Month: May 2021

Important disclaimer before beginning this post: In the eyes of Charles Barkley, the greatest basketball player of all-time will forever be Michael Jordan. But on Thursday morning’s episode of Get Up!, Barkley brought up the place LeBron James could potentially occupy in this conversation should he lead the Los Angeles Lakers from the 7-seed to a championship at 36 years old, which Stephen A. Smith did not appreciate.

Smith originally thought that Barkley said that this would put James above Jordan, but Chuck was quick to clarify that it’d just lead to a conversation taking place. Still, this did not sit well with Stephen A.

“What we gotta talk for?” Smith asked, right before writing off the difficulty of winning on the road in half-empty arenas. “What we gotta talk for?”

Barkley and Smith sparred over this, with Smith needing a reminder once or twice that Barkley doesn’t ever plan on placing James atop his GOAT list. There was also the usual mention of how physical the game was when Jordan dominated compared to now — if you have ever heard this conversation, you know exactly how it played out, although it was fun hearing Barkley say “you can only knock down the people who are in front of you” in response to this instead of turning into a curmudgeon who hates the way basketball is played right now, like so many other retired players do.

Anyway, Barkley laid out his thesis once more to end, saying, “LeBron, if he’s able to win the championship, listen, I’m not gonna put anybody above Michael Jordan, but I tell you what, I can see how people would do it is my point, Stephen A.”

A special shout out here goes to Mike Greenberg, who very obviously found this all extremely funny.

The PGA Championship is at the Ocean Course at Kiawah Island this week, one of golf’s sternest tests of a player’s skills and mental resolve. The wind that whips around the South Carolina coastal course makes life incredibly difficult on the golfers. Add in it being one of the longest courses on Tour at 7,800-plus yards and you have a recipe for some big numbers to come into play.

Being accurate off the tee is a must at Kiawah, where the fairways are wide but missing them puts you in sandy native areas with deep grass. That is unless you miss in the few spots where grandstands can be put up on the marshland, which provide a bit of a respite for the golfers by effectively creating bumpers down the sides of the fairways. One place this happens is on the 18th hole, a diabolically long par 4 that plays into the wind and players almost always have to go driver-long iron into at best.

For Sebastian Munoz, his efforts in launching a driver saw him tug it left into the grandstand where it somehow found its way into a trash can.

Munoz would get free relief from the trash can as he was not forced to play it as it lies, no matter what Happy Gilmore may have taught you, and managed to find the green after fishing his ball out of the garbage and taking his drop. He managed to make par on the hole, and while the rest of the day hasn’t gone as well for Sebastian, he will have one of the more memorable moments of the tournament.

Despite a huge showdown that saw Anthony Mackie’s Sam Wilson fully embrace the mantle of Captain America and show off his awesome new suit, complete with collapsible wings, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier finale just didn’t have what it takes to stop reruns of NCIS on Netflix. Yup, you read that right.

According to the latest Nielsen ratings, the numbers for The Falcon and the Winter Soldier actually dipped for its final episode after mopping up the week before. Turns out the draw of an all-new Captain America wasn’t enough to defeat the country’s love affair with crime procedurals.

Via Deadline:

After claiming the crown in its penultimate week, with 855 million minutes of total viewing, the show finished the week of April 19-25 with 796 million across its six episodes. That was good for second place in the rankings of overall shows. NCIS, a mainstay on Netflix, finished No. 1.

While being bested by NCIS reruns probably wasn’t what Disney+ had in mind when it entered the streaming wars, for the most part its flagship series like The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, WandaVision, and The Mandalorian have been pop culture juggernauts, and the real test of Marvel’s massive investment in streaming series is still a ways off.

Within hours of the Falcon and Winter Soldier finale, Marvel announced a fourth Captain America movie that will star Mackie’s new Cap, and it will be the ultimate test of the Disney+ series if the show fuels ticket sales for the film. Or vice versa: The film funnels moviegoers to Disney+ to see the new Cap’s origin story.

We’re guessing Marvel is hoping for both.

(Via Deadline)

For the first time in Lego’s 72-year history, it’s releasing an official LGBTQIA+ pride set. The new set comes out just in time for Pride Month, starting June 1.

The new set is inspired by the classic rainbow pride flag and features 11 monochrome figurines that match the color in the flag. The set is called “Everyone is Awesome,” which was inspired by the song “Everything is Awesome” from “The Lego Movie” soundtrack.

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“I wanted to create a model that symbolizes inclusivity and celebrates everyone, no matter how they identify or who they love,” the set’s designer, Matthew Ashton, said in a statement Thursday.

via Lego

The Lego set has personal meaning for Ashton who is a proud member of the LGBTQIA+ community.

“If I had been given this set by somebody after having come out, it would have been such a relief to know that somebody had my back,” Ashton said. “To know that you’ve got someone there, to say ‘I Love you, I believe in you. I’ll always be there for you.'”

Lego believes that the set is a way for people to show their love, support, and acceptance for young members of the LGBTQIA+ community. Historically, researchers have thought that children begin to self-identify as LGBTQIA+ in their teen years, however, new research says that it often happens as early as age nine.

Everyone is Awesome! We’re over the moon (rainbow?) about this set from @LEGO_Group celebrating diversity & inclus… https://t.co/gC5ZWOq35k

— Flynn De Marco & Richard Board (@TrickyBricks)
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A 2018 study found that 1% of 9 and 10-year old children surveyed self-identified as gay, bisexual or transgender. Nearly 7% of parents, when asked about the sexual identity of their children, reported their child might be gay and 1.2% reported that their child might be transgender.

A recent study published by Gallup found that 5.6% of American adults identify as members of the LGBTQIA+ community.

It’s important for families to send a strong message of support for their LGBTQIA+ kids. Young LGBTQIA+ people have a much higher rate of suicide than cisgender kids, especially when they lack sufficient support from their families.

via Lego

Giving a child a Pride-themed Lego set may also be a way to initiate an important conversation about sexuality.

“Having LGBT-inclusive toys creates a space for families to let LGBT children know that they are loved and accepted,” Joe Nellist, from the U.K.’s LGBT Foundation, told CNN.

“Growing up in a world which often tells you there is something ‘wrong’ with you can lead to a person developing a deep sense of shame — something we know can have a long-lasting impact on both mental and physical health,” Nellist added.

But the set isn’t just for young people. There is a growing community of adults that love to build with Legos and this set is a great way for them to show their pride, too.

The Lego set includes the classic rainbow colors first introduced by Gilbert Baker in 1978 and includes the subsequent additions of black and brown for people of color as well as white, pink, and blue for transgender and queer people.

The 4-5 series in the Eastern Conference features a pair of up-and-coming squads, the New York Knicks and the Atlanta Hawks, going head-to-head in what should be a fun, evenly-matched slugfest. But before things tip off, the NBA had a bit of business to tend to which will cost Hawks coach Nate McMillan a hefty chunk of change.

The league announced that McMillan, who took over the job in an interim role earlier this year following the firing of Lloyd Pierce, was fined $25,000, citing “detrimental public comments asserting bias by the NBA relating to the 2020-21 Playoffs.”

This is a pretty major assertion for the league to make, especially when the comments McMillan doled out weren’t particularly controversial. Chris Kirschner of The Athletic identified the comments that led to the fine, and in them, McMillan said more or less what everyone has said about the Knicks for years: There is a desire for them to be good because they are the New York Knicks.

This isn’t really saying there’s biased involved or anything, more that the league has a vested interest in teams in gigantic markets making the playoffs, which it should! He didn’t really indicate that games were officiated any differently, nor did he say that thumbs were on scales in any way, shape, or form. McMillan just said that the league is happy when the Knicks are good, which is a line that has been trotted out whenever they have been bad.

On May 21, Marvel’s M.O.D.O.K. is coming to Hulu, and from the looks of it (and the look of that cast list, whew!) we’re in for a good time. However, while so many of Marvel’s most dastardly villains are pretty well known thanks to the MCU, MODOK remains one that — while vital in the comics — isn’t as much of a hot commodity. So, if you’re wondering just who MODOK is and uh, what’s up with his whole look, we’ve got you covered.

— MODOK, real name is George Tarleton (voiced by Patton Oswalt), is a former employee of Advanced Idea Mechanics, or A.I.M., a privately funded think tank you might recognize from Iron Man 3. In addition to appearing in the MCU, A.I.M. is a reoccurring evil-doing organization in the comics with ties to most of Marvel’s roster of heroes. You see, A.I.M.’s whole thing is the acquisition of power through science, and they execute this idea through creating and selling futuristic weaponry and conducting incredibly unethical and dangerous experiments. One such experiment is conducted on Tarleton, who undergoes a mutagenic medical procedure designed to increase his intelligence in order to be used by A.I.M. for advanced computing. Ultimately the project is successful, but as a result of his increased brain size is an alarmingly big noggin to hold it. In addition, his mental growth ends up impeding the growth of the rest of his body, leading to his smaller stature that cannot support the weight of his head. For these reasons, Tarleton becomes confined to the exoskeleton and accompanying hovercraft we see him in.

— After the procedure, Tarleton grows both ambitious and enraged, and soon decides to murder several of his fellow workers and take over A.I.M. He also adopts the name MODOK, which is an acronym for “Mental Organism Designed Only For Killing,” though the M has been said to mean both “Mobile” and “Mechanized” as well. In addition to a new name and brain size, the new and “improved” MODOK comes with impressive powers including enhanced intuition, perfect memory and recall, pattern solving, and the ability to outcomes that is so advanced and correct, it borders on precognition. To help hone MODOK’s powers, A.I.M. creates a headband for him that allows him to turn his mental power into pure energy beams in order to both contact and control people through his mind. A.I.M. also ensures that MODOK’s hovercraft is top of the line, and creates the “Doomsday Chair,” which is equipped with explosives, missiles, and lasers. In the comics, MODOK is a repeated threat for several superheroes, with Captain America and the Hulks being his primary foes.

However, in the upcoming Hulu series, it appears creators Jordan Blum and Patton Oswalt are giving us a different — and very domestic — look at MODOK. In Marvel’s M.O.D.O.K., Tarleton (voiced by Patton Oswalt) is comedically humanized as a man desperate to save his marriage, be a decent father, and keep his company afloat. The ten-episode series follows his relationship and power struggles, and it looks to be a violent and hilarious time.

— In addition to Oswalt, the series boasts a pretty incredible cast of voice actors, including Aimee Garcia, Ben Schwartz, Melissa Fumero, Wendy McLendon-Covey, Beck Bennett, Sam Richardson, Jon Hamm, Nathan Fillion, Whoopi Goldberg, Bill Hader, and Kevin Michael Richardson. Whew. Oh, and for all the Adult Swim fans thinking that animation looks very familiar — Stoopid Buddy Stoodios of Robot Chicken fame is providing the show’s stop-motion animation.

Marvel’s M.O.D.O.K. hits Hulu May 21, however eager fans can catch the show early during a watch along with Jordan Blum and Patton Oswalt on May 20 at 4 PM PT.

So much about our lives changed in the past year, and one of the most obvious areas was eating out. Suddenly we couldn’t just go out to eat anymore and the whole industry designed around it was thrown into turmoil. Top Chef is a show that revolves entirely around this industry, so it obviously couldn’t just go back to normal when the chefs it profiles and the restaurants they work at still haven’t.

Yet when you watch Top Chef these days, with its latest season set in Portland, it still feels mostly like Top Chef always has. And being able to immerse ourselves in a world where the quality of restaurant food is a matter of great importance is both a refreshing return to normalcy and a little bit escapist. Yet this is a show that was filmed last fall, when much of the country was still locked down and indoor dining wasn’t allowed.

To produce a show that still looked relatively normal in the midst of all this, clearly, must’ve required meticulous planning and some creative thinking. Piling 15 chefs into a house together and having them go from restaurant to restaurant cooking for judges flown in for the privilege simply wasn’t going to work. Instead, Top Chef‘s producers moved the thing to a hotel and created a big “bubble,” with a handful of past contestants and winners as judges, and everyone otherwise rigorously tested and kept separate from larger society whenever possible. I spoke to Top Chef producer Dan Murphy this week about what was different about this season and the work that went into keeping it consistent.

Can you tell me your official title and explain what your duties entail?

I’m Dan Murphy, I’m the COO of Magical Elves, and basically, I’ve been with the company for about 13 years, been the head of production for many years, before recently becoming COO this past year. I oversee physical production, from the budgeting and the planning, and the scheduling, and I oversee all of the safety protocols in terms of getting our shows back up and running during COVID.

Your last season got delayed, right?

The previous season we had actually filmed before the pandemic started, and we were in editorial during the pandemic, and we quickly pivoted to having editors and producers working from home, and communicating over Zoom, which was fine. We were basically able to continue post-production with very little downtime when the pandemic started, but it gave us a runway to figure out how and when we were going to be able to come back to filming. We prepped and loaded this season in September, shot in October and November. So we had a long lead time to figure out all of our protocols and work with the network. We took all of the CDC guidelines and the state and local laws and guidance, and we worked with NBC, and our own sort of high standards of safety kind of guided us through that process.

So then what did the “bubble” look like, and how did this season differ from past seasons?

Well, in terms of creating the bubble we kept everyone together in a hotel, we made sure everyone was wearing masks and PPEs, and social distanced. There were obviously a lot of things that we did differently behind the scenes that we hoped would not distract from what people saw on screen. We tried to make the show as seamless as possible from previous seasons, but did include some additional elements that you probably haven’t seen before; we had the All-Star panel [of past contestants judging], that we kept within our bubble, and we were able to showcase former Top Chef contestants in a way that we hadn’t necessarily done before.

So with the hotels — in the past, the competitors would have all been in the same house together. Did that create any new challenges from a content standpoint?

We knew that we had to change how that was going to work this season, and we kind of leaned into it. There were some challenges but we always have such a, I would say ‘a richness of content’ that in a lot of ways it may have made the editing process easier. Because we just didn’t have that element to have to incorporate. We always get such great content out of the cast houses, but there’s always so much that’s already there within the show itself and the competition, that it was not difficult to make that pivot.

In the past, the contestants would be going out and visiting restaurants and working in other restaurant kitchens. I know this was shot in the middle of a time when a lot of restaurants were closed. What were the challenges there, and what were the kinds of ways that you had to improvise?

The challenges were finding the right spaces, I think, and on a normal season of Top Chef we can shoot just about anywhere. But when we’re dealing with a large crew, and contestants, we had to be very mindful of how we could work within a space, when indoors, and keep everyone safe. So we had to find spaces that were large enough, and had large enough support spaces, etc.

So that was definitely different for us, and a bit of a challenge this season.

On the other hand, with restaurants not at full capacity, or not serving indoors, was it easier in any way? Like, was it an easier sell to get restaurants to let you film in their space?

I would say there was definitely more availability. Some restaurants had shut down. There were some spaces available to us that that may not have otherwise been.

Had you guys chosen Portland before all this happened?

I mean we had been wanting to go to Portland for many seasons. It’s a rich, celebrated culinary destination and we’ve been wanting to go there for a long time. We had gone to Seattle in one season, and then a couple seasons later we were still like “well, let’s go somewhere else,” but we were really glad to get the opportunity to come back to that region, and go to Portland specifically.

Chefs normally take, I forget what it is, six or eight weeks off to come film the show. Was it an easier sell for contestants in any way? Because maybe they were having to not work as much, or close down restaurants during the pandemic?

I would say it was probably more of the opposite. I think that most of our chefs were extremely busy as frontline workers in terms of keeping people fed, and a lot of the restaurants that our contestants were working with were very busy. So it was a bit of a challenge to get them to come out and quarantine prior to shooting. It was a lengthier time off of work for many of them.

Did you manage to get through the whole season without any positive tests?

Thankfully, we did. We did not have any cases on the show and it was, I think, all because everyone took it seriously. We had training in advance of the show that everyone had to participate in. We talked about how serious we were taking it as a company. And we gave everyone on the crew side ample opportunity to not participate if it was not something they felt that they could live up to.

Thankfully, everyone was excited about getting back to work.

I don’t hear this that much anymore, but every once in a while you hear people say that “the judging that goes on on Top Chef is all fake,” and that the contestants who go home, that’s all decided by producers behind the scenes. Can you shed any light on that process?

I would say from the time that I started at the company, at the end of season four, the producers have always had a hands-off approach when it comes to deciding who the winner is, and who the people are that are going home. That’s always been left up to our judges.

As a producer, are there ever contestants that you think are particularly entertaining, or just they’re good for entertainment value, and then you get disappointed when the judges send them home?

Well, I’m probably not the best person to speak to that, but I think everyone has their favorites, and it’s always difficult to see someone go before you think they should. But we trust in the process. The judges really deliberate on this stuff, and it’s not always clear-cut answers. You don’t always see the amount of deliberation that goes into the decisions that they make, but I’ve been on seasons, and I can remember a specific episode where they took hours and hours deliberating and disagreeing over decisions amongst themselves.

Do the judges ever surprise you with how seriously they take the judging?

I will say that I personally was surprised, again it was literally hours one night, probably three in the morning until four, five, six in the morning before they could finally agree on a decision. So yeah, they take it very seriously. They all have strong opinions about each of the contestants, and the meals, and I would say most people would probably be very surprised how much deliberation goes into the decisions that they make.

In terms of just time and budget, and sponsorships, was this season pretty comparable to past seasons, or was there anything different about it in that sense?

I’m not sure how much into detail I can go and send you this stuff. I mean there were definitely costs as a result of doing show during COVID that we don’t ordinarily incur, but I can’t give you a percentage or a dollar figure or anything like that. It’s definitely more expensive to produce, to put these protocols into place. We’ve spent a lot of time as a company, and a lot of people put in months of work sort of developing the guidance and the protocols, and revising them, and refining them, and we’re really proud of the show that resulted from it.

Ted Cruz apparently did not learn from Tucker Carlson’s experience in angering military leaders by ridiculing female service members (and being told to f*ck off by Tammy Duckworth). This week, Tucker also declared that the U.S. military couldn’t possibly defend against UFOs because they’re too focused on equality, and Ted’s jumping on that military-bashing bandwagon while criticizing the same U.S. military recruitment ad (as Tucker) and branching out on his own self-owning skills.

“Holy crap,” Cruz wrote while retweeting a Russian military “ad” that sets up Putin’s guys against the ad pushed out under President Biden as commander-in-chief. “Perhaps a woke, emasculated military is not the best idea….”

Oh boy. It’s not a good look for a U.S. senator to tweet out Russian propaganda at all, let alone while bashing those that serve and project U.S. citizens. The Lincoln Project was quick to tweet out their own “holy crap” to that effect.

As one might imagine, people are piling onto Cruz for numerous things, including kissing Donald Trump’s butt while making campaign calls for him (after Trump insulted Heidi Cruz’s looks during the primary season). There’s also some pushback from military members, and this little gem: “Why are you tweeting out Russian propaganda videos, Comrade Senator Fidel Emasculated Cancun?” It’s a fair question.

This screencap never gets old, does it?

On Thursday, Overwatch devs finally gave some details on the future of Overwatch 2 with a showcase of the upcoming multiplayer changes. Details on the future title have been sparse despite the game first being announced back at BlizzCon 2019 and it has left fans asking for more. We know that the multiplayer is going to be an update to the first game, while players will need to pay for the player vs. environment story mode, but that’s it. Fans’ confidence in the game wasn’t improved when game director Jeff Kaplan left Activision-Blizzard in April, so they really needed a big splash to get fans talking about their game.

It did not take long for the devs to make a splash. They started off the event by announcing a huge change to Overwatch. 6v6 combat is gone. Games will now be 5v5 with two DPS, two healers, and one tank. This is going to change the entire structure of how heroes are designed and how games are played. Fans got a chance to see this new combat in action on a brand new map during the event.

Ever since Overwatch was launched the developers have always tried to push players towards a 2-2-2 style meta. Sure this was frequently broken with metas such as triple DPS, GOATS, and triple tank, but the developers would always try to update the game to push everyone back towards 2-2-2. Eventually, they forced players into this with role queue. The game has always been, by design, about 6v6 style combat. So moving to 5v5 is going to change everything.

For starters, tanks are going to need to be completely reworked across the board. Off-tanks like Roadhog and Zarya will need to be switched from off-tanks to main tanks, or maybe have a role change entirely, while main tanks such as Winston will need to have more damage potential since they’ll be without off-tank support. The showcase proved this a little by showing off that Winston, a hero all about getting up in player’s faces, had been given a secondary ranged attack.

What will be interesting is how this impacts strategies. It seems likely the game is going to be faster, but this also is going to accentuate weak points on a team. If a Winston for example dives in by their lonesome and dies early in a team fight, there is no one around to help absorb damage. Healers are left out to dry and a team is going to fall apart quickly. On the flip side, this could make classic combos like Pharah-Mercy even more powerful now that a healer can focus on keeping up a single tank instead of two.

Obviously Overwatch 2 could still undergo more changes before release, but this is an exciting change that is sure to make playing Overwatch feel completely differently. Whether that different feeling is good or bad will depend on if they make the right changes to help 5v5 feel like a better experience than classic 6v6.

The eighth and final season of NBC’s Brooklyn Nine-Nine premieres in August with back-to-back episodes, 16 months after the season seven finale. The long break between seasons was due to both the pandemic and numerous episodes being scrapped following the death of George Floyd and nationwide protests against police brutality.

“We’ve had a lot of somber talks about it and deep conversations and we hope through this we’re going to make something that will be truly groundbreaking this year. We have an opportunity and we plan to use it in the best way possible,” Terry Crews explained. “Our showrunner Dan Goor, they had four episodes all ready to go and they just threw them in the trash. We have to start over. Right now we don’t know which direction it’s going to go in.” Andre Braugher hopes that B99 will “tell the kinds of stories that heretofore have only been seen on grittier shows” in its final season, but based on the brief teaser above, there will still be plenty of time for goofiness and sex tape titles.

Here’s more:

Brooklyn Nine-Nine follows the exploits of hilarious Det. Jake Peralta and his stoically ever-professional Capt. Raymond Holt, along with their diverse, lovable colleagues as they police the NYPD’s 99th Precinct. In this final season of the series, Jake and the squad must try to balance their personal lives and their professional lives over the course of a very difficult year.

Brooklyn Nine-Nine is back on August 12.