You know the Star Wars universe. You know the DC Extended Universe. You know the Marvel Cinematic Universe. 

How about the Talking Animal Cinematic Universe?

Movies and television shows allow us to peer inside other worlds, worlds where almost anything is possible. Sometimes these worlds are real. Sometimes they’re fiction. Sometimes they are shared worlds set across multiple features or series.

What if — and stay with us for a minute here — the live action movies and TV shows starring talking animals are all part of a shared universe?

How? We have three conflicting theories, each of them completely plausible and foolproof. One of them is a biological miracle. One of them is horrifying for the animals. And the last one is terrifying for humans.

Going nuclear

In 1961, a horse who possessed the capability of speaking and understanding the English language made his gift known to humanity. His name was Mister Ed. Mister Ed was a horse (of course) who chose to speak through quips and witticisms than contemplate the troubling and haunting question of his only existence in a world that was not built for him yet.

In the very first episode of his series, his delightfully goofy human companion Wilbur Post exclaims, “This whole thing is fantastic! I just don’t understand it.”

Mr. Ed, responds with the crudely comedic, “Don’t try to. It’s bigger than both of us.” 

What is poised as a comedic turn of phrase from a palomino (who totally doesn’t have peanut butter in his mouth to make him look like he is talking) is actually a rather peculiar statement. What is greater than possibly the first sentient and linguistically capable talking horse? A nuclear bomb? 

In the early 1960s, the United States government performed several nuclear bomb tests at the Los Alamos facility in Sante Fe, New Mexico (as explained here by actual journalist Mark Kaufman). Los Alamos became the testing facility for the Manhattan Project and the site for more than 50 tests between 1960 and 1961. Los Alamos was arguably so under wraps in its heyday that it’s uncertain what other kinds of testing were at play there. 

The talking animals are victims of tragedy.

We’re not trying to make light of the incalculable tragedies of nuclear warfare. We’re just trying to say that all talking animals are definitely a result of reckless nuclear testing that affected animals in the area. 

A single horse clearly wasn’t the only animal affected by this. Post Mister Ed, we see more instances of films in which animals talk amongst one another, but rarely to humans. 

Truthfully, the talking animals are tragic figures — animals isolated from their own species and forced into the oppressive system of pet ownership. 

But by the ’90s, with movies like Air Bud (he couldn’t talk but had abnormal sports prowess), Paulie, and of course Babe, there was a small hope in the gifted animals that there might have been some community formed with the humans. Not only were there more species of talking animals, there were several generations of them (e.g. the Air Buddies saga).

As talking animal media progressed in the 2000s, animals were fully integrated and assimilated into human society. The iconic television series Dog With a Blog marked the current zenith of talking animal abilities, in which they are able to coexist alongside and even masquerade as humans on the internet. 

Such is one optimistic possibility for these talking creatures. While these animals are not widely known by humans, there seems at least to be the potential for a more peaceful future. 

But perhaps there’s a different reason that all these animals gained the ability to speak.

The power of Mewtwo

In Detective Pikachu, we see an interesting power of Mewtwo’s. As one of the most powerful Pokémon in the Pokémon universe, Mewtwo has the ability to combine Pokémon and humans into a single being, with the human’s mind taking over the Pokémon’s body while the human body disappears.

It’s a disturbing event in the movie, but it could help explain how animals have ended up talking in movies and TV shows like Stuart Little, Cats and Dogs, and Mister Ed.

You see, there are these things called Ultra Wormholes that were introduced to the Pokémon universe in 2016’s Pokémon Sun and Moon games. These mysterious Ultra Wormholes, formed by specific Legendary Pokémon and perhaps sometimes opened through other means, can be used to travel to Ultra Space, a sort of interdimensional space with paths to other universes.

One of these universes could be an alternate version of our own universe, and it’s possible that Mewtwo may have traveled to the talking animal universe through an Ultra Wormhole.

Upon seeing this world where there are no Pokémon, perhaps Mewtwo sought ways to improve the intelligence of the animals and make them more Pokémon-like. Perhaps he melded a human being into the body of an animal. Maybe that’s how we got Milo and Otis, the stars of Milo and Otis. 

Mewtwo works in mysterious ways.

The animals don’t know that they are being occupied by humans because, as Detective Pikachu establishes, the animals would experience amnesia and not remember their past lives as humans.

It’s completely logical to look at movies like Homeward Bound, Stuart Little, and Beverly Hills Chihuahua and view them as a single universe. We are peering into an alternate dimension wherein Mewtwo is floating around like a god, combining humans and animals seemingly at random.

SEE ALSO: ‘Detective Pikachu’ is so pure, you’ll forget it’s Deadpool talking to you

Except we never see Mewtwo do this. He’s a puppet master with invisible strings, injecting the guinea pigs of G-Force with human intelligence, giving Babe the pig complex thought and speech. It’s a terrifying prospect knowing that these people are trapped inside the bodies of animals.

At the surface, Babe seems like an adorable, smart little pig who’s just happy to be living. Underneath that, though, is a trapped spirit, blissful in its ignorance of its own Cronenbergian flesh prison. A human life is essentially lost in Mewtwo’s pursuit of animal-human hybridization.

To what end? We don’t know. Mewtwo works in mysterious ways. 

Alien invasion

Finally, we cannot ignore the possibility that this alternate Earth — the one all these talking animals live in — has been invaded, not by a Mewtwo with unimaginable powers, but by aliens masquerading as animals.

In Men in Black, there’s a pug named Frank who wears a little suit and can speak in clear English. It’s later revealed that Frank isn’t a dog at all, but an alien who has shape-shifted into the form of an animal.

Could it be possible that all of these animals in the Talking Animal Cinematic Universe, from Mister Ed to the blogging dog Stan, are actually aliens that have transformed themselves into familiar animals to gain humanity’s trust, grow closer to people, and learn from them?

There are at least three alien species that can disguise themselves at Earth mammals, according to Men in Black. 

There are the Remoolians, which is what Frank is. Remoolians are thought to be small aliens that can only shape shift into small mammals. As far as we know, Frank is the only Remoolian that traveled to Earth, but it’s quite possible that others arrived at various times in history and disguised themselves as other dogs and small mammals.

Then there’s the Cephalapoids, a race of aliens that can convincingly disguise themselves as humans. They’re seen working alongside Edgar the Bug who is of an third, insect-like species that can also disguise itself by wearing the skin of humans. There’s no saying that these creatures can’t disguise themselves as something other than humans.

Edgar the Bug and his agents are intergalactic terrorists in search of powerful weapons and information. Why not disguise themselves as various animal companions to gain the trust of humans in this alternate talking animal universe? It’s much easier to trust an animal than a human, after all.

While some animal/Remoolian hybrids are just enjoying their lives on Earth, these others are timidly plotting their destruction of humanity. Mister Ed is not as innocent as he seems, if this is all true.

Good thing this isn’t happening in our universe.

Imagine taking an Apple MacBook Pro with a Touch Bar, then stretching that Touch Bar down to occupy nearly half of the space where the keyboard usually resides. 

That’s pretty much what Asus’ new ZenBook Pro Duo laptop looks like, and while we’re not quite sure about the concept’s usefulness yet, we have to give Asus credit for sheer bravado in launching such a product. 

SEE ALSO: HP’s new gaming laptop has 2 screens

The concept is similar to HP’s Omen X 2S laptop, which also has a smaller screen below the regular screen and above the keyboard. But while HP’s secondary screen measures a meagre 6 inches, the Asus ZenBook Pro Duo has an ultra-wide, 4K touchscreen with a 14-inch diagonal, which can easily fit several apps side-by-side. 

And besides the ScreenPad Plus, which is how Asus calls its secondary screen, the laptop actually has a third screen, in the form of a trackpad that doubles as a number pad. 

The ZenBook Pro Duo will surely take some getting used to. Its keyboard appears a bit crammed, and the trackpad is placed to the right (instead of directly below) of the keyboard. But if you’re really hurting for screen real estate, it might all be worth it. Imagine being able to have a chat window open while playing a game in full screen, or being able to take notes on the secondary screen (yes, it supports styluses and one is included) while watching a full-screen video. 

With so many screens, one might wonder why Asus hasn’t gone all in and simply turned the entire lower half of the laptop into a giant screen, à la Lenovo Yoga Book. But having tried that device’s virtual keyboard, I’d say that a real physical keyboard is still preferable for any amount of serious work or gaming. 

The rest of the ZenBook Pro Duo’s specs are pretty good as well. Its main screen is a 15-inch, 4K OLED panel, and the laptop can be configured to have up to an 8-core Intel Core i9 processor and an Nvidia GeForce RTX 2060 graphics chip. It also has a Thunderbolt 3 port, two USB-A ports, an HDMI port and a headphone jack, as well as two big cooling vents, one on each side.

Asus also announced the Zenbook Duo, a smaller version of the dual-screen laptop, with a 14-inch main screen and a 12.6-inch secondary screen and specs which max out at an Intel Core i7 processor and an Nvidia GeForce MX250 graphics chip. 

Pricing for the ZenBook Pro Duo and the ZenBook Duo has not been announced yet, but Asus says both will be available in the third quarter of 2019.  

Disney’s highly anticipated Aladdin is here, but we know better than to expect anything groundbreaking from another needless live-action adaptation. While remake has pleasantly surprised most critics with colorful costumes and charismatic leads, Aladdin‘s signature songs are its biggest disappointment.

From Mashable’s own Angie Han: “Guy Ritchie and his team seem to have no idea how to stage and shoot a musical number,” which is precisely the opposite of what you want to hear about the director of a movie musical (much less one who was married to Madonna).

So, where and how did Aladdin botch its opportunities for movie musical greatness? Let us count the ways.

SEE ALSO: The new Aladdin is the best part of Disney’s new ‘Aladdin’

Aladdin is tricky to negotiate from a representational standpoint because it was never based on one specific culture. The animated film was an amalgam of Middle Eastern and South Asian visual inspirations, and the live-action takes this at face value, doing the same and adding literally nothing to it. This piece references Bollywood dance numbers a few times, not because of any confusion about where Aladdin takes place, but because India has a booming film industry that thrives on movie musicals that Disney would’ve done well to study.

It’s disappointing to see that in attempting to pay homage to Eastern dance traditions, Aladdin opted to go the So You Think You Can Dance route and whittle these art forms down to what the West already recognizes of them. American reality shows have gladly co-opted Indian dance in particular and repackaged only the most harsh, angular movements (which I’ve written about before – and before before) – so the end result looks more like fitness than fine art. 

Dozens of Middle Eastern dance styles go unknown in the West, while bellydance has been sanitized and mainstreamed for popular consumption, much like yoga. Erasing the grace and expression of these styles strips away what makes them so irresistible to watch in the first place.

The dancing in live-action Aladdin features a conspicuously high amount of tutting, which features prominently in funk and hip hop (choreographer Jamal Sims specializes in hip hop). These dance moves draw inspiration from ancient Egyptian drawings to create geometric shapes with the body, but tutting only gained popularity in the last century. 

It doesn’t help that during almost every dance sequence in Aladdin, the footage appears to have been specially shot so that the dancers move faster than most human beings are physically capable of doing. It’s a jarring visual choice that you’ll sense even if you’re not a dancer, the same way you just sense when an actor has been digitally de-aged or otherwise altered from our known reality.

That decision does demonstrate the filmmakers’ awareness of screen vs. stage possibilities, but unfortunately they don’t push it much further. Live-action Aladdin means adding digital flair with magic and flying carpets, but it also means the songs have freedom to cut between locations or costumes, and to cut together choreography that would physically limit stage actors who have to perform it in one run instead of with breaks. 

Yet none of these advantages are used. Other than those weirdly sped-up portions, the Aladdin choreography is shockingly low-energy, with the most offensive choice being to not fill the frame within an inch of its life.

Take for example, the 2017 Bollywood song “Malhari” from the movie Bajirao Mastani. Lead actor Ranveer Singh always exudes energy, even with simple movements. The camera tracks his motion, and the frame is bursting with dancers at any given moment. Dozens if not hundreds of men populate the frame, some appearing as mere shadows in the background or entering for four counts just to throw powder in the air:

In contrast, every wide shot of “Prince Ali” reminds you that there are maybe two dozen dancers in the whole number. There’s always empty space between the parade and Agrabah’s onlookers, and whenever the frame is full the background actors simply stand and cheer. There’s dizzying color where there should be choreographed chaos.

This is baffling. Disney is hardly struggling with a budget that won’t allow for more dancers or extras. Aladdin is not a movie constricted by reality; a hundred more dancers, hype men, and animals could be thrown in here and explained away as “genie magic” (an explanation used in the film for Aladdin’s Clark Kent-level disguise as Ali).

SEE ALSO: ‘Aladdin’ review roundup: What critics thought of Disney’s live-action remake

Multiple Middle Eastern dance traditions incorporate props or objects and would have made for spectacular visuals in Aladdin. The shamadan from Egypt incorporates a large candelabrum for wedding celebrations. The ardah features men holding swords or sticks and is literally derived from an Arabic “to parade.” The song could’ve used a dance break interlude to showcase any of these styles, but instead the only major change it undergoes is the new lyric “Heard your princess was HOT, where is she?” 

A new scene has Aladdin and Jasmine dancing together at a party the Sultan hosts in the palace (dear Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, who are definitely not reading this: Here is where you should’ve added a musical number, not Jasmine’s straight-out-of-Hit-List-in-Smash-Season-2 power ballad). 

This is a prime opportunity to build chemistry, but it’s painfully tepid. I wouldn’t have cared if they redid that one Bride and Prejudice song shot-for-shot with Middle Eastern folk dance inspiration. Aladdin and Jasmine join the rest of the dancers in a circular formation that lends itself to Middle Eastern and East African folk dances including dabke and līwa, or even Indian garba, but they do none of these. They don’t even look at each other like this!

Jasmine and the other women do partake of some social belly dance, which is culturally accurate even if the choreography is nothing amazing and modern belly dance only evolved in the last century or two (and despite the cultural permission, Aladdin decides Jasmine’s midriff is too scandalous to ever be seen). 

Perhaps Aladdin limited itself based on the strengths of its actors, but this itself is a restriction of the stage musical mindset. Your star does not have to be your best dancer or singer (nor is there any shame in playback singing), but should have the charisma to captivate an audience even when surrounded by chaos. Aladdin doesn’t even give its leads that chance.

Let’s be real. You’re going to take your phone to the beach. How could you not? So let’s make sure it doesn’t meet its untimely end there.

There are three main issues to consider when beach-proofing your device: sun, sand, and moisture. You don’t want your phone to overheat, you don’t want it to get sand in its ports and crevices, and you definitely don’t want it to get wet. 

Take these precautions and you’ll be able to enjoy your beach day in peace. Unless you get sand under your swimsuit, in which case … may god be with you.

Keep it cool

Your phone runs the risk of overheating on a hot day, especially if it’s sitting out in direct sunlight. To keep it safe, store it under a bit of shade — your beach umbrella, perhaps. Popular Science suggests keeping it under a t-shirt or a corner of your beach towel (but not in the sand!). Whatever you do, don’t leave it in your car or in an enclosed, compact space like your pocket. Too hot!

If your phone does start to overheat, turn it off immediately. It’s probably best to wait until you’re in a cooler place before you turn it back on. If you have one handy, hold it in front of a gentle fan or a hairdryer on the “cool” setting.

Keep it dry

Yes, we all know the (dubious) rice trick, but the better option is to not let your phone get wet in the first place. 

Sure, there are “waterproof” phone cases and beach pouches out there, but the easiest preventative measure is to keep your phone in a sealed plastic sandwich bag when you’re not using it. Speaking of, you should be using it as little as possible — for one thing, you’ll probably have a hard time seeing the screen in the sunlight, and besides, you’re at the beach anyway. There’s other stuff to look at.

Please don’t bring your phone with you into the ocean and try to hoist it above the water. 

SEE ALSO: If you want to stay cool this summer, don’t be afraid to look corny

Keep it sand-free

As the flawless character Anakin Skywalker once said, “I hate sand. It’s coarse and rough and irritating and it gets everywhere.” Agreed!

It’s particularly important to keep sand away from your phone’s ports. If any finds its way into your charging port, your device could lose its ability to charge — or stop functioning entirely. Sand can also slip into the corners of your case and screen protector, which can be a real nightmare to remove. If it really gets in there, it could even scratch your screen.

Luckily, you should be in the clear if you’re already keeping your phone in a sandwich bag. (For extra preparedness, try a dust plug.) If you’re the designated DJ for the day (congratulations), consider making a Spotify playlist ahead of time, pressing play when you arrive, then stowing your phone away immediately. You can rest easy knowing you won’t accidentally drop your phone in the sand. Plus, no one will be able to request songs or hijack the queue if your phone is inaccessible. This means that a) Their sunscreen-y hands will remain off your screen, and b) your flawless musical curation will play as you intended.

You could also opt to operate your phone using only voice commands. Will you look weird saying “Hey Siri” every three seconds? Yes. But your phone’s already in a plastic bag, so you look weird anyway.

OK, but what if I want to go in the water?

It’s a classic beach question: How do you keep your stuff from getting stolen while you’re in the water? If you’re in a large group, you could take shifts staying behind with everyone’s phones and wallets, but that kind of sucks. So what do you do? 

The easiest preventative measure is to keep your phone in a sealed plastic bag.

The definitive resource on the subject seems to be a New York Times story from 2016, for which friends of the author submitted their go-to methods for hiding their valuables. There are a lot of genuinely great suggestions and a few deeply weird ones. Some are even both: stowing your cash in an empty sunscreen bottle, for instance, or hiding your phone in a dirty-looking diaper.

Clean it when you get home

When you return from your beautiful beach journey, give your phone a quick cleaning. Employing a small can of compressed air is a popular choice, but Apple actually cautions against this approach, suggesting a “soft, slightly damp, light-free cloth” like a lens cloth instead. If you want to sanitize your phone, this BuzzFeed guide suggests making a solution of half distilled water and half 70 percent isopropyl alcohol, then gently wiping everything down.

And be sure to turn off your phone before you begin the cleaning process. You don’t want it to short circuit. Imagine if those six hours it spent in a Ziploc were for nothing!

Upcoming iPhones might get the ability to send Bluetooth audio to two different devices. 

This is according to a report by Japanese blog Mac Otakara (via MacRumors), which cites sources from the Asian supply chain. 

SEE ALSO: Look at These Teeny Tiny Phones

You can already connect one iPhone to several Bluetooth devices — a watch, a speaker, a car — but you currently cannot send Bluetooth audio to two different audio devices. 

With this new functionality, two users could listen to tunes on one iPhone using two pairs of AirPods. Or you could have the phone send GPS directions to a car’s audio system, while transmitting audio to a pair of headphones at the same time. 

The feature sounds nifty but isn’t exactly new — Samsung phones which support Bluetooth 5.0 already have it under the “Dual Audio” moniker. 

Unfortunately, Mac Otakara does not say which iPhones might get this functionality, but we’re not exclusively talking about future iPhones. Certain iPhone models, including iPhone XS, iPhone X and iPhone 8 have Bluetooth 5.0 on board, so it might be possible for Apple to bring the functionality to these phones, as well as some upcoming models. 

Other rumors about the new iPhones, which are likely coming in September in three flavors (5.8-inch and 6.5-inch models with OLED screens, and a 6.1-inch model with an LCD screen), include a triple rear camera, bigger batteries and reverse wireless charging. 

Nowadays, most computer users don’t need to worry about the exact specifications of the chips running in their machines — a mid-range processor will run the majority of common tasks without issues. 

But every once in a while comes a processor that promises to make everyday computers far more powerful without breaking the bank. AMD’s new Ryzen 9 3900X, launched at Computex trade show on Sunday, is one such processor. 

SEE ALSO: HP Chromebook 14 review: Does the job, but value is questionable

The Ryzen 9 3900X is a 12-core, desktop processor built on AMD’s 7-nanometer architecture, that performs a little better (according to AMD) than Intel’s top-of-the-line Core i9-9920X processor. Despite the performance boost, AMD’s chip has a better power efficiency than Intel’s offering, with a 105W TDP (thermal design power), compared to Intel’s 165W TDP. 

But the biggest deal here is the price: Compared to Core i9-9920X, which costs roughly $1,200, the Ryzen 9 3900X is an absolute bargain at $499. 

Of course, AMD’s performance numbers (in one example, the company says the 3900X beats the i9-9920X by 16% in a Blender render) will be tested by independent experts in following months, and surely Intel will have something to say about them as well. But the 3900X still sounds almost too good to be true. 

To be clear: The Ryzen 9 3900X is a gaming-oriented desktop processor, and as such will be primarily interesting to users pushing the FPS counts on latest games. But again, at that price point, it will surely make its way into configurations of many power users and enthusiasts who are looking for a powerful machine without spending gaming-desktop-dollars on it.

On Sunday, AMD also introduced several cheaper chips, including the $399 8-core Ryzen 7 3800X and the $329 Ryzen 7 3700X (which has an astoundingly low 65W TDP). All three chips are based on AMD’s new Zen 2 architecture, which should perform 15% better than the previous iteration of the tech. Given the Ryzen 9 3900X’s low price, users aiming for maximum performance will likely go for the top chip, while those looking for a performer that’s less power-hungry will probably choose the 3700X. 

AMD’s new processors will become available on July 7. 

Facebook has come under criticism for not doing enough on dog fighting, a practice which is illegal in numerous countries around the world.

The report, published by animal rights organisation Lady Freethinker, highlights how dog fighting content is easily found on the platform, and how the company has failed to enforce its own policies against the practice.

Between Oct. 2018 and Feb. 2019, the organisation found 2,000 posts which promoted dogfighting or trafficking animals used for fighting, more than 150 pages, groups and profiles actively involved in the practice, plus 160,563 members in the top five pages and groups.

SEE ALSO: Whistleblower says Facebook’s algorithms generate extremist videos

The organisation’s investigator reported 26 posts to Facebook for violating its policies, with all but six removed from the platform. These posts were found by using common keywords which are associated with dog fighting, with some of these terms coded.

“Facebook has become ground zero for discussing the merits of particular dogs and breeders, often on closed forums. Many of the pages and groups use coded terminology the average reader might not understand,” the report explains.

“A dog could be described as a ‘grand champion’ with five wins (Gr Ch) or a ‘champion’ with three wins (Ch), or a promoter may reference the box the dogs fight in (4×4).”

In a statement to The Guardian, Lady Freethinker founder Nina Jackel said the “level of violence and exploitation of dogs is appalling.”

“Facebook is often used as a platform for advocacy to effect positive change, but as our report shows, it is failing to protect innocent animals from abuse and possible death. By not enforcing its own policies against animal cruelty, Facebook is complicit in perpetuating criminal acts against dogs,” she told the newspaper.

A Facebook spokesperson reiterated that content promoting or depicting staged animal fights is not allowed on the platform.

“We’re grateful to Lady Freethinker for bringing these posts to our attention and we have contacted them so we can get the information we need to investigate this content,” the spokesperson said.

“If people see something on Facebook they think breaks our Community Standards, we encourage them to report it using the tools on our platform so our teams can investigate and take action.”