NASA and Boeing announced on Wednesday that the first manned flight of the Starliner spacecraft will now take place no earlier than July 21. This pushes the flight of the vehicle carrying NASA astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore from the previously announced April timeframe.

NASA commercial crew program manager Steve Stich said the delay was due to the extra time it took to complete the pre-flight verification process of Starliner and also traffic from other vehicles serving the space station visited in June and the first half of July.

“If we look at all the different parts, most of the work will be completed for the flight in April,” Stich said during a conference call with reporters. “But there’s an area that stretches into May and that really has to do with the parachute system certification products.”

Boeing has conducted more than 20 tests of its parachute system, including dropping the vehicle from different heights to test its deployment sequence and the performance of the parachutes in different environments to simulate a return from space. Stich said there were no problems with the parachutes already installed on Starliner. Most of the time it’s a matter of verifying all the tests Boeing has done to ensure the parachutes are working as intended.

“It’s just going through all this data and looking at the data and making sure we’re really ready to fly safely,” said Stich.

One last test needs to be done on the ground, he said, of a parachute subsystem that pulls Starliner’s forward heat shield away and sets up deployment of the drogue and then the main parachutes. This test is targeted for May.

The additional time needed to complete the verification process of Starliner and its parachute system delayed the vehicle’s launch into June. At this point, however, NASA plans to launch SpaceX’s CRS-28 cargo resupply mission, which will tie up one of the lab’s docking hatches. This supply mission is bringing solar arrays to the station, which NASA does not want to delay because it would delay planned spacewalks to install them. The lack of a docking port therefore postponed the Starliner flight to the second half of July.

NASA and Boeing also need to align schedules with the United Launch Alliance, which is propelling the mission into orbit with its Atlas V rocket. The company currently has the USSF-51 mission scheduled for Space Force this summer and also requires the Space Launch Complex-41 pad for the debut of its Vulcan rocket in May or later this summer.

This will be the third flight of Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft. The vehicle’s December 2019 debut failed to rendezvous with the International Space Station after several issues, including software issues. After these issues were addressed, Boeing flew the vehicle on a second test flight in May 2022. Although there were some propulsion problems on this flight, Starliner docked with the space station and set the stage for a manned flight test.

After Boeing completes this critical test flight and NASA certifies the vehicle as operational, the company will fly to the space station for regular crew rotations about once a year. The first of these operational missions is planned for spring 2024 at the earliest.

YES Network, the New York Yankees’ cable channel, joins the streaming game. Before Thursday MLB Opening Daythe network announced it is now offering a direct-to-consumer streaming option for local fans who want to watch games without signing up for a cable or satellite package.

The new option costs $25 per month if purchased as part of a monthly subscription, or $240 if purchased annually. As part of a special introductory promotion running through April 30, YES is offering the service at a discounted rate of $20 per month (until the end of 2023) or $200 per year.

Once signed up, fans can then watch games and other YES programming through the network’s website or its YES app, which is available on iOS, Android, Samsung TVs and smart TV platforms such as Apple TV, Roku, Amazon Fire TV and Google is TV.

In addition to Yankees games, the YES Network also broadcasts games for the NBA’s Brooklyn Nets and the WNBA’s New York Liberty. The network says its new streaming option will be available in its “regional coverage area,” which consists of upstate New York, Connecticut, northeastern Pennsylvania, and northern and central New Jersey.

YES’ move marks the latest major regional sports network to offer cable cutters who want to watch their local teams an option without having to purchase an expensive cable, satellite or streaming TV package. The new option also comes amid an ongoing surge in cable cutting and turmoil at regional sports networks.

The Diamond Sports Group, which owns Bally’s Sports’ regional sports networks and broadcasts local games for 42 teams in the MLB, NBA and NHL, has submitted an application bankruptcy earlier this month. Warner Bros. Discovery, which broadcasts games for six teams across the three leagues on its AT&T SportsNet offering, also said earlier this month that was the case plans to exit the regional sports business.

Looking for a good scary movie to watch on HBO Max? Some of the most famous horror movies of all time can be streamed there alongside the latest spooky hits. Here are 10 of the scariest horror movies in streaming HBO Max.

Update 3/29/23: We’ve verified that our links are working and we’re still convinced these are the best horror movies HBO Max has to offer.

barbarian

Filmmaker Zach Cregger managed a successful transition from sketch comedy to horror with the imaginatively structured film barbarian. The story changes and expands over time, from two travelers stuck in a double-booked Detroit vacation rental to a Hollywood actor (Justin Long) experiencing a career meltdown. Cregger balances different tones and subgenres, and the seemingly disparate elements come together in a satisfyingly over-the-top finale.

The hut in the forest

A horror film about the concept of horror films, The hut in the forest begins with the cliche of a group of attractive young people traveling to a spooky remote vacation spot and getting caught one by one. From there, director and co-writer Drew Goddard deconstructs familiar genre elements and creates new horrors from that deconstruction. It’s a smart and funny comment on horror film conventions, while also succeeding as a standalone, imaginative, suspenseful horror film.

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child’s play

The first film starring horror icon Chucky, child’s play is less playful and belligerent than later Chucky Movies, but it still has a sense of humor about the ridiculousness of a killer doll. Chucky, voiced by Brad Dourif, is an angelic Good Guy doll inhabited by the soul of a serial killer who terrorizes 8-year-old Andy (Alex Vincent) and his mother (Catherine Hicks).

Director Tom Holland builds suspense by keeping Chucky off-screen most of the time, making his eventual attacks scarier. This stripped down slasher film provides a perfect starting point for one of horror’s greatest franchises.

Hereditary

With his feature film debut Hereditary, announced filmmaker Ari Aster as the great new voice of horror. Toni Collette is intriguing as a mother dealing with a demonic family legacy gripping her children. Aster creates memorable, unsettling images as the family slowly dissolves, taking the audience on the protagonist’s descent into madness. The surreal, intense meditation on generational trauma is one of the scariest movies on HBO Max.

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let me in

The rare American remake of a foreign horror film that defies the original let me in adapts the Swedish vampire film Let the right one in. Director Matt Reeves moves the setting to New Mexico but retains the essential elements of the story as shy teenager Owen (Kodi Smit-McPhee) meets his mysterious new neighbor Abby (Chloë Grace Moretz).

The powerful Abby protects Owen from thugs, but turns out to be dangerous and unpredictable. The main characters form a tender bond amidst the violence and bond as two different types of misfits.

The night house

Rebecca Hall delivers an excellent performance The night house as a high school teacher who just lost her husband to suicide. As she processes her grief while living in her large, empty, isolated home, she begins to feel a presence that she believes is her late husband. Director David Bruckner is great at building suspense and intrigue, and Hall is intriguing as a slightly confused woman who begins to realize she may not have really known her husband.

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Night of the Living Dead

Zombie films as we know them would not exist without George A. Romero’s classic Night of the Living Dead. The low-budget black-and-white film launched a franchise and set the ground rules that are followed—or intentionally broken—in every subsequent zombie film. Romero’s film remains chilling and unsettling more than 50 years after its release, with its sparse depiction of the horrors of the dead rising from their graves to attack the living.

scanner

David Cronenberg’s groundbreaking horror hit scanner is still best known for his image of a character’s head exploding from a telepathic attack. But the film has more to offer, with its story of a war between “scanners” (people with telepathic and telekinetic abilities) and the government agency trying to control them. It mixes Cronenberg’s early interest in body horror with a more mainstream sci-fi/conspiracy angle.

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The silence of the Lambs

The only horror film to ever win Best Picture at the Oscars, Jonathan Demmes The silence of the Lambs shows with the serial killer Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins) one of the greatest villains of all time. Some may consider Lecter an anti-hero, as he helps FBI trainee Clarice Starling (Jodie Foster) catch another killer while Lecter himself remains behind bars.

The interplay between Lecter and Starling is fascinating, balancing manipulation and admiration as both attempt to maneuver the situation to their advantage.

The witch

Subtitled “A New-England Folktale”, Robert Eggers’ The witch is an impeccably researched historical drama that also happens to be one of the scariest movies on HBO Max. Eggers uses his attention to period detail to recreate the harsh circumstances faced by early English settlers in North America, then adds the threat of a supernatural presence lurking in the nearby woods.

In her breakout role, Anya Taylor-Joy plays the teenage Thomasin, the daughter of Puritans who abandon their colony and struggle to survive on their own. She is tempted by dark forces, and Eggers makes her both seductive and nightmarish.