title: Grantchester (TV series)

text: The first episode of the fifth series continues to feature Will Davenport as vicar of Grantchester. The plot centres around the students of two colleges at the University of Cambridge: a 'prestigious all-female college' (the real-life women's college Newnham College, Cambridge) and a fictional men's college (filmed at St John's College, Cambridge). The sixth series expanded to eight episodes, rather than the standard six.


title: Grantchester (TV series)

text: On 28 July 2021, ITV announced that filming for the seventh series of Grantchester had begun, with the series due for release on 11 March 2022, with Tom Brittney directing for the first time. On 19 August 2022, ITV announced that an eighth series had been commissioned and filming had begun, with its release scheduled for spring 2023.


title: Grantchester (TV series)

text: The first episode was generally well received by the critics. Michael Pilgrim of "The Daily Telegraph" wrote: "Delightfully neat and economical of plot, it’s Cluedo with cassocks and just enough noir for the modern palate. Victoria sponge with a tablespoon of battery acid." He added that "There could be a worse antidote than Grantchester" in a grim October in the early 21st century. Ellen Jones of "The Independent " thought the programme "delightful, a new treat for fans of period-set, gently paced detective series like "Endeavour", and also for fans of top TV totty James Norton." Nancy deWolf Smith of "The Wall Street Journal" wrote, ""Grantchester" is a revelation."


title: Grantchester (TV series)

text: The first series was given a Metacritic score of 70 based on 14 reviews, indicating a generally favourable reception.


title: Grantchester (TV series)

text: The first series was broadcast in the UK on ITV starting 6 October 2014. The show premiered in the United States on 18 January 2015 on "Masterpiece Mystery" on PBS. It premiered in Australia on 28 February 2015 on ABC. A French version premiered on France 3 from 12 July 2015. Series two was broadcast on PBS in the US from 27 March 2016. The series was licensed to Amazon Prime in a multi-year deal; that network gained the rights to air the episodes of all series after PBS affiliates had done so. On Amazon Prime, the 2016 Christmas Special listed in the Episodes section below is identified as Episode 1 of Series 3, with a total of seven episodes in the series.


title: Grantchester (TV series)

text: Episodes for the eighth series began production in August 2022. The storyline had reached the 1960s, similar decade to ITV's rival crime drama "Endeavour".


title: Grantchester (TV series)

text: All of the principal actors had returned and three new ones were added. The producers provided a few hints as to the relationships; not all was expected to go smoothly. "Unfortunately, it looks like Will and Geordie have some tough times ahead of them following the peaceful end to series seven."


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: Contagion is a 2011 American medical thriller film directed by Steven Soderbergh. Its ensemble cast includes Matt Damon, Laurence Fishburne, Elliott Gould, Jude Law, Gwyneth Paltrow, Kate Winslet, Bryan Cranston, Jennifer Ehle, Sanaa Lathan, and Marion Cotillard. The plot concerns the spread of a highly contagious virus transmitted by respiratory droplets and fomites, attempts by medical researchers and public health officials to identify and contain the disease, the loss of social order as the virus turns into a worldwide pandemic, and the introduction of a vaccine to halt its spread. To follow several interacting plot lines, the film makes use of the multi-narrative "hyperlink cinema" style, popularized in several of Soderbergh's films.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: Following their collaboration on "The Informant!" (2009), Soderbergh and screenwriter Scott Z. Burns discussed a film depicting the rapid spread of a virus. Burns consulted with representatives of the World Health Organization as well as medical experts such as W. Ian Lipkin and Larry Brilliant. Principal photography started in Hong Kong in September 2010, and continued in Chicago, Atlanta, London, Dublin, Geneva, and San Francisco Bay Area until February 2011.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: "Contagion" premiered at the 68th Venice International Film Festival in Venice, Italy on September 3, 2011, and was theatrically released on September 9, 2011. Commercially, the film made $136.5 million against its $60 million production budget. Critics praised it for its narrative and the performances, as did scientists for its accuracy. The film received renewed popularity in 2020 due to the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: Returning from a Hong Kong business trip, Beth Emhoff has an affair with her ex-boyfriend during a Chicago layover and is feeling a little bit sick, to which she attributes jet lag. Two days later, back home in suburban Minneapolis, Beth's husband, Mitch, rushes her to the hospital when she suffers a seizure; she dies from an unknown illness. Returning home, Mitch finds that his 6-year-old stepson, Clark, has also died. Mitch is isolated but found to be naturally immune. After being released, he protectively keeps his teenage daughter, Jory, quarantined at home.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: In Atlanta, Department of Homeland Security representatives meet with Dr. Ellis Cheever of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) over concerns that the disease may be a bioweapon. Cheever dispatches Dr. Erin Mears, an Epidemic Intelligence Service officer, to Minneapolis where she traces everyone having had contact with Beth. She negotiates with reluctant local bureaucrats to commit resources for a public health response. Soon after, Mears becomes infected and dies. As the novel virus spreads, several cities are placed under quarantine, causing panic buying, widespread looting, and violence.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: At the CDC, Dr. Ally Hextall determines the virus is a combination of genetic material from pig and bat-borne viruses. Scientists are unable to discover a cell culture to grow the newly identified MEV-1. Cheever determines the virus too virulent to be researched at multiple labs and restricts all work to one government site. Hextall orders UCSF researcher Dr. Ian Sussman to destroy his samples. Believing he is close to finding a viable cell culture, Sussman violates the order and identifies a usable cell culture, from which Hextall develops a vaccine. Scientists determine the virus is spread by respiratory droplets and fomites, with an R of four when the virus mutates; they project that 1 in 12 of the world population will be infected, with a 25–30% mortality rate.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: Conspiracy theorist Alan Krumwiede blogs about the virus. He claims to have cured himself of the virus using a homeopathic cure derived from forsythia. People seeking forsythia violently overwhelm pharmacies. Krumwiede, having faked being infected to boost sales of forsythia, is arrested for conspiracy and securities fraud.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: Hextall inoculates herself with the experimental vaccine, then visits her infected father. She does not contract MEV-1 and the vaccine is declared a success. The CDC awards vaccinations by lottery based on birthdates. By this time, the pandemic's death toll has reached 2.5 million in the U.S. and 26 million worldwide.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: Earlier in Hong Kong, WHO epidemiologist Dr. Leonora Orantes and public health officials comb through security videotapes of Beth's contacts in a Macau casino and identify her as the index case. Government official Sun Feng kidnaps Orantes as leverage to obtain a vaccine for his village, holding her for months. WHO officials provide the village with the earliest vaccines, and she is released. When she learns the vaccines were placebos, she goes to warn the village. Mitch stages a home "prom" for Jory after her boyfriend Andrew receives the vaccine, as life begins to return to normal.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: In a flashback to the spillover event, a bulldozer from Emhoff's company clears rainforest in China, disturbing bats. One bat finds shelter in a pig farm and drops an infected piece of banana that is then consumed by a pig. The pig is then slaughtered and is prepared by a chef in a Macau casino, who, without washing his hands, transmits the virus to Beth via a handshake.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: Additionally, the film also stars John Hawkes as Roger, CDC custodian and acquaintance of Dr. Cheever; Anna Jacoby-Heron as Jory Emhoff, daughter of Mitch Emhoff; Josie Ho as the sister of Li Fai, who was the first to be infected with MEV-1 in Hong Kong; Sanaa Lathan as Aubrey Cheever, fiancée of Dr. Cheever; Demetri Martin as Dr. David Eisenberg, CDC colleague of Dr. Hextall; Armin Rohde as Damian Leopold, a WHO official; Enrico Colantoni as Dennis French, a Department of Homeland Security official; Larry Clarke as Dave, a Minnesota health official working with Dr. Mears; and Monique Gabriela Curnen as Lorraine Vasquez, a print journalist for the "San Francisco Chronicle".


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: Story development for "Contagion" coincided with Burns' collaboration with Soderbergh in "The Informant!" (2009). The duo had initially planned to create a biographical film on Leni Riefenstahl, a trailblazer in German cinema during the 1930s and a figure in the rise of the Nazi Party. Soderbergh later contacted Burns to cancel the project, as he thought that a film about Riefenstahl would struggle to attract an audience. Intrigued with the field of transmission, Burns suggested that they instead create a film that centered on a pandemic situation—"an interesting thriller version of a pandemic movie". His main objective was to construct a medical thriller that "really felt like what could happen".


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: Burns consulted with Larry Brilliant, renowned for his work in eradicating smallpox, to develop an accurate perception of a pandemic event. He had seen one of Brilliant's TED presentations, which he was fascinated by, and realized that "the point of view of people within that field isn't 'If this is going to happen', it's 'When is this going to happen? Brilliant introduced Burns to epidemiologist W. Ian Lipkin. With the aid of these physicians, the producers were able to obtain additional perspectives from representatives of the World Health Organization. Burns also met with the author of "The Coming Plague", Laurie Garrett. Her 1995 book helped Burns consider a variety of potential plots for the film. He wanted to feature an official from the CDC, and ultimately decided to use an epidemiologist, since that role requires interacting with people while tracking the disease.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: Although he had done research on pandemics six months prior to the 2009 flu pandemic, that outbreak enhanced his understanding of the societal apparatus that responds during the onset stages of a pandemic. To him, it was not solely the virus itself that one had to be concerned about, but how society handles the situation. "I saw them come to life", Burns said, "and I saw issues about, 'Well, do you close the schools and if you close the schools, then who stays home with the kids? And will everyone keep their kids at home?' Things happening online, which is where the Jude Law character came from, that there's going to be information that comes out online where people want to be ahead of the curve, so some people will write things about anti-virals or different treatment protocols, and so there's always going to be an information and that information also has sort of a viral pulse."


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: In conjunction with overseeing the directing process, Soderbergh functioned as a cinematographer for "Contagion". The film was wholly shot using Red Digital Cinema's RED One MX digital camera, which has a 4.5K image resolution. Since he hoped for the premise to be authentic and "as realistic as possible", Soderbergh opted not to film in the studio. "There's, to me, nothing more satisfying occasionally than making someplace look like someplace else on film and having nobody know the difference." For choosing cities, Soderbergh felt that they couldn't "go anywhere where one of our characters hasn't been", since he wanted to portray an "epic", yet "intimate" scenario. He explained,


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: We can't cut to a city or a group of extras that we've never been to that we don’t know personally. That was our rule. And that’s a pretty significant rule to adhere to in a movie in which you're trying to give a sense of something that’s happening on a large scale, but we felt that all of the elements that we had issues with prior, when we see any kind of disaster film, we're centered around that idea.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: Principal photography started in Hong Kong in September 2010, and continued for approximately two weeks. Soderbergh was originally hoping to also film in mainland China, though Moviefone journalist David Ehrlich believed that permission from the Chinese government was unlikely to be forthcoming. Although producers also intended to establish a filming location in one of the many casinos in Macau, the Jumbo Floating Restaurant in Hong Kong's Aberdeen Harbour was used instead for the casino setting, as filming within the vicinity of a gambling establishment is prohibited by law. To move the equipment for the casino scenes to the on-the-water location, producers hired a number of locals to carry out the task, as they were accustomed to "using sampans like trucks". Additional locations included the Hong Kong International Airport, InterContinental Hong Kong, and the Princess Margaret Hospital.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: Principal photography relocated in the following month to Chicago, Illinois, which served as the nexus for production. Much of the cityscape and its surrounding suburbs were used to emulate Minneapolis, Minnesota, and Atlanta, Georgia, in addition to serving as backdrop for Chicago itself. Since principal photography occurred during the winter months, snowfall was a prerequisite in simulating a "persistent coldness" that encompassed "a hypersensitive kind of glare". Within the city limits, filming locations were installed at the Shedd Aquarium, O'Hare International Airport, and Midway Airport. Arguably the largest sets were at the General Jones Armory, which was converted into an infirmary, and a major location shoot occurred in Waukegan, about 40 miles north of Chicago, where a portion of the Amstutz Expressway was used to simulate the Dan Ryan Expressway. Production also took place at Sherman Hospital in Elgin and Central Elementary School in Wilmette, and also in Downtown Western Springs, where the grocery store scene was filmed.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: Filming moved once again in January 2011 to the Druid Hills quadrant of Atlanta, which contains the headquarters of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The restricted nature of the CDC campus meant that producers were only allowed to shoot exterior scenes of the area, as well as within the parking garage and reception area for the CDC's museum onsite. Principal photography then proceeded into Atlanta's central business district and Decatur, before advancing to London, Geneva, and lastly San Francisco, California, in the ensuing month. The San Francisco Film Commission charged filmmakers $300 per day for production within the city limits. In the North Beach and Potrero Hill sections of the city, production designer Howard Cummings scattered trash and discarded clothing on the ground to depict the rapid decline of civilization. For the Civic Center set, over 2,000 extras were sought for in background roles; actors who were a part of the Screen Actors Guild were paid $139 per day, while nonunion workers received $64 per day for their work. Other filming locations were established at Golden Gate Park, Chinatown, and Candlestick Park; it cost $60,000 to rent the football stadium for six days. Genentech Hall at the University of California, San Francisco Mission Bay campus was used for filming also, renamed Mendel Hall for the occasion.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: Cliff Martinez composed the film's soundtrack, which was his first big-screen score for Soderbergh since "Solaris" in 2002. Given that the pacing of the music was one of Soderbergh's biggest concerns, Martinez needed to maintain a brisk pace throughout the soundtrack, while also conveying fear and hope within the music. "I tried to create the sound of anxiety. And at key, strategic moments I tried to use the music to conjure up the sense of tragedy and loss." Martinez incorporated orchestral elements, and fused them with the predominantly electronic sounds of the score. He noted that the "sound palette for "Contagion" came by way of combining three very different approaches Steven went through as he was cutting the film." Martinez received a rough cut for the film in October 2010, which contained music that was imbued with elements of "The French Connection" (1971) and "Marathon Man" (1976). He "loved" those two soundtracks, and composed a few pieces in their style. A few months later, he acquired a new cut, which included music influenced by German electronic group Tangerine Dream. Toward the end, Soderbergh changed again and used contemporary soundtrack music that was "more energetic and more rhythmic". Ultimately, Martinez used aspects of all three approaches: "I reasoned that combining them would not only be effective but would give the score a style all its own." The score was released by WaterTower Music in September 2011.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: Soderbergh was motivated to make an "ultra-realistic" film about public health and scientific response to a pandemic. The film's "hyperlink style" (often quickly moving back and forth from geographically distant places and persons) emphasizes both the historically new perils of contemporary networked globalization and timeless qualities of the human condition (recalling famous literary treatments of epidemics, such as Albert Camus's "The Plague"). The movie touches on a variety of themes, including the factors which drive mass panic and collapse of social order, the scientific process for characterizing and containing a novel pathogen, balancing personal motives against professional responsibilities and ethics in the face of an existential threat, the limitations and consequences of public health responses, and the pervasiveness of interpersonal connections which can serve as vectors to spread disease. Soderbergh acknowledged the salience of these post-apocalyptic themes is heightened by reactions to the September 11 attacks and Hurricane Katrina. The movie was intended to realistically convey the "intense" and "unnerving" social and scientific reactions to a pandemic. The real-life epidemics such as the 2002–2004 SARS outbreak and the 2009 flu pandemic have been inspirations and influences in the film. The chain of contagion involving bats and pigs is reminiscent of the trail of the Nipah virus (which infects cells in the respiratory and nervous systems, the same cells as the virus in the movie) that originated in Malaysia in 1997, which similarly involved the disturbance of a bat colony by deforestation. In fact, the film uses a Nipah virus protein model in a scene describing the recombination found in the fictional paramyxovirus.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: The film presents examples of crowd psychology and collective behavior which can lead to mass hysteria and the loss of social order. The bafflement, outrage, and helplessness associated with the lack of information, combined with new media such as blogs, allow conspiracy theorists like Krumwiede to spread disinformation and fear, which become dangerous contagions themselves. Dr. Cheever must balance the need for full disclosure but avoid a panic and allow the time to characterize and respond to an unknown virus. The movie indirectly critiques the greed, selfishness, and hypocrisy of isolated acts in contemporary culture and the unintended consequences they can have in the context of a pandemic. For example, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends social distancing by forcibly isolating the healthy to limit the spread of the disease, which stands in stark opposition to contemporary demands for social networking. Responding to the pandemic presents a paradox, as the contagiousness and lethality of the virus instills deep distrust of others but surviving and limiting the spread of the disease also requires individuals to work together.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: Against this existential threat and fraying social order, the film also explores how individual characters bend or break existing rules for both selfish and selfless reasons. Dr. Hextall violates protocols by testing a potential vaccine on herself, Dr. Sussman continues experiments on a cell line despite orders to destroy his samples, Dr. Cheever notifies his fiancée to leave the city before a public quarantine is imposed, Sun Feng kidnaps Dr. Orantes to secure vaccine supplies for his village, Dr. Mears continues her containment work despite contracting the virus, and Krumwiede is paid to use his blog to peddle snake oil cures so as to drive demand and profit for investors in alternative medicine. Soderbergh repeatedly uses the cinematographic style of lingering and focusing on the items and objects which are touched by the infected and become vectors (fomites) to infect other people. These objects link characters together and reinforce the multi-narrative hyperlink cinema style which Soderbergh developed in "Traffic" (2000) and "Syriana" (2005), which he produced.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: The story also highlights examples of political cronyism (a plane to evacuate Dr. Mears from Minneapolis is instead diverted to evacuate a congressman), platitudes and rigid thinking (public health officials consider postponing the closing of shopping malls until after the Thanksgiving shopping season), federal responders trying to navigate 50 separate state-level public health policies, and the heroism of federal bureaucrats. Soderbergh does not use type-cast pharmaceutical executives or politicians as villains, but instead portrays bloggers such as Krumwiede in a negative light. Social media play a role in Krumwiede's accusations against Dr. Cheever and in Emhoff's daughter's attempts to carry on a relationship with her boyfriend through text messaging. Other responses in the movie, such as Emhoff's appropriating a shotgun from a friend's abandoned house to protect his home from looters, imposition of federal quarantines and curfews, the allocation of vaccines by lottery, inadequate federal preparation and responses, and use of bar-coded wristbands to identify the inoculated highlight the complex tensions between freedom and order in responding to a pandemic. Soderbergh uses Emhoff to illustrate the micro-effects of macro-level decisions.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: "Contagion" premiered on September 3, 2011, at the 68th Venice International Film Festival in Venice, Italy, and a wider release followed on September 9. In the United States and Canada, "Contagion" was shown in 3,222 theaters, of which 254 screenings occurred at IMAX venues.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: "Contagion" was released on DVD and Blu-ray in North America on January 3, 2012, and in the United Kingdom on March 5, 2012. In its first week of release, the film topped the DVD chart with 411,000 units sold for $6.16 million. That same week it sold 274,000 Blu-ray copies for $4.93 million, topping that chart as well. DVD sales dropped during the second week of release, with 193,000 units sold for $2.89 million. As of early July 2012, "Contagion" had sold 802,535 copies in DVD, for $12.01 million in revenue.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: Various American commercial analysts anticipated that the film would have ticket sales of between $20–$25 million during its opening weekend, which it did, grossing $8 million on its first day, and $23.1 million for the entire weekend. Of that total, ten percent ($2.3 million) of the gross came from IMAX screenings. By outgrossing competitor "The Help" ($8.7M), "Contagion" became the highest-grossing film of the week. Demographically, the opening audience was evenly divided among gender, according to Warner Bros., while eighty percent of spectators were of the age of 25 and over. "Contagion" did well the following weekend, generating a $14.5 million box office, but came in second to the re-release of "The Lion King" (1994). The third week saw the box office drop by forty percent, for a total gross of $8.7 million. By the fourth week, "Contagion" had dropped to ninth place at the box office with $5 million, and the number of theaters narrowed to 2,744. The film completed its theatrical run on December 15, 2011, at which point its total domestic gross was $75.6 million.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: "Contagion" made its international debut in six foreign markets the same weekend as its American release, including Italy, where it achieved $663,000 from 309 theaters. The first week saw "Contagion" gross $2.1 million from 553 establishments—a per-theater average of $3,797. Foreign grosses for "Contagion" would remain relatively stagnant up until the weekend of October 14–16, 2011, when the film expanded into several additional European markets. Out of the $3.9 million that was generated from 1,100 venues during that weekend, nearly 40% of the gross originated from Spain, where the film earned $1.5 million from 325 theaters. With the growing expansion of the film in seven additional markets, the weekend of October 21–23, 2011 saw "Contagion" take in $9.8 million from 2,505 locations, increasing the international gross to $22.9 million. In the United Kingdom, one of the film's significant international releases, "Contagion" opened in third place at the box office with $2.3 million from 398 theaters; it subsequently garnered the highest debut gross of a Soderbergh film since "Ocean's Thirteen" (2007). International grosses for "Contagion" totaled $60.8 million.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: "Contagion" has received positive reviews by film commentators. Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reported that 85% of critics have given the film a positive review based on 278 reviews, with an average rating of 7.10/10. The website's critics consensus states, "Tense, tightly plotted, and bolstered by a stellar cast, "Contagion" is an exceptionally smart – and scary – disaster movie." On Metacritic, which assigns a rating out of 100 based on the critiques from mainstream critics, the film received an average score of 70 based on 38 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B−" on an A+ to F scale.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: "The Guardian" journalist Peter Bradshaw felt that "Contagion" blended well together as a film, although opined that Soderbergh was somewhat unsuccessful in channeling the fears, frights, and "the massive sense of loss" of "ordinary people". To David Denby of "The New Yorker", the "brilliant" film was "serious, precise, frightening," and "emotionally enveloping". Despite applauding Soderbergh for "hopscotching" tidily "between the intimate and international", "The Atlantic" Christopher Orr was disappointed with the film's detached and "clinical" disposition, which led him to conclude that "Contagion" should have gone with a more inflexible rationale, or a lesson "beyond 'wash your hands often and hope you're lucky'." "For all the craft that went into it, "Contagion" is ultimately beyond good or bad, beyond criticism. It just is," professed "The Atlantic" writer. Describing it as a "smart" and "spooky" installment, Manohla Dargis of "The New York Times" wrote, "Mr. Soderbergh doesn't milk your tears as things fall apart, but a passion that can feel like cold rage is inscribed in his images of men and women isolated in the frame, in the blurred point of view of the dying and in the insistent stillness of a visual style that seems like an exhortation to look." In regards to the story, "Salon" columnist Andrew O'Hehir avouched that the "crisp" and succinct narrative matched up to the "beautifully composed" visuals of the film. Todd McCarthy of "The Hollywood Reporter" proclaimed that Soderbergh and Burns effectively created anxiety in the "shrewd" and "unsensationalistic" film without becoming exaggerated, a sentiment echoed by Jeannette Catsoulis of NPR, who insisted that the duo "weave multiple characters into a narrative that's complex without being confusing, and intelligent without being baffling". Writing for "The Village Voice", Karina Longworth thought that "Contagion" reflected the "self-consciousness" and "experimentation" of some of Soderbergh's previous efforts, such as the "Ocean's" trilogy and "The Girlfriend Experience" (2009).


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: The performances of multiple cast members were frequently mentioned in the reviews. Lou Lumenick of the "New York Post" asserted that Ehle was "outstanding", a view that was analogous to that of "The Boston Globe" journalist Wesley Morris, who praised not only Ehle's performance, but the work of the "undercard" such as Cranston, Gould, and Colantoni, among others. Similarly, Peter Travers of "Rolling Stone" called Ehle the "best in show". As "Los Angeles Times" Kenneth Turan summed up, "Two-time Tony-winning actress Jennifer Ehle comes close to stealing the picture with this quietly yet quirkily empathetic performance." With regard to Law, "The Philadelphia Inquirer" Steven Rea stated that the actor portrayed the character with a "nutty" confidence; Mick LaSalle from the "San Francisco Chronicle" agreed with Rea's thoughts. Damon provided the film's "relatable heart", according to Forrest Wickman of "Slate", who concluded that even with her controlled performance, Winslet "lives up to her head-of-the-class reputation even in an unusually small role".


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: The character development of multiple characters produced varying response from critics. Contrary to Mitch's stance as the main protagonist, Michael O'Sullivan of "The Washington Post" felt that "Contagion" "treats him with an oddly clinical detachment". In particular Law's character, Alan Krumwiede, attracted commentary from Roger Ebert of the "Chicago Sun-Times", who wrote, "The blogger subplot doesn't interact clearly with the main story lines and functions mostly as an alarming but vague distraction."


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: Ferris Jabr of "New Scientist" approved of "Contagion" for accurately portraying the "successes and frustrations" of science. Jabr cites story elements such as "the fact that before researchers can study a virus, they need to figure out how to grow it in cell cultures in the lab, without the virus destroying all the cells" as examples of accurate depictions of science. Carl Zimmer, a science writer, praised the film, stating, "It shows how reconstructing the course of an outbreak can provide crucial clues, such as how many people an infected person can give a virus to, how many of them get sick, and how many of them die." He also describes a conversation with the film's scientific consultant, W. Ian Lipkin, in which Lipkin defended the rapid generation of a vaccine in the film. Zimmer wrote that "Lipkin and his colleagues are now capable of figuring out how to trigger immune reactions to exotic viruses from animals in a matter of weeks, not months. And once they've created a vaccine, they don't have to use Eisenhower-era technology to manufacture it in bulk." Paul Offit, a pediatrician and vaccination expert, stated that "typically when movies take on science, they tend to sacrifice the science in favor of drama. That wasn't true here." Offit appreciated the film's usage of concepts such as "R" and fomites, as well as the fictional strain's origins, which was based on the Nipah virus.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: In 2020, the film received renewed popularity due to the COVID-19 pandemic. By March 2020, "Contagion" was the seventh-most-popular film on iTunes, listed as the number two catalog title on Warner Bros. compared to its number 270 rank the past December 2019, and had average daily visits on piracy websites increase by 5,609 percent in January 2020 compared to the previous month. HBO Now also reported that "Contagion" had been the most viewed film for two weeks straight.


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: As the film continued to regain popularity, the cast reunited through an infomercial PSA in partnership with the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health in March 2020. Regarding its resurgence in 2020, screenwriter Scott Z. Burns responded in an interview with "The Washington Post" saying, "It is sad, and it is frustrating. Sad because so many people are dying and getting sick. Frustrating because people still don’t seem to grasp the situation we are now in and how it could have been avoided by properly funding the science around all of this. It is also surreal to me that people from all over the world write to me asking how I knew it would involve a bat or how I knew the term "social distancing." I didn’t have a crystal ball — I had access to great expertise. So, if people find the movie to be accurate, it should give them confidence in the public health experts who are out there right now trying to guide us."


title: Contagion (2011 film)

text: In February 2021, British Health Secretary Matt Hancock revealed that watching the scramble for vaccines in "Contagion" inspired him to order a much larger quantity of COVID-19 vaccines for the United Kingdom than his advisers recommended, accelerating the UK's eventual rollout of its vaccination programme ahead of other European countries.


title: Moonshine

text: Moonshine is high-proof liquor that is usually produced illegally. The name was derived from a tradition of creating the alcohol during the nighttime, thereby avoiding detection. In the first decades of the 21st century, commercial distilleries have begun producing their own novelty versions of moonshine, including many flavored varieties.


title: Moonshine

text: In English, moonshine is also known as "mountain dew", "choop", "hooch" (abbreviation of "hoochinoo", name of a specific liquor, from Tlingit), "homebrew", "mulekick", "shine", "white lightning", "white/corn liquor", "white/corn whiskey", "pass around", "firewater, bootleg".


title: Moonshine

text: The ethanol may be concentrated in fermented beverages by means of freezing. For example, the name "applejack" derives from the traditional method of producing the drink, "jacking", the process of freezing fermented cider and then removing the ice, increasing the alcohol content. Starting with the fermented juice, with an alcohol content of less than ten percent, the concentrated result can contain 25–40% alcohol.


title: Moonshine

text: In some countries, moonshine stills are illegal to sell, import, and own without permission. However, enthusiasts explain on internet forums how to obtain equipment and assemble it into a still. To cut costs, stainless steel vessels are often replaced with plastic (e.g. polypropylene) vessels that can withstand heat, a concept of the plastic still.


title: Moonshine

text: The preferred heat source for plastic stills or spiral stills are "sous vide" sticks; these control temperature, time, and circulation, and are therefore preferred over immersion heaters. Multiple units can be used to increase the wattage. Also, "sous vide" sticks, commonly sold in 1200 W and generally temperature regulated up to (ethanol boils at ), will evaporate the ethanol faster than an immersion heater, commonly sold in 300 W. Electrical injury may occur if immersion heaters are modified; For example, if a thermostat is removed from an aquarium heater because it may break their waterproofing, or if an immersion heater is disassembled from an electric water boiler.


title: Moonshine

text: A plastic still is a device for distillation specially adapted for separating ethanol and water. Plastic stills are common because they are cheap and easy to manufacture. The principle is that a smaller amount of liquid is placed in an open smaller vessel inside a larger one that is closed. A cheap 100 W immersion heater is typically used as heat source, but a thermal immersion circulator, like a "sous vide" stick is ideal because it comes with a temperature controller. The liquid is kept heated at about which slowly evaporates the ethanol to 40% ABV that condense on the inner walls of the outer vessel. The condensation that accumulates in the bottom of the vessel can then be diverted directly down through a filter containing activated carbon. The final product has approximately twice as much alcohol content as the starting liquid and can be distilled several times if stronger distillate is desired. The method is slow, and is not suitable for large-scale production.


title: Moonshine

text: A column still, also called a continuous still, patent still or Coffey still, is a variety of still consisting of two columns. A column still can achieve a vapor alcohol content of 95% ABV.


title: Moonshine

text: A spiral still is a type of column still with a simple slow air-cooled distillation apparatus, commonly used for bootlegging. Column and cooler consist of a copper tube wound in spiral form. The tube first goes up to act as a simple column, and then down to cool the product. Cookware usually consists of a plastic wine bucket. The heat source is typically a thermal immersion circulator (commonly runs at 1200 W), like a "sous vide stick" because it is hard to find 300 W immersion heaters, and it is risky to disassemble the immersion heater from an electric water boiler because it may cause electrical injury. The spiral burner is popular because despite its simple construction and low manufacturing cost, it can provide 95% ABV.


title: Moonshine

text: A pot still is a type of distillation apparatus or still used to distill flavored liquors such as whisky or cognac, but not rectified spirit because they are poor at separating congeners. Pot stills operate on a batch distillation basis (as opposed to a Coffey or column stills which operate on a continuous basis). Traditionally constructed from copper, pot stills are made in a range of shapes and sizes depending on quantity and style of spirit. Geographic variations in still design exist, with certain stills gaining popularity in regions of Appalachia.


title: Moonshine

text: Spirits distilled in pots is commonly 40% ABV, and top out between 60 and 80% after multiple distillations.


title: Moonshine

text: Poorly produced moonshine can be contaminated, mainly from materials used in the construction of the still. Stills employing automotive radiators as condensers are particularly dangerous; in some cases, glycol produced from antifreeze can be a problem. Radiators used as condensers could also contain lead at the connections to the plumbing. Using these methods often resulted in blindness or lead poisoning in those who consumed tainted liquor. In Prohibition-era United States, many died from ingesting unhealthy substances with their moonshine. Consumption of lead-tainted moonshine is a serious risk factor for saturnine gout, a very painful but treatable medical condition that damages the kidneys and joints.


title: Moonshine

text: Although methanol is not produced in toxic amounts by fermentation of sugars from grain starches, contamination is still possible by unscrupulous distillers using cheap methanol to increase the apparent strength of the product. Moonshine can be made both more palatable and perhaps less dangerous by discarding the "foreshot" – the first of alcohol that drip from the condenser. Because methanol vaporizes at a lower temperature than ethanol it is commonly believed that the foreshot contains most of the methanol, if any, from the mash. However, research shows this is not the case, and methanol is present until the very end of the distillation run. Despite this, distillers will usually collect the foreshots until the temperature of the still reaches . Additionally, the head that comes immediately after the foreshot typically contains small amounts of other undesirable compounds, such as acetone and various aldehydes. Fusel alcohols are other undesirable byproducts of fermentation that are contained in the "aftershot", and are also typically discarded.


title: Moonshine

text: Alcohol concentrations at higher strengths (the GHS identifies concentrations above 24% ABV as dangerous) are flammable and therefore dangerous to handle. This is especially true during the distilling process when vaporized alcohol may accumulate in the air to dangerous concentrations if adequate ventilation is not provided.


title: Moonshine

text: The incidence of impure moonshine has been documented to significantly increase the risk of renal disease among those who regularly consume it, primarily from increased lead content.


title: Moonshine

text: Outbreaks of methanol poisoning have occurred when methanol has been accidentally produced in moonshine production or has been used to adulterate moonshine.


title: Moonshine

text: A quick estimate of the alcoholic strength, or proof, of the distillate (the ratio of alcohol to water) is often achieved by shaking a clear container of the distillate. Large bubbles with a short duration indicate a higher alcohol content, while smaller bubbles that disappear more slowly indicate lower alcohol content.


title: Moonshine

text: A more reliable method is to use an alcoholmeter or hydrometer. A hydrometer is used during and after the fermentation process to determine the potential alcohol percent of the moonshine, whereas an alcoholmeter is used after the product has been distilled to determine the volume percent or proof.


title: Moonshine

text: A common folk test for the quality of moonshine was to pour a small quantity of it into a spoon and set it on fire. The theory was that a safe distillate burns with a blue flame, but a tainted distillate burns with a yellow flame. Practitioners of this simple test also held that if a radiator coil had been used as a condenser, then there would be lead in the distillate, which would give a reddish flame. This led to the mnemonic, "Lead burns red and makes you dead." or "Red means dead."


title: Moonshine

text: Other toxic components, such as methanol, cannot be detected with a simple burn test, as methanol flames are also blue and difficult to see in daylight.


title: Moonshine

text: Manufacturing of spirits through distilling, fractional crystallization, etc, outside a registered distillery is illegal in many countries.


title: Moonshine

text: Moonshine historically referred to "clear, unaged whiskey", once made with barley in Scotland and Ireland or corn mash in the United States, though sugar became just as common in illicit liquor during the last century. The word originated in the British Isles as a result of excise laws, but only became meaningful in the United States after a tax passed during the Civil War outlawing non-registered stills. Illegal distilling accelerated during the Prohibition era (1920–1933) which mandated a total ban on alcohol production under the Eighteenth Amendment of the Constitution. Since the amendment was repealed in 1933, laws focus on evasion of taxation on any type of spirits or intoxicating liquors. Applicable laws were historically enforced by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives of the US Department of Justice, but are now usually handled by state agencies. Enforcement agents were once known colloquially as "revenuers".


title: Moonshine

text: The earliest known instance of the term "moonshine" being used to refer to illicit alcohol dates to the 1785 edition of "Grose's Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue", which was published in England. Prior to that, "moonshine" referred to anything "illusory" or to literally the light of the moon. The U.S. Government considers the word a "fanciful term" and does not regulate its use on the labels of commercial products, as such, legal moonshines may be any type of spirit, which must be indicated elsewhere on the label.


title: Moonshine

text: In Prohibition-era United States, moonshine distillation was done at night to avoid discovery. While moonshiners were present in urban and rural areas around the United States after the civil war, moonshine production concentrated in Appalachia because the limited road network made it easy to evade revenue officers and because it was difficult and expensive to transport corn crops. As a study of farmers in Cocke County, Tennessee, observes: "One could transport much more value in corn if it was first converted to whiskey. One horse could haul ten times more value on its back in whiskey than in corn." Moonshiners in Harlan County, Kentucky, like Maggie Bailey, sold moonshine in order to provide for their families. Others, like Amos Owens from Rutherford County, North Carolina and Marvin "Popcorn" Sutton from Maggie Valley, North Carolina, sold moonshine in nearby areas. Sutton's life was covered in a documentary on the Discovery Channel called "Moonshiners". The bootlegger once said that the malt (a combination of corn, barley, rye) is what makes the basic moonshine recipe work. In modern usage, the term "moonshine" still implies the liquor is produced illegally, and the term is sometimes used on the labels of legal products to market them as providing a forbidden drinking experience.


title: Moonshine

text: Once the liquor was distilled, drivers called "runners" or "bootleggers" smuggled moonshine and "bootleg" (illegally imported) liquor across the region in cars specially modified for speed and load-carrying capacity. The cars were ordinary on the outside but modified with souped-up engines, extra interior room, and heavy-duty shock absorbers to support the weight of the illicit alcohol. After Prohibition ended, the out-of-work drivers kept their skills sharp through organized races, which led to the formation of the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing (NASCAR). Several former "runners" became noted drivers in the sport.


title: Moonshine

text: Some varieties of maize grown in the United States were once prized for their use in moonshine production. One such variety used in moonshine, Jimmy Red corn, almost became extinct when the last grower died in 2000. Described as a "blood-red, flint-hard "dent" corn with a rich and oily germ", two ears of the corn were passed on to "seed saver" Ted Chewning, who saved the variety from extinction and began to produce it on a wider scale.


title: O

text: O, or o, is the fifteenth letter and the fourth vowel letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is "o" (pronounced ), plural "oes".


title: O

text: Its graphic form has remained fairly constant from Phoenician times until today. The name of the Phoenician letter was


title: O

text: "ʿeyn", meaning "eye", and indeed its shape originates simply as a drawing of a human eye (possibly inspired by the corresponding Egyptian hieroglyph, cf. Proto-Sinaitic script).


title: O

text: Its original sound value was that of a consonant, probably , the sound represented by the cognate Arabic letter ع "ʿayn".


title: O

text: The use of this Phoenician letter for a vowel sound is due to the early Greek alphabets, which adopted the letter as O "omicron" to represent the vowel . The letter was adopted with this value in the Old Italic alphabets, including the early Latin alphabet. In Greek, a variation of the form later came to distinguish this long sound (Omega, meaning "large O") from the short o (Omicron, meaning "small o"). Greek omicron gave rise to the corresponding Cyrillic letter O and the early Italic letter to runic ᛟ.


title: O

text: Even alphabets that are not derived from Semitic tend to have similar forms to represent this sound; for example, the creators of the Afaka and Ol Chiki scripts, each invented in different parts of the world in the last century, both attributed their vowels for 'O' to the shape of the mouth when making this sound.


title: O

text: The letter is the fourth most common letter in the English alphabet. Like the other English vowel letters, it has associated "long" and "short" pronunciations. The "long" as in "boat" is actually most often a diphthong (realized dialectically anywhere from to ). In English there is also a "short" as in "fox", , which sounds slightly different in different dialects. In most dialects of British English, it is either an open-mid back rounded vowel or an open back rounded vowel ; in American English, it is most commonly an unrounded back to a central vowel .


title: O

text: Common digraphs include , which represents either or ; or , which typically represents the diphthong , and , , and which represent a variety of pronunciations depending on context and etymology.


title: O

text: In other contexts, especially before a letter with a minim, may represent the sound , as in 'son' or 'love'. It can also represent the semivowel as in "choir" or "quinoa."


title: O

text: In English, the letter in isolation before a noun, usually capitalized, marks the vocative case, as in the titles to O Canada or O Captain! My Captain! or certain verses of the Bible.


title: O

text: is commonly associated with the open-mid back rounded vowel , mid back rounded vowel or close-mid back rounded vowel in many languages. Other languages use for various values, usually back vowels which are at least partly open. Derived letters such as and have been created for the alphabets of some languages to distinguish values that were not present in Latin and Greek, particularly rounded front vowels.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War is a 2020 first-person shooter video game developed by Treyarch and Raven Software and published by Activision. It was released worldwide on November 13, 2020, for PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Windows, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S. It serves as the sixth installment in the "Black Ops" series and the seventeenth installment in the overall "Call of Duty" series. The game is the second "Call of Duty" title since 2011's "" to be co-developed by two studios.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: "Black Ops Cold War"s campaign is set during the early 1980s of the Cold War, taking place between "" (2010) and "" (2012) chronologically. It is centered around a pursuit of the alleged Soviet spy Perseus, whose stated goal is to subvert the United States and tilt the balance of power toward the Soviet Union. For the campaign, the player takes control of "Bell", who is recruited by CIA officer Russell Adler into a multinational task force created to hunt down Perseus. The campaign also sees the return of "Black Ops" characters Alex Mason, Frank Woods, and Jason Hudson, with Mason also being the playable character in certain missions. The game's multiplayer introduced new game modes as well as new map dynamics and elements, carrying over several design choices introduced in "". It features a seasonal content system similar to "Modern Warfare", which includes a battle pass as well as free maps and weapons added every season. "Cold War" also features narrative tie-ins to "Modern Warfare" via the campaign and multiplayer, establishing a shared universe across multiple "Call of Duty" sub-series.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: The game was originally developed by Raven and Sledgehammer Games and not intended to be an entry in the "Black Ops" subseries. However, the development suffered from disagreements among the two teams, resulting in Activision placing Treyarch in charge of the game's development in 2019, with Raven acting as a co-developer to them. Marketing for the game began in August 2020 and was done in different forms, including certain content creators receiving slide projectors, puzzles made to be solved online by fans, and a website showcasing historical Cold War events. A public multiplayer beta for the game was also made live in October 2020. "Black Ops Cold War" received generally favorable reviews from critics, with praise for the campaign, multiplayer, and zombies, while criticizing its technical issues and lack of innovation. It became the best-selling game of 2020 in the US.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: "Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War" campaign allows players to assume a custom character, codenamed "Bell", with the ability to choose their intelligence agency, skin tone, nationality, and gender; as well as different personality traits that provide in-game perks. For the first time since "", the campaign features multiple endings, dependent on player choice throughout the campaign.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: Multiplayer features new and returning game modes, as well as maps that accommodate both the traditional 6v6 format, as well as larger 12v12 combat. The game also introduced a new game mode named "Fireteam", which can support up to 40 players. The Create-a-Class system from "Modern Warfare" returns, with two major differences: field upgrades are implemented as part of class loadouts, and each class has a wildcard choice out of four possible ones: Gunfighter (allows up to 8 primary weapon attachments), Perk Greed (allows 2 perks from each perk type for a total of 6 usable perks), Danger Close (double grenade equipment), or Lawbreaker (allows mixing and matching any weapon/perk type in any slot). Like "Modern Warfare", "Cold War" also support cross-platform play and cross-platform progression. Following an update, the progression system for multiplayer is integrated with "", allowing for a unified level system across "Cold War", "Warzone" and "Modern Warfare". In addition, Operator characters and weapons from "Cold War" are also added to "Warzone" to be used alongside "Modern Warfare" Operators and weapons, though the multiplayer modes remain separated and do not share Operators and weapons.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: Zombies features a new storyline titled "Dark Aether" which expands on the original Aether story, concluded in "", while also staying true to the main narrative of the campaign. Instead of playing as predefined characters, players can take on the role of Operator characters from Multiplayer, as part of a CIA response team codenamed "Requiem". Progression from Multiplayer is shared with Zombies, as players are able to use any weapon to start a Zombies match, alongside Gunsmith, scorestreaks and field upgrades, in addition to returning mechanics such as wallbuys, the Mystery Box, Pack-a-Punch and past fan-favorite Perks. For the first time in "Zombies", players can opt to "exfil" the map, which will put them in a difficult wave with increased enemy spawn that they must survive before they can escape. Collectible intels are also scattered around the playable maps, allowing players to keep track of and unfold the main story as they progress. A skill upgrade system is featured in the game, allowing players to enhance weapons, perks, ammo mods and field upgrades with Aetherium Crystals, a currency acquired from reaching round milestones. A new game mode, Onslaught, was introduced exclusively to PlayStation players until November 1, 2021. In this mode, which are played within Multiplayer maps, up to 2 players defend areas grounded off by the Dark Aether orb, which must be powered by zombie kills. Sufficient kills will move the orb to new positions, forcing the players to move or die outside of the orb's protection zone. The Season Two update introduces "Outbreak", a large-scale mode where players fight off zombie hordes and complete objectives in an open-world area, composed of locations featured in the larger Multiplayer modes.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: "Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War" is set during the Cold War in the early 1980s. The campaign follows Green Beret turned CIA SAD/SOG officer Russell Adler (Bruce Thomas) and his mission to stop an international espionage threat named Perseus (William Salyers) in 1981. The story is inspired by actual events and the campaign features locations such as East Berlin, Vietnam, Turkey, and the Soviet KGB headquarters. Adler is supported by returning "Black Ops" characters Alex Mason (Chris Payne Gilbert), Frank Woods (Damon Victor Allen) and Jason Hudson (Piotr Michael), alongside fellow MACV-SOG operative Lawrence Sims (Reggie Watkins), Mossad fixer Eleazar "Lazar" Azoulay (Damon Dayoub), and MI6 intelligence officer Helen Park (Lily Cowles), with additional support from KGB Head of Security and undercover agent Dimitri Belikov (Mark Ivanir). Players take on the role of "Bell", a mysterious operative who assists Adler and his team in finding Perseus for the majority of the campaign; Mason and Belikov are also playable in certain segments. Perseus' inner circle consists of: Iranian terrorists Arash Kadivar (Navid Negahban) and Qasim Javadi (Farshad Farahat), Russian mafia boss Anton Volkov (Rafael Petardi), rogue KGB Agent Major Vadim Rudnik and ex-CIA officer Robert Aldrich. The campaign also features a brief appearance by Imran Zakhaev (Dan Donohue), father of "" antagonist Victor Zakhaev, and Colonel Lev Kravchenko (Andrew Divoff), a former nemesis of Mason and Woods whom they last encountered in Vietnam.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: The multiplayer mode's seasonal story takes place from late 1983 to 1984, and follows Adler on a new mission to investigate the resurgence of Perseus and his agents, led by Vikhor "Stitch" Kuzmin (Chris Parson), who seeks vengeance on Adler for personal reasons. Stitch's followers and fellow Perseus operatives include: Laotian warlord Kapano "Naga" Vang (Greg Chun), ex-NIS operative Freya "Wraith" Helvig, ex-MI6 agent Roman "Knight" Gray (Mark Sheppard), mercenary Owethu "Jackal" Mabuza (Gabe Kunda), ex-yakuza Kaori "Kitsune" Tanaka (Erika Ishii), and ex-Spanish Army demolitions expert Benito "Fuze" Ortega. Several NATO allies appear throughout the seasons assisting Adler and the CIA in fighting Stitch's forces, including: DGSE operative Zeyna Ossou (Mara Junot), SRT Marine Wyatt "Bulldozer" Jones (Jeff Schine), Delta Force sniper Terrell Wolf (Zeke Alton), guerrilla fighter Karla Rivas (Krizia Bajos), Unit 777 officer Jabari Salah (Ayman Samman), and CIA SAD operative Colton "Stryker" Greenfield (Christian Rummel). Captain Carver Butcher (Ron Bottitta), founder of Task Force Vanguard and a protagonist of the "" multiplayer seasonal story, makes an appearance in the final "Cold War" multiplayer season.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: The Dark Aether story in Zombies mode takes place from late 1983 to 1985, and continues several narrative elements from its predecessor, the Aether story. The central protagonists of the story are Requiem, a classified CIA task force dedicated to studying and eradicating the global rising undead threat. Players take on the role of a four-person Strike Team, taking orders from CIA officer Grigori Weaver (Gene Farber), who coordinates Requiem's various operations. Other Requiem members include: Major Mackenzie Carver (Keston John), Head of Containment and Security Division; Doctor Elizabeth Grey (Amy Pemberton), Head of Unnatural Sciences; Doctor Oskar Strauss (Thure Riefenstein), Head of Energy Research; "Raptor One" (Derek Phillips), a pilot who is tasked with extracting the strike team from outbreak zones upon completion of their missions; and the enigmatic Director who monitors the strike team's activities. Opposing Requiem is Omega Group, a Soviet Union-backed organization lead by Colonel Kravchenko, who is largely responsible for the new undead outbreak threat. Through the course of the story, Requiem agents come into contact with Kravchenko and other Omega operatives, including: Doctor William Peck (Zeke Alton), an American scientist who betrayed the United States government to defect to Omega; Doctor Aleksandra Valentina (Sadie Alexandru), Lead Scientist in Psychotronics Research, whose secret identity is Angelika Vogel, daughter of Nazi scientist Ulrich Vogel (Michael Gough); Doctor Hugo Jager, Research Lead of Necro-Analytics department; and Commander Gorev (Zeke Alton), Kravchenko's right-hand man. Assisting Requiem in their battle against Omega Group and the undead are Samantha Maxis (Julie Nathanson), a former BND operative and acquaintance of Weaver with a mysterious past; and Sergei Ravenov (Andrew Morgado), an Omega Group soldier who lost faith in the organization's mission and acts as Maxis' mole. Both Requiem and Omega also regularly establish contact with Kazimir Zykov (Andrew Morgado), a Soviet engineer who is trapped in the Dark Aether dimension and wishes to escape with either group's help.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: In January 1981, CIA SAD/SOG operatives Russell Adler, Alex Mason, and Frank Woods are sent to target Qasim Javadi and Arash Kadivar for their roles in the Iran hostage crisis. With intelligence gained from interrogating Qasim, the team tracks Arash to Turkey. Arash boasts that Perseus was the one responsible for organizing the hostage crisis before being executed. US President Ronald Reagan authorizes a black operation team to neutralize Perseus after being briefed of his threat by Jason Hudson and Adler.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: Adler's team consists of CIA operative Lawrence Sims, American born Mossad operative Eleazar "Lazar" Azoulay, and MI6 intelligence officer Helen Park, with Mason and Woods providing tactical support. The final member of the team is an agent known only by the codename "Bell", who served with Adler and Sims in MACV-SOG during the Vietnam War. The team starts by asking Bell to recall Operation Fracture Jaw in 1968, where Adler believes he, Bell, and Sims first encountered Perseus. Afterwards, the team proceeds to East Berlin to apprehend/kill Anton Volkov, a Russian mafia boss with ties to Perseus.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: Following an infiltration into a secret Spetsnaz training facility by Bell and Woods, the team discovers that Perseus had infiltrated Operation Greenlight, a top secret American program that secretly planted neutron bombs in every major European city to deny their use to the Soviets in the event of an invasion. Mason and Woods are deployed to Mount Yamantau in the Ural Mountains, where they infiltrate Nikita Dragovich's destroyed base in hopes of retrieving his list of sleeper agents. However, the team finds out that Perseus has wiped the data from the Yamantau base's mainframe, leaving their only option to infiltrate KGB Headquarters to retrieve the list. Enlisting the help of one of their KGB double agent allies, Dimitri Belikov, they manage to get Adler and Bell inside the Lubyanka Building. The team learns that an Operation Greenlight scientist is one of the sleeper agents and has fled to Cuba. Hoping to catch Perseus there, the team launches a raid. They learn that Perseus has managed to steal the detonation codes for every Operation Greenlight bomb, meaning he can devastate Europe and lay the blame on the United States. The team comes under heavy fire and Lazar and Park are injured in the process, leaving Bell only enough time to save one of them.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: After rescuing Bell, Adler continues to press them by provoking their memories of Vietnam once more. At this point, Bell's true identity is revealed as an agent of Perseus, having been shot by Arash in Turkey out of jealousy. Bell was found by Adler and was brainwashed using Project MKUltra into believing they were his comrade. With Bell's memory returned, Adler interrogates them on the location of Perseus' headquarters. Bell can then either choose to remain loyal to Perseus and lie to Adler, or choose to betray Perseus and reveal his location.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: Two years after Operation Greenlight's failure, a Perseus cell infiltrates the Cheyenne Mountain Complex and successfully hijacks a nuclear ICBM during military exercise Able Archer 83. Operators from NATO and Warsaw Pact countries are deployed to various hot zones, where Perseus activities are sighted. On January 20, 1984, a Perseus cell, led by Vikhor "Stitch" Kuzmin, raids a CIA safe house in West Berlin in order to gain intel on Adler. Stitch, who was in charge of Nova-6 production on Rebirth Island, vowed vengeance on Adler, who captured and tortured him during the CIA's assault on the island in 1968. Stitch leaves behind a message to taunt Adler that leads him to a mall in New Jersey. At the mall, Adler's team runs into an ambush by Stitch, who has also set up a cache of Nova-6. The team attempts to escape, but Adler is ultimately captured and taken away by Stitch and his men.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: Three months later, Woods leads a squad to Laos where Adler was last sighted, only to learn that he has been transported to Verdansk. Hudson authorizes a search and rescue operation to retrieve Adler. On June 2, 1984, two Perseus operatives, Freya "Wraith" Helvig and Roman "Knight" Gray, infiltrate the Yamantau secret military base and retrieve data related to Dragovich's numbers program, which Stitch plans to use in order to create more sleeper agents across the nation. They then detonate the base, intending to shift the blame toward the U.S. and spark another war. Eight days later, Woods manages to locate Adler in Verdansk and rescue him.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: Some times later, Stitch orders Perseus operative Owethu "Jackal" Mabuza to assault Jumpseat Satellite Ground Station in South Africa. The station's surviving specialist is forced to obey Stitch's order as he de-orbits two CIA satellites, which end up crashing in Verdansk and Algeria, respectively. Following his recovery, Adler immediately leads a squad to investigate the satellite crash in Algeria. As they approach the crash site, Adler recklessly charges in and eliminates Perseus agents, while secretly recovering a data recorder from the satellite debris. A month later, Woods leads a response team, accompanied by Colton "Stryker" Greenfield, to the ECHELON Listening Station in Teufelsburg, where they attempt to apprehend Perseus operative Kaori "Kitsune" Tanaka. Kitsune, who has just finished uploading the numbers protocol, activates the sequence, turning the response team against Woods and Stryker, who narrowly escape death. Afterwards, Hudson meets with Woods in private and reveals an inconsistency in Adler's statement about the data recorder from the Algeria satellite crash site, as well as his recent unmonitored activities in Verdansk. Recognizing that Adler may have been compromised due to the numbers program, Hudson orders Woods to contact Mason for help.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: On August 2, 1984, Stitch and Perseus operative Benito "Fuze" Ortega attempt to defuse several explosive charges planted all across Verdansk by Adler. Meanwhile, Adler is put through extensive torture by Mason and Hudson in order to break his programming. Mason succeeds in deprogramming Adler, while Stitch's team fails to stop most of the charges from detonating. Woods, Adler, Mason and Hudson are deployed at a heavily destroyed Verdansk to confront Stitch for the final time. They eventually find Stitch in the woods, where Adler learns that he had taken over the mantle of Perseus, while the previous one passed away from cancer in 1983. Having finished his work, Stitch willingly surrenders his life, while taunting Adler of his actions. A gunshot is heard as the scene cuts to black.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: A few days after, Adler, Mason, Woods and Hudson investigate an underground Nazi bunker in the ruins of Verdansk, where they meet Captain Carver Butcher, a retired Special Operations Executive agent and founder of Task Force Vanguard. Butcher begins telling Adler and the others of his mission in leading various special operations task forces to hunt down remnants of the Nazi empire in the Pacific.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: In 1983, CIA Special Officer Grigori Weaver is contacted by an acquaintance, former BND operative Samantha Maxis, who provides him with secret KGB intelligence. Weaver learns from Maxis that during World War II, the Nazis attempted an experiment in a secret bunker in Morasko, Poland where they managed to reanimate dead soldiers into zombies. Afterwards, the bunker was discovered and sealed by the Soviet Union, only to be recently uncovered by Omega Group, a KGB-Spetsnaz joint research team working in favor of the Soviet Union. As a result, several Dark Aether anomalies begin to appear around the world, unleashing zombies in their wake. A classified task force codenamed Requiem is assembled to combat the global undead threats as well as conduct research into the anomalies for technological advancement.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: In November 1983, Requiem deploys a strike team to the bunker in Morasko, dubbed Projekt Endstation, where they discover a rift that acts as a gateway to the Dark Aether dimension, responsible for other global dimensional breaches. Upon further investigation, the strike team uncovers a device in the facility called Der Wechsler, which can restore a zombie's brain functionality. The strike team uses it on one of the roaming zombies in the facility, who was a former Omega Group member named Orlov. In turn, he agrees to help the team close the dimensional rift. Orlov successfully seals the rift, destroying Endstation and sacrificing himself in the process, while allowing the strike team to escape.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: Following Endstation's destruction, Maxis investigates further into Omega Group's activities, and travels to Outpost 25, located in A Sầu Valley, Vietnam, but is captured by Omega forces and thrown into the Dark Aether dimension. In June 1984, the Requiem strike team arrives at Outpost 25, and makes contact with Captain Sergei Ravenov, Maxis' mole within Omega. Ravenov guides the strike team through the undead-infested facility, while also dealing with Doctor William Peck, an American scientist who defected to Omega. After learning from Peck of Maxis' current situation, the strike team attempts to open a portal and stabilize it long enough for Maxis to escape the dimension. They eventually succeed and exfiltrate with Maxis, while Ravenov elects to remain undercover as Omega continues their operations in the Ural Mountains. Following Requiem's success, Omega's leaders, Colonel Lev Kravchenko and Doctor Aleksandra Valentina, travel to Outpost 25 to confront Peck about his failure.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: In an effort to catch up to Omega Group's progress, Requiem launches Operation Threshold, a large-scale mission across the Ural Mountains where the largest outbreak zones have been identified. Over the next several months, Requiem operators are deployed in multiple Ural regions in order to eliminate undead targets, capture specimen and commence further research on the mysterious Aetherium element. Meanwhile, Maxis is quarantined under isolation due to her time spent inside the Dark Aether dimension. In November 1984, Maxis secretly contacts the Requiem strike team during their mission, requesting them to meet with Ravenov. At the missile silo in Ruka, Ravenov reveals that Peck has been using Aetherium crystals to supercharge nuclear warheads, which would allow Omega Group to create new outbreak zones wherever they choose. Not wishing to let either side possess the warheads, Maxis instructs Ravenov and the strike team to work together and direct the warheads toward the Pacific Ocean where they can be safely dumped. After clearing out a massive zombie horde guarding the silo, the strike team succeeds in deploying the warheads and manages to exfil.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: Afterwards, Ravenov contacts Weaver via Maxis' secret radio channel, and requests Requiem's help in extracting several Omega scientists who wish to defect from the group. Though angry at Ravenov and Maxis' secrecy, Weaver agrees to help him carry out the operation. Some times later, the strike team receives intel from Ravenov that he has lost contact with the scientists. The team is sent to the State Sanatorium U-23 to investigate a crash site and help extract the scientists; however, they were all murdered by Doctor Hugo Jager, an Omega scientist who was secretly a mole planted by Kravchenko to root out the defectors. The strike team attempts to exfil, but is captured by Kravchenko and Omega forces.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: Amidst the operations at the Ural Mountains, both Requiem and Omega come into contact with Kazimir Zykov, a Soviet engineer who was originally sent to the Endstation bunker in 1945 to shut it down, and has been trapped inside the Dark Aether since then. Zykov, who wishes to escape the dimension, has attempted to reach out to the real world, giving both Requiem and Omega warnings of a mysterious entity commanding the undead forces from within. Meanwhile, Valentina continues to further her own agenda: to open a gateway to the Dark Aether in hopes of freeing her father, who seemingly has been communicating with her from the other side since her childhood. Omega Group eventually deduces Valentina's real identity as the daughter of Ulrich Vogel, a Nazi scientist who previously lead Projekt Endstation.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: Two months after the strike team's capture, an outbreak occurs in East Berlin, where Valentina was last sighted. Having learned of her true allegiance, Kravchenko decides to deploy the Requiem strike team at the Berlin site to stop her, while overseeing their mission. Upon arriving in Berlin, Kravchenko and the strike team learn that Valentina has been mutated with Dark Aether energy by the Forsaken, the entity mentioned by Zykov, who was also masquerading as Vogel to trick Valentina into doing his bidding. The strike team reaches an abandoned CIA safehouse and reactivates Klaus, a combat robot customized with an artificial intelligence module created by the Director of Requiem. With Omega Group's instructions, the team constructs a miniature Aetherium warhead using components left onsite by the CIA. Valentina attempts to stop them, but is ultimately defeated, and her energy is used to refine the Aetherium for the warhead. As the Forsaken taunts Requiem of his imminent arrival, Klaus carries the warhead through the portal to complete the mission. Kravchenko attempts to betray the strike team at the last minute, but Maxis, using her Dark Aether power, manages to open a portal, allowing the team to return home safely. Meanwhile, the Director monitors Maxis, and sends a group memo to an unknown recipient, noting her growing power as a concern toward Project Janus.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: As Operation Threshold expands into the North Atlantic Sea and Algeria, the Director continues to pressure Maxis in isolation, coercing her into using her powers. Meanwhile, Omega Group authorizes a new operation to free Zykov from the Dark Aether, intending to use this opportunity to take down the Forsaken with their own warheads. Requiem, after receiving intel on Omega's new operation from Ravenov, also intends to free Zykov by their own means. On June 4, 1985, the Requiem strike team is deployed to an Omega test site in Ukraine, where Kravchenko and Peck are conducting the final steps to open a Dark Aether gateway. They succeed in freeing Zykov, only to learn that he was the Forsaken all along. As Kravchenko and Peck attempt to escape the facility, Maxis and the strike team make their final stand against the Forsaken. Eventually, Maxis sacrifices herself by plunging into a Dark Aether portal, weakening the Forsaken enough for him to be captured by Omega's containment chamber. With the Forsaken defeated, all global outbreak zones are collapsed, and the undead threat is contained. The Director - revealed to be Edward "Eddie" Richtofen - orders Requiem to be shut down, and its department leads apprehended alongside the strike team, while the Forsaken's chamber is delivered to an unknown location. Five years later, Peck travels to Japan and charters a boat to the middle of the Pacific Ocean, claiming that he is looking for "some old friends".


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: On May 18, 2019, Kotaku reported that the game was in upheaval as developers Sledgehammer Games and Raven Software had increasing tensions between the studios. Two sources described the game as a "mess". In response, Activision assigned Treyarch to lead development alongside Raven. This led to a shorter development period compared to previous entries as well as the two studios having different responsibilities, with Raven Software leading the development of the single-player campaign.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: On August 4, 2020, Activision in their Q2 earnings call confirmed that a new "Call of Duty" title was planned to be released in 2020 and that Treyarch and Raven were developing the game. It is the first "Call of Duty" game since to be co-developed by two studios, as well as the first time Raven Software is a main developer, as in previous games they assisted on the multiplayer and extra features. Activision president Rob Kostich confirmed during the Q2 earnings call that "Black Ops Cold War" will be "tightly connected" to and "".


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: Raven Software's Dan Vondrak said on the idea of multiple endings, "when we started creating the story, we had multiple endings in mind right away. And that really helped ... But we knew right away that we wanted to do that. I absolutely loved the idea that we could [have a] little bit of homage to "Black Ops 2" by having these [multiple endings]."


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: Announcements and marketing relating to a "Call of Duty" game have traditionally been around April or May prior to the game's fall release. However, Activision began teasing the game with an alternate reality game (ARG) in August 2020. Various YouTubers prevalent to the "Call of Duty" community on YouTube were shipped crates. Once authorized to open on August 10, 2020, they were greeted by a slide projector, 10 different slides per crate, and a manifest. Starting on August 14, 2020, the game was marketed, after initial ciphers solved, by enticing fans to solve ciphers and puzzles on pawntakespawn.com. The website allowed fans to watch VHS tapes containing news segments and footage that pertained to the corresponding year(s) throughout the Cold War. Throughout the VHS tapes, at random intervals, two-digit nixie tube combinations appeared, required to solve ciphers, in addition to one set of coordinates per VHS tape that led to a location in "Warzone".


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: On August 19, 2020, once all ciphers were solved, the teaser trailer was revealed. The teaser trailer contains segments of a 1984 interview with former Soviet PGU KGB informant and defector Yuri Bezmenov discussing active measures, taken from a 1984 interview with conspiracy theorist G. Edward Griffin. The worldwide reveal was on August 26, 2020.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: Starting on September 22, 2020, another alternate reality game (ARG) on pawntakespawn.com, teasing the Zombies mode, began when various "Call of Duty" YouTubers such as NoahJ456 and MrDalekJD were sent crates with 1980s technology and ciphers to solve. The official reveal for Zombies was on September 30.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: Pre-orders of all "Black Ops Cold War" editions grant early access to the open-access beta, a weapons pack, and a Frank Woods operator pack in "" and "". The Ultimate Edition grants access to three additional cosmetic skin packs, plus access to the Battle Pass of the current Season for "Black Ops Cold War" (dependent on time of purchase). The Cross-gen Bundle and Ultimate Edition grant console players two versions of the game for use on the current console generation (PlayStation 4 and Xbox One) and the next generation (PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series S or Xbox Series X) upon availability.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: CBR.com reported that the teaser trailer had been banned in China due to a one-second depiction of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests. An edited teaser was released worldwide instead. PC Gamer's Andy Chalk wrote: "There's also no mistaking the irony of active censorship in a promo trailer for a game whose tagline is, literally, 'Know your history'."


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: An editorial by Ian Walker in Kotaku accused "Call of Duty" of legitimating the views of Bezmenov when it included footage of his interview with Griffin in its August trailer. Among the complaints he had was that Bezmenov's views acted as a magnet for far-right conspiracy theories and personalities, that Activision presented Bezmenov's interview without the proper context and that Bezmenov himself held views that Walker argued were on the far right.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: All downloadable content (DLC) maps for the game, both for multiplayer and Zombies, were completely free. As with "Modern Warfare", the game features post-launch microtranscations via the battle pass system and cosmetic bundles available via the in-game store.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: In May 2021, for the mid-season update of Season 3, Activision and Treyarch announced a collaboration event, titled "'80s Action Heroes", featuring the addition of John Rambo and John McClane as playable characters, as well as new limited-time game modes inspired by the "Rambo" franchise and the "Die Hard" film series. Rambo and McClane's appearances are based on "" and "Die Hard", respectively, with their voice lines adapted directly from the films.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: In September 2021, Activision and Rebellion Developments announced a collaboration, bringing the character Judge Dredd of the "2000 AD" comic book series into "Cold War" as a cosmetic outfit for the operator Ingo Beck. The Judge Dredd bundle was released September 14, 2021.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: In October 2021, Activision and Treyarch announced The Haunting seasonal event as part of its sixth season content update, which would feature game modes and purchasable cosmetic items based on several horror movie franchises. Ahead of the event's release, details were leaked about some of the items, including a Ghostface operator character based on the "Scream" franchise, as well as a Frank the Bunny outfit based on the character from "Donnie Darko".


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: "Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War" received "generally favorable" reviews from critics, according to review aggregator Metacritic.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: "Game Informer" gave the game a 8.75/10 rating, praising the campaign and saying: "If "Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War" excels at anything, it's options. This isn't uncommon for a "Call of Duty" title, but with a vast array of game modes for myriad player profiles and a fun campaign that retains a summer-blockbuster feel while getting weird and wild, the ride is a good one."


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: There have been multiple reports of "Black Ops Cold War" bricking video game consoles. This has affected the releases of both the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X.


title: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War

text: The PlayStation 4 version sold 84,475 physical copies within its first week on sale in Japan, making it the bestselling retail game of the week in the country. The PlayStation 5 version was the nineteenth bestselling retail game in Japan throughout the same week, with 6,045 copies being sold. In December 2020, it was confirmed that the game had sold 5.7 million digital units. Within its first six weeks of release, the game earned $678 million. The NPD Group named it the best selling game of 2020 and also ranked it as the twentieth bestselling video game in the United States by lifetime dollar sales.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: Bath () is a city in the Bath and North East Somerset unitary area in the county of Somerset, England, known for and named after its Roman-built baths. At the 2021 Census, the population was 101,557. Bath is in the valley of the River Avon, west of London and southeast of Bristol. The city became a World Heritage Site in 1987, and was later added to the transnational World Heritage Site known as the "Great Spa Towns of Europe" in 2021. Bath is also the largest city and settlement in Somerset.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: The city became a spa with the Latin name " ("the waters of Sulis") 60 AD when the Romans built baths and a temple in the valley of the River Avon, although hot springs were known even before then.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: Bath Abbey was founded in the 7th century and became a religious centre; the building was rebuilt in the 12th and 16th centuries. In the 17th century, claims were made for the curative properties of water from the springs, and Bath became popular as a spa town in the Georgian era. Georgian architecture, crafted from Bath stone, includes the Royal Crescent, Circus, Pump Room and Assembly Rooms where Beau Nash presided over the city's social life from 1705 until his death in 1761.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: Many of the streets and squares were laid out by John Wood, the Elder, and in the 18th century the city became fashionable and the population grew. Jane Austen lived in Bath in the early 19th century. Further building was undertaken in the 19th century and following the Bath Blitz in World War II. Bath became part of the county of Avon in 1974, and, following Avon's abolition in 1996, has been the principal centre of Bath and North East Somerset.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: Bath has up to 1.3 million yearly visitors, making it one of ten English cities visited most by overseas tourists. Attractions include the spas, canal boat tours, Royal Crescent, Bath Skyline, Parade Gardens and Royal Victoria Park which hosts carnivals and seasonal events. Shopping areas include SouthGate shopping centre, the Corridor arcade and artisan shops at Walcot, Milsom, Stall and York Streets. There are theatres, including the Theatre Royal, as well as several museums including the Museum of Bath Architecture, the Victoria Art Gallery, the Museum of East Asian Art, the Herschel Museum of Astronomy, Fashion Museum, and the Holburne Museum. The city has two universities – the University of Bath and Bath Spa University – with Bath College providing further education. Sporting clubs from the city include Bath Rugby and Bath City. It is also home to software, publishing and service-oriented industries such as Future plc and Rotork.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: The hills in the locality such as Bathampton Down saw human activity from the Mesolithic period. Several Bronze Age round barrows were opened by John Skinner in the 18th century. A long barrow site believed to be from the Early Bronze Age Beaker people was flattened to make way for RAF Charmy Down. Solsbury Hill overlooking the current city was an Iron Age hill fort and the adjacent Bathampton Camp may also have been one.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: Archaeological evidence shows that the site of the Roman baths' main spring may have been treated as a shrine by the Britons, and was dedicated to the goddess Sulis, whom the Romans identified with Minerva; the name Sulis continued to be used after the Roman invasion, appearing in the town's Roman name, " (literally, "the waters of Sulis"). Messages to her scratched onto metal, known as curse tablets, have been recovered from the sacred spring by archaeologists. The tablets were written in Latin, and cursed people whom the writers felt had wronged them. For example, if a citizen had his clothes stolen at the baths, he might write a curse, naming the suspects, on a tablet to be read by the goddess.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: A temple was constructed in AD 60–70, and a bathing complex was built up over the next 300 years. Engineers drove oak piles into the mud to provide a stable foundation, and surrounded the spring with an irregular stone chamber lined with lead. In the 2nd century, the spring was enclosed within a wooden barrel-vaulted structure that housed the caldarium (hot bath), tepidarium (warm bath), and frigidarium (cold bath).


title: Bath, Somerset

text: The town was later given defensive walls, probably in the 3rd century. After the failure of Roman authority in the first decade of the 5th century, the baths fell into disrepair and were eventually lost as a result of rising water levels and silting.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: In March 2012, a hoard of 30,000 silver Roman coins, one of the largest discovered in Britain, was unearthed in an archaeological dig. The coins, believed to date from the 3rd century, were found about from the Roman baths.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: Bath may have been the site of the Battle of Badon ( 500 AD), in which Arthur, the hero of later legends, is said to have defeated the Anglo-Saxons. The town was captured by the West Saxons in 577 after the Battle of Deorham; the Anglo-Saxon poem "The Ruin" may describe the appearance of the Roman site about this time. A monastery was founded at an early date – reputedly by Saint David although more probably in 675 by Osric, King of the Hwicce, perhaps using the walled area as its precinct. Nennius, a 9th-century historian, mentions a "Hot Lake" in the land of the Hwicce along the River Severn, and adds "It is surrounded by a wall, made of brick and stone, and men may go there to bathe at any time, and every man can have the kind of bath he likes. If he wants, it will be a cold bath; and if he wants a hot bath, it will be hot". Bede described hot baths in the geographical introduction to the "Ecclesiastical History" in terms very similar to those of Nennius. King Offa of Mercia gained control of the monastery in 781 and rebuilt the church, which was dedicated to St. Peter.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: According to the Victorian churchman Edward Churton, during the Anglo-Saxon era Bath was known as "Acemannesceastre" ('Akemanchester'), or 'aching men's city', on account of the reputation these springs had for healing the sick.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: By the 9th century, the old Roman street pattern was lost and Bath was a royal possession. King Alfred laid out the town afresh, leaving its south-eastern quadrant as the abbey precinct. In the Burghal Hidage, Bath is recorded as a burh (borough) and is described as having walls of and was allocated 1000 men for defence. During the reign of Edward the Elder coins were minted in Bath based on a design from the Winchester mint but with 'BAD' on the obverse relating to the Anglo-Saxon name for the town, Baðum, Baðan or Baðon, meaning "at the baths", and this was the source of the present name. Edgar of England was crowned king of England in Bath Abbey in 973, in a ceremony that formed the basis of all future English coronations.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: William Rufus granted the town, abbey and mint to a royal physician, John of Tours, who became Bishop of Wells and Abbot of Bath, following the sacking of the town during the Rebellion of 1088. It was papal policy for bishops to move to more urban seats, and John of Tours translated his own from Wells to Bath. The bishop planned and began a much larger church as his cathedral, to which was attached a priory, with the bishop's palace beside it. New baths were built around the three springs. Later bishops returned the episcopal seat to Wells while retaining the name Bath in the title, Bishop of Bath and Wells. St John's Hospital was founded around 1180 by Bishop Reginald Fitz Jocelin and is among the oldest almshouses in England. The 'hospital of the baths' was built beside the hot springs of the Cross Bath, for their health-giving properties and to provide shelter for the poor infirm.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: Administrative systems fell within the hundreds. The Bath Hundred had various names including the Hundred of Le Buri. The Bath Foreign Hundred or Forinsecum covered the area outside the city and was later combined into the Bath Forum Hundred. Wealthy merchants had no status within the hundred courts and formed guilds to gain influence. They built the first guildhall probably in the 13th century. Around 1200, the first mayor was appointed.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: By the 15th century, Bath's abbey church was dilapidated and Oliver King, Bishop of Bath and Wells, decided to rebuild it on a smaller scale in 1500. The new church was completed just a few years before Bath Priory was dissolved in 1539 by Henry VIII. The abbey church became derelict before being restored as the city's parish church in the Elizabethan era, when the city experienced a revival as a spa. The baths were improved and the city began to attract the aristocracy. A Royal charter granted by Queen Elizabeth I in 1590 confirmed city status. Anne of Denmark came to bathe in 1613 and 1615.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: During the English Civil War, the city was garrisoned for Charles I. Seven thousand pounds was spent on fortifications, but on the appearance of parliamentary forces the gates were thrown open and the city surrendered. It became a significant post for the New Model Army under William Waller. Bath was retaken by the royalists in July 1643 following the Battle of Lansdowne and occupied for two years until 1645. Luckily, the city was spared the destruction of property and starvation of its inhabitants unlike nearby Bristol and Gloucester. During the occupation, the finances of the Bath City Council took a drubbing with council spending, rents and grants all falling. The billeting of soldiers in private houses also contributed to disorder and vandalism.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: Normalcy to the city quickly recovered after the war when the city council achieved a healthy budget surplus. Thomas Guidott, a student of chemistry and medicine at Wadham College, Oxford, set up a practice in the city in 1668. He was interested in the curative properties of the waters, and he wrote "A discourse of Bathe, and the hot waters there. Also, Some Enquiries into the Nature of the water" in 1676. It brought the health-giving properties of the hot mineral waters to the attention of the country, and the aristocracy arrived to partake in them.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: Several areas of the city were developed in the Stuart period, and more building took place during Georgian times in response to the increasing number of visitors who required accommodation. Architects John Wood the Elder and his son laid out the new quarters in streets and squares, the identical façades of which gave an impression of palatial scale and classical decorum. Much of the creamy gold Bath stone, a type of limestone used for construction in the city, was obtained from the Combe Down and Bathampton Down Mines owned by Ralph Allen (1694–1764). Allen, to advertise the quality of his quarried limestone, commissioned the elder John Wood to build a country house on his Prior Park estate between the city and the mines. Allen was responsible for improving and expanding the postal service in western England, for which he held the contract for more than forty years. Although not fond of politics, Allen was a civic-minded man and a member of Bath Corporation for many years. He was elected mayor for a single term in 1742.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: In the early 18th century, Bath acquired its first purpose-built theatre, the Old Orchard Street Theatre. It was rebuilt as the Theatre Royal, along with the Grand Pump Room attached to the Roman Baths and assembly rooms. Master of ceremonies Beau Nash, who presided over the city's social life from 1705 until his death in 1761, drew up a code of behaviour for public entertainments. Bath had become perhaps the most fashionable of the rapidly developing British spa towns, attracting many notable visitors such as the wealthy London bookseller Andrew Millar and his wife, who both made long visits. In 1816, it was described as "a seat of amusement and dissipation", where "scenes of extravagance in this receptacle of the wealthy and the idle, the weak and designing" were habitual.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: The population of the city was 40,020 at the 1801 census, making it one of the largest cities in Britain. William Thomas Beckford bought a house in Lansdown Crescent in 1822, and subsequently two adjacent houses to form his residence. Having acquired all the land between his home and the top of Lansdown Hill, he created a garden more than in length and built Beckford's Tower at the top.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia spent the four years in exile, from 1936 to 1940, at Fairfield House in Bath. During World War II, between the evening of 25 April and the early morning of 27 April 1942, Bath suffered three air raids in reprisal for RAF raids on the German cities of Lübeck and Rostock, part of the Luftwaffe campaign popularly known as the Baedeker Blitz. During the Bath Blitz, more than 400 people were killed, and more than 19,000 buildings damaged or destroyed.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: Houses in Royal Crescent, Circus and Paragon were burnt out along with the Assembly Rooms. A high explosive bomb landed on the east side of Queen Square, resulting in houses on the south side being damaged and the Francis Hotel losing of its frontage. The buildings have all been restored although there are still signs of the bombing.


title: Bath, Somerset

text: A postwar review of inadequate housing led to the clearance and redevelopment of areas of the city in a postwar style, often at variance with the local Georgian style. In the 1950s, the nearby villages of Combe Down, Twerton and Weston were incorporated into the city to enable the development of housing, much of it council housing. In 1965, town planner Colin Buchanan published "Bath: A Planning and Transport Study", which to a large degree sought to better accommodate the motor car, including the idea of a traffic tunnel underneath the centre of Bath. Though criticised by conservationists, some parts of the plan were implemented.