All Knowledge

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Stranger ThingsSource

Netflix's Predecessors Rejected the Pitch Around 20 Times

Long before it became one of the biggest shows on the planet, Stranger Things was turned down by roughly 15 to 20 different networks and studios. Execs weren't sure what to do with a story mixing kids, adults, sci-fi and horror all at once, and some even suggested reworking it into either a straight-up kids show or an adult mystery centred on Hopper. The Duffers held their ground and kept pitching the version they actually wanted to make.

Batman BeginsSource

Batman Almost Had a Different Face

Christian Bale wasn't the only name on Nolan's shortlist for Bruce Wayne. Keanu Reeves, Jake Gyllenhaal, Joshua Jackson, Eion Bailey, Hugh Dancy, Billy Crudup, and even a young Henry Cavill were all in the mix at some point before Bale locked it down.

LokiSource

Breaking Brad, A Breaking Bad Riff

The title of season two's second episode, "Breaking Brad," is a play on Breaking Bad, and it works on more than one level. TVA hunter X-5 goes rogue and starts a secret double life under the alias Brad Wolfe, essentially living out his own quiet Walter White transformation.

Call of Duty 4: Modern WarfareSource

The Nuke Was Built to Make You Feel Powerless

That gut-punch of a scene where Sergeant Paul Jackson crawls out of a downed helicopter into a mushroom cloud wasn't just there for shock value. Critics have pointed out it deliberately strips away every bit of control the campaign spent hours building up, right before killing the character off outright, which is almost unheard of for a genre built on power fantasies.

Call of Duty: Black Ops IISource

The Pack-a-Punch Machine on Nuketown Just Falls Out of the Sky

Most zombies maps make you build or unlock the Pack-a-Punch machine through some kind of puzzle. Nuketown skips all of that entirely: an air raid siren sounds partway through the match and the machine crash-lands randomly somewhere on the map, usually in the backyard or garage, forcing players to scramble toward wherever it happens to land.

ArcaneSource

The Concept Existed Years Before Production Started

Christian Linke and Alex Yee first pitched the idea for a League of Legends show back in the mid-2010s, and Riot's own founders were reportedly hesitant at first since it was a big risk for a game studio. Riot ended up quietly funding concept art and even a test pilot episode in 2016 before the project got the proper greenlight.

One Piece Live ActionSource

Mr. 7 Finally Gets a Face

In the manga, the Baroque Works agent Mr. 7 is only ever mentioned as someone Zoro killed before the story even started, and readers only saw what he looked like thanks to a sketch Oda included in an SBS column years later. The live-action actually brings that obscure design to the screen.

Moon KnightSource

Khonshu Had Two Different Actors

Khonshu might sound like F. Murray Abraham, but the physical performance you're watching on set was actually captured by Egyptian-American actor Karim El-Hakim, with Abraham's voice layered on afterwards to give the god his commanding tone.

Avengers: EndgameSource

The Funeral Scene Wasn't Stitched Together In Post

With basically the entire MCU cast standing together at Tony's funeral, you'd assume some digital trickery was involved to get everyone in one shot. Nope - every actor was physically there on the same day, and the crew just shot five or six takes of the whole group.

DestinySource

Grasp of Avarice Was Built Around the Loot Cave

Years after Destiny 1 ended, Bungie revisited the Cosmodrome loot cave as the setting for the Grasp of Avarice dungeon in Destiny 2's 30th Anniversary Pack, spinning the community's favourite exploit into an in-universe story about a fireteam corrupted by greed.