Month: November 2021

In what’s becoming a recurring theme, Alex Jones has lost yet another lawsuit filed by families of Sandy Hook victims. On Monday, a Connecticut judge ruled that the InfoWars host is liable by default for refusing to turn over “financial and analytics data” in a defamation suit filed by the families. Jones and his media entities ignored several requests to produce the documents to the plaintiffs.

However, despite winning another victory against Jones (he lost two lawsuits for failing to turn off over discovery material in early October), attorneys for the Sandy Hook families are not thrilled that the conspiratorial host has been able to hide his business practices, which included calling the shooting a “false flag” operation and questioning whether the victims were even real. Via CNN:

“As the Court noted, Alex Jones and his companies have deliberately concealed evidence of the relationship between what they publish and how they make money,” said Chris Mattei of Koskoff, Koskoff & Bieder, which represents the plaintiffs. “Mr. Jones was given every opportunity to comply but, when he chose instead to withhold evidence for more than two years, the Court was left with no choice but to rule as it did today. While today’s ruling is a legal victory, the battle to shed light on how deeply Mr. Jones has harmed these families continues.”

The issue of Jones continuing to conceal his business practices aside, on social media, the reactions were joyous as the InfoWars host is now staring down another potentially ruinous loss for peddling a beyond-the-pale conspiracy theory downplaying the mass shooting of elementary school-age children.

(Via CNN)

For years, Britney Spears and her supporters in the #FreeBritney movement have been trying to get the pop star out of her conservatorship, and finally, it happened: On Friday, Spears’ conservatorship was officially terminated. Naturally, Spears has been doing some celebrating and today, she reported that this past weekend, her first one post-conservatorship, was “amazing.”

Sharing a Vlada Haggerty photo of a fork stuck in some lipstick on Instagram, Spears described her weekend and how awesome she feels now, writing, “What an amazing weekend … I felt like I was on cloud 9 the whole time !!! I actually got my first glass of champagne at the most beautiful restaurant I’ve ever seen last night !!!! I’m celebrating my freedom and my B day for the next two months !!!!!!!!!!! I mean after 13 years … I think I’ve waited long ENOUGH !!!! I’m so happy my lawyer Mathew Rosengart came into my life when he did … he has truly turned my life around … I’m forever thankful for that !!!! What a sight seeing so many people celebrating my victory …. I love my fans so much … so thank you !!!!⁣”

Just because Spears is out of her conservatorship doesn’t mean that she’s just going to ride off into the sunset. Last month, she declared that she wants “justice,” writing, “This message is to my family … for hurting me deeper than you’ll ever know !!! I know the conservatorship is about to be over but I still want justice !!! I’m only 5’4” and I’ve played the bigger person my entire life … do you know how hard that is ???”

Halo Infinite is one of the most anticipated games of the year. Microsoft’s latest game in the Halo franchise is supposed to be the one that changes everything and revolutionizes the series. One way they’re doing that is by making the multiplayer for Infinite a free-to-play model. Players don’t need to own the campaign to play Halo Infinite. They’ll just need a PC or Xbox console.

If that wasn’t enough, Microsoft took it a step further by deciding to drop the free-to-play multiplayer over two weeks before the game is supposed to drop in December. On November 15, the 20th anniversary of the original Xbox, the multiplayer beta for Halo Infinite was released to everyone. However, since it’s free-to-play and all progress is going to carry over when the game officially launches in December, players are treating it as the release of the actual game and losing their minds.

Infinite immediately became the most viewed game on Twitch shortly after the announcement. It surpassed other recent new releases such as Forza Horizon 5 and Battlefield 2042.

As everyone swiftly moved to their PC or Xbox to play the game however they did run into some problems. The servers are getting hit hard and some people trying to get in are discovering a blank blue screen preventing access to the game. So close and yet so far.

Then there were those of us who weren’t quite as happy about the game being surprise launched. A lot of people like to call out of work so they can play new games. With Halo being a surprise it left a few unlucky people sitting at work waiting for time to pass by so they can go play Infinite.

Yeah, let’s just say this game is a big deal. We’re excited to try it ourselves!

The backlash to Dave Chappelle’s The Closer, according to him, cost him some film festival invites due to his unapologetic stance regarding his trans jokes (and his choice to side declare himself “Team TERF” in alliance with JK Rowling’s position). And last week, his (high school) alma mater, the Duke Ellington School of the Arts in Georgetown, signaled that they were distancing themselves from the controversial comedian as well. Following a mounting revolt by students, the school “quietly cancelled” a fundraiser that was meant to raise money for an on-campus theater named after Chappelle. The situation continues, and according to the Washington Post, the act of putting Chappelle’s name on the theater has been delayed.

The planned dedication for the venue was previously scheduled for November 23, but given “concerns” from students, Duke Ellington is pumping the brakes. The renaming isn’t cancelled, but The Post reports word from the school that “moving forward with the event … without first addressing questions and concerns from members of the Ellington Community would be a missed opportunity for a teachable moment.” At this time, the renaming has been rescheduled for next April 22, which the school hopes will give time for reassessing the issue Here’s more on the rationale behind the decision:

In an interview, Duke Ellington Principal Sandi Logan said she has had both formal and informal meetings with students to discuss Chappelle’s comments, including a month of weekly meetings with an “advisory committee” of student leaders that includes representatives from the school’s Gender and Sexuality Alliance.

The school plans to continue those discussions in the coming months. It said Friday that it has expanded its social studies curriculum “to include content related to political activism, civic engagement, arts activism, and the intersections of race, gender, and sexuality.”

“On our end, we just needed a little time to get our community to at least have the conversation — not to maybe change minds. That is never our objective,” Logan said. “We needed that time to be able to get conversation and meaningful progress within the community, not a Band-Aid.”

The Washington Post notes that some Duke Ellington students have expressed feeling “uncomfortable” with Chappelle’s name ending up on the theater, which is “what some referred to as the heart of the school.” Previously, Chappelle declared that the renaming would be “the most significant honor of my life.” Following the decision to postpone the renaming, Chappelle representative Carla Sims stated that the comedian “supports the school and any effort to contribute to open conversations vs. cancellations.”

In the meantime, Chappelle’s tour appearances continue. Last week in Des Moines, Iowa, he told a packed audience, “Boy, I went too far with The Closer. The trans always get mad, but this time I did it.”

(Via Washington Post & Des Moines Register)

Justin Bieber clearly takes this “global pop star” thing seriously. It takes more than just a donut collaboration with Tim Horton’s, or an interactive experience in the metaverse to truly be considered as such. At his 2020 New Year’s Eve livestream, he said, “We’ve been working hard to create the best show we’ve ever done, and we can’t wait to share it with fans around the world. I’ll see you soon.”

He has effectively delivered on that promise in a major way, announcing a wave of global dates for the “Justice World Tour,” bringing the total to almost 100 dates in a less than one year period spanning 2022 and 2023. He also announced that the supporting acts for the global tour will be Jaden, ¿Téo?, Eddie Benjamin, and Harry Hudson.

While the tour is already set to travel to five continents, even more dates are said to be announced in Asia and the Middle East soon as well.

Check out the full tour dates below and buy tickets here.

02/18/2022 — San Diego, CA @ Pechanga Arena
02/20/2022 — Las Vegas, NV @ T-Mobile Arena
02/22/2022 — Glendale, AZ @ Gila River Arena
02/23/2022 — Inglewood, CA @ The Forum
02/26/2022 — Tacoma, WA @ Tacoma Dome
02/28/2022 — San Jose, CA @ SAP Center at San Jose
03/02/2022 — San Jose, CA @ SAP Center at San Jose
03/04/2022 — Sacramento, CA @ Golden 1 Center
03/07/2022 — Los Angeles, CA @ STAPLES Center
03/08/2022 — Los Angeles, CA @ STAPLES Center
03/11/2022 — Portland, OR @ MODA Center
03/13/2022 — Salt Lake City, UT @ Vivint Home Energy Arena
03/16/2022 — Denver, CO @ Ball Arena
03/18/2022 — Tulsa, OK @ BOK Center
03/21/2022 — Atlanta, GA @ State Farm Arena
03/22/2022 — Atlanta, GA @ State Farm Arena
03/25/2022 — Toronto, ON @ Scotiabank Arena
03/28/2022 — Ottawa, ON @ Canadian Tire Centre
03/29/2022 — Montreal, QC @ Bell Centre
03/31/2022 — Newark, NJ @ Prudential Center
04/01/2022 — Brooklyn, NY @ Barclays Center
04/04/2022 — Pittsburgh, PA @ PPG Paints Arena
04/06/2022 — Greensboro, NC @ Greensboro Coliseum
04/07/2022 — Jacksonville, FL @ Vystar Veterans Memorial Arena
04/09/2022 — Tampa, FL @ Amalie Arena
04/11/2022 — Orlando, FL @ Amway Center
04/13/2022 — Miami, FL @ AmericanAirlines Arena
04/19/2022 — Cincinnati, OH @ Heritage Bank Center
04/21/2022 — Indianapolis, IN @ Bankers Life Fieldhouse
04/24/2022 — DesMoines, IA @ Wells Fargo Arena
04/25/2022 — St. Louis, MO @ Enterprise Center
04/27/2022 — Austin, TX @ Moody Center
04/29/2022 — Houston, TX @ Toyota Center
05/01/2022 — Dallas, TX @ American Airlines Center
05/04/2022 — Kansas City, MO @ T-Mobile Center
05/06/2022 — Minneapolis, MN @ Target Center
05/09/2022 — Chicago, IL @ United Center
05/10/2022 — Chicago, IL @ United Center
05/12/2022 — Grand Rapids, MI @ Van Andel Arena
05/14/2022 — Buffalo, NY @ KeyBank Center
05/16/2022 — Columbus, OH @ Schottenstein Center
05/17/2022 — Nashville, TN @ Bridgestone Arena
05/22/2022 — Monterrey, Mexico @ Estadio de Béisbol Monterrey
05/23/2022 — Guadalajara, Mexico @ Estadio 3 de Marzo
05/25/2022 — Mexico City, Mexico @ Foro Sol
06/05/2022 — Detroit, MI @ Little Caesars Arena
06/07/2022 — Toronto, ON @ Scotiabank Arena
06/08/2022 — Toronto, ON @ Scotiabank Arena
06/10/2022 — Washington DC @ Capital One Arena
06/13/2022 — New York, NY @ Madison Square Garden
06/14/2022 — New York, NY @ Madison Square Garden
06/16/2022 — Philadelphia, PA @ Wells Fargo Center
06/18/2022 — Uncasville, CT @ Mohegan Sun Arena
06/20/2022 — Boston, MA @ TD Garden
06/24/2022 — Milwaukee, WI @ American Family Insurance Amphitheater
08/03/2022 — Skanderborg, Denmark @ Smukfest
08/05/2022 — Malmo, Sweden @ Bigslap Xl
08/07/2022 — Trondheim, Norway @ Trondheim Summertime
08/09/2022 — Helsinki, Finland @ Kaisaniemen Park
09/04/2022 — Rio de Janeiro, Brazil @ Rock In Rio
09/07/2022 — Santiago, Chile @ Estadio Nacional
09/10/2022 — Buenos Aires, Argentina @ Estadio Único de La Plata
09/28/2022 — Cape Town, South Africa @ Cape Town Stadium
10/01/2022 — Johannesburg, South Africa @ Johannesburg FNB Stadium
10/13/2022 — Tel Aviv, Israel @ HaYarkon Park
11/22/2022 — Perth, Australia @ HBF Park
11/26/2022 — Melbourne, Australia @ Marvel Stadium
11/30/2022 — Sydney, Australia @ Sydney Football Stadium
12/03/2022 — Brisbane, Australia @ Suncorp Stadium
12/07/2022 — Auckland, New Zealand @ Mt Smart Stadium
01/13/2023 — Amsterdam, Netherlands @ Ziggo Dome
01/16/2023 — Hamburg, Germany @ Barclays Arena
01/18/2023 — Zürich, Switzerland @ Hallenstadion
01/21/2023 — Lisbon, Portugal @ Altice Arena
01/23/2023 — Madrid, Spain @ WiZink Center
01/25/2023 — Barcelona, Spain @ Palau Sant Jordi
01/27/2023 – 01/28/2023 — Bologna, Italy @ Unipol Arena
01/31/2023 — Cologne, Germany @ LANXESS Arena
02/02/2023 — Frankfurt, Germany @ Festhalle
02/04/2023 — Berlin, Germany @ Mercedes-Benz Arena
02/08/2023 — Glasgow, UK @ OVO Hydro
02/11/2023 — Aberdeen, UK @ P&J Live
02/13/2023 – 02/14/2023 — London, UK @ The O2
02/22/2023 — Birmingham, UK @ Resorts World Arena
02/25/2023 — Manchester, UK @ AO Arena
02/26/2023 — Sheffield, UK @ Utilita Arena
03/06/2023 — Paris, France @ Accor Arena
03/09/2023 — Munich, Germany @ Olympiahalle
03/11/2023 — Budapest, Hungary @ Budapest Arena
03/12/2023 — Prague, Czech Republic @ O2 Arena
03/15/2023 — Stockholm, Sweden @ Tele2 Arena
03/17/2023 – 03/18/2023 — Copenhagen, Denmark @ Royal Arena
03/20/2023 — Antwerp, Belgium @ Sportpaleis
03/24/2023 — Vienna, Austria @ Wiener Stadthalle
03/25/2023 — Krakow, Poland @ TAURON Arena

All four Lethal Weapon movies were directed by Richard Donner, who died earlier this year. His death, along with the most recent installment in the series happening 23 years ago and, uh, star Mel Gibson’s history of racist, anti-Semitic, sexist, and homophobic comments, should be enough reasons to end the franchise. Not so, according to Gibson.

Mel Gibson has confirmed he’s set to direct Lethal Weapon 5… Gibson confirmed the news at a fan event in London, An Experience with Mel Gibson, which took place at Intercontinental London – The 02 on Saturday (November 13).

“An Experience with Mel Gibson” is something to avoid, not pay for, but the event apparently sold out. “The man who directed all the Lethal films, Richard Donner, he was a big guy,” Gibson told the audience. “He was developing the screenplay and he got pretty far along with it. And he said to me one day, ‘Listen kid, if I kick the bucket you will do it.’ And I said: ‘Shut up.’ But he did indeed pass away.” What a storyteller.

Gibson — who will also appear in the John Wick prequel series — provided no other details about Lethal Weapon 5, including whether Danny Glover and Joe Pesci will return. But here’s an idea: make a Lethal Weapon movie without Mel Gibson. It turned out OK the last time one of his franchises continued without his involvement.

(Via NME)

While Barney and Friends might have been “a happy family” on screen, apparently things weren’t quite so cheery for the purple dinosaur behind the scenes. Now, nearly 30 years since Barney made his debut on PBS, the NBC-owned streaming service Peacock has announced a Barney the Dinosaur documentary is currently in development for the streaming service. According to Peacock (via The Wrap), the series will examine “the rock star-like trajectory of Barney the Dinosaur” who “captured the hearts of millions of children and then became the target of hate and rage across pop culture, the early internet and playgrounds around the world.” The currently untitled three-part series is slated to hit the service sometime in 2022.

In the series, Peacock will shed light on “exclusive interviews and archival footage,” offering never-before-seen “first-hand accounts of the Barney phenomenon from the cast and crew to its most outspoken critics.” The project will also go over the PBS program’s 1992-2010 run — as well as the series’ spinoff various films — and the reception they received from the general public.

The Barney the Dinosaur documentary comes from Scout Productions, the executive producers of Queer Eye and The Hype, and will be directed and executive produced by Tommy Avallone of The Bill Murray Stories. In addition, Wendy Greene, Trent Johnson, Raymond Esposito, and Scout’s Rob Eric, David Collins, Michael Williams, Amy Goodman Kass, and Joel Chiodi are also all on board to produce. Rod Aissa, the executive vice president of unscripted content at NBCUniversal, said the television network is “thrilled” to be working on the series that is “bound to captivate audiences.”

“Barney the Dinosaur was a ubiquitous character for children and parents alike and we are thrilled to work with the Scout Productions team to bring this three-part series to Peacock. This documentary is bound to captivate audiences like Barney has over the years.”

On Monday, Microsoft celebrated 20 years of the Xbox and they made sure it was quite a party. During their live stream celebration, Microsoft announced that the multiplayer for the highly anticipated Halo Infinite would be going live in Beta form. All progress in the beta is going to carry over into the actual game when it launches on December 8. Since the multiplayer is going to be free-to-play, this is essentially the actual multiplayer mode launching over two weeks early. The campaign will of course still launch, with a price tag, in December.

If there was any title that was going to be perfect to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Xbox with it was always going to be Halo. Ever since the original Xbox was released, Halo has been the flagship franchise that has pushed the console. People bought Halo 2 so they could play Xbox Live with their friends. People bought the Xbox 360 so they could continue that experience with Halo 3. Halo Infinite is expected to continue that legacy with the Series X/S.

Halo Infinite is expected to be the title that shakes up the entire franchise. The campaign is going to be an open world, the multiplayer is free-to-play, and Microsoft is clearly putting a lot behind Infinite. This is going to be the title that pushes Microsoft and the Xbox ecosystem right back into the race with Sony as the video game industry’s top developer.

The NBA made a fairly dramatic change in officiating this offseason by putting a point of emphasis on not calling as many fouls when offensive players initiate contact by unnaturally moving into a defender. The results have been rather delightful for fans and defenders, while the players who used to stroll to the free throw line regularly have found them far less enjoyable.

Games have felt less stop-start and the league has already seen the fruits of that rule change in the form of fewer offensive players jumping into defenders to draw shooting fouls, stopping on screens, and sweeping through on drives. With how quickly we’ve seen players starting to adapt to new rules, it’s given hope that the NBA can take the other remaining scourge to the flow of games: the take foul (aka the Euro Foul).

Players stopping fast breaks by grabbing their opponent at midcourt has taken away so many possibilities for dunks and easy baskets, and it’s clear that the league’s clear path rules aren’t doing enough to dissuade players from eating a foul to stop an odd-man (or sometimes, oddly enough, an even-man) break. The league is reportedly already looking into options and there are plenty of options to consider, but when you take into account that the goal should be to improve game flow, further penalizing those fouls might not have the intended consequence.

Instead, a popular concept has been the addition of a soccer-style advantage policy, that allows play to continue until the team with the ball either scores within direct flow of action or, if they don’t, the referees go back and hand out the foul at the spot it happened. This would allow situations where a foul happens on a pass ahead to play out and a team get their bucket, without needing to stop play for a clear path review and take the ball out — Mike Prada has been among those pounding the drum on an advantage rule and highlights an example where it would’ve freed up a Zach LaVine fastbreak dunk on Sunday night in L.A.

It would take some getting used to, but it would improve game flow considerably if rather than blowing a play dead, officials simply raised an arm and let play go, noting that a foul took place but not stopping everyone. That alone won’t fix things, but it is the best starting point for getting away from all the whistles and stoppages that ruin fast breaks.

The first critique of an advantage system is that this will just lead to harder take fouls, but the answer to that is pretty simple: if players start trying to give harder fouls, it becomes much easier to hand out flagrants which are two shots and the ball, as well as coming with a fine attached. Players don’t want to get tagged with a flagrant, and if it’s a combination of letting play go on for soft fouls that don’t stop action and handing out flagrants for harder fouls that do, that would seem likely to be effective in pushing take fouls out of the game.

On top of that, since you have an official raising an arm to note a foul has occurred, even if you let play go on and a basket count, those take fouls can still be added to the scorebook to count against that player and team’s foul total during the next stoppage of play. That would add another layer of punishment to keep players and teams from still just trying a take foul, because even if play isn’t stopped, it would still count towards that player’s foul count and towards getting the other team in the bonus faster.

It would certainly be a major shift for the NBA to accept an advantage rule officially, but referees already do so in certain situations when they let minor contact go on some layups if the basket is made and blow the whistle if it rims out. It’s not the letter of the law, but it is part of their way of keeping the game flow going, and this would just be a formal application of that principle that would help both cut back on the efforts of players to break up one of the most exciting parts of the game in the fast break.

We are truly in the midst of Adele season. This past weekend saw the premiere of her CBS special Adele One Night Only, and today, she has added to her chart success: “Easy On Me” is No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart for the fourth straight week on the chart dated November 20.

As for the song’s performance, it actually went down in the streaming and downloads departments but saw a rise on the radio: Over the November 5 to 11 tracking week, the song had 8.1 million radio airplay audience impressions (up 12 percent) and 23.6 million US streams (down 8 percent), and sold 14,600 downloads (down 7 percent).

While the No. 1 spot has been the same for a few weeks now, there were some noteworthy shake-ups in this week’s top 10. Ed Sheeran’s “Bad Habits” and “Shivers” are now Nos. 4 and 5 respectively, making this the first time Sheeran has had multiple songs simultaneously in the top 5. Furthermore, two songs debuted in the top 10: Post Malone and The Weeknd’s “One Right Now” (at No. 6) and Silk Sonic’s (Bruno Mars and Anderson .Paak) “Smokin Out The Window,” which enters the chart at No. 8.

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