Hollywood is busily trying to figure out the best way to present big-budget films in VR. The platform is great for games and short-form entertainment, but if you want to tell an epic story and really draw the viewer in emotionally, the limits of VR present barriers to that type experience. At the forefront of this great figuring-out is filmmaker Darren Aronofsky. He has previously written and directed visually adventurous films like Mother, Black Swan, Pi, and Requiem for a Dream. Next, Aronofsky is serving as the executive producer of Spheres, a VR series about the cosmos written and directed by Eliza McNitt. Earlier this year, Spheres screened at the Telluride Film Festival, making it the first VR film ever to play at the fest.

On this episode, Aronofsky talks with WIRED senior writer Lauren Goode about VR’s future in filmmaking. They also talked about the ways in which artificial intelligence is changing the way we tell, consume, and think about visual stories. Their conversation took place Monday at Web Summit in Lisbon, Portugal.

Before their talk, Arielle and Mike go over the news of the week. And of course, we’ll end the show with our latest tech recommendations.

Recommendations this week: Demetricator for Twitter, and Jaybird Tarah Pro headphones.

Send the Gadget Lab hosts feedback on their personal Twitter feeds. Arielle Pardes can be found at @pardesoteric. Lauren Goode is @laurengoode. Michael Calore can be found at @snackfight. Bling the main hotline at @GadgetLab. Our theme song is by Solar Keys.

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