Month: January 2022

There’s a case to be made that Yellowjackets is the best new television show in a decade (we made it right here), but it wasn’t perfect. You know how the hit series could have been better? With Tori Amos and Nine Inch Nails, that’s how.

Jen Malone is the music supervisor for Yellowjackets (and Euphoria, and Atlanta, and The Umbrella Academy), and in an interview with Vulture, she discussed how she wanted to include Amos in the soundtrack for season one but couldn’t find the right spot.

“We tried it, and it just wasn’t — we want to do Tori proud with the scene that we put her music to and we just couldn’t find the right one,” she said. “She’s so influential, to not only myself. Little Earthquakes, when I was in high school, that record was everything. I remember the first time I heard that record. Thank God we have season two.”

Would “Winter” be too on the nose?

Malone also revealed that Nine Inch Nails, especially something from Pretty Hate Machine, “is going to be [on] the top of the list next season. There’s so much for Yellowjackets that I’m just very excited to dig into in season two. We haven’t even scratched the surface with the songs from that time period. To reintroduce these artists to a whole new audience has been very special for both shows.”

Misty is the Tori Amos-meets-Nine Inch Nails of people. I can’t explain it, but I know it’s true.

(Via Vulture)

Even though The Rock won’t be returning to the franchise thanks to his ongoing feud with Vin Diesel, Fast & Furious 10 will have no shortage of muscle thanks to a new report that Jason Momoa is in talks to play the villain in the next installment. The actor’s career has been white hot thanks to the success of Aquaman, and now, he’s looking to trade in his trident for something with a little more horsepower. Via The Hollywood Reporter:

Jason Momoa is in final negotiations to join Vin Diesel and the cast in what is being called Fast & Furious 10 as a working title. And while plot details are being muffled, the Aquaman actor could be poised to act as one of the film’s villains. Universal had no comment.

Of course, this can only mean awesome things to come for Fast & Furious 11. The films have made a habit of taking the villain from this previous film and adding him to the crew (See: Jason Statham‘s Deckard Shaw and John Cena‘s Jakob Toretto.) Granted, Fast & Furious 10 could break that tradition, but adding Momoa to the already stacked crew lead by Diesel seems like a no-brainer to ensure the franchise moves on with a bang. Or we should say a vroom?

Either way, Jason Momoa in a Fast & Furious movie, where do we sign up? Also, just assume we made a whole bunch of jokes about the cars driving underwater this time. That’s gotta be where this is going.

(Via The Hollywood Reporter)

Fayetteville, Georgia producer OG Parker has been steadily growing in impact and esteem in the hip-hop world thanks to his hard-hitting beats for everyone from Migos to fast-rising newcomer DDG. His combination of trap and R&B has resulted in hits for the likes of Megan Thee Stallion, Ski Mask The Slump God, and more. On his latest single he reunites with PartyNextDoor, whose 2019 hit “Loyal” he produced, for “No Fuss,” a slow-burning, apologetic ballad addressing their wrongdoings toward a miffed lover.

“You caught me in a lie, I won’t deny it,” Party croons, admitting that “maybe the blame is on me / Might be moving too shady.” Nonetheless, though, they warn, “All the wrongs I’ve done, I feel empathy / But it’s wrong to hold on to this energy.” If anyone was worried that the Torontonian singer had moved on from his toxic ways on 2020’s Partymobile, it looks like they can rest assured that he’s still up to no good.

Party has been laying low since the release of his third album, although he did re-release his fan-favorite 2014 EP Colours to streaming in 2021. Will his new collab with OG Parker signal the beginning of a new project rollout? We’ll see. Meanwhile, OG Parker continues to roll out his own freestanding singles, which could mean a new project from his this year as well.

Listen to OG Parker and PartyNextDoor’s “No Fuss” above.

After a breakup, most people do something silly like get bangs or take up a new hobby, like knitting. Not Aquaman, who was recently spotted living in an elaborate camper van.

Jason Momoa has been reportedly living in a (very expensive) RV earlier this week. Page Six reports the black camper van cost $750,000, which sits outside a friend’s house, near the home where Momoa and Lisa Bonet were living with their two kids.

The couple shocked fans after announcing their split earlier this year, after nearly 17 years together. They wed at an exclusive ceremony in 2017. The duo have two teenagers, plus Momoa’s stepdaughter Zoe Kravitz, from Bonet’s marriage with Lenny Kravtiz. The pair’s top priority is still to raise their kids as best they can, despite the split.

It’s nice to see that Momoa is still remaining close to his kids. In a trailer, no less. But, you think he could afford, say, another house? But if you are going to live in a trailer, a $750k one is probably a pretty swanky place to live.

But this leads us to the most important question…where does self-proclaimed bath-lover Momoa bathe when living in an RV?? And how will he continue to eat his elaborate breakfasts? Some things we may never know.

Claire Sattler lived every young Jeopardy! fan’s dream by winning the 2018 Teen Tournament, taking home the $100,000 grand prize. But her dream turned into a bit of nightmare after facing online bullying. “I was more nervous about the internet’s reaction,” she told the Naples Daily News in 2018. “Twitter very much decided I was the villain of the finals for some reason other than the fact that I talk a lot.”

Sattler, who now attends Yale University, shared examples of the harassment she faced in a recent TikTok. “What was it like being on teen jeopardy?” the opening text reads. What follows is “stalkers,” “nationwide bullying,” and “being accused of having $3x with a 79 year old man [host Alex Trebek] (as a 16 year old) for the answers (because you weren’t smart enough to win on your own apparently).”

The video (set to a remix of Bastille’s “Pompeii” where the lyrics are replaced by the words “emotional damage”) ends on a lighter note, with Sattler making fun of herself for dabbing on the show. But’s that’s a lot for anyone to face, let alone a teenager.

You can watch the TikTok below.

In 2020, Sattler gave some advice for aspiring Jeopardy! contestants. “I would say, get your plastic toilet paper holder out and learn how to buzz. And I would say study up on, situationally, what you should do for betting,” she told the Yale School of Engineering & Applied Science. “There’s only a few betting strategies you should employ, but if you don’t know the strategy of the game before, it’s hard to come up with those ideas on the spot.” Also, stay off social media. This is good advice for anyone, honestly.

(Via Decider)

The Afterparty delivers gifts on gifts on gifts of comic goodness thanks to its amazing ensemble and Clue: The Next Generation vibes, but none may be more enduring than the experience of seeing Sam Richardson and Ben Schwartz and team up as reunited friends at a high school reunion gone way way wrong. Playing off each other throughout the murder mystery series from Apple TV+ (which premieres with 3 episodes on Friday before going weekly), the two demonstrate a supernatural kind of shorthand that we desperately hope will see the light of day again in future seasons and/or in other projects.

This is the birth of a new comedy super duo. I say this as someone who binged the first half of the series and as someone who had the unique pleasure of talking with the pair ahead of the premiere. Dear reader, it was the good chaos as we riffed on their love of the murder mystery genre, the craft behind their on-screen rap duet, karaoke go-tos and big mistakes, why you shouldn’t fuck with them when it comes to Disney songs, and the Old Testament. We took a little journey. Dive in.

You guys have off-the-charts chemistry. Is that just pure talent, do you have a long relationship?

Ben Schwartz: We had never met before. I had tried to do a show with Sam, but he was busy, but I’ve always thought Sam was a genius and smart, because I think he’s genuine and his acting is hilarious and really, really warm. And we had never met when… We didn’t even get to the table read together. So the first time I think we probably met each other in person was the first day of shooting, but it was ajn immediate friendship, immediate connection, and I felt I had been friends with him since high school. And because we have improv backgrounds and we spent so much time doing sketch and improv, our shorthand was already there and bits that would take people weeks to do, we were doing after two seconds and just making each other crack up.

Sam Richardson: Destined to be friends. And we are now.

I got vibes of Clue. I got vibes of Only Murders In The Building. I got so many good vibes off this. What’s your level of love and affection for the murder mystery genre?

Richardson: I mean, I absolutely love a murder mystery. I love riddles, I love puzzles, I love sort of anything that I have to figure out like a cat and a cat toy where you have to like get the treats out of it, I’m the same. I’m rewarded by answering these things right. So it was incredible to be a part of one like this, and one that’s so unique and just a new take on that genre. I’m over the moon.

Schwartz: Same with me. I love Sherlock stuff. I also loved Colombo when I was a kid. So like all that stuff. I love trying to figure it out before they tell me. I love trying to figure it out before I’m told. I thought Knives Out was so good too. If we’re talking about new references, but Clue is, I mean, Clue in terms of classic films is one of the best. So the fact that we’re playing with the genre and kind of twisting it on its head a little bit by playing with different genres within the genre of who done it… heaven. And there’s nobody better in the universe than Lord and Miller to do that. They’re geniuses.

Richardson: Yeah, truly.

Any experience with your own high school reunions? Can famous people do that, or is it just unfair?

Schwartz: Is it unfair? [Laughs]

Yeah, it’s unfair. You roll in fresh from the set, no big deal.

Richardson: [Laughs] And you just automatically win? I don’t know. I haven’t [been], but I’ve always wanted to, ever since I saw the movie Romy and Michelle’s High School Reunion. I just never got to do it.

Schwartz: I did one, five years after we graduated, but there was nothing to brag about. I was doing comedy. I didn’t have any money. I was still eating Wendy’s, you know what I mean? Because there’s a meal that you could get for a dollar… also pizza in New York, you could learn how to get a slice, but put all the free stuff on top of it. I would get really good at that stuff. Like a lot of red pepper and parmesan.

That’s protein right there.

Schwartz: That’s exactly correct.

There’s a great yearbook photo scene in the show. Can you guys show me what the yearbook photo pose was for you guys back in the day?

Schwartz: It’s easy. Here it is.

Perfect. Did you guys go with the laser theme or anything?

Richardson: Oh, I wish. No, I didn’t. I don’t think it was even an option for mine.

Schwartz: We didn’t have options either.

This was more musical than I anticipated — specifically in the episode focused on your character, Ben. How did that rap come to be? That Sorkin line killed me.

Schwartz: That Sorkin line is a Sam Richardson beautiful line. Just gorgeous.

Was that pre-planned?

Richardson: Oh, pre-planned.

Schwartz: Any time we sang anything, it was recorded in a booth beforehand and an engineer who’s more brilliant than us and a woman named Feora Cutler helped us with our vocals. And then when you see us on stage Cat Burns is doing all the choreography. And we had like this gorgeous team, wonderful, wonderful, talented team behind us. But that rap song was so fun because I love hip-hop and R&B and I love rap. And the idea that we could actually, they shot it like an actual rap video. And when they showed us a playback of what we were doing, I was like, “Oh my God, we’re doing it. We’re in a rap video.” I mean, our version of a rap video. But the words were already locked. It was probably the only thing that was truly locked.

What are your karaoke go-to’s?

Richardson: “I Would Do Anything For Love” and “I Don’t Want To Miss A Thing,” by Aerosmith.

Schwartz: Ooh.

Are you giving all your focus to the song or are you acting it out?

Richardson: I mean, “Anything For Love,” you got to get into that one and you got to at least be on your feet for, “I Don’t Want To Miss A Thing.”

Schwartz: I do the audiobook of the Bible. That’s my karaoke. [Laughs]

Old Testament or New?

Schwartz: Old Testament. What are you talking about, man? Schwartz! Old Testament, babyyyyy! [Laughs] But I haven’t done karaoke very often. One time I did it, I did “New York State Of Mind,” and I was like, this would be great. Cause I’m from New York. And I know that song, Billy Joel and I started singing and then it was like seven minutes long.

Richardson: [Laughs] It is a long one.

Schwartz: You’re so embarrassed after a while. It’s so long. And I’m like, God, still? We’re still singing this song? [Laughs]

I did “Scenes From An Italian Restaurant” the first time I did karaoke. Same issue.

Schwartz: Oh, that’s a huge mistake. Oof. That’s a rock opera.

Richardson: It sure is. Me and [Adam] Pally do that song in Champaign ILL. And we had to like sing-along to that song like a hundred times and it’s long.

[Richardson and Schwartz break into song for a few seconds]

That’s the second time anyone’s sang during an interview. I interviewed Justin Theroux once and he started singing Disney songs with Tessa Thompson in the room.

Schwartz: You don’t want to fuck with us and Disney songs.

Richardson: We used to play this game in the car where Ben would play songs from his mix, his Disney mix, and see how quickly I could identify them.

Schwartz: How many notes. And it would be songs from movies, from like the original Jungle Book all the way to… It would be how long until Sam could do it. And Sam was so quick. It made me so proud.

Give me the top three. What are the top three Disney songs? What’s the ranking.

Richarson: You can’t.

Schwartz: You can’t! What are you doing? You can’t. That’s three out of hundreds!?

Come on. What do you got? Put your name behind it.

Richardson: I will. I will. Like some of these aren’t hits. Some of these aren’t popular but they’re brilliant. “Every Little Piece” from Pete’s Dragon.

Schwartz: I’m getting in there. Oh, by the way, “Everybody Wants To Be A Cat…” Great song. Great, great song. Take away the un-pc things in that song, there’s a section where cats… take that away. “Bear Necessities.” I mean, that’s got to be top… that’s tops.

Richardson: That’s tops. I’m going to go a little bit more modern. “I’ll Make A Man Out Of You,” which is not very modern. That’s like maybe 20 something years old, but Donny Osmond singing “I’ll Make A Man Out Of You” from Mulan? Terrific.

Schwartz: “Be Our Guest.” Unbelievable. “Under The Sea.” See, this is the problem because when you get into the nineties, we’re not even talking about Disney television shows because then you’re screwed. We have Ducktales, Rescue Rangers, Gummi Bears.

Richardson: Dark Wing Duck. These theme songs alone…

Schwartz: Dark Wing Duck‘s is perfect.

If we hum a bar from Gummi Bears, we’ll all be fucking infected with that for five days.

Richardson: Dashing and daring, courageous and caring, faithful and friendly…

I’m going to go Oliver And Company – “Why Should I Worry.”

Schwartz: Very interesting.

Richardson: “Why Should I Worry!” Going back to Billy Joel.

I saw Billy Joel live a few years ago. I got so pissed he didn’t sing that song.

Schwartz: You saw him at MSG?

I saw him in Philly at like Lincoln whatever the hell it is. I never know these stadium bank names. Crypto whatever. Unless you guys want to do a crypto commercial right now. That seems to be on-trend. Feel free.

Schwartz: Well Sam and I are releasing a set of NFTs where it’s us hugging. You can get them. There are different ones — there’s zombie us hugging, there are cats.

Richardson: There’s us hugging zombies. Yeah. We’re trying to work on a Disney collab for an NFT. They won’t do it, but we wanted to do like Gummi Bear-y hugs. It’s a work in progress. They’re getting back to us.

Schwartz: They’re getting back to us.

Richardson: It’s not a no, but it’s a long yes, I think.

‘The Afterparty’ premieres on Apple TV+ with the first three episodes on 1/28 with weekly drops after that.

For a brief moment, it seemed like Sarah Palin was actually bucking the Republican Party by coming out in favor of masking and vaccines after her family caught COVID last year. It was a surprising stance for the former vice presidential candidate who’s been a stalwart Donald Trump supporter. However, Palin’s dalliance with common sense was fleeting as she kicked into full GOP mode barely six months later and swore she’d never get vaccinated while trashing Dr. Fauci on Fox News.

Jump to this week where Palin has been making headlines after her defamation suit against The New York Times was delayed because she caught COVID again. Things really took a turn when two days later, the COVID positive Palin was spotted eating out at a New York restaurant, which even Meghan McCain couldn’t resist calling “stupid” and “selfish.”

Naturally, late night hosts like Jimmy Kimmel got in on the act, and he came loaded with new nicknames for Palin during Thursday’s episode of Jimmy Kimmel Live! After referring to her as “The Unmasked Singer,” Kimmel unloaded on Palin for refusing to quarantine. Via The Wrap:

“You know, in New York, you’re supposed to isolate for five days after a positive test, but darn it, that’s not how [the] Alaska top hockey mom does it. She plays by her own rules. So the other night she caught some flack for eating indoors at a restaurant, despite the fact you’re supposed to show proof of vaccination to get in and she doesn’t have that.”

Kimmel then showed footage of Palin eating in a restaurant, and joked, “There’s Typhoid Mary having some linguini or something.”

Kimmel also roasted Palin for not getting take-out, which would’ve been ridiculously easy to do in her situation. “What’s she supposed to do,” Kimmel quipped. “Sit in her hotel room and order from any of the 20,000 restaurants in New York City?”

(Via The Wrap)

While some of us are mostly invested in Kanye West as a musician, there are apparently many, many people who care a great deal — perhaps even too much — about his love life. Headlines about the controversial rapper/producer have revolved around his nascent relationship with actress Julia Fox lately, as Ye works to move on from his divorce from Kim Kardashian West.

Another thing people are truly interested in is Kanye’s passive-aggressive feud with Drake. While the two rappers apparently buried the hatchet at their Free Larry Hoover concert in LA last year, they’ve appeared to settle their differences in the past before something sets one or the other off and they go back to taking petty subliminal jabs at each other in their music.

Here’s where that particular Venn diagram of interests intersects: According to Page Six, Drake and Ye have yet another thing in common. They both dated Julia Fox. A source told Page Six that Drake DMed Fox shortly after her role in 2019’s Uncut Gems, and when her prior relationship with Peter Artemiev broke up, the two spent some time together in New York in 2020, leading to drinks, a workplace drop-in, and a flight to LA, where Drake allegedly bought a pair of Birkin bags for Fox.

Fox was shacking up with Drake in Toronto the COVID-19 pandemic finally prompted lockdown measures, which sent Fox back home to the US due to the imminent closure of the US/Canada border. Fox reunited with Artemiev before meeting Kanye on New Year’s Eve, and the rest, as they say, is history. Whether this revelation leads to another round of back-and-forth between Drake and Ye remains to be seen, but considering Kanye is supposed to release his next album, Donda 2, next month, there might not be much longer to wait to find out.

The Rundown is a weekly column that highlights some of the biggest, weirdest, and most notable events of the week in entertainment. The number of items could vary, as could the subject matter. It will not always make a ton of sense. Some items might not even be about entertainment, to be honest, or from this week. The important thing is that it’s Friday, and we are here to have some fun.

ITEM NUMBER ONE — This is officially a thing now

A few weeks ago, Chris Noth’s character on the Sex and the City continuation series, And Just Like That, died as a result of a Peloton-related calamity. This was, and still is, extremely funny to me. It was a whole big thing, too. It was all over the news. Peloton had to put out a statement and everything. A full-on fiasco. The chaos of it all was delicious.

Then, this Sunday, against staggering odds, it happened again. Kind of. It kind of happened again. On the season premiere of Billions, Mike Wagner, played with mustache-twirling glee by David Costabile, was cranking away on his own Peloton when the paramedics burst into his home to inform him he was having a heart attack. They knew because of the device’s various monitors and gizmos and such. I don’t understand it all, to be honest, beyond knowing that it is very, very funny that it all happened again. Here, proof.

The takeaways from all of this are twofold:

• It does not seem like a fun time to work in the media relations department at Peloton
• This is officially a trend now

That second thing is important. Two characters have suffered Peloton-related health emergencies this year. The general rule is that things in life tend to happen in threes, which raises a question I am beyond delighted to try to answer: Who is next? What television character will — should — suffer a Peloton-related health crisis to complete the circle?

Below, I have listed some options. The key things to know here are as follows:

• Some of these are characters I would like to see killed or maimed because I hate them a lot, but most are just the ones I think would be funniest
• I have included characters who are no longer on television, in part because Sex and the City came back and killed someone off and in part because it’s really funny to me to picture Paulie Walnuts from The Sopranos having a heart attack on a robot bicycle

Make your own list if you’re so great

Here we go.

Literally any character on Succession

I’m serious here. Any of them. More than one. Kendall, sure, yes. Roman, of course. Shiv and/or Tom would be hilarious. Cousin Greg is maybe too on the nose but still something I want to see as long as he survives it. Karl or Frank would be perfect for this, too. Especially Karl. There is a 100 percent chance he owns a Peloton. I can see him right now with the towel wrapped around his neck. You can, too. Just give it a second.

Henry Winkler’s character on Barry

Henry Winkler could make an entire meal out of a Peloton crisis and I think we should let him do it.

Judy Gemstone

Peddling with alarming intensity until her heart tries to burst out of her body, BJ finding her and shrieking a little. I need it.

Pete Campbell

The tricky thing here is that Mad Men was set in the 1960s and 1970s and the Peloton was not invented for another 40ish years. I get that. I do. But consider this: It would be hilarious. Pete Campbell was the worst. I once wrote 1000 words about how I wanted him to get eaten by a bear. This works, too.

Paulie Walnuts

Please take five minutes today and picture Paulie Walnuts from The Sopranos having a mild heart attack on a Peloton. My gift to you.

Frank from It’s Always Sunny

Danny DeVito on an exercise bike, pumping away, really getting after it, then clutching his chest dramatically. This is comedy.

Queen Elizabeth on The Crown

It would make me happier than any of you could imagine if the next season of The Crown threw historical accuracy into the toilet and killed off Elizabeth via exercise bike disaster. I would never stop laughing.

Dewey Crowe from Justified

I miss him a lot. Just make this like a web short. For me. Send it just to me.

Kim Wexler and/or Lalo Salamanca

Kim and Lalo both exist in Better Call Saul but they’re both gone by Breaking Bad. Why? What happens?

Peloton.

Steve Martin’s character on Only Murders in the Building

Just for the physical comedy.

George Costanza

Perfect. No notes.

Baby Yoda

Baby Yoda trying to ride an exercise bike with his tiny little limbs, maybe getting electrocuted and launched 50 feet through the air, then landing, healthy and alive but dazed, and making one of his little faces.

This is television.

Vision from WandaVision

Here for the robot-on-robot violence.

Laszlo from What We Do in the Shadows

Need to hear him call it like “a confounded contraption” in the full Matt Berry voice.

These are good ideas.

ITEM NUMBER TWO — Being a historically great Jeopardy! champion seems weird

The bad news here is that Amy Schneider’s run as Jeopardy champ ended this week. It’s bad for a few reasons, too, but mostly it’s bad because I love a dominant Jeopardy champ. I love to see them rip off win after win, I love to see people get excited, I love to see the close calls where they squeak out a win over a worthy competitor. Sometimes I daydream about being the one to take them down and I picture the crowd cheering for me — the scrappy underdog defeating the invincible champ — like it’s the end of Rocky IV or something. You are not allowed to psychoanalyze me for this. It is, I believe, a HIPAA violation.

There is good news, though, starting with the fact that she’ll actually get the million-plus she won for winning all those games. Jeopardy winners don’t get paid until their winning streaks are over. I learned that this week from this article in The Ringer by Claire McNear, who is basically the world’s foremost Jeopardy expert, and just generally very good at this stuff. Other things I learned from her article:

• Amy actually had to get demoted on-purpose at work because she was missing so much time
• Keeping the secret kind of forces you to become a spy

Here, look:

For players like Schneider, whose streaks have necessitated repeat trips to Los Angeles for taping, the secrecy of a streak-in-progress is that much harder to preserve. Jennings, for one, was forced to tip his hand to his boss, who covered for him with a series of excuses about sudden conflicts and illnesses, to the point that Jennings felt like he had a secret identity.

“Lying to everyone I know for months on end is taking a psychological toll as well,” Jennings wrote in his 2006 memoir, Brainiac. “The secret starts to make me feel a little schizophrenic. A couple days a month, I’m the Ken Jennings who’s shattered game show records, whose ever-growing daily winnings total is starting to look like a life-changing amount of money. But nobody knows about him yet. I still have to come home and be Ken Jennings the boring suburban dad, in his same old mundane treadmill of an office job, pretending nothing has happened.”

I want to be very clear about a couple of things here. The first is that this sounds both cool and stressful. Equally so, basically. I think it would be fun at first to play secret agent about all of it. I would have a blast coming up with excuses and sneaking around and having a little secret. One that’s good and won’t hurt anyone. A nice little secret, for me. And money. A secret and money. That could be cool.

This brings us to the second thing, though: There is something approaching a 100 percent chance that I would blab this secret to someone/everyone if it lasted longer than, say, two weeks. I would try to get cute about it, like “maybe I’ll be on longer than you think…” and then people would start grilling me and I’d spill it out everywhere. Everyone would know. The people at Jeopardy would be so mad at me.

The lesson here is that you should not tell me if you commit a crime. You will absolutely go to jail because of me. I’m sorry. But it’s better that you know.

ITEM NUMBER THREE — Finally, someone has made a movie about thieves who use speedboats to rob yachts

Okay, so technically, if we’re being sticklers here, the picture at the top of this post is tangentially related to the subject matter. At best. It’s a screencap from a movie called Speed Kills, where John Travolta plays a champion speed boat racer who gets in business with drug runners and it becomes a whole thing. I watched it three years ago and wrote like 2000 words about it. I have so many screencaps of John Travolta driving a speedboat. Still. Today. Which turned out to be useful today. Joke’s on you.

Anyway, context. The greatest movie I’ve ever heard of was announced this week. Look at this. Read it all twice.

Jake Gyllenhaal is set to star in “Cut and Run,” a heist thriller about a group of thieves who use high-powered speed boats to rob super-yachts. Their caper takes a turn when they steal the wrong thing from the wrong group of people.

This is quite possibly the best one-two punch of sentences I’ve ever read. There is so much going on here, almost all of it wonderful. It keeps getting better, too. Because you think it can’t get better than “Jake Gyllenhaal starring in a heist movie called Cut and Run about dudes in speedboats robbing dudes in super-yacht” and then, blammo, “they steal the wrong thing from the wrong people.”

I’m already dying to know what this means. What is the wrong thing? Who are the wrong people? Did they steal a nuclear bomb from an arms dealer? Did they steal Dominic Toretto’s child? Did Jake Gyllenhaal steal an unreleased collection of songs by Taylor Swift, who in this scenario is playing a version of herself that is also secretly an international supervillain who has a pet alligator named Randy Sugarman?

Anything is possible right now. I’m almost too excited. I hope this becomes a franchise and I hope it goes on for decades and I hope the ninth movie features Jake Gyllenhaal driving a speedboat to outer space.

I’m a simple man.

ITEM NUMBER FOUR — If this is an Olympic event this year, I will definitely watch the Winter Olympics

It is my position, generally, that the Summer Olympics are better than the Winter Olympics. The Summer Olympics have cooler events and a more diverse slate — track and swimming and gymnastics and fencing and basketball and horse things and so on — and just feel more right in a bunch of ways. Maybe it’s because I hate winter, as a concept. Maybe it’s because I was never into stuff like skiing or skating. Maybe it’s because so many of the events seem to me like falling down a mountain in different elaborate ways. I don’t know. It’s just how it’s always been.

That said, if this commercial represents a real new event this time, in the Winter Olympics that start next month, I will change my tune. Because, like…

See, this I can work with. Why are you racing down an icy mountain on two skinny planks? Because DINOSAURS ARE CHASING YOU. Every world record would be broken. It would be thrilling. Some skiers and spectators would get eaten, sure. But the survivors would be true champions. Maybe we can put the dinosaurs on skis too. That would be funny. They’d be so mad. Stupid angry dinosaurs.

There is a very real chance that this commercial for the Winter Olympics and the new Jurassic World movie ends up bringing me more joy than the Winter Olympics and the new Jurassic World combined. I feel okay about it.

ITEM NUMBER FIVE — Hey look, some good tweets

Joe Pera is the best. We’ve discussed this. His show, Joe Pera Talks With You, is so good and so pure and so sweet and so funny. But that’s not the point right now. It’s true, but not the point. It’s kind of the point, actually. Because Joe Pera is also from Buffalo. He roots for the Buffalo Bills. Do you see where I’m going here? I’ll explain.

The Buffalo Bills played the Kansas City Chiefs in the NFL playoffs last Sunday. It was one of the craziest football games I’ve ever seen. The last two minutes and overtime featured like four touchdowns and insane twists and I was almost out of breath watching it even though I don’t care about either team too much. People were going nuts. My twitter feed was scrolling faster than the Price Is Right wheel, with dozens of “BEST GAME OVER” and “HOLY SHIT” tweets, and then, mixed in there, like a flawless diamond in a pit of spiders, was Buffalo Bills fan Joe Pera tweeting this.

Beautiful. Perfect. I love him so much. All three seasons of his show are on HBO Max and all the episodes are like 12 minutes long and I just said all of this earlier this month. Please listen to me. I’ll just keep repeating myself until you do.

Hey, speaking of good tweets that I love…

I promise this is not hyperbole: I have watched this video at least 50 times this week since my colleague Josh Kurp showed it to me in Slack. It could be closer to 100. I watched it like 10 times in a row just now, while I was supposed to be writing this section. I bet I’ll watch it at least five more times before I finish. I refuse to do any additional research into it because it’s probably a bummer and I simply will not research myself into ruining something so beautiful.

I’m going to move on now but I understand if you get stuck here and just keep watching this clip. You’ll miss the phrase “contraband bologna” if you stop here, which is coming up soon, I promise, but I’ll understand. We’re all doing the best we can.

READER MAIL

If you have questions about television, movies, food, local news, weather, or whatever you want, shoot them to me on Twitter or at [email protected] (put “RUNDOWN” in the subject line). I am the first writer to ever answer reader mail in a column. Do not look up this last part.

From Matt:

Somehow, you have missed the most important pop culture event of the past two weeks: the debut of the intro video for Peacemaker. I don’t care that you ignored the show. It’s the dance routine we must discuss. First, let’s watch.

Where to begin. Is it the amazing choreography for John Cena’s weirdly swollen body? The seriousness of the expressions? Robert Patrick’s crotch explosion? I am going to propose it’s actually with the song, “Do You Want To Taste It” by Wig Wam. Consider that this song was recorded only 10 years ago. By these Norwegian guys. One of them is named Flash– can you guess which?

All of this is amazing.

James Gunn is somehow our greatest director now.

This is just a really good email. I like that it takes me to task for whiffing on something I should have — given everything we know about me at this point — covered extensively. I like that it includes both links and research. I like that it kind of does my job for me.

But first, just in case you didn’t click on the hyperlinks in there, here’s the aforementioned Peacemaker opening credits, which are beautiful and borderline revolutionary…

… and here is the full-length music video for the song by the aforementioned Norwegian band.

It’s all quite lovely. Yes, sure, the Succession credits with its theme song with the cascading tinkly pianos. We all love it. But that’s a little too classy for all occasions. Sometimes you need something chaotic and silly. That’s what this is. Chaos and silliness for the sake of being chaotic and silly. I appreciate it a lot. I’m so proud of all of them.

It’s a good reminder, too: there really aren’t as many rules out there as you think there are. You can get weird and break stuff a little sometimes. The only thing stopping you is the guardrails you slapped on your imagination around age 12. Bust those suckers down if you want. Get weird. Have John Cena dance a little.

This is admittedly a pretty specific example. Most of us don’t even know John Cena. And it would be weird if you ran into him and just shouted like “DANCE, JOHN.” So maybe don’t do that. But the rest of the point stands. Excellent email, Matt.

AND NOW, THE NEWS

To the Texas border!

Hundreds of pounds of contraband pork bologna were seized at the Texas border as U.S. citizens tried smuggling the lunch meat in two recent incidents, officials say.

CONTRABAND BOLOGNA

I KNOW THIS IS SERIOUS

I’M SORRY

BUT YOU NEED TO GIVE ME A MINUTE TO ALL-CAPS ABOUT CONTRABAND BOLOGNA

In the first case, a 40-year-old resident of Albuquerque tried entering the U.S. at the Paso Del Norte crossing in El Paso on Jan. 13, according to a CBP news release. He did not declare having any meat products. During an inspection of his car, agriculture specialists with the agency say they found 55 pounds of bologna hidden under a bag of chips, under the seats and in the trunk compartment of the SUV.

Imagine getting arrested for smuggling 55 pounds of bologna. Imagine explaining that to… anyone.

“It says here you were arrested in 2022. What happened?”

“So… you’re familiar with bologna, the lunch meat, right?”

Fascinating. And it gets weirder.

In the second incident, on Jan. 21, a 40-year-old resident of Pueblo West, Colorado, tried entering the Ysleta border crossing in El Paso, officials say. She also did not declare any meat products. But when her vehicle was inspected, officials say they found 19 rolls of bologna totaling 188 pounds under the back seat, inside the duvet cover liners and hidden with some luggage

The thing about this one is that I kind of just want to see 188 pounds of bologna. It seems like a lot. I also kind of want to see footage of the search, just to see the faces of people nearby when the agents just keep pulling bologna out of the car, over and over and over.

I’ve got to believe this kind of thing is rare, though. I can’t imagine bologna smuggling happens a lot.

This isn’t the first time someone tried illegally bringing bologna into the U.S.

Hmm.

Tell me everything.

In September, McClatchy News reported that a motorist tried bringing 320 pounds of bologna and 30 pounds of turkey ham across the Texas border.

And in February, 277 pounds of contraband bologna were found in the floorboards of a car crossing the New Mexico border. Also that month and in New Mexico, McClatchy News reported that 194 pounds of bologna were seized from a different vehicle.

I need three seasons on any streaming service about this as soon as possible. We can start with a McMillions-style documentary and then branch out to the Narcos-style loose fictionalization. Get Paul Giamatti as a frustrated bureaucrat. Get Brian Tyree Henry as a border patrol agent. Get Florence Pugh as an international bologna smuggling queenpin.

I am not joking. I would never joke about contraband bologna.

Though she’s still a relative newcomer on the scene, UK producer and DJ PinkPantheress has already amassed a very passionate fan base. Boosted by a healthy dose of virality on Tiktok, her glitchy songs like “Just For Me” (and its subdued video), or the mini-doc she made with Spotify, Feast On This, helped introduce pave the way for her debut mixtape. To Hell With It seemed to encapsulate not just the producer’s mood at that time, but a collective ennui that had set in during the fall of 2021 that helped the tape’s sometimes frenetic, sometimes lonesome sound really resonate.

Now that it’s a new year, though, PinkPantheress has something else in store for fans of To Hell With It. While the original tape was just her, with no features, a new remix version she’s dropping today has got a whole host of guests involved, including Flume, Anz, Powfu, LSDXOXO, Sam Gellaitry, and Nia Archives. “I’m extremely happy to have had all some of my favourite creatives work on this project,” PinkPantheress said in a press release. “These remixes get me up and dancing like there’s no tomorrow, and I hope they have the same effect on everyone that tunes in.”

Check out the new version of the tape above, and the most recent US tour dates from PinkPantheress right here.