Month: February 2021

The shorthanded Portland Trail Blazers looked to pick up their second win in a week over the Sixers, who hold the East’s best record. Damian Lillard was back for this game and had a big first half with 21 points, but was held in relative check with just nine (including a clutch three) in the second half.

With the Sixers threatening to pull away in the early fourth quarter, Portland turned to Carmelo Anthony to give them the lift they needed and he obliged with a 17-point fourth quarter, piling up the threes in a sensational individual performance.

However, after a hot start where he had 15 of the Blazers first 19 points of the quarter, he cooled off some and the Sixers once again closed the gap. After Lillard’s big three to take a five-point lead with 1:15 to play, the Sixers would answer with two straight scores, as Seth Curry would tie the game at 114-114 with a clutch three of his own in transition as he finally was able to get loose for a clean look.

Ben Simmons harassed Damian Lillard on Portland’s ensuing possession before taking Philly’s foul to give with five seconds on the clock, meaning the Blazers had to draw up a potential game-winning play. The ball ended up in Anthony’s hands, who earned a pair of free throws when he got tripped up and fouled at the top of the key.

Anthony made both of his free throws but the Sixers had 3.1 seconds to come up with an answer. After advancing the ball, Philly had Ben Simmons inbounding, but couldn’t get any of their first options free and Simmons came late to Harris curling off an Embiid screen at the foul line. Robert Covington recognized where Simmons was going and left Embiid to jump the pass, sealing the game with the steal and tipping it to Lillard who sank two free throws to ice it.

It is a season series sweep for the Blazers in the most improbable of fashion, as they beat the East’s best team twice while shorthanded, withstanding big nights from Joel Embiid each time (35 points on Thursday) to get a pair of big victories in their quest to stay afloat in the West playoff race.

For Philly, it’s another head-scratching loss to Portland and they still have some things to figure out with execution late in close games on offense. Still the story of the night will be the Melo eruption in the fourth quarter, as he turned back the clock and put on a show that helped lift the Blazers to a win.

If there was ever a time to release a song that showed love to the special woman in your life, Valentine’s weekend would be the perfect time to do it. That’s exactly what DoeBoy and Lil Uzi Vert did with their new track, “Lowkey.” The two rappers gave thanks to their love interests who opt to keep things quiet in public rather than loud and flashy. As rappers who may have targets on their backs, DoeBoy and Uzi love that their partners can stay low and enjoy each other’s presence.

The song stands as DoeBoy and Lil Uzi’s second collaboration together following their late 2020 effort, “Bussin.” That song could be found on DoeBoy’s Demons R Us, a joint effort he released last November with executive production from Southside. On the flip side, things have been rather active for Lil Uzi, but for things outside of music for the most part. The Philly rapper recently caught the attention of social media after he had a pink diamond embedded in his forehead thanks to New York jewelry company, Eliantte & Co. Elsewhere he revealed that Jay-Z compared him to Prince and that he and Grimes are “making hits” together as well as planning to get “brain chips” together.

You can listen to “Lowkey” in the video above.

Lil Uzi Vert is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Evan Rachel Wood seemingly opened the floodgates when she recently came forward to name ex-partner Brian Warner, a.k.a., “Marilyn Manson,” as her alleged abuser, who she accused of terrorizing her during their relationship, which apparently began in 2007 (when she was 18 and he was 36) and ended in 2010. In doing so, Wood accused Manson of both “grooming” and “horrifically” abusing her, but this wasn’t the beginning of the allegations against Manson. Yes, it’s true that the accusations are now intensifying, yet this wasn’t Manson’s first alleged (horrible) rodeo. Let’s run down the timeline of allegations against the disgraced singer, who’s now experiencing a career freefall.

February 1998: Manson’s The Long Hard Road Out Of Hell memoir revealed a lot more claims than mere run-of-the-mill backstage antics. At the time, Jim Derogatis of the Chicago Reader criticized the book for revealing Manson “generally mistreating one or more women per page.” In a chapter called “Meating the Fans / Meat and Greet,” an especially egregious account detailed how Manson and his bandmates covered a young woman in raw meat and urinated upon her. In describing the incident, Manson wrote, “I think she, too, found it to be art and was having a good time.”

Within the memoir, Manson also described an alleged incident in which he and Nine Inch Nails’ Trent Reznor (during a joint tour in the 1990s) sexually assaulted an intoxicated woman. Reznor previously denied the allegations, and on February 3, 2010, Reznor condemned Manson with the following statement to Pitchfork:

“I have been vocal over the years about my dislike of Manson as a person and cut ties with him nearly 25 years ago. As I said at the time, the passage from Manson’s memoir is a complete fabrication. I was infuriated and offended back when it came out and remain so today.”

November 1998: A lawsuit from Craig Marks (at the time, Spin‘s executive editor) alleged that Manson threatened fatal violence over his unhappiness with a cover feature. That lawsuit settled and never went to court, but while discussing the incident in 2017 with Rolling Stone, Manson claimed to have been “arrested for putting a gun in the mouth of an editor of SPIN,” although Manson was never arrested for the incident.

December 2001: Manson was, however, arrested for assaulting a security guard during a show in Clarkson, Michigan when he allegedly rubbed his crotch (covered in a G-string) on the guard’s head and spitting upon the man. He paid a $4,000 fine and pleaded no contest on disorderly conduct after a warrant was issued over felony fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct and misdemeanor assault and battery allegations.

April 2002: The mother of actress Jennifer Syme (an ex-girlfriend of Keanu Reeves) brought a wrongful death lawsuit against Manson for allegedly giving Syme drugs during a gathering at his home and encouraging her to get into her Jeep and drive home. Syme fatally crashed her Jeep; however, Manson denied the accusations against him as “completely false.” At the time, Blabbermouth quoted Manson as threatening a countersuit for slander and harassment and explaining the alleged incident as follows:

“This lawsuit, which is completely without merit, will not bring back Jennifer’s life. It serves only to reopen the wounds and the pain felt by all who loved Jennifer. It is a pity that St. John sullies her own daughter’s reputation by filing this baseless claim… After Manson and his five guests finished an evening at the movies followed by a quiet get-together at his home, he made sure Syme received a safe ride home from a designated driver and went to sleep.”

2007: Manson and Evan Rachel Wood went public with their relationship. As mentioned above, she was 18 at the time, and he was 36 years old. They endured a breakup and an engagement and split for good in 2010.

June 2009: Manson discussed his initial 2007 breakup with Wood to Spin, to which he admitted self-harming, including cutting himself and sending photos of his injuries to Wood. He also spoke of how he fantasized “every day about smashing her skull in with a sledgehammer” while claiming this as the inspiration for his song, “I Want to Kill You Like They Do in the Movies.” His representatives (and as recently as November 2020) dismissed Manson’s comments as “obviously a theatrical rock star interview promoting a new record, and not a factual account.” That statement pointed towards Evan and Manson’s subsequent engagement as indicative “that no one took this story literally.”

July 2009: Manson threatened to murder journalists, and according to NME, he wrote this rant on his website: “I am far different than the soon-to-be-murdered-in-their-home press has decided to fabricate. If one more ‘journalist’ makes a cavalier statement about me and my band, I will personally or with my fans’ help, greet them at their home and discover just how much they believe in their freedom of speech.”

November 2016: Evan Rachel Wood spoke with Rolling Stone to promote the first Westworld season. In doing so, she revealed herself to be a sexual assault survivor, although she did not name her alleged abuser.

October 2017: Sexual and psychological abuse allegations against longtime bassist Jeordie White, a.k.a., Twiggy Ramirez, surfaced from his ex-girlfriend, Jessicka Addams, who claimed that White raped her during their 1990s relationship. Manson stated that he wasn’t aware of the accusations until recently, and he declared, “I am saddened by Jessicka’s obvious distress.” The singer subsequently tweeted, “I have decided to part ways with Jeordie White as a member of Marilyn Manson. He will be replaced for the upcoming tour. I wish him well.” For his part, Ramirez denied the allegations and stated that he’d “only recently been made aware of these allegations from over 20 years ago.” He added, “I do not condone non-consensual sex of any kind.”

February 2018: Evan Rachel Wood’s advocacy for domestic abuse survivors led her to U.S. congressional testimony to support the Sexual Assault Survivors’ Bill of Rights Act. While speaking to the House Judiciary Committee, she declared of the abuse, “It started slow but escalated over time, including threats against my life, severe gaslighting and brainwashing, [and] waking up to the man that claimed to love me raping what he believed to be my unconscious body.”

August 2018: Amid the #MeToo movement, the Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office declared that they would not pursue charges against Manson after an accuser filed a report against him for unspecified sex crimes. Given that the alleged crimes occurred in 2011, the statute of limitations had already run, and the DA declared that there was an “absence of corroboration.” Manson’s representatives issued the following statement:

“The allegations made to the police were and are categorically denied by Mr. Warner and are either completely delusional or part of a calculated attempt to generate publicity for the claimant’s business of selling Manson memorabilia. The police report that spurred the investigation was accompanied by the woman’s press release and other attempts to generate publicity that fraudulently claimed she was held captive by Mr. Warner for 48 hours in 2011. Any claim of sexual impropriety or imprisonment at that, or any other, time is false.”

April 2019: Evan Rachel Wood testified in front of the California Senate Public Safety Committee in support of the Phoenix Bill (to expand the rights of domestic abuse survivors). During a detailed account of the abuse she had suffered, Wood declared that her unnamed abuser “beat me and shocked sensitive parts of my body with a torture device called a violet wand.” She continued: “The pain was excruciating. It felt like I left my body and a part of me died that day.”

February 2021: Evan Rachel Wood named Manson as her alleged abuser. In doing so, she accused him of “grooming” and “horrifically” abusing her over the course of their relationship. She issued the following statement:

“The name of my abuser is Brian Warner, also known to the world as Marilyn Manson. He started grooming me when I was a teenager and horrifically abused me for years. I was brainwashed and manipulated into submission. I am done living in fear of retaliation, slander, or blackmail. I am here to expose this dangerous man and call out the many industries that have enabled him, before he ruins any more lives. I stand with the many victims who will no longer be silent.”

In response to Wood’s Instagram post, several women (as discussed by Vanity Fair) immediately came forward against Manson with allegations of abuse against him. Prior to her post, Wood seemed to suggest that she was preparing a statement of some sort while referencing the 1986 Jim Henson film, Labyrinth. In doing so, she quoted the words of Jennifer Connelly’s teen character while she took back her power from David Bowie’s Goblin King: “Through dangers untold and hardships unnumbered, I have fought my way here to the castle, beyond the goblin city, to take back the child that you have stolen. For my will is as strong as yours… And my kingdom is as great…”

February 2021: Manson’s professional woes began to accumulate. His record label, Loma Vista Recordings, removed him from their roster, and his agency, CAA, dropped him as well. Additionally, his longtime manager, Tony Ciulla, parted ways with him. Two TV shows (AMC’s Creepshow anthology series and Starz’s ongoing American Gods) that filmed appearances by Manson also removed him from upcoming episodes.

February 2021: Manson describes the allegations against him as “horrible distortions of reality.” He issued this statement in full:

“Obviously, my art and my life have long been magnets for controversy, but these recent claims about me are horrible distortions of reality. My intimate relationships have always been entirely consensual with like-minded partners. Regardless of how – and why – others are now choosing to misrepresent the past, that is the truth.”

February 2021: California State Senator Susan Rubio called upon the FBI to investigate “alleged cases” against Manson, which Rubio did not detail:

“Since some of the alleged cases against Mr. Warner are from California, I am especially alarmed. Individuals who engage in this kind of abuse are often serial offenders. If these allegations are true, and no investigation is undertaken, we will be failing the victims and allowing a possible perpetrator to continue abusing unsuspecting victims. That must not be allowed to happen.”

February 2021: Phoebe Bridgers told a sickening story about Manson, who she accused of showing off a “rape room” in his home when she visited with friends as a teenager. “I thought it was just his horrible frat boy sense of humor,” Bridgers wrote. “I stopped being a fan. I stand with everyone who came forward.” She added that “the label knew, management knew, the band knew” and slammed Manson’s associates for “pretending to be shocked and horrified… [it] is f*cking pathetic.”

February 2021: Wood revealed that she decided to publicly identify Manson when she filed a police report because “I was alerted to threats made by @leslee_lane and @lindsayusichofficial (Brian’s wife) for conspiring to release photos of me when I was UNDERAGE, after being given large amounts of drugs and alcohol, after Brian performed on Halloween in Las Vegas to ‘ruin my career’ and ‘shut me up.’” Wood also accused Manson of anti-Semitic behavior. “I was called a jew in a derogatory manner,” she wrote. “He would draw swastikas over my bedside table when he was mad at me. I heard the ‘n’ word over and over.”

February 2021: Corey Feldman comes forward to accuse the “obsessed” Manson of “decades of mental and emotional abuse. Feldman’s claims include grooming and being kissed without consent, and he makes reference to passages that Manson wrote about him in his 1998 memoir, The Long Hard Road Out Of Hell, as evidence that Manson is “obsessed” with Feldman:

“Manson has been obsessed w me 4 over 2 decades! Dont #BELIEVE me? Just LOOK @ THE PUBLISHED FACTS! He 1st wrote several passages about me in his book #LONGROADOUTOFHELL as we had met a few months prior 2 that @ a Premier 4 #HOWARDSTERNSPRIVATEPARTS IN NY where the #GROOMING process began. He grabbed my face in front of the crowd and kissed me w his Black Lip Stick that I couldn’t rub off all night. He proceeded 2 gush over me telling me what a ‘Huge fan’ of mine he was.”

February 2021: Wolf Alice’s Ellie Rowsell accused Manson of pointing a camera up her skirt during a music festival. She expressed solidarity with Evan Rachel Wood and other survivors while adding, “It’s sad to see people defending him, just because he put his depravity in plain sight doesn’t give him a free pass to abuse women?!” Rowell added, “There were no repercussions for his behaviour… he does this kind of thing all the time.’”

February 2021: Game of Thrones actress Esme Bianco came forward to reveal that her 2011 relationship with Manson “almost destroyed” her. During an interview with New York Magazine, Bianco provided photos to the publication and gave her harrowing account of physical abuse by Manson, who she claims terrorized her (with both emotional and physical abuse that included whipping, cutting, and bruising her) during the two months that she lived with him. Her claims were corroborated to New York by Manson’s former assistant, Jessica Walters, who went on record with the publication. A former member of Manson’s inner circle also spoke up (under the pseudonym of Alex) to reveal that he’d spotted bruises on Bianco’s back and arms, but he was too afraid to speak up out of fear of retaliation. Bianco accused Manson of playing her Game of Thrones sex scenes in front of friends while berating and humiliating her, and here’s a bleak summary of what she says gave her PTSD:

Bianco spent roughly two months living with Manson, drinking heavily to cope. She was often in a dissociative state, “hovering above life like I was looking at it through a net curtain,” she says, raising her hands in front of her face. Once, she remembers, he repeatedly cut her torso with a knife. “I just remember laying there, and I didn’t fight it,” she says. “It was kind of this final-straw moment where I had lost all sense of hope and safety.” He sent a photo of her cuts to Walters and one of his bandmates at the time, with the subject line “See what happens?”

As of this writing, Manson hasn’t commented upon Bianco’s accusations. He’s currently without a record label and has gone radio silent, although TMZ reports that police recently performed a wellness check at Manson’s home after a friend grew concerned when he was unable to reach the singer by phone.

Ariana Grande’s latest album, Positions might’ve gotten a little lost in the dramatic 2020 presidential election, but now that the blue states have safely been certified for President Biden — who Grande campaigned for — the best single off the record is finally getting the attention it deserves. Already one of the most sex-positive and explicit tracks on the record, “34 + 35” quickly replaced the title track as the fan-favorite off the album, even if that video imagines Ari as the president herself.

But as great as “34 +45” is on its own, Ari decided to make it better by enlisting two of the hottest rappers in the game right now to jump on a remix, adding Doja Cat and Megan Thee Stallion verses, and teasing a new video with all three stars. Now that clip is here, and like most Ari videos, it does not disappoint. The three girls live a life of hotel luxury in the clip, sitting by the pool, lounging in lingerie, and drinking plenty of champagne. After all, Grande does have a real life engagement to celebrate, so bubbly is in order. As great as the track is, Megan’s verse steals the show, with even Ari rapping along to her brilliant additions. Check out the whole clip above, which also includes a funny behind-the-scenes shot of Ari trying to order room service for the crew. Baked Alaska, anyone?

Jensen Macrae kicked off 2021 in a big way when her imaginary cover of Phoebe Bridgers’ next single went viral on Twitter. After Phoebe co-signed the cover, MacRae went ahead and made a full version of the song, and “Immune” is anything but a joke. It landed Jensen on our rising pop stars list, in that she has the potential to become an artist that takes over this year. MacRae is releasing her debut album later this year, and tonight she’s shared a new collaboration with X Ambassadors. The band teased a clip of the new track on Twitter without sharing any details, but now it’s out and the song is called “Skip That Party.”

For her part, Jensen had a pretty epic description of the song — “it’s like ‘Drivers License’ but if Bon Iver wrote it and he was an extremely pissed off 23-year-old girl,” she wrote.

In the track, Jensen and X Ambassadors’ Sam Harris take turns on verses that sound like they’re about the disintegration of a relationship. Decidedly a rock song, with plenty of handclaps and beats, the song gets heavy and distorted at the most emotional peaks. It’s definitely a tear jerker, which might be just what some people are looking for what we have all been through during this pandemic. It’s unclear if the song will be on MacRae’s debut album, but it’s listed as an X Ambassadors song that she is featured on. Check out the collaboration above and look out for a lot more new music from MaRae this year.

The beginning of February marked the four-anniversary of Syd’s lone solo album, Fin. Months after the album arrived she returned with another solo project with her Always Never Home EP, but since then, aside from a few guest appearances, the singer has left her solo career untouched as she returned to The Internet. However, even with that collective, things have been quiet since their 2018 album Hive Mind. While it remains unknown what’s in store for the singer in 2021, fans can enjoy the first bit of music from her in a while this year thanks to her new single, “Missing You.”

The track is described as an “anti-Valentine’s Day ode” that brings all of Syd’s best qualities to the table. In the song, she speaks about the end of an old relationship, which concluded due to their inability to “spend the proper time trying to work it out.” Now that it’s a thing of the past, she spends the rest of the song pondering her ex’s current life and if they’ve found any happiness. “Hope you’re finding what you need / Or what you seek,” she sings. “Cause now I’m free / And maybe in another life / You’d be mine.”

Before sharing her latest single, Syd joined Kehlani and Disclosure last year for “Birthday.” Prior to that, she could be found alongside Lil Uzi Vert and Free Nationals on “Urgency” and “Shibuya” respectively.

Listen to “Missing Out” in the video above.

Movies are a lot like rock ‘n’ roll. Yes, they can be the absolute corniest thing in the world, but the corniness is part of what makes them great. The best ones find that common corn in all of us. And what’s more corny than finding common cause with your fellow man?

There is, perhaps, no more perfect illustration of movies’ inherent cheese than the “trailer line.” The film trailer, of course, attempts to reduce a feature-length film down to a 1-2 minute advertisement. Not a summation, but an encapsulation of the feeling the movie is meant to produce — “sell the sizzle, not the steak,” as they say.

Occasionally, in only the best of scenarios, that 1-2 minutes will boil down even further, into a single, definitive line; one glorious soundbite of pure sizzle, so hot it burns your tongue. If movies are life distilled, and trailers are movies distilled, trailer lines are like beautiful blue meth crystals of pure cinema. The best ones are more memorable than the movies from whence they came, or even make the movies themselves irrelevant.

We tried to discover the best.

Trailer Line: “A million dollars isn’t cool. You know what’s cool? A billion dollars.”

Movie: The Social Network (2010)

Someone should probably slap the keyboard out of my hands every time I try to write about The Social Network at this point, but at the risk of repeating myself, it has to be one of the best-marketed movies of all time. When you think about the movie, be honest, was the first thing that comes to mind the actual movie or something from one of the trailers? The slowed-down dramatic cover of “Creep” ushered in an entire era of copycat versions, but if you remember just one thing from The Social Network, whether or not you even saw it, chances are it was probably the perfect trailer line, bitchily delivered by Justin Timberlake in his finest acting moment: “A million dollars isn’t cool. You know what’s cool? A billion dollars.”

Not only is it perfect earworm cheese, it’s also a perfect summation of the movie, in a way no one involved probably even intended. “A million dollars isn’t cool…” is The Social Network‘s id. There are a lot of things it pretends to be about, but mostly it’s about how making a billion dollars is cool.

Trailer Line: “Moy naime is Chev Chelios, an’ today is da day dat oy doy.”

Movie: Crank (2006)

If it feels like we’ve been living in a shitty alternate future, I have to think part of the reason is that Neveldine and Taylor haven’t made a movie together since 2011. Come back, Neveldine/Taylor, the world needs you.

Neveldine/Taylor made movie-movies, movies that basically had the “movie” dial cranked up until it distorted. So it’s fitting that their most memorable trailer took one of the most conventional ways to start a trailer and blasted it until it cracked — arguably spawning the Twitter meme,”record scratch, freeze frame: yup, that’s me. I bet you’re wondering how I got here” in the process. Not to mention hundreds of posts of my own written in ersatz Statham voice.

“My name is Chev Chelios, and today is the day I die” is the movie version of a rapper starting a song “my name is ___ and I’m here to say…”

To be sure, Statham’s inimitable accent is part of what makes it, but also: his name is “Chev Chelios.” Has there ever been a more perfect Jason Statham character name than “Chev Chelios?” Or a more perfect Statham plot? Every Neveldine/Taylor movie, and every facet of Jason Statham’s persona, is perfectly distilled in “my name is Chev Chelios, and today is the day that I die.”

Trailer Line: “I’m going to steal the Declaration Of Independence.”

Movie: National Treasure (2004)

Now that it’s been 16 or 17 years, I thought I might be able to look back on this stretch of early aughts Bruckheimer movies with a fondness I couldn’t summon at the time. But honestly, no, these movies were goddamned terrible. Watching this trailer now all I can think is how eerily it foreshadows both the Q movement and that awful smart-alecky Joss Whedon-style of self-aware acting. “So that happened…”

I don’t think I noticed that kind of acting so much until I had a stepkid in the house, but it is in every show or movie aimed at kids nowadays and it is terrible.

Trailer Line: “You’re the man now, dog.”

Movie: Finding Forrester (2000)

The “old person uses young person slang,” or “the rappin’ granny,” as I like to call it, has been a staple of bad comedies at least since Son In Law (“I gotta tell you, Travis, it really tweaks my melon to see a buff bro like Crawl here get weized on by a greasy scumbag like you. So you just chill.” -I wish I could get this scene permanently excised from my brain).

The twist of Finding Forrester was that it was Sean Connery doing it, in a scene that wasn’t intended to be comedic. I’m sensing a theme here, that trailer lines delivered in funny accents are inherently more memorable. The combination was so brain-shattering that not only did it long outlive the movie from whence it came, it spawned a cult website that outlived either. You’re the man now, dog.

Trailer Line: “In Africa, it’s bling-bang.”

Movie: Blood Diamond (2006)

Every once in a while, the effort to come up with the perfect trailer line leads to something so clunky, so perfectly nonsensical and idiotic, that it becomes a perfectly trailer line almost entirely by accident. I will never forget “In Africa, it’s bling-bang” for as long as I live (yes, I know it’s technically “out here it’s bling-bang,” but I choose to remember it my way). It’s a sub-moronic line, delivered in arguably Leonardo DiCaprio’s worst on-screen accent, with an even dumber look on his face. You know how when a great athlete makes an incredible play they say “he makes it look easy?”

With bling-bang, the exact opposite is true. It makes everything — writing, acting, cutting trailers, facial expressions, speaking with accents — seem incredibly difficult. “In Africa, it’s bling-bang” is almost a meta deconstruction of the act of making a trailer line. I love it so much.

Trailer Line: “The only law that matters is gravity.”

Movie: The Point Break remake (2015)

The Point Break remake somehow distilled all the silliness of the original and quadrupled down, making it about “extreme sports polyathletes” (yes, they use that term). It truly is a magnificent movie and I implore all of you to see it if you haven’t. It’s pretty hard to distill the Point Break remake, which was two hours of non-stop ridiculousness, into a single line. And yet, “the only law that matters is gravity” manages to do it just about perfectly.

Trailer Line: “A particular set of skills.”

Movie: Taken (2008)

Clearly, the aughts were the heyday of the trailer line, which was probably a combination of the ubiquity and inescapability of TV advertising and the movie industry shifting towards massive “tentpole” blockbusters as their main source of income. These days neither is really true, and the closest thing we have to a “trailer line” is the Chipotle guy saying “It’s bomb steak.” I wish I could get that out of my head.

Anyway, I already wrote a previous list based entirely on the genre of movies that Taken unleashed, and without relitigating that, I’d just say here that the trailer was probably more influential than the movie ever was. More so than any other trailer line on this list, “a particular set of skills” is probably far more about the deliverer than about the line itself. No one delivers a trailer line like my man Liam Neesons. On that note, “release the Kraken!” is probably worth an honorable mention here.

Trailer Line: “Look at me, I am the captain now.”

Movie: Captain Phillips (2013)

In retrospect, Barkhad Abdi deserves more credit. When you consider that Captain Phillips is a movie starring Captain Tawm Hanks with a Masshole accent, it’s a wonder that someone else stole the trailer line. Sometimes it’s the unconventional choice that wins out. I gawta put this whole team of pirates in my reahview!

Trailer Line: “Get off my plane!”

Movie: Air Force One (1997)

In the nineties, it seemed like every other action movie was “Die Hard on a _____”, and Air Force One might’ve been the most obvious derivation. Obviously, it was Die Hard on Air Force One, and the centerpiece trailer line was delivered while the hero threw the circle bearded foreign villain to his death, just like in Die Hard. I don’t know that I ever saw this movie all the way through, but it’s a credit to just how good a trailer it is that I had completely memory hole the fact that Gary Oldman was the bad guy getting off the plane.

Trailer Line: “Gimme back my son!”

Movie: Ransom (1996)

Mel Gibson’s life is like a Greek tragedy. It was his ability to shake with rage while shouting invective that brought him fame and fortune, but in the end shouting and screaming was also what brought him down. Okay, so “down” is a bit of a stretch, considering he’s still insanely rich and even stars in movies from time to time.

But imagine having the power to scream and grandstand like that on a split-second’s notice. How could you resist? Whenever I hear “leaked” audio of actors ranting, like Tom Cruise or Christian Bale, all I can think about is how good they are at screaming — fully articulate, no stuttering or false starts, and with the presence of mind to even take dramatic pauses in between clauses. On the one hand, sure, what incredible assholes they must be. But on the other, listening to them scream and grandstand is like watching Tiger Woods hit a stinger draw off the tee that tracks the fairway perfectly and never gets more than 15 feet off the ground. In those moments, it’s so obvious that you’re watching a master of his instrument at the top of his craft.

Sidenote: Hey, did you know Ron Howard directed this? Wild.

Trailer Line: “I ALREADY work around the clock!”

Movie: Extraordinary Measures (2010)

Perhaps no trailer line has ever so far outpaced the movie from whence it came as Harrison Ford shouting “I ALREADY work around the clock” in Extraordinary Measures. Did you even remember that it was Brendan Fraser that he was screaming at? Gun to my head, I would’ve told you it was Josh Hartnett. This line was so infamous that it spawned a KnowYourMeme page and a segment on Pop Culture Happy Hour.

Rewatching it now, the line is extra jarring on account of how much it seems to come out of nowhere. The trailer seems to be wrapping up, with tinkling pianos, cute sick kids, and the general tone of a Nicholas Sparks weepy. And then, boom, Harrison Ford is angrily screaming. Where’d that come from?

For the record, Extraordinary Measures is just Air Force One, only Gary Oldman is a rare genetic disorder and Harrison Ford’s son is the plane.

Vince Mancini is on Twitter. You can access his archive of reviews here.

Valentine’s Day is just two days away and while most are looking for new love, or hoping to celebrate with an already-secured partner, 6lack and Lil Tjay have different goals in mind. Their new collaboration, “Calling My Phone,” finds the two acts trying their best to escape the grasp of a former lover, who can’t seem to understand that the relationship has ended.

Lil Tjay delivers a promise to never return to his ex singing, “I done told you before that it’s over, leave me ‘lone.” He adds, “I won’t go back / But trust me, you’re gon’ hold that.” 6lack arrives for a second verse and doubles down on his collaborator’s message. “No, you can’t wear my chain no more,” he sings. “We are not a thing, can’t take no more.” The song is also paired with a video that shows exactly what the artists’ struggle looks like as their ex-lovers hold on to their coattails in hopes of a chance at renewed love.

The song arrives as 6lack continues work on his upcoming third album. While the new project will be his first full-length effort since 2018’s East Atlanta Love Letter, the Atlanta native made the wait for album No. 3 easier for fans with the release of his 6pc Hot last year.

As for Lil Tjay, the Brooklyn native is coming off a year that saw the release of his State Of Emergency EP before he landed a spot on the 2020 XXL Freshman Class list. Unfortunately, to end the year, Tjay was arrested and charged with possession of marijuana, weapons, and grand larceny

You can listen to the track in the video above.

Young Thug fans are still waiting for the rapper to release not one, but two projects. The eclectic rapper has forced his supporters to exercise every bit of their patience as he continues to work on his Punk and Slime Language 2 albums. While the wait will certainly continue, the journey may almost be over as Thug returns with his new single, “That Go!” The track is a high-energy effort that sees contributions from Meek Mill and T-Shyne, two acts that Thug has worked with on multiple occasions in his career.

The new song will hopefully be a wave of more positive actions from Young Thug. Over the past few months, the rapper has caught himself in a few brief moments of controversy due to statements he made during interviews. The first came when he gave his reason for never working with fellow ATLien, Andre 3000. “Dre likes his ass kissed,” the rapper said in part during an appearance on T.I.’s expediTIously. The second instance when he implied that he had more recognizable hits than Jay-Z. The latter seemed to cause more of a storm, but Thug clarified the comment as nothing more than an instance of “talking [too] fast.”

Press play on “That Go!” in the video above.

Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Though the most heartbreaking impact of the pandemic is undoubtedly the loss of life and physical illness that COVID-19 has brought on for thousands of Americans, it’s had plenty of other frustrating effects, too. One example is that artists who were ready to release new albums and tour behind them had to instead shelf those plans until it’s safe to gather and travel, and for a star on the rise like Dua Lipa, that situation has to be tough. Her second record, Future Nostalgia, came out in 2020 right as the pandemic was hitting America, and she’s still not really had the chance to perform any of those songs live, save a few award show performances and live streams here and there.

Still, nothing keeps Dua down, and she released a remix version of the record called Club Nostalgia that included huge features from iconic artists like Madonna and Missy Elliott. Not too shabby for a second album, eh? Now, she’s ready to branch out even farther, not totally closing the door on her Future Nostalgia era, but releasing a brand new single, “We’re Good” that builds on everything she established on that album. The track is a lot more tropical than the last album, getting a little bit out of the disco era and into some groovier realms, and tries to let a lover down easy. Check out the new song above, and stay tuned for more updates on what she’s up to next.