Tech companies have gradually invaded the film festival space, but Meta’s secret new project was a perfect fit for this year’s Toronto International Film Festival, both because of its entertainment capabilities, and because it feels straight out of a movie. Not far from where I’d soon watch the new Zack Snyder film, a makeshift gallery played host to covert keynote presentations, each with an audience of one, as a well-dressed entertainment executive showed surprising candor.

“We are… self-aware,” she sighed. A strange way to begin a marketing pitch, but a surprisingly welcome one, as she echoed thoughts that have likely been on the mind of anyone who has thus far rejected the industry’s clunky VR-sphere, and its closed-off headsets akin to ski goggles. The Meta Quest (and like it, the Apple Vision Pro) haven’t exactly pivoted society towards Ready Player One, and perhaps we’re better for it. However, the reveal of Meta’s new entertainment-centric gizmo, Meta VR Glasses, arriving this spring, might just be enough of a departure to entice agonistics like myself, starting with the fact that wearing them doesn’t make you feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.

They are, for all intents and purposes, a pair of slick dark glasses. They still have the noticeable bulge of a VR device, but they’re more along the lines of X-Men’s Cyclops than Johnny Mnemonic . These streamlined shades feature a cable leading to a “puck” the size of an iPhone, a battery-and-computer pack you can place in your pocket or handbag, or clip to your belt.

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