Most viewed Wikipedia articles on December 22 , 2015
The Book of the Dead is an ancient Egyptian funerary text generally written on papyrus and used from the beginning of the New Kingdom to around 50 BCE. The original Egyptian name for the text, transliterated rw nw prt m hrw, is translated as Book of Coming Forth by Day or Book of Emerging Forth into the Light. "Book" is the closest term to describe the loose collection of texts consisting of a number of magic spells intended to assist a dead person's journey through the Duat, or underworld, and into the afterlife and written by many priests over a period of about 1,000 years.
Justin Berfield is an American actor, writer, and producer. He is known for his portrayal of Malcolm's dimwitted older brother, Reese, on the family sitcom Malcolm in the Middle. He also played Ross Malloy on The WB sitcom Unhappily Ever After. As of 2010, Berfield is Chief Creative Officer of Virgin Produced, a film and television development, packaging, and production company announced in 2010 by the Virgin Group.
Star Wars is an American epic space opera media franchise created by George Lucas, which began with the eponymous 1977 film and quickly became a worldwide pop-culture phenomenon. The franchise has been expanded into various films and other media, including television series, video games, novels, comic books, theme park attractions, and themed areas, comprising an all-encompassing fictional universe. In 2020, its total value was estimated at US$70 billion, and it is currently the fifth-highest-grossing media franchise of all time.
Frodo Baggins is a fictional character in J. R. R. Tolkien's writings, and one of the protagonists in The Lord of the Rings. Frodo is a hobbit of the Shire who inherits the One Ring from his cousin Bilbo Baggins and undertakes the quest to destroy it in the fires of Mount Doom in Mordor. He is mentioned in Tolkien's posthumously published works, The Silmarillion and Unfinished Tales.
Pia Alonzo Wurtzbach, formerly known professionally as Pia Romero, is a Filipino-German model, actress and beauty queen who was crowned Miss Universe 2015. She is one of the four Filipinas to have won the Miss Universe. Previously, she was crowned Miss Universe Philippines 2015.
A membrane transport protein is a membrane protein involved in the movement of ions, small molecules, and macromolecules, such as another protein, across a biological membrane. Transport proteins are integral transmembrane protein; that is they exist permanently within and span the membrane across which they transport substances. The proteins may assist in the movement of substances by facilitated diffusion or active transport. The two main types of proteins involved in such transport are broadly categorized as either channels or carriers. The solute carriers and atypical SLCs are secondary active or facilitative transporters in humans. Collectively membrane transporters and channels are transportome. Transportomes govern cellular influx and efflux of not only ions and nutrients but drugs as well.
Daisy Jazz Isobel Ridley is an English actress who rose to international prominence through playing the lead role of Rey in the Star Wars sequel trilogy: The Force Awakens (2015), The Last Jedi (2017), and The Rise of Skywalker (2019).
Dilwale is a 2015 Indian Hindi-language romantic action comedy film produced by Gauri Khan and directed by Rohit Shetty. The film is distributed by Red Chillies Entertainment. The film's dialogue was written by Sajid-Farhad and the soundtrack was composed by Pritam. It stars Shah Rukh Khan and Kajol in their seventh film together alongside Varun Dhawan and Kriti Sanon in the lead roles.
Miss Universe 2015, the 64th Miss Universe pageant, was held on December 20, 2015 at The AXIS in Las Vegas, Nevada, United States. Paulina Vega of Colombia crowned her successor Pia Wurtzbach of the Philippines at the end of the event. After 42 years, this is the third time the Philippines won Miss Universe, after Margarita Moran in 1973. 80 contestants competed for the crown.
Broderick Stephen Harvey is an American television presenter, comedian, actor, broadcaster, author, game show host and businessman. He hosts The Steve Harvey Morning Show, Family Feud, Celebrity Family Feud and the Miss Universe competition.
Bajirao Mastani is a 2015 Indian Hindi-language epic historical romance film directed by Sanjay Leela Bhansali, who also composed its soundtrack. Jointly produced by Bhansali and Eros International's Kishore Lulla, the film stars Ranveer Singh, Deepika Padukone and Priyanka Chopra. The supporting cast includes Tanvi Azmi, Vaibhav Tatwawaadi and Milind Soman. Based on the Marathi fictional novel Rau by Nagnath S. Inamdar, Bajirao Mastani narrates the story of the Maratha Peshwa Bajirao I and his second wife.
Miss Universe is an annual international beauty pageant that is run by the United States–based Miss Universe Organization. Along with Miss World, Miss International, and Miss Earth, Miss Universe is one of the Big Four international beauty pageants.
The winter solstice, hiemal solstice or hibernal solstice occurs when one of the Earth's poles has its maximum tilt away from the Sun. It happens twice yearly, once in each hemisphere. For that hemisphere, the winter solstice is the day with the shortest period of daylight and longest night of the year, when the Sun is at its lowest daily maximum elevation in the sky. At the pole, there is continuous darkness or twilight around the winter solstice. Its opposite is the summer solstice. Also the Tropic of Cancer or Tropic of Capricorn depending on the hemispheres winter solstice the sun goes 90 degrees below the horizon at solar midnight to the nadir.
Java is a class-based, object-oriented programming language that is designed to have as few implementation dependencies as possible. It is a general-purpose programming language intended to let application developers write once, run anywhere (WORA), meaning that compiled Java code can run on all platforms that support Java without the need for recompilation. Java applications are typically compiled to bytecode that can run on any Java virtual machine (JVM) regardless of the underlying computer architecture. The syntax of Java is similar to C and C++, but has fewer low-level facilities than either of them. The Java runtime provides dynamic capabilities that are typically not available in traditional compiled languages. As of 2019, Java was one of the most popular programming languages in use according to GitHub, particularly for client-server web applications, with a reported 9 million developers.
Elon Reeve Musk is a business magnate, industrial designer and engineer. He is the founder, CEO, CTO and chief designer of SpaceX; early investor, CEO and product architect of Tesla, Inc.; founder of The Boring Company; co-founder of Neuralink; and co-founder and initial co-chairman of OpenAI. In 2018, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) and ranked 25th on the Forbes list of The World's Most Powerful People, and was ranked joint-first on the Forbes list of the Most Innovative Leaders of 2019. A centi-billionaire, Musk became the richest person in the world in January 2021, surpassing Jeff Bezos.
Baji Rao I, born as Visaji, also known as Bajirao Ballal, was the 7th Peshwa of the Maratha empire. In his 20-year military career, he never lost a battle and is widely considered as one of the best Indian cavalry generals. His relationship with his half-Muslim wife Mastani, a subject of controversy, has been adapted in Indian novels and cinema.
Web scraping, web harvesting, or web data extraction is data scraping used for extracting data from websites. Web scraping software may access the World Wide Web directly using the Hypertext Transfer Protocol, or through a web browser. While web scraping can be done manually by a software user, the term typically refers to automated processes implemented using a bot or web crawler. It is a form of copying, in which specific data is gathered and copied from the web, typically into a central local database or spreadsheet, for later retrieval or analysis.
Kylo Ren is a fictional character and a major antagonist in the Star Wars franchise. Introduced in the 2015 film Star Wars: The Force Awakens, he is portrayed by Adam Driver. Kylo Ren is the chosen name of Ben Solo, the only child of original Star Wars trilogy characters Han Solo and Princess Leia Organa. Though trained by his uncle Luke Skywalker as a Jedi, he was seduced to the dark side of the Force by Supreme Leader Snoke, and aspires to be as powerful as his grandfather, the Sith Lord Darth Vader. Ren is eventually redeemed like his grandfather before him and helps Rey in her fight against her grandfather, the revived Emperor Palpatine.
Carrie Frances Fisher was an American actress and writer. Fisher played Princess Leia in the Star Wars films, a role for which she was nominated for four Saturn Awards. Her other film credits include Shampoo (1975), The Blues Brothers (1980), Hannah and Her Sisters (1986), The 'Burbs (1989), When Harry Met Sally... (1989), Soapdish (1991), and The Women (2008). Fisher was nominated twice for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series for her performances on the television series 30 Rock and Catastrophe. She was posthumously made a Disney Legend in 2017, and in 2018 she was awarded a posthumous Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album.
Mastani was the daughter of Maharaja Chhatrasal and the second wife of the Maratha Peshwa Bajirao I. Her relationship within the Maratha Brahmin family has been subject of both admiration and controversy, and well adapted in Indian novels and cinema.
Adam Douglas Driver is an American actor. He is the recipient of numerous accolades, including the Volpi Cup for Best Actor, as well as nominations for a Tony Award, two Academy Awards, and four Primetime Emmy Awards.
Star Wars is a 1977 American epic space-opera film written and directed by George Lucas, produced by Lucasfilm and distributed by 20th Century Fox. It stars Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, Peter Cushing, Alec Guinness, David Prowse, James Earl Jones, Anthony Daniels, Kenny Baker and Peter Mayhew. It is the first installment of the original Star Wars trilogy, the first of the franchise to be produced, and the fourth episode of the "Skywalker saga".
The Revenant is a 2015 American epic Revisionist Western film directed by Alejandro González Iñárritu. The screenplay by Mark L. Smith and Iñárritu is based in part on Michael Punke's 2002 novel of the same name, which describes frontiersman Hugh Glass's experiences in 1823; that novel is, in turn, based on the 1915 poem The Song of Hugh Glass. The film stars Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Hardy, Domhnall Gleeson, and Will Poulter.
The following is a list of women who have won the Miss Universe title.
Charles Cameron Woodson is a former American football player. He played college football for Michigan, where he led the Wolverines to a share of the national championship in 1997. Woodson, a "two-way player" who played both offense and defense, won the Heisman Trophy in the same year. To date, he is the only primarily defensive player to win the Heisman, and, until wide receiver DeVonta Smith won the Heisman in 2020, Woodson had been the most recent player to win the Heisman who was not either a running back or quarterback. Woodson went on to accomplish a storied career professionally with one of the most decorated professional football resumes of all time. He is considered by many of his peers to be one of the greatest defensive players to have ever played.
Steven Allan Avery is an American convicted murderer from Manitowoc County, Wisconsin, who had previously been wrongfully convicted in 1986 of sexual assault and attempted murder. After serving 18 years of a 32-year sentence, he was exonerated by DNA testing and released in 2003, only to be charged with murder two years later.
The Star Wars sequel trilogy is the third trilogy of the main Star Wars franchise, an American space opera created by George Lucas. It is produced by Lucasfilm Ltd. and distributed by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures. The trilogy consists of episodes VII through IX, chronologically following the prequel trilogy and the original trilogy, serving as the final act of the "Skywalker saga". Lucas had planned a sequel trilogy as early as 1976, but canceled it by 1981. He ended up producing only the first six episodes and for a time described these as comprising the complete story. The sequel trilogy concept was revived when The Walt Disney Company entered negotiations to acquire Lucasfilm in mid-2011. Lucas produced new story treatments, but according to him these were largely discarded. Both the acquisition and plans to produce the trilogy were announced in late 2012.
Crime in Serbia is combated by the Serbian Police and other government agencies.
A Commonwealth realm is a sovereign state which has Elizabeth II as its monarch and head of state. Each realm functions as an independent co-equal kingdom from the other realms.
Mark Richard Hamill is an American actor, voice actor, and writer. He is known for playing Luke Skywalker in the Star Wars film series, winning three Saturn Awards for the role. His other film appearances include Corvette Summer (1978) and The Big Red One (1980). Hamill has also appeared on stage in several theater productions, primarily during the 1980s.
Harrison Ford is an American actor, pilot, and environmental activist. As of 2019, the U.S. domestic box office grosses of his films total over $5.1 billion, with worldwide grosses surpassing $9.3 billion, placing him at No. 4 on the list of highest-grossing domestic box office stars of all time. In addition to his box office success, he is also an Academy Award nominee, a four-time Golden Globe nominee, a three-time Saturn Award winner, and the recipient of the AFI Life Achievement Award and the Cecil B. DeMille Award.
This is a list of notable deaths, organized by year. New deaths articles are added to their respective month, and then linked here.
The Hateful Eight is a 2015 American revisionist western thriller film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino. It stars Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russell, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Walton Goggins, Demián Bichir, Tim Roth, Michael Madsen, and Bruce Dern as eight strangers who seek refuge from a blizzard in a stagecoach stopover some time after the American Civil War.
Joy is a 2015 American biographical comedy-drama film, written and directed by David O. Russell and starring Jennifer Lawrence as Joy Mangano, a self-made millionaire who created her own business empire.
Return of the Jedi is a 1983 American epic space opera film directed by Richard Marquand. The screenplay is by Lawrence Kasdan and George Lucas from a story by Lucas, who was also the executive producer. It is the third installment in the original Star Wars trilogy, the third film to be produced, and the sixth film in the "Star Wars saga". It takes place one year after The Empire Strikes Back. The film stars Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, Billy Dee Williams, Anthony Daniels, David Prowse, Kenny Baker, Peter Mayhew and Frank Oz.
Donald John Trump is an American politician who was the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021. Before entering politics, he was a businessman and television personality.
Darth Vader is a fictional character in the Star Wars franchise. The character is a primary antagonist in the original trilogy and a primary protagonist in the prequel trilogy. Star Wars creator George Lucas has collectively referred to the first six episodic films of the franchise as "the tragedy of Darth Vader".
John Adedayo Bamidele Adegboyega, known professionally as John Boyega, is a British-Nigerian actor and producer. He first rose to prominence in his native Britain for his role as Moses in the sci-fi comedy film Attack the Block (2011), and his international breakthrough came with his role as Finn in the Star Wars sequel trilogy films The Force Awakens (2015), The Last Jedi (2017), and The Rise of Skywalker (2019). His other credits include the drama film Imperial Dreams (2014), the historical drama film Detroit (2017), the science fiction film Pacific Rim: Uprising (2018), and four episodes of the television series 24: Live Another Day. He received the BAFTA Rising Star Award in 2016, and was awarded the Trophée Chopard at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival. Boyega was cited as one of the Top 100 most influential Africans by New African magazine in 2020.
Governor Wilhuff Tarkin is a fictional character in the Star Wars franchise, debuting as the main antagonist of the film Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, alongside Sith Lord Darth Vader. He is commander of the Death Star, the Galactic Empire's dwarf planet-sized battle station. Tarkin advocated for the Tarkin Doctrine, an entirely fear-based military system in which intimidating capital ships and vast numbers of strike fighters are used in huge numbers to make the Galactic Empire seem so impossible to defeat that nobody would ever dare try and rise up against it. His philosophy of "ruling through fear of force" became central to Imperial policy and promoted him to become the first Grand Moff in the Galactic Empire. While he is first introduced as a superior officer of Darth Vader, the series also portrays his life prior to the first film, including having known Vader’s former Jedi self, Anakin Skywalker, and having been instrumental in the rise of the Empire. Tarkin has been called "one of the most formidable villains in Star Wars history."
Ariadna María Gutiérrez Arévalo is a Colombian model, actress, and beauty pageant titleholder who was crowned Miss Colombia 2014. Gutiérrez placed as the first runner-up in Miss Universe 2015, where she was mistakenly announced as the winner by host Steve Harvey. After pageantry, she starred in the film XXX: Return of Xander Cage and tied for 3rd place on Celebrity Big Brother 1.
Joy Mangano is an American inventor and entrepreneur known for inventions such as the self-wringing Miracle Mop. She was the president of Ingenious Designs, LLC, and appeared regularly on the US television shopping channel HSN until her departure in late 2018.
Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) is an American aerospace manufacturer and space transportation services company headquartered in Hawthorne, California. It was founded in 2002 by Elon Musk with the goal of reducing space transportation costs to enable the colonization of Mars. SpaceX has developed several launch vehicles, as well as the Dragon cargo spacecraft and the Starlink satellite constellation, and has flown humans to the International Space Station on the SpaceX Dragon 2.
The Empire Strikes Back, also known as Star Wars: Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back, is a 1980 American epic space opera film directed by Irvin Kershner and written by Leigh Brackett and Lawrence Kasdan, based on a story by George Lucas. The second installment in the original Star Wars trilogy, as the sequel to Star Wars (1977), it is the second film in the franchise to be produced, and the fifth episode of the "Skywalker saga". The story is set three years after the events of the first film, as the Galactic Empire hunts the scattered Rebel Alliance throughout the galaxy. While Darth Vader relentlessly pursues Luke Skywalker's friends—Han Solo, Princess Leia, and Chewbacca—Luke studies the Force under Jedi Master Yoda to prepare himself for his upcoming confrontation with Vader.
Christmas is an annual festival commemorating the birth of Jesus Christ, observed primarily on December 25 as a religious and cultural celebration among billions of people around the world. A feast central to the Christian liturgical year, it is preceded by the season of Advent or the Nativity Fast and initiates the season of Christmastide, which historically in the West lasts twelve days and culminates on Twelfth Night. Christmas Day is a public holiday in many of the world's nations, is celebrated religiously by a majority of Christians, as well as culturally by many non-Christians, and forms an integral part of the holiday season centered around it.
Óscar Isaac Hernández Estrada is a Guatemalan-American actor who starred in the tragicomedy Inside Llewyn Davis (2013), for which he received a Golden Globe Award nomination, the crime drama A Most Violent Year (2014), and the science fiction thriller Ex Machina (2014). In 2006, he portrayed Saint Joseph, husband of Mary, in The Nativity Story. He also portrayed José Ramos-Horta, former president of East Timor and co-recipient of the 1996 Nobel Peace Prize, in the Australian film Balibo, for which he won the AACTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role.
Films generate income from several revenue streams, including theatrical exhibition, home video, television broadcast rights, and merchandising. However, theatrical box office earnings are the primary metric for trade publications in assessing the success of a film, mostly because of the availability of the data compared to sales figures for home video and broadcast rights, but also because of historical practice. Included on the list are charts of the top box-office earners, a chart of high-grossing films by calendar year, a timeline showing the transition of the highest-grossing film record, and a chart of the highest-grossing film franchises and series. All charts are ranked by international theatrical box-office performance where possible, excluding income derived from home video, broadcasting rights, and merchandise.
One-Punch Man is a Japanese superhero franchise created by the artist ONE. It tells the story of Saitama, a superhero who can defeat any opponent with a single punch but seeks to find a worthy opponent after growing bored by a lack of challenge due to his overwhelming strength. ONE wrote the original webcomic version in early 2009.
Adele Laurie Blue Adkins, is an English singer-songwriter. After graduating from the BRIT School in 2006, Adele signed a recording contract with XL Recordings. In 2007, she received the Brit Awards Critics' Choice Award and won the BBC Sound of 2008 poll. Her debut album, 19, was released in 2008. It is certified 8× platinum in the UK and triple platinum in the US. The album contains her first song, "Hometown Glory", written when she was 16, which is based on her home suburb of West Norwood in London. An appearance she made on Saturday Night Live in late 2008 boosted her career in the US. At the 2009 Grammy Awards, Adele won the awards for Best New Artist and Best Female Pop Vocal Performance.
Erik Per Sullivan is an American former actor. He is best known for his role as Dewey, the younger brother to middle child Malcolm, on the Fox series Malcolm in the Middle.
Hugh Glass was an American frontiersman, fur trapper, trader, hunter, and explorer. He is best known for his story of survival and forgiveness after being left for dead by companions when he was mauled by a grizzly bear.
Red hair occurs naturally in one to two percent of the human population, appearing with greater frequency among people of Northern or Northwestern European ancestry and lesser frequency in other populations. It is most common in individuals homozygous for a recessive allele on chromosome 16 that produces an altered version of the MC1R protein.
Odell Cornelious Beckham Jr., commonly known as OBJ, is an American football wide receiver for the Cleveland Browns of the National Football League (NFL). Born in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Beckham played college football at nearby Louisiana State University (LSU) and was drafted by the New York Giants in the first round of the 2014 NFL Draft. Since entering the NFL, Beckham has been one of the most productive and popular players but has drawn media scrutiny for his personal conduct.
Women's suffrage is the right of women to vote in elections. Beginning in the mid-19th century, aside from the work being done by women for broad-based economic and political equality and for social reforms, women sought to change voting laws to allow them to vote. National and international organizations formed to coordinate efforts towards that objective, especially the International Woman Suffrage Alliance, as well as for equal civil rights for women.
D-Unit was a South Korean girl group under the label D-Business Entertainment. The groups concept includes the addition of a new member with every promotion cycle. The group debuted as a trio consisting of Ram, UJin and Zin with a full-length album, featuring the title track "I’m Missin’ You" on August 1, 2012. This was followed by their debut stage on August 2, 2012 on M!Countdown. In March 2013, D-UNIT added their first guest member, JNey, a member of GP Basic.
Trypophobia is an aversion to the sight of irregular patterns or clusters of small holes or bumps. It is not officially recognized as a mental disorder, but may be diagnosed as a specific phobia if excessive fear and distress occur. People may express only disgust to trypophobic imagery.
Luke Skywalker is a fictional character and the main protagonist of the original film trilogy of the Star Wars franchise created by George Lucas. Portrayed by Mark Hamill, Luke first appeared in Star Wars (1977), and he returned in The Empire Strikes Back (1980) and Return of the Jedi (1983). Three decades later, Hamill returned as Luke in the Star Wars sequel trilogy, appearing in all three films: The Force Awakens (2015), The Last Jedi (2017), and The Rise of Skywalker (2019). He reprised the role in The Mandalorian episode "Chapter 16: The Rescue" (2020), voicing the character that was portrayed by a body double with digital de-aging.
The 2012 Delhi gang rape and murder case involved a rape and fatal assault that occurred on 16 December 2012 in Munirka, a neighbourhood in South Delhi. The incident took place when Jyoti Singh, a 23-year-old female physiotherapy intern, was beaten, gang-raped, and tortured in a private bus in which she was travelling with her male friend. There were six others in the bus, including the driver, all of whom raped the woman and beat her friend. Eleven days after the assault she was transferred to a hospital in Singapore for emergency treatment but died two days later. The incident generated widespread national and international coverage and was widely condemned, both in India and abroad. Subsequently, public protests against the state and central governments for failing to provide adequate security for women took place in New Delhi, where thousands of protesters clashed with security forces. Similar protests took place in major cities throughout the country. Since Indian law does not allow the press to publish a rape victim's name, the victim was widely known as Nirbhaya, meaning "fearless", and her struggle and death became a symbol of women's resistance to rape around the world.
Jeffrey Jacob Abrams is an American film director, producer, and screenwriter. He is known for his work in the genres of action, drama, and science fiction. Abrams wrote or produced such films as Regarding Henry (1991), Forever Young (1992), Armageddon (1998), Cloverfield (2008), Star Trek (2009), Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015), and Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (2019).
Marvel's Jessica Jones, or simply Jessica Jones, is an American television series created by Melissa Rosenberg for the streaming service Netflix, based on the Marvel Comics character of the same name. It is set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), sharing continuity with the films of the franchise, and is the second in a series of shows that led to The Defenders crossover miniseries. The series is produced by Marvel Television in association with ABC Studios and Tall Girls Productions, with Rosenberg serving as showrunner. Scott Reynolds was a co-showrunner for the third season.
Jessica Campbell Jones Cage is a fictional superhero appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. The character was created by writer Brian Michael Bendis and artist Michael Gaydos and first appeared in Alias #1, as part of Marvel's Max, an imprint for more mature content. Within the context of Marvel's shared universe, Jones is a former superhero who becomes the owner of Alias Private Investigations. Bendis originally envisioned the series centered on Jessica Drew and only decided to create Jones once he noticed that the main character had a distinct voice and background that differentiated her from Drew.
Falcon 9 is a partially reusable two-stage-to-orbit medium-lift launch vehicle designed and manufactured by SpaceX in the United States. Both the first and second stages are powered by SpaceX Merlin engines, using cryogenic liquid oxygen and rocket-grade kerosene (RP-1) as propellants. Its name is derived from the fictional Star Wars spacecraft, the Millennium Falcon, and the nine Merlin engines of the rocket's first stage. The rocket evolved with versions v1.0 (2010–2013), v1.1 (2013–2016), v1.2 "Full Thrust" (2015–present), including the Block 5 Full Thrust variant, flying since May 2018. Unlike most rockets in service, which are expendable launch systems, since the introduction of the Full Thrust version, Falcon 9 is partially reusable, with the first stage capable of re-entering the atmosphere and landing vertically after separating from the second stage. This feat was achieved for the first time on flight 20 in December 2015.
Han Solo is a fictional character in the Star Wars franchise created by George Lucas. The character first appeared in the 1977 film Star Wars portrayed by Harrison Ford, who reprised his role in The Empire Strikes Back (1980) and Return of the Jedi (1983). Ford returned to the role for The Force Awakens (2015), as well as a brief cameo in The Rise of Skywalker (2019). In the spin-off film Solo: A Star Wars Story (2018), a younger version of the character was portrayed by Alden Ehrenreich.
Macaulay Macaulay Culkin Culkin is an American actor, musician, and podcaster. Regarded as one of the most successful child actors of the 1990s, he was placed on VH1's list of the "100 Greatest Kid-Stars" and on E!'s list of the "50 Greatest Child Stars".
Paulina Vega Dieppa is a Colombian TV Host, model and beauty queen who was crowned Miss Colombia 2013 and Miss Universe 2014. Vega is the second Miss Universe from Colombia.
Krampus is a horned, anthropomorphic figure in Alpine folklore who during the Christmas season scares children who have misbehaved, assisting Saint Nicholas. The pair visit children on the night of the 5th December and Saint Nicholas rewards the well-behaved children with modest gifts such as oranges, dried fruit, walnuts and chocolate whilst the badly behaved ones only receive punishment with birch rods.
Princess Leia Organa is a fictional character in the Star Wars franchise, portrayed in films by Carrie Fisher. Introduced in the original Star Wars film in 1977, Leia is princess of the planet Alderaan, a member of the Imperial Senate and an agent of the Rebel Alliance. She thwarts the sinister Sith lord Darth Vader and helps bring about the destruction of the Empire's cataclysmic superweapon, the Death Star. In The Empire Strikes Back (1980), Leia commands a Rebel base and evades Vader as she falls in love with the smuggler Han Solo. In Return of the Jedi (1983), Leia helps in the operation to rescue Han from the crime lord Jabba the Hutt, and is revealed to be Vader's daughter and the twin sister of Luke Skywalker.
George Walton Lucas Jr. is an American film director, producer, screenwriter, and entrepreneur. Lucas is best known for creating the Star Wars and Indiana Jones franchises and founding Lucasfilm, LucasArts, and Industrial Light & Magic. He served as chairman of Lucasfilm before selling it to The Walt Disney Company in 2012. Lucas is one of history's most financially successful filmmakers and has been nominated for four Academy Awards. His films are among the 100 highest-grossing movies at the North American box office, adjusted for ticket-price inflation. Lucas is considered a significant figure of the 20th-century New Hollywood movement.
Pablo Emilio Escobar Gaviria was a Colombian drug lord and narcoterrorist who was the founder and sole leader of the Medellín Cartel. Dubbed "The King of Cocaine," Escobar is the wealthiest criminal in history, having amassed an estimated net worth of US$30 billion by the time of his death—equivalent to $59 billion as of 2019—while his drug cartel monopolized the cocaine trade into the United States in the 1980s and early 1990s.
Santa Claus, also known as Father Christmas, Saint Nicholas, Saint Nick, Kris Kringle, or simply Santa, is a legendary character originating in Western Christian culture who is said to bring gifts on Christmas Eve of toys and candy to well-behaved children, and either coal or nothing to naughty children. He is said to accomplish this with the aid of Christmas elves, who make the toys in his workshop at the North Pole, and flying reindeer who pull his sleigh through the air.
December 22 is the 356th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. Nine days remain until the end of the year.
"The Twelve Days of Christmas" is an English Christmas carol that enumerates in the manner of a cumulative song a series of increasingly numerous gifts given on each of the twelve days of Christmas. The song, published in England in 1780 without music as a chant or rhyme, is thought to be French in origin. "The Twelve Days of Christmas" has a Roud Folk Song Index number of 68. The tunes of collected versions vary. The standard tune now associated with it is derived from a 1909 arrangement of a traditional folk melody by English composer Frederic Austin, who introduced the familiar prolongation of the verse "five gold rings".
Anthony Clement "Nuts" McAuliffe was a senior United States Army officer who earned fame as the acting commander of the 101st Airborne Division defending Bastogne, Belgium, during the Battle of the Bulge in World War II. He is celebrated for his one-word reply to a German surrender ultimatum: "Nuts!" After the battle, McAuliffe was promoted and given command of the 103rd Infantry Division, which he led from January 1945 to July 1945. In the post-war era, he was commander of United States Army Europe.
Jennifer Shrader Lawrence is an American actress. The films she has acted in have grossed over $6 billion worldwide, and she was the world's highest-paid actress in 2015 and 2016. Lawrence appeared in Time's 100 most influential people in the world list in 2013 and in the Forbes Celebrity 100 list in 2014 and 2016.
Ethan Anthony Couch is an American who, at age 16, killed four people while driving under the influence on June 15, 2013, in Burleson, Texas. Couch was driving while intoxicated and under the influence of drugs, was driving on a restricted license and was speeding in a residential area when he lost control of his vehicle, colliding with a group of people assisting another driver with a disabled sport utility vehicle. Four people were killed in the collision, and a total of nine people were injured. Two passengers in Couch's pickup truck suffered serious injuries, with one passenger suffering complete paralysis.
Creed is a 2015 American sports drama film directed by Ryan Coogler from a story by Coogler and a screenplay written by Coogler, Aaron Covington, and Sylvester Stallone who uncreditedly wrote all the scenes and dialogues with his character in the film. Both a sequel and spin-off to the Rocky film series, serving as the seventh installment of the series and a sequel to 2006's Rocky Balboa, Michael B. Jordan stars as Adonis "Donnie" Johnson Creed, Apollo Creed's son, with Sylvester Stallone reprising the role of Rocky Balboa. It also features Tessa Thompson, Phylicia Rashad, Tony Bellew, and Graham McTavish. The film reunites Jordan with 2013's Fruitvale Station writer-director Coogler, as well as Wood Harris, with whom Jordan had worked on the television series The Wire.
USS Enterprise (CVN-65), formerly CVA(N)-65, is a decommissioned United States Navy aircraft carrier. She was the first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier and the eighth United States naval vessel to bear the name. Like her predecessor of World War II fame, she is nicknamed "Big E". At 1,123 feet (342 m), she is the longest naval vessel ever built. Her 93,284-long-ton (94,781 t) displacement ranks her as the 12th-heaviest carrier, after the ten carriers of the Nimitz class and USS Gerald R. Ford. Enterprise had a crew of some 4,600 service members.
Talulah Jane Riley is an English actress. She has appeared in films such as Pride & Prejudice, St Trinian's, The Boat That Rocked, St Trinian's 2: The Legend of Fritton's Gold, and Inception. Riley portrayed Angela on the HBO science-fiction Western television series Westworld.
Hayden Christensen is a Canadian actor and producer. He began his career on Canadian television at the age of 13, then diversified into American television in the late 1990s. He was praised for his acting as Sam in Life as a House (2001), earning Golden Globe Award and Screen Actors Guild Award nominations. Christensen gained international fame for his portrayal of Anakin Skywalker / Darth Vader in the Star Wars prequel trilogy films, Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones (2002) and Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith (2005) a role he is expected to reprise for the announced Obi Wan Kenobi Disney+ series. His honours for these films include a nomination for the Saturn Award for Best Actor and the Cannes Film Festival Revelation Award. He also received critical acclaim for his portrayal of Stephen Glass in the film Shattered Glass.
Facebook is an American online social media and social networking service based in Menlo Park, California, and a flagship service of the namesake company Facebook, Inc. It was founded by Mark Zuckerberg, along with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Moskovitz, and Chris Hughes.
Concussion is a 2015 American biographical sports drama film written and directed by Peter Landesman, based on the exposé "Game Brain" by Jeanne Marie Laskas, published in 2009 by GQ magazine. Set in 2002, the film stars Will Smith as Dr. Bennet Omalu, a forensic pathologist who fights against the National Football League trying to suppress his research on chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) brain degeneration suffered by professional football players. It also stars Alec Baldwin.
This is a list of Bollywood films that were released in 2015.
Sandra Bland was a 28-year-old African American woman who was found hanged in a jail cell in Waller County, Texas, on July 13, 2015, three days after being arrested during a pretextual traffic stop. Her death was ruled a suicide. It was followed by protests against her arrest, disputing the cause of death and alleging racial violence against her.
According to traditional festive legend in some parts of the world, Santa Claus's reindeer are said to pull a sleigh through the night sky to help Santa Claus deliver gifts to children on Christmas Eve. The commonly cited names of the nine reindeer are Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner, Blitzen, and Rudolph, although Donner is sometimes called Donder and Blitzen is sometimes called Blixem.
The Slammy Awards is a concept used by WWE, where awards, similar to the Academy and Grammy Awards, are given to professional wrestlers and other individuals within WWE, such as commentators and managers. Introduced in 1986, there have been 13 editions of the concept. The awards are a mixture of "serious" and "tongue-in-cheek". Winners of the award receive a statuette that depicts one wrestler holding another over his head.
2015 in film is an overview of events, including the highest-grossing films, award ceremonies, festivals, and a list of films released and notable deaths.
Luther is a British psychological crime drama television programme starring Idris Elba as DCI John Luther and Ruth Wilson as Alice Morgan, written by Neil Cross. The first series is composed of six episodes which ran in May and June 2010. A second series of four episodes aired on BBC One in June and July 2011, and a third was commissioned in 2012 composed of four episodes which aired in July 2013. A two-episode fourth series was broadcast in December 2015, and a fifth series of four episodes premiered on 1 January 2019. BBC Studios handles the distribution.
The Solo family is a fictional family of characters in the Star Wars franchise, whose key member is smuggler Han Solo, one of the central protagonists of the franchise starting in the original film trilogy in which he is featured prominently throughout. Subsequent to these films' events, Han marries Princess Leia, hence connecting her family tree to his; their son Ben Solo is introduced in the 2015 film Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
Domhnall Gleeson is an Irish actor, screenwriter, and short film director. He is the son of actor Brendan Gleeson, with whom he has appeared in a number of films and theatre projects. He received a Bachelor of Arts in Media Arts from Dublin Institute of Technology.
Boxing Day is a holiday celebrated the day after Christmas Day, occurring on the second day of Christmastide. Though it originated as a holiday to give gifts to the poor, today Boxing Day is primarily known as a shopping holiday. It originated in the United Kingdom and is celebrated in a number of countries that previously formed part of the British Empire. Boxing Day is on 26 December, although the attached bank holiday or public holiday may take place either on that day or one or two days later. Boxing day is also concurrent with the Christian holiday Saint Stephen's Day.
Sicario is a 2015 American action thriller film directed by Denis Villeneuve, written by Taylor Sheridan and starring Emily Blunt, Benicio del Toro, and Josh Brolin. The film follows a principled FBI agent who is enlisted by a government task force to bring down the leader of a powerful and brutal Mexican drug cartel. Sicario was selected to compete for the Palme d'Or at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival. It began a limited release in the United States on September 18, 2015, followed by a nationwide release on October 2, 2015.
Rian Craig Johnson is an American film director, producer, and screenwriter. He is known for writing and directing the neo-noir film Brick (2005), the comedy-drama The Brothers Bloom (2008), the science-fiction thriller Looper (2012), the space opera Star Wars: The Last Jedi (2017), and the murder-mystery Knives Out (2019), the last of which was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy and earned Johnson a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay.
Srinivasa Ramanujan was an Indian mathematician who lived during the British Rule in India. Though he had almost no formal training in pure mathematics, he made substantial contributions to mathematical analysis, number theory, infinite series, and continued fractions, including solutions to mathematical problems then considered unsolvable. Ramanujan initially developed his own mathematical research in isolation: according to Hans Eysenck: "He tried to interest the leading professional mathematicians in his work, but failed for the most part. What he had to show them was too novel, too unfamiliar, and additionally presented in unusual ways; they could not be bothered". Seeking mathematicians who could better understand his work, in 1913 he began a postal partnership with the English mathematician G. H. Hardy at the University of Cambridge, England. Recognizing Ramanujan's work as extraordinary, Hardy arranged for him to travel to Cambridge. In his notes, Hardy commented that Ramanujan had produced groundbreaking new theorems, including some that "defeated me completely; I had never seen anything in the least like them before", and some recently proven but highly advanced results.
Love Actually is a 2003 Christmas-themed romantic comedy film written and directed by Richard Curtis. It features an ensemble cast, composed predominantly of British actors, many of whom had worked with Curtis in previous film and television projects. Mostly filmed on location in London, the screenplay delves into different aspects of love as shown through ten separate stories involving a wide variety of individuals, many of whom are shown to be interlinked as the tales progress. The story begins five weeks before Christmas and is played out in a weekly countdown until the holiday, followed by an epilogue that takes place one month later.
Harry Potter and the Cursed Child is a 2016 British two-part play written by Jack Thorne based on an original story by J. K. Rowling, John Tiffany, and Thorne. Previews of the play began at the Palace Theatre, London, on 7 June 2016, and it premiered on 30 July 2016. The play opened on Broadway on 22 April 2018 at the Lyric Theatre, with previews starting on 16 March 2018. Its cast is similar to that of the first year in the West End, with returning actors Anthony Boyle, Sam Clemmett, Noma Dumezweni, Poppy Miller, Jamie Parker, Alex Price, and Paul Thornley.
The Danish Girl is a 2015 biographical romantic drama film directed by Tom Hooper, based on the 2000 novel of the same name by David Ebershoff, and loosely inspired by the lives of Danish painters Lili Elbe and Gerda Wegener. The film stars Eddie Redmayne as Elbe, one of the first known recipients of sex reassignment surgery, Alicia Vikander as Wegener, and Sebastian Koch as Kurt Warnekros, with Ben Whishaw, Amber Heard, and Matthias Schoenaerts in supporting roles.
A Uniform Resource Locator (URL), colloquially termed a web address, is a reference to a web resource that specifies its location on a computer network and a mechanism for retrieving it. A URL is a specific type of Uniform Resource Identifier (URI), although many people use the two terms interchangeably. Thus http://www.example.com is a URL, while www.example.com is not.</ref> URLs occur most commonly to reference web pages (http), but are also used for file transfer (ftp), email (mailto), database access (JDBC), and many other applications.
The Man in the High Castle is an American dystopian alternate history television series created for streaming service Prime Video, depicting a parallel universe where the Axis powers of Nazi Germany and the Empire of Japan rule the world after their victory in World War II. It was created by Frank Spotnitz and is produced by Amazon Studios, Scott Free Productions, Headline Pictures, Electric Shepherd Productions, and Big Light Productions. The series is based on Philip K. Dick's 1962 novel of the same name.
Lupita Amondi Nyong'o is a Kenyan-Mexican actress. The daughter of Kenyan politician Peter Anyang' Nyong'o and Dorothy Ogada Buyu, Nyong'o was born in Mexico City, where her father was teaching, and was raised in Kenya from age one. She attended college in the United States, earning a bachelor's degree in film and theatre studies from Hampshire College.
Dwayne Douglas Johnson, also known by his ring name the Rock, is an American-Canadian actor, producer, businessman, retired professional wrestler, and former American football and Canadian football player. Widely regarded as one of the greatest professional wrestlers of all time, he wrestled for the World Wrestling Federation for eight years prior to pursuing an acting career. His films have grossed over $3.5 billion in North America and over $10.5 billion worldwide, making him one of the world's highest-grossing actors.