star Wars releases where logic has been traded in for a release strategy that is best described as “fluid.”  At this point, it seems unlikely that we will ever actually get a fourth season of The Mandalorian. It’s not necessarily a guarantee that Disney won’t decide to break that glass in case of a scheduling emergency (see the fluid situation referenced above), but The Mandalorian and Grogu’s mere existence underscores how far they’ve moved away from the show, at least temporarily. That said, The Mandalorian Season 4 was in development at one point and some progress was made on it before the idea was basically thrown into a drawer. Based on what’s been said so far, here’s everything we know about both the situation behind the apparent demise of that season and what it would have been about.  Was The Mandalorian Season 4 Canceled? The Mandalorian Season 4 wasn’t so much canceled as it was replaced on the schedule by The Mandalorian and Grogu movie. Basically, The Mandalorian Season 4 was in pre-production when series creator Jon Favreau and the rest of the show’s team were told that the decision had been made to make The Mandalorian and Grogu movie instead.  According to Favreau, he was already writing The Mandalorian Season 4 when that decision was made. He had reportedly completed at least a draft of each of that season’s episodes by that point (more on that in a bit). What we know for sure is that version of the show’s fourth season is effectively dead and will not be coming back. Even if some of those ideas are revisited, it really could never be the same thing for reasons we will soon get into.  What’s less clear is if we’ll ever see a fourth season of The Mandalorian at all. Most of those involved with the series (most notably, Favreau) have understandably been focused on the movie and haven’t even really entertained the possibility of a revived fourth season. Favreau’s official word on the subject is “talk to [Lucasfilm president] Dave Filoni.” It feels safe to say that there is at least not a confirmed plan for a fourth season of the show in place at the moment. Whether that situation ever changes is likely dependent on budgets, schedules, and whether or not there is enough genuine interest in such a project to justify the first two factors. Why Was The Mandalorian Season 4 Replaced With The Mandalorian and Grogu? In an interview with Deadline, former Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy stated that the 2023 writers’ strikes caused Disney to re-evaluate the entire Star Wars franchise and ultimately determine that The Mandalorian and Grogu had more reach than another season of The Mandalorian: “What we’ve really enjoyed about the streaming space is we’ve been able to experiment,” Kennedy said. “It’s harder to do that in the movie space. And now I think that that’s why it feels so good to be able to move into a Mandalorian movie as we’re coming off of three seasons of a very successful show. We’ve actually built an audience for that, and we gave the young audience an opportunity to enter Star Wars at a different place and not feel like you have to have seen everything. It can become their Star Wars. And that, I think, is the fun storytelling challenge.” Favreau expanded on those challenges by stating that the movie is “like somebody might have seen everything with Star Wars. You’ve got to make it good for them, because that’s your people, that’s you, that’s me,” he added. “But you also want to always have an outstretched hand to somebody new, who may not have done it and seen it before…” The on-paper story of how the film came to be makes some sense. Disney was dealing with production delays around the time of the strike, re-evaluated their Star Wars slate, and determined it would be more efficient and effective to make a Mandalorian movie at that time rather than a new season of the show. The added benefit was that a movie could serve as a better jumping-off point for younger viewers and new viewers than a fourth season.  However, a few unanswered questions surround this project. Namely, why is this the first Star Wars theatrical movie since 2019’s The Rise of Skywalker?  There have been many Star Wars movies in the works over the years that haven’t been released and are effectively on hold (or otherwise softly canceled). They include the standalone Rey movie, Donald Glover’s Lando film, and Taika Waititi’s Star Wars project. Perhaps most notably for the purposes of this discussion, there was also Dave Filoni’s “Mandoverse” movie, which was supposed to combine elements of the various Mandalorian shows into an epic adventure.  Did Disney simply see that none of their other Star Wars films were going to be ready any time soon and decided to convert The Mandalorian into a movie to get something on the schedule? If so, it’s a bit strange that they refer to the film as a better gateway for new and younger fans when Filoni has said that the movie is a “big celebration” of these characters. The message seems to be that you don’t need to watch the show to understand the movie but that it’s very much built on everything that has happened in the show so far. Understandably, the movie’s name value also largely appeals to those who are familiar with that name in the first place. All of that makes it a little more odd that the first Star Wars film in so long (and the one designed to reach a wider, possibly new audience) is based on the plot of an existing show. An unspoken factor here may be the mixed-to-negative receptions to Ahsoka, The Mandalorian Season 3, and The Book of Boba Fett. If The Mandalorian Season 4 was going to lead into both Ahsoka Season 2 and Filoni’s Mandoverse film as it reportedly was, then maybe Disney felt that it would be better to consolidate the entire universe a bit rather than continue to invest so much time and money into it during increased production delays. That said, those decisions were made before Dave Filoni became president of Lucasfilm, so who knows how big The Mandalorian will be moving forward.  What Would The Mandalorian Season 4 Have Been About? Based on everything that’s been revealed about The Mandalorian Season 4 so far, a substantial part of its story would have been devoted to setting up the events of Ahsoka Season 2 (and possibly the aforementioned Filoni Mandoverse movie) while answering some of the lingering lore questions posed by the show’s earliest seasons. It also would have featured quite a bit of Grand Admiral Thrawn.  One of the first things we heard about The Mandalorian Season 4 came from actor Giancarlo Esposito way back in 2020 ahead of the release of the show’s second season. At that time, the actor said that the first two seasons of the show had set up questions and plot points that seasons three and four would eventually address.  In reality, Season 3 of The Mandalorian felt closer to a soft reboot of the show compared to where Season 2 left us. The series was quick to put Din and Grogu back together, it brought back Esposito’s Moff Gideon from his apparent death, and it introduced quite a few more connections to the other Mandoverse shows (which, to be fair, did not exist at the end of season 2). By the end of the third season, Din had adopted Grogu and the two were set to explore the galaxy completing various assignments. Interestingly, that basic premise is where The Mandalorian and Grogu movie will pick up.  The Mandalorian Season 4 would have also picked up from there, but that’s seemingly about where the story similarities between the two projects end. Jon Favreau has said that the initial ideas for the show’s fourth season had to be scrapped or re-worked simply because they could not have been condensed into a movie. The biggest of those ideas would have been the incorporation of Grand Admiral Thrawn.  Yes, Thrawn was set to be one of the villains of The Mandalorian Season 4. More specifically, and much more importantly, Favreau says that the Thrawn storyline would have helped set up the character’s arc in the upcoming second season of Ashoka:“It would have heavily linked to Ahsoka Season 2. You can’t just take those scripts and turn them into a movie,” Favreau said. “There were a lot of characters, it assumed you’d watched the whole show, and it was teeing up what was happening moving into [the second season of ] Ahsoka. It was about Grand Admiral Thrawn and following the larger storyline [of this era of the Star Wars timeline].” We don’t know much about Ahsoka Season 2’s plot (besides the involvement of Hayden Christensen), but the big takeaway from that quote is how connected The Mandalorian Season 4 would have been to the Mandoverse. Season 3 was already trending in that direction, and there were always reports that Season 4 would have (at one point) also led into the Dave Filoni Mandoverse movie.  Everything that’s been said about The Mandalorian Season 4 vs. The Mandalorian and Grogu suggests the first draft of the former would have dived deeper into that interconnected lore while the latter is designed to function as more of a standalone experience. The tie that binds the two is seemingly the idea that Din and Grogu are now working together as a unit, but The Mandalorian and Grogu will seemingly use that idea as a set-up for a kind of fresh start rather than as a way to have those characters interact with an expanding and increasingly connected universe.  However, given that Ahsoka Season 2 will be released in 2027 (well before we’d ever get a new season of The Mandalorian), there’s no way the previously written version of The Mandalorian Season 4 will ever be aired as is. If so much of it was based around the second season of Ahsoka, then it will need to be changed to accommodate both The Mandalorian and Grogu and what we’ll learn in that upcoming season of the spin-off show. Beyond that, it is rumored (not confirmed) that the show’s fourth season would have featured an expanded role for The Shadow Council as well as various members of the New Republic. There again, the general idea seems to be that the show was going to use the freelance adventures of Din and Grogu as a launchpad for a deeper dive into the Mando mythos whereas the movie is seemingly pulling back on some of those lore elements in favor of a slightly more standalone adventure.[end-mark] The post What Happened to <i>The Mandalorian</i> Season 4? appeared first on Reactor.

What to Watch and Read This Weekend: Matthew Rhys and Monopoly —the Twin Evils of Capitalism
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What to Watch and Read This Weekend: Matthew Rhys and Monopoly —the Twin Evils of Capitalism

News What to Watch What to Watch and Read This Weekend: Matthew Rhys and Monopoly —the Twin Evils of Capitalism Plus: God needs new material in Paige Lewis’s Canon By Molly Templeton | Published on May 22, 2026 Image: Apple TV Comment 0 Share New Share Image: Apple TV Happy there’s-a-Star-War-in-theaters day to all who celebrate! Honestly I thought The Mandalorian and Grogu was coming out next week for a really long time. No real reason for this, except that I guess I found it a little hard to keep track of a movie that feels like an episode of television that just happens to be playing in theaters. I’ll see it eventually, but let’s be real: I don’t need to tell you about the Star War. Let’s talk about some other stuff! In This House We Will Watch Tatiana Maslany Do (Almost) Anything No, Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed isn’t an SFF series (alas). But it stars the star of Orphan Black and She-Hulk, ergo: It is Of Interest. At least to me. And according to the AV Club, Maslany is “better here than she’s been anywhere since her Emmy-winning turn on Orphan Black.” This is very promising! Very few things have given this woman enough to do in the years since Orphan Black! As Apple TV explains it, “The series follows newly divorced mom Paula as she falls down a dangerous rabbit hole of blackmail, murder, and youth soccer.” One of these things is not like the other, right? OR IS IT? I’m gonna find out.  Resetting the Canon There is exactly one book that I am frothingly excited about this week, and it’s Paige Lewis’s Canon. You can read the synopsis, sure, but I feel like this pair of sentences from Brooklyn Rail’s review may tell at least some of you everything you need to know. “For millennia, God has been recycling the same tropes that we all know from Homer, Virgil, Dante, and the Bible. By the time we get to the action in Canon, the schtick is getting stale.”  God’s schtick is getting stale. I am here for this—and for the fact that the book is set in the ’90s, making it the kind of historical fiction (sorry) I deeply love to read. There are Good Guys and Bad Guys and a nonbinary hero named Yara who has been chosen to save the day, but also a prophet who’s pretty sure she should be the one to save the day, and, listen, Karen Russell called this book “an unprecedented page-turner.” If Karen Russell finds it unprecedented, I simply must know more.  The True History of Monopoly One of the more unpleasant headlines I read this week involved the opening of a Monopoly-themed steakhouse, which “offers a high-end culinary experience complemented by the luxurious aesthetic of the Monopoly universe.” I don’t want to visit the luxurious Monopoly universe, no thank you! But on the upside, this creepy synergy led me to learn the real history of the loved-and-loathed board game—which was patented by a woman named Elizabeth Magie. Magie called her Landlord’s Game “a practical demonstration of the present system of land-grabbing with all its usual outcomes and consequences.” In an excerpt from The Monopolists: Obsession, Fury, and the Scandal Behind the World’s Favorite Board Game, Mary Pilon writes: Lizzie created two sets of rules: an anti-monopolist set in which all were rewarded when wealth was created, and a monopolist set in which the goal was to create monopolies and crush opponents. Her vision was an embrace of dualism and contained a contradiction within itself, a tension trying to be resolved between opposing philosophies. However, and of course unbeknownst to Lizzie at the time, it was the monopolist rules that would later capture the public’s imagination. Magie didn’t sell the game to Parker Brothers; a man named Charles Darrow did, and he’s the one who got all the royalties. If you would like to become further incensed about all of this, I really do recommend reading this excerpt from The Monopolists, and/or just reading the whole book, which would probably take less time than most games of Monopoly. The Specific Enjoyment in Watching Matthew Rhys Suffer Yes, I need to talk about Widow’s Bay again. Widow’s Bay is great, and only occasionally do I have to pick up my phone and not look at the screen because it’s just a little too creepy for my delicate sensibilities. There are many specific and wonderful things about this show—including the incredible Kate O’Flynn as the long-suffering assistant to the mayor, and Stephen Root as the guy who’s sure he knows what’s really going on—but man do I love watching Matthew Rhys suffer. As mayor Tom Loftis, Rhys cares about putting his town on the map. The national map. With tourists and everything. And no matter how weird shit gets—scary ladies hunting him in his bathtub, parties that go deeply awry—Tom is going to continue to stubbornly ignore what’s directly in front of his wide eyes. It’s funny, it’s spooky, and it’s, um, really quite relevant, watching this minor government official just absolutely reject reality in favor of his preferred version of events.[end-mark] The post What to Watch and Read This Weekend: Matthew Rhys and Monopoly —the Twin Evils of Capitalism appeared first on Reactor.

The Boroughs Is a Charming Distraction, But Nothing You Haven’t Seen Before
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The Boroughs Is a Charming Distraction, But Nothing You Haven’t Seen Before

Movies & TV The Boroughs The Boroughs Is a Charming Distraction, But Nothing You Haven’t Seen Before The delightful cast is still a treat to watch. By Lacy Baugher Milas | Published on May 21, 2026 Credit: Netflix Comment 0 Share New Share Credit: Netflix They say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, a statement that sounds as if it’s meant to be mean, but can just as easily be read as a compliment in the right circumstances. So while it’s clear from its opening sequence that Netflix’s new sci-fi adventure The Boroughs is meant to feel like a cousin of its megahit streaming phenomenon Stranger Things, the eight-part drama still manages to chart its own path, as it follows a squad of quirky senior citizens who team up to investigate the bizarre goings on in their gated elder community. Our television landscape is often reluctant to tell stories about older characters and the concerns of aging, often defaulting to unfortunate stereotypes or refusing to deal with the difficult everyday realities of older adults. The Boroughs, no matter what else may be said about it, treats its characters as three-dimensional people, all with emotional arcs and personal histories of their own.  Many viewers will undoubtedly tune in because of the involvement of the Duffer Brothers, the Stranger Things creators who also served as executive producers on the painfully ponderous yet strangely popular horror series Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen. The Duffers are once again just producers on this project, but, on the whole, The Boroughs feels much more of a piece with their previous work than Something Very Bad ever did. The show, which hails from Jeffrey Addiss and Will Matthews, boasts a similar found family vibe and feels like nothing so much as a riff on Stranger Things for the retirement set. (Seriously, they basically just swap out the former’s ubiquitous bikes for designer motorized golf carts.)  The Boroughs also has a similar old-school sci-fi feel, with visual and thematic nods to everything from Cocoon to E.T. as it wrestles with deeply human themes of friendship, grief, love, and loss. It’s even got a familiar nod toward vintage technology, and an array of cathode ray tube television sets provide a magical, sparkling visual that rivals the first time we see Winona Ryder communicating via Christmas lights in Hawkins. Also, much like Stranger Things, the show’s larger monstrous mystery doesn’t bear up under a terrible amount of scrutiny, but by the time you reach the answer to what’s really going on at the heart of this retirement community, you’ll likely be more interested in the various relationships between its residents anyway. The story begins as retired engineer Sam Cooper (Alfred Molina) arrives in the picturesque New Mexico community of The Boroughs, an idyllic retirement destination that completely unironically promises its elderly residents the time of their lives. With its lavish golf courses, charming community center, Alexa-like home assistants, and cul-de-sacs full of similarly aged potential new friends, it doesn’t even seem like the folks in charge are lying. But, of course, things at The Boroughs are not as picturesque as they initially seem.   A widower still reeling from the recent loss of his beloved wife, Lilly (Jane Kaczmarek), Sam doesn’t want any part of life at The Boroughs. It was Lilly, as it turns out, who pushed for their move, and in the wake of her death, he’s eager to cancel his contract as quickly as possible. But he begins to reconsider after meeting several of his boisterous and offbeat neighbors, who each force him to reevaluate what it is that he wants to do with the time he has left and who he wants to spend it with. Things take a dark turn when an escaped dementia patient (Ed Begley Jr.) from the community facility breaks into Sam’s home—his own former residence—to warn him about alleged “owls” hiding in the walls, but it’s the unexpected death of one of The Boroughs’ most popular residents that shakes him to his core.  The Boroughs is pretty upfront about the fact that there are dark creatures hidden in the shadows of these picturesque homes, so when Sam has a frightening encounter with a disturbing monster—in all its chittering, many-legged glory—we don’t have to waste any time wondering if we can trust what he’s seeing. Suddenly, he finds himself on the hunt for the truth with a ragtag team of his neighbors and fellow seniors, including investigative journalist Judy (Alfre Woodard), her weed-loving husband Art (Clarke Peters), cancer-stricken doctor Wally (Denis O’Hare), and cynical music manager Renee (Geena Davis).  The gang’s hunt for the truth is cheesy and charming by turns, mixing glimpses into The Boroughs’ murky professional operations and mysterious history with deepening character dynamics and relationship arcs. The show shines brightest whenever various members of its primary ensemble are onscreen together, hunting for clues, hatching plans, or even just hanging out with one another and it’s a testament to the casting department that the chemistry between and among the group feels so lived-in and natural. It’s hard to talk about specifics of the series’ larger plot without spoiling the various twists at its center, but suffice it to say that you’ll see many of them coming. The Borough does attempt to give its primary villains some pathos through their complicated backstory, but the characters still come off stiff and one-note. Like the Duffers’ other projects, The Boroughs is also too long—you could easily trim this down to six episodes or maybe even five without really sacrificing any key story beats—and isn’t terribly subtle about its overarching messages.  It helps that the bulk of the series cast is so strong and more than capable of handling what can often feel like fairly banal or repetitive material. Molina brings a soulful melancholy to Sam, whose loneliness and painfully fresh sense of loss shape the larger edges of the story. Woodard and Peters are charming together as a couple, navigating what it means to be in a marriage for as long as the two of them have been. But it’s O’Hare who steals the show as Wally, taking a character who, by all rights, should be little more than a caricature—he’s basically the professional version of the Sassy Gay Friend and definitely gets all the show’s best one-liners—and giving him complicated layers of grief and rage.  Credit: Netflix © 2026 If there’s a weak link in the ensemble, it’s sadly Davis, whose character gets siloed in a cute but insubstantial romance with a Boroughs security officer (Carlos Miranda) and has little else to do. Don’t get me wrong, we love to see a mature woman getting her shot at love in a major television property and this industry absolutely needs to do this kind of thing more often. (Let older actresses play real romance!) But it’s also hard not to be annoyed at how much more the Renee character could be if given the chance. Every scene Davis shares with O’Hare is dynamite, for example, but we’re only given the barest hints of what her life outside of The Boroughs involves. (Her ex-husband seems like a jerk?) Elsewhere, Bill Pullman is a delightful scene-stealer as boisterous neighborhood playboy Jack, but also suffers from an unfortunate lack of screentime that requires us to be told more about his clandestine relationship with Judy than we’re ever shown.  The Boroughs almost certainly won’t inspire the massive global fandom that Stranger Things did. But as throwback summer adventures go? It’s a charming enough distraction.[end-mark] The post <i>The Boroughs</i> Is a Charming Distraction, But Nothing You Haven’t Seen Before appeared first on Reactor.

Read an Excerpt From The Unicorn Hunters by Katherine Arden
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Read an Excerpt From The Unicorn Hunters by Katherine Arden

Excerpts fantasy Read an Excerpt From The Unicorn Hunters by Katherine Arden In a desperate gamble to save her throne, a young monarch conceals a secret marriage in the shadows of an enchanted forest… By Katherine Arden | Published on May 21, 2026 Comment 0 Share New Share We’re thrilled to share an excerpt from The Unicorn Hunters by Katherine Arden, a new fantasy novel set in historical Brittany—out from Del Rey on June 2nd. Anne of Brittany was a child when France invaded and drove her royal father to his death. Now she is a young woman, sovereign duchess of an occupied realm, and France means to crown their conquest by marrying her to their king. Such an alliance would put her title, her lands, and her body forever in the hands of her enemies.But Anne refuses to be the last duchess of Brittany.Her only hope of resisting conquest is another alliance sealed with marriage, so Anne arranges a daring last gambit: a secret betrothal to Charles of France’s greatest rival. But secrets are hard to keep in a world where rival courts spy on each other with diviners.The forest of Brocéliande was once the haunt of Merlin the Enchanter and the long-lost faerie queen. But magic is long gone from Broceliande, except for the occasional sight of a unicorn and one critical quirk: This ancient forest is completely hostile to divination.While pretending compliance with France, Anne plans a unicorn hunt in Brocéliande. A bit of pointless pageantry. A diversion so she can wed in secret.Or so she thinks. Chapter 1 The French envoy came to Nantes on the last Sunday of Eastertide, when all the Breton court were still at church, when the hiss of rain and the pealing of bells swallowed the hoofbeats and shouts of his company. The court heard Mass unaware of his coming; they schemed and gossiped and took communion just as always, and no one from the pot-boy to the duchess knew that from that year, Christendom would never be the same. Rain does not fall in Brittany so much as hover, filling the air with vapor, so that the courtiers emerged from the cathedral and were instantly wrapped in cloud. The bells overhead rang loud enough to shake the raindrops crooked. Arrayed in their Easter best, the court glowed in the gray light, though there were fewer of them than there should have been. Many had died in the war with France, many more were still far away awaiting ransom, like ambulatory notes payable in their conquerors’ chateaux. At the heart of the crowd walked a girl with merry eyes, a floating violet in a sea of cut-velvet and silk hose, cloth-of-silver and the smell of myrrh, concentrating as she held her skirt clear of puddles. This was Anne, duchess regnant of Brittany, her hair caught back in a diadem and pearl-studded crespine, though she wore no other jewels. They had all been sold to pay her garrisons. She did not know that a French envoy had come to the castle. Indeed, she was expecting a messenger from quite another direction, and that expectation lit an already-animated face. She and her maids-of-honor were playing a game of riddles as they walked. “—I am in all things and through all things,” declaimed the prosiest among them. “I am in candles and lamps and water and dice. I am the word of God; I am the blessing of mankind I am—.” “Divination,” answered four brisk voices. All of Anne’s maids-of-honor were clever. Another of them began a different riddle: “Three pears hang, three monks pass, each takes one, yet two remain, how—.” Jean de Rieux had been named Anne’s guardian by her father while the latter lay breathing blood on his deathbed, and now he watched the riddle-game with an indulgent, anxious face. He was of far too sober a mind to make up riddles. He said, low, “Highness, have you seen the diviner this day? What news?” “Of my messenger? None yet,” murmured Anne, leaning on his arm to dodge another puddle. Rain filled the air; she breathed it in. “I shall ask when I have dry feet. But knowing where he is will not bring him here the faster.” De Rieux shook his head. “I have warned you against overconfidence, my daughter. This—your—arrangement—” He stumbled on the right word, so great was the secrecy, though the clamor of bells overhead muffled their voices. “—It is a notable victory, but you must not sell the bear’s skin before it’s been killed.” “Or in this case married. Let us all pity the bear,” said Anne and smiled impishly up at him. Ducal dignity could not quite hide her pleased excitement, and she was not yet twenty. “I have not been hasty.” Before De Rieux could answer, Anne’s sister Isabeau darted up to them, dragging her soaking hem straight through the puddles. She was ten years old, restless as a baby duck; her dark hair had already begun the inevitable process of slithering loose of its careful plaits. She skidded across the stones, De Rieux caught her and Anne said, “Isabeau, unless you intend to man the battlements yourself, I beg you will not bankrupt me keeping you in shoes. We must pay our soldiers.” Buy the Book The Unicorn Hunters Katherine Arden Buy Book The Unicorn Hunters Katherine Arden Buy this book from: AmazonBarnes and NobleiBooksIndieBoundTarget “Give me a spear and I will guard the wall,” retorted Isabeau, swinging an imaginary weapon. She hardly came to De Rieux’s shoulder, barely shorter than Anne, though Isabeau gave every promise of overtaking her. The child was all long, awkward limbs, while Anne was small and glossy as a cat in a dairy. “Will you? I pity the French,” said Anne, tweaking her sister’s nose. Isabeau butted against Anne’s shoulder and smiled up at De Rieux, who was her guardian too. They were all crossing the drawbridge that divided the city of Nantes from the vast new ducal keep that Bretons called, simply, the Castle of the Dukes of Brittany. Half-tuned music and laughter trickled from the castle windows and from the wall-top as a bright stream of courtiers passed beneath the barbican and crossed the courtyard. The rain was falling faster. Isabeau had been dignified all through church, and Anne saw her trying to be stately again now, though she made a small, irrepressible skip before she caught herself. Anne said, “Isabeau, if you cannot sit still this forenoon, let you put on a good cloak and run about the garden.” If Breton children were kept indoors when it rained, they’d never go outside. “Only be sure and bring me a posy when you return.” Isabeau lit up. “Will you come with me and pick the flowers?” “I will not.” The mist showed every sign of thickening, enough to lay sparkling droplets on her violet bodice. “I am going to sit by a nice fire, embroider my altar cloth, entertain deputations, and gossip furiously.” She gave her sister an innocent look. “You may come in if you like and hem a kerchief.” Isabeau shuddered and slipped away at once, turning back to wave, trailed by her exasperated governess and a tutor with a dripping nose. It was only after Anne, smiling, had watched her sister go that she realized something was wrong in the courtyard. A string of unfamiliar horses was being led to stabling; an unfamiliar equerry stood by the horse-troughs. A loud blend of strange voices echoed in the guardhouse. Who had come? A glimpse of banner or shield, tabard or surcoat might tell her, but rain hovered still, cold and close, blurring the world like a painter’s fingertips. Whoever had come, it could not be her messenger. Her messenger was riding alone, in secret. She and Jean de Rieux exchanged wary glances as they passed into the castle proper. Her bastard half-brother Henri, Baron of Avaugour, met Anne in her garderobe, a private chamber above the oratory, where she entertained her intimates and read documents, sewed and gossiped with her maids-of-honor. The light was gray near the windows, rosy near the fire, wavering in places from the interplay of rain and firelight. Rugs and wolfskin and tapestry softened the stone. Every courtier with a reason to wait upon the duchess was already in the room, passing news in low voices. Henri scythed straight through them all, a high, outraged color on his handsome face. When Anne was crowned, some had whispered that it was a shame the duke’s only son could not inherit the duchy. Anything, they said, would have been better than giving the realm to poor Francis’ barely-grown daughter. Henri just laughed at those people. “Lord,” he’d told Anne. “Who’d want it? All those papers to read. Treaties and accounts and letters. And old men talking. You like it, you unnatural creature. They think you only live to frolic, but they don’t see the look in your eye when you preside over that council.” Anne did like it. Although sometimes she envied Henri whom God had made tall and broad, a knight and a man. Any or all of those attributes would have made her life much easier. She crossed the garderobe and planted herself beside the hood of the enormous stone fireplace, nodding at the reverences of a dozen courtiers. “Tell me your news, brother. Who has come? I saw the horses below.” De Rieux followed them to the fireplace, his mouth downturned and worried. Her council was scattered about the room: clever, jolly Dunois, whose father was the famous Bastard of Orléans. The Comte de Comminges, and Montauban her chamberlain, catlike and wary and intensely loyal. They all drifted unobtrusively nearer, while her maids-of-honor raised a chorus of chatter to mask their conversation. “La Trémoille is here with a grand escort and messages from the French court.” said Henri, low. “He has had word via diviner and rode from the garrison at St. Aubin-du-Cormier. I think he is come to insist upon the French marriage with no further delay.” Anne went very still. Her mind, instantly, darted back to the day of her coronation. She had been too young and red-eyed, her father newly buried. “I will not marry the king of France,” she had told De Rieux. She knew—everyone knew—that if she wed the king of France, then there would be no more Brittany. Only France, from the Rhine to the stormy sea. “I promised my father.” “What choice do you have?” De Rieux had rejoined, with some justice. Her father had lost a war over this very question, and died in the aftermath. Brittany was a fair green jewel rich with the wealth of the sea, and France was ten times its size and coveted it. Brittany was also Anne’s bridal-portion, and would go to her husband when she married. Of course France wanted her. “I will make myself new choices,” she had said then. And she had. She was sure of it. Her secret messenger from Flanders was carrying Brittany’s salvation even now, sewn up hidden in his saddle-skirt. “They must have found out,” whispered De Rieux. Anne’s mind was racing. She said, “Perhaps. Or perhaps not. He would have brought soldiers if he knew, and he has only his escort, hasn’t he?” “But why else would he have come now?” murmured Montauban. They were all worried and she did not blame them. If France laid bare her plans too soon, she would be deposed. Or taken away and married forcibly. She was finding it hard to draw a full breath. “I can think of a few reasons,” said Dunois, brows drawn together. “But I like none of them.” He took a gasping draught of his spiced wine. “He has not said why he is here, only asked for audience with the duchess,” said Henri. Her brother had no head for statecraft. He liked jousting and expensive horses and a well-cut doublet. But he was an easy, kindly man, her father’s mistress’s son. Anne’s rising heartbeat seemed to shake her whole body; she forced her voice to mildness. “We’ll find out soon enough. Give him my utmost respect and say we honor our cousin of France and wait upon his noble general’s convenience.” She’d given standing orders to treat anyone from the French court with an exasperating degree of servility. She cast a speculative glance at her brother. “Henri go and put on something more expensive. That vulgar hat with the ostrich. I want him to think you have ambitions and have spent all your money.” “What?” “Now,” said Anne. “Quick. He’ll probably come in here any moment, when he gets the summons. Hates delays. Don’t you remember? And another thing—,” She whispered in his ear. “I don’t understand,” said her brother dubiously. “No need,” said Anne. She said it cheerfully, but the firelight kept wanting to go sideways in her vision, to remind her of the stabs of light that roared from besieging cannon. The first time she had seen La Trémoille was from the wall of that very castle. He had been directing the French army that was methodically laying siege to their battlements. Her father had pointed out the three blue eagles of his standard, noted the bombards being drawn into position to fire. That day was years gone, but the cold fear of it seemed to cling to her. Henri said, “You should know that my hats are the envy of the court.” “Now.” He went off, muttering something incredulous about how their easy-tempered father had sired such a baby tyrant. Anne smiled as she watched him go, but her smile faded again when she met De Rieux’s worried eyes. * * * Four years ago, Guillaume de la Trémoille, lieutenant-general of France, had been the architect of the conquest of Brittany, and in his firm opinion, the war had stopped too soon. The Bretons had been defeated, roundly, at St. Aubin-du-Cormier, but France ought not have heard their suit for peace after the battle. They should not have relented, in the face of Duke Francis’ death. They ought to have driven on, reduced the chateau at Nantes, taken Rennes, packed off the girls, the ducal heirs, to be wards of the crown of France and set a loyal man—himself, for preference—in the seat of the duke of Brittany. That was the way wars were won. That was how the old king would have won. But Charles was young and naïve and desired to emulate Saint Louis, his canonized ancestor, in the matter of virtue. Virtuous kings, Charles opined, did not seize territory on the thinnest possible claim, backed up with a legion of bloody hired swords. Virtuous kings enlarged their holdings by good, lawful, Christian marriage, and both Brittany’s heirs were girls. His court agreed in public, but in private they wondered what Charles’ warlike father would have said to his amiable son. La Trémoille knew very well what the old king would have said and wished with all his might that he could have said it for him. The only saving grace of it all had been that the new-crowned duchess was a mere slip of a silly child, a puppet on an all-but-bankrupt throne. Charles was young and much given to amorous intrigues; the crown was distracted by wars in Burgundy and it did not seem so very risky to wait for the girl to grow up a little. She would be less likely to die in childbed. But now La Trémoille meant to wash his hands of Brittany. He wished never to see another raincloud so long as he lived, wished never again to ride while soaked to his shriveled skin. He wanted to go enjoy his lands and titles, the gifts of a grateful France. Then he meant to raise fresh troops and go and fight a fine plundering war far away in sunny Pavia. The duchess must marry. She is past old enough, and Charles is crowned king. It must be now, Marguerite had written him. Marguerite of France was the king’s elder sister, his regent before he came of age. The cleverest woman in Europe, the most powerful. Even after Charles’ coronation, she kept a knowing hand on the reins of state. She shared entirely La Trémoille’s views on the danger of leaving Brittany half-conquered. You will go to Nantes and set this marriage in motion. You will frighten them if you must. With these injunctions echoing in his mind, very grand in a new doublet, Guillaume de la Trémoille went to wait upon the duchess of Brittany, prepared to terrify her and her council if they proved in the least resistant to this imminent and necessary French marriage. A repast was laid out already on long boards in the duchess’s garderobe. She did not receive all her court here; this was a meal of her intimates. She got smartly to her feet when he made his bow and greeted him with touching shyness. La Trémoille’s heart sank at the sight of the food: all sugared fruits and marchpane. A meal for a spoiled child. At least she was pretty. Perhaps Charles of France, also something of a fool, would like her. They could be fools together and leave the business of governing to others. Breathlessly, the duchess encouraged him to try the delicacies, and when he had choked some of them down, she asked timidly, “Monseigneur, have you messages for me?” La Trémoille shoved the last of the sweets away. “Madame, I am come on behalf of the crown of France, which greatly desires to settle with all dispatch the alliance between Charles the king and his beloved subject Anne of Brittany. I am empowered to do all that is required to facilitate this longed-for union.” “Oh,” she said, looking tentatively down the table, as though expecting someone to chide her. “I suppose—it’s only—I fear…” She trailed off, biting her lips. La Trémoille followed her gaze, suddenly alert. He and Marguerite had discussed the likelihood that someone in the Breton court, holding particular sway with the duchess, would delay the French marriage in hopes of a bribe. Was there such a person? “But not so fast, sister,” said a ringing voice a few places down the table. “You have forgot the unicorn.” This man, perhaps. A great handsome knight by his clothes, brawny arms crossed over a straining doublet and wearing upon his head the most vulgar heap of dyed ostrich feathers La Trémoille had ever seen. “Oh—Henri,” said the duchess, looking uneasy. “The general does not care about unicorns.” This must be the Breton bastard, the eldest child, knighted by the duke and created Baron of Avaugour. Rumor said Francis had got the boy on the old French king’s castoff mistress. A bastard must always be chewing at the doors of power and a royal bastard doubly so. What would he want for a bribe? La Trémoille almost forgot the duchess, staring at this upstart. “What unicorn?” He was expecting the commission of some tapestry or other nonsense thing. “Oh,” said the duchess confidingly. “It is only that we have had word that a unicorn has been sighted. In Brocéliande.” All around the table, voices seemed to drop; the word Brocéliande itself breathed out dark mystery. Men told wild tales of that ancient forest. That the fair-folk, the korriganed, had lived long in its shadows. That an unwary traveler might stray into the Lost Lands, only to vanish forever, or return a century hence, still young while his whole world had spun out from under his feet. And they also did say, with more force than mere rumor, that Brocéliande was one of the last, best places in Christendom for men to hunt unicorns. A unicorn was the noblest and rarest prey in Christendom. The fire-drakes, if ever they had lived, had not been seen in living memory, and one could not hunt sea-drakes. Sea-drakes hunted men. At least, that’s what seamen said, when their ships did not come back. But now and again, one heard credible tales of a unicorn. Like his master the king, La Trémoille loved to hunt. “A unicorn, you say?” The duchess threw a diffident glance at her brother. “We had a message from Trécesson. A lymerer with his dog, seeking stags for his master, came upon the beast in Broceliande. Four days ago—or was it five? I thought—I mean I thought—that perhaps we should try and hunt it. While I am—” she stumbled over the words, going modestly pink. La Trémoille knew what she was trying to say. To hunt a unicorn required two things. The first was a virgin of high birth and unimpeachable virtue, to bait the unicorn. And the other was a hunt so extravagant that the mere dazzle of it would tempt the vain beast near. What better bait for a unicorn than this beautiful, high-born fool? And what nobler quarry for a man than a unicorn? La Trémoille hesitated, remembering his orders. Then he said, “It would be a fine thing, to hunt a unicorn.” In a hectoring voice, Henri of Avaugour answered, drinking his wine, “Then why do we speak of marriage? Even the breath of coming unchastity might ruin all—it is said that unicorns know these things, monseigneur.” The duchess was blushing even more furiously, biting her lips. La Trémoille considered. Just the chance of it fired his blood. A living unicorn, at bay… “A small delay before negotiations begin might be possible,” he said at last. A small, odd smile came to Henri of Avaugour’s lips. “I knew you were wise, monseigneur.” The bastard was probably still holding out for a bribe, thought La Trémoille. Well, an estate in France could be found for him. But let it be a wretched estate. The duchess, still scarlet, said, “I shall make of the unicorn’s horn a wedding present to the king of France. You shall take the hide, God willing, for all the world to marvel at, monseigneur.” Her look was soft, earnest. And when she put out her hand to be kissed, he did it with less than his usual coldness. * * * They got rid of La Trémoille at last. The general had unbent considerably at the thought of hunting a unicorn, though he stared daggers all the while at poor Henri. He even ate some marchpane, though he grimaced, and drank his cup of wine—Anne had made sure it was the sweet kind that gave you a headache—and then took his leave. The servants came in his wake to draw the cloth and clear away the boards and trestles. Soon there would be proper feasting in the great hall. Anne finally gave in to the fit of laughter that had been trying to burst out of her all that while. When she looked up, wiping her eyes, Henri was grinning too, still wearing that ridiculous hat, and that started her off again. She said, “Let us hope the feast tonight contains a few bearable dishes; one cannot subsist on marchpane.” “Lord, how do you do it? One moment my sister is there and the next there is a ninny blushing on cue. And yon Frenchman’s no fool yet he swallowed that nonsense about future unchastity.” Anne said, “He was pleased with his own superiority. It makes people unwise.” She had not let any of her councilors, not even Jean de Rieux, assist at the comedy she played for La Trémoille. Henri was the only one she needed, and a great crowd would merely increase the odds that someone let something slip. But La Trémoille had not been gone a candle-mark when De Rieux hurried up the stairs. “What did the general say?” he asked urgently. “What does he want?” Henri was still grinning. “He had no idea what struck him. The duchess has that effect. And of course, I gave my sister vital assistance.” Anne had resumed her accustomed chair and was putting minute stitches in the vast watered-silk sweep of an altar-cloth; she said austerely, “We have convinced the general to delay any talk of my marriage to the king of France until after we all go hunt unicorns in Brocéliande.” She turned her altar-cloth in the firelight, wishing for her favorite thimble. Being gold, it had been sold too. De Rieux looked tolerably blank. “But—why? There are no unicorns. Or, there have been no sightings. Not these twenty years.” “That,” said Anne. “Is entirely beside the point. We have bought ourselves time.” “To what purpose? You have bought yourself a week or two, no more; it will not make a difference.” Anne laid the cloth aside. “That’s where you’re wrong. Consider only—,” she broke off. Her court diviner was called Calyx; no one recalled his birth-name, except for some dusty scribe in the Diviners’ Guild. Every diviner took a Latin name upon achieving his mastery. Calyx stumbled into the duchess’s garderobe now, three-parts drunk. That was to be expected. Calyx was an oenomancer, who read his divination in the dregs of wine. With a bleared eye, carrying bottle and cup in his slack hands, he said, “You sent for me, highness?” Anne leaped up, pausing only to see that her maids-of-honor tidied her altar-cloth away and secured the needle. “You are a welcome sight, auspex—” that is what diviners were called in the formal language of the court. She pulled him at once to the deep window embrasure, with the rain sluicing fast past the leaded panes. Diviners needed clear light for their auguries. Anne had sometimes wished for a court diviner whose gift came in a more practical form—the Guild contained diviners by dice and clouds and water and candlelight—but the Guild also kept a relentless grip on its masters and would not send a gifted young diviner to work in a court as beleaguered as hers. Especially not with its sovereign a woman unwed. Calyx was old and his eyes were bloodshot; his hair swooned greasily from a velvet cap of uncertain cleanliness, his mouth was a sea of wine-stained stumps, and she could wish that his gift did not require the drinking of quite so much wine. But her father had liked Calyx. And Anne loved and missed her father. Divination was a useful and necessary art, although it was neither infallible nor omniscient. It could only answer questions that related to the bodily senses. A diviner might be asked, what color are the slippers of the Sultan in Stamboul, every day for a year and never get it wrong. More difficult were moods and intentions; names and numbers were impossible. To divine a place was possible, but only if the diviner could put a place-name to the colors or sounds or smells he found in his augury. Most diviners specialized in a small area. Who is the betrothed of the Duchess of Brittany was a question that could be answered by a skilled diviner, working diligently—royal diviners kept careful physical descriptions of sovereigns—and one that Anne lived in mortal fear of the French court asking. But it had been Pliny the Younger, a diviner himself, who discovered the chief use of divination. For, as he said in a letter, if the emperor’s auspices can tell him the color of anything in the world, but the name of nothing, then all we must do is assign words to colors. Now kings and generals and ambassadors and grand seigneurs all communicated via diviner. Diviners carried colored squares of cloth and each cloth meant something like safe, or war or beset or yesterday. The exact code changed from court to court. To send a message, the diviner merely laid down cloths in order and the recipient’s diviner asked his clouds or dice or wine or beetles to tell him, what colors lay today upon the table of the duchess of Brittany’s diviner? Diviners were kept busy relaying such messages all over the continent. Anne said low to Calyx, heart beating fast. “Where is my messenger from Flanders?” Calyx could only answer if he had come near enough to Nantes. Calyx drained his cup to the dregs, peered at the sludge on the bottom and said squinting, “The northwestern road. Will be here by nightfall or a little after if the rain keeps on.” Anne bit her lip. The plan she was slowly forming was too complex to share via any code of colors. She said abruptly, “Calyx, is it true that there is no divination possible beneath the eaves of Brocéliande?” Calyx stiffened. The moving rain-light grayed his face and made him seem older. “That is a cursed place for diviners,” he said at last Anne leaned forward. “Why? Is it true then?” She had the impression he would prefer not to answer. But he had to. It was one of the codes of the Guild, that a diviner must answer every direct question from his principal, and never lie. He turned his cup in restless hands. “No. Not exactly.” “What then?” Reluctantly, he said, “A diviner can set his inward sight upon Brocéliande. But he sees nonsense. If he persists, he goes mad. The chronicles say that long ago it was just the same if any man tried to use divination upon the korriganed or any piece of their realm in the Lost Lands.” Anne clasped her hands, pleased. Her nascent plan depended on this peculiar quality of Broceliande. She did not fear the korriganed. They had not been seen for five hundred years. “But,” added Calyx, setting down his cup with a click. “The forest is dangerous. Merlin the Enchanter was vanquished there, caught in the toils of the Queen of the Lost Lands, and no man of greater wisdom has lived since the world began. I beg you will not meddle with Brocéliande, highness.” “No more than I must,” said Anne and smiled reassuringly at him. He did not look reassured. Anne bid her diviner go and drink something gentler than wine and get some sleep, then turned back to the fire. To De Rieux she said, “My messenger will be here at nightfall. You needn’t fret until then. Go and change, Jean. It may be a long night.” Something in his heavy face lightened. “That is welcome news, highness,” he said. Henri was still lolling in a chair by the fire, now addressing gallant remarks to Madeleine of Chateaubriant, the cleverest of Anne’s maids-of-honor. The lady was wearing a very demure expression that said she was enjoying herself. Damn them both, there was no time. Anne crooked a peremptory finger at her brother. Henri came over, reluctantly, “Sister, if you have more schemes involving hats and lying to the French—” She interrupted. “I need you to go and intercept the messenger from Flanders and bring him here tonight. Secretly. La Trémoille mustn’t know. The northwestern road.” Henri did not look enthusiastic. Madeleine was very beautiful and the rain had not let up. Anne said sympathetically, “I know. But you may lounge about in comfort after the realm is preserved.” Excerpted from The Unicorn Hunters, copyright © 2026 by Katherine Arden. The post Read an Excerpt From <i>The Unicorn Hunters</i> by Katherine Arden appeared first on Reactor.