Month: February 2022

The world was not shocked to learn that Donald Trump would pardon the rioters who stormed the Capitol on January 6 if he’s reelected as president. “If I run and I win, we will treat those people from Jan. 6 fairly,” he said at a rally in Texas over the weekend. “If it requires pardons, we will give them pardons, because they are being treated so unfairly.”

During Monday’s episode of The Late Show, host Stephen Colbert sounded the alarm over Trump’s comments. “While the January 6th select committee continues to look for the cause of the Capitol riot, the cause admitted to everything and threatened to do it again. He was in Texas this weekend holding a rally because his father didn’t hug him enough. Unlike the former-president, the January 6th rioters have actually faced some legal consequences. And he was not happy about it, and he made this promise,” Colbert said before playing a clip of Trump promising to pardon the insurrectionists.

Once the video was over, Colbert added, “Well, as long as you’re doling out pardons: f*ck you.” Pardon his French.

You can watch The Late Show monologue above, which also includes Colbert riffing on Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Tom Brady’s possible retirement.

Super champ Amy Schneider’s historic Jeopardy! run wound down last week after 40 wins. Co-host Mayim Bialik wasn’t on hand for this streak, given that she trades off duties with Ken Jennings, who Amy loves (no offense intended to Mayim). Mayim recently spoke with The Wrap (to promote Call Me Kat‘s new season), and Amy’s streak definitely came up with the Big Bang Theory admitting how difficult it was to not tell her co-stars that she didn’t meet Amy (because that would have clued everyone into Amy eventually departing).

As well, the subject of super-champs came up, given that Matt Amodio recently nailed 38 wins, meaning that he held the second-place in consecutive wins before Amy busted in and claimed that same status. While pondering why there appear to be so many super-champs these days (The Ringer’s Claire McNear recently explored the subject), Mayim discussed her hunch, which is that people aren’t necessarily smarter, but there’s a lot more information out there for the taking:

“I think it’s kind of like the stock market. Like, if you look at it over a period of five years, 10 years, I think there’s probably more of these kinds of trends. Do I think people are smarter now? No. Is there more information available that never was before? Absolutely. I think it’s been a really fun and special time. But you know, that’s also the fun of ‘Jeopardy!’ You never know what’s going to happen. Someone can seem like they’re winning, winning, winning, and anything can happen — they can have a tummy ache. And that kind of changes the course of their day.”

Mayim could very well be correct, given that James Holtzhauer nabbed 32 wins not too long ago, although it doesn’t seem likely that anyone will eclipse Ken Jennings’ 74 wins anytime soon. But you never know!

Meanwhile, one can hope that Amy finally got that check for her $1,382,800 in winnings (minus taxes), and we’ll soon see Mayim return to Jeopardy!, where she and Jennings are trading off host duties until this season concludes over the summer.

(Via The Wrap)

The director of Final Fantasy VII Remake, Tetsuya Nomura, is no stranger to large elaborate franchises. He was one of the key figures behind the Kingdom Hearts series and has been a part of the Final Fantasy franchise ever since Final Fantasy IV. His pedigree speaks for itself and while sometimes his games can go a little off the rails in terms of scope, Nomura is someone whom Square Enix has entrusted many of their biggest projects to, including Final Fantasy VII.

Monday is the 25th Anniversary of Final Fantasy VII, and that means that we got a little bit of a tease on what that means for not only the upcoming Final Fantasy VII Remake Part 2, but what Square Enix is planning for the IP itself. Final Fantasy VII has exploded into something even bigger than when it came out in 1997. There are multiple spin-offs, animated movies, and tie-ins related to Final Fantasy VII including the upcoming Final Fantasy VII Ever Crisis. If that and the second part of the remake sounds like a lot, then we hope you’re ready for even more Final Fantasy VII content. In a statement celebrating the 25th Anniversary of the game, Nomura said they have plans of even more Final Fantasy VII content in the future. This machine is not stopping anytime soon.

“And there will be even more FFVII projects that started up after the remake coming in the future too. The team see this 25th anniversary as a waypoint on our journey with FFVII, and will continue pressing ahead to even greater things, so please keep supporting us going forward!”

Speaking of the remake, it sounds like we’re going to be getting some more info on that sometime in 2022. The original Final Fantasy VII director, Yoshinori Kitase, spoke of Square Enix’s intentions to give more info about the remake series during an anniversary event. Via VGC.

“We are hard at work on Final Fantasy VII: Ever Crisis, so please look forward to that. In addition, with regards to the long awaited Final Fantasy VII Remake [Part 2]… there will be more information… this year if we can,” he said, in a translation for VGC provided by PushDustIn.

Final Fantasy VII was, until Final Fantasy XIV, the most popular game in the franchise. Its legacy as one of the greatest JRPG’s of all time and how it popularized the genre in the west, can never be understated. It’s no surprise to see that Square Enix is continuing to build off that popularity even 25 years after the fact.

Some in the music world are getting deep into NFTs, like Kyle, Nas, and Eminem. When it comes to Ye (aka Kanye West), though, it looks like he’s staying away from non-fungible tokens and would like people to stop asking him about them. That said, he doesn’t seem completely closed off to delving into NFTs some day.

On Instagram last night, Ye shared a photo of a handwritten message that reads, “My focus is on building real products in the real world. Real food, real clothes, real shelter. Do not ask me to do a f*cking NFT. Ye. Ask me later.” He reiterated his point in the post’s caption, writing, “STOP ASKING ME TO DO NFT’s I’M NOT FINNA CO-SIGN … FOR NOW I’M NOT ON THAT WAVE I MAKE MUSIC AND PRODUCTS IN THE REAL WORLD.”

Some notable folks took to the comments to share their thoughts. Wacka Flocka Flame commented, “It’s not a wave Ye.” Rapsody also dropped some diamond emojis and added, “Solid!” Keri Hilson wrote, “MOOOOOD! but… ‘ask me later’ [laughing emoji].” The NFL’s Dez Bryant also chimed in, “This message alone let’s me know he don’t understand the full capabilities of an NFT….”

Meanwhile, Ye has kept busy lately, as he’s been doing things like getting in the studio with Marilyn Manson, spending time with Julia Fox, and getting rid of a tank he had laying around.

Hailing from Chicago, Ravyn Lenae came up five years ago as a future R&B revelation of sorts, albeit an enigmatic one. Creating alongside some of Chi-town hip-hop’s finest like Smino and producer Monte Booker, Lenae was a core member of the Zero Fatigue crew. Her 2016 Moon Shoes EP is sublime and 2018’s Crush EP featured the breakout song “Sticky,” plus a track with The Internet’s Steve Lacy. The latter is now back on deck with Lenae on her first single in years, “Skin Tight,” and it’s pure silk from the pair.

Lacy strings the beat on a smooth guitar, as drums lay the groundwork for Lenae’s luscious coo. She shares the hook with the prodigious Lacy, but it’s Lenae and her magnetic delivery that linger fondly. She’s been an exciting emerging force for years and “Skin Tight” is released as the lead single from her debut album that will drop sometime later this year.

She shared a statement on the comeback track:

“I wanted to snap people into my world through the sonics, so they can feel how I’ve felt over the past couple of years… It has those hypnotic elements, but it’s very simple, familiar, and fresh. Thematically, it’s about not being in a relationship with somebody, but still having those physical and mental ties. It speaks to sharing kinetic energy with another person, even if time has passed and you aren’t together anymore.”

Listen to “Skin Tight” above, along with the surrealist video directed by Zongbo Jiang.

This week, Pam & Tommy — the miniseries chronicling the strange-but-true tale of Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee’s stolen sex tape — debuts on Hulu. The incident was one of many tumultuous things that happened during their three-year marriage, which lasted from 1995 — about a month-and-a-half after they first met — to 1998. So when was the tape first leaked and when did they break up?

As per Us Weekly, the tape was made early in their relationship, including footage of them on a houseboat on Lake Mead. (Anderson does not like the term “sex tape,” saying it was really “a compilation of vacations that we were naked on.”) The two met at a New Year’s Eve party in 1994. He proposed to her four days later, and they were wed in mid-February. The tape was stolen from their Malibu home later that year, pilfered by a former porn actor-turned-electrician named Rand Gauthier, and by early 1996, it was being sold to thousands. (They didn’t win their case against the distributor, Image Entertainment Group, until 2002.)

Anderson has said the scandal added “so much frustration and stress to our relationship.” But it wasn’t the main reason they divorced two years later. Their marriage had ups and downs, including fights, a miscarriage, and Lee being jailed for six months in 1998 for spousal abuse after kicking Anderson in the back while she was holding their seven-week-old son Dylan. After his release, Anderson said she was “very proud” of Lee’s attempts at reconciliation. They divorced later that year.

The pair tried to patch things up a decade later, in 2008, but that ended quickly.

You can see a version of the sex tape scandal when Pam & Tommy, starring Lily James and Sebastian Stan as the pair and Seth Rogen as Gauthier, debuts its first three episodes on Feb. 2 on Hulu.

The House select committee that’s spent months investigating the lead-up to the Jan. 6 Capitol riot had to go over and beyond to procure White House documents from the National Archives, for one main reason: former president Donald Trump did his best to stop them from getting into their hands. Two weeks ago, those documents were finally delivered to lawmakers, but there was a catch: According to The Washington Post, some of them had been torn into shreds then taped back together.

This shouldn’t come as a surprise. In 2018, Politico reported that Trump had a peculiar (and possibly illegal) habit: He liked to tear up official White House documents and throw the remains on the floor.Aides then had to scramble to tape them back together, sometimes dealing with shards as thin as confetti. This was in direct violation of the Presidential Records Act, which stipulates that all memos, letters, notes, emails, faxes, and any other documentation pertaining to presidential duties be preserved.

Alas, not all of them had been reconstructed. Among the 700 documents they received from the National Archives, the committee found a number that had never been put back together again by some poor aides.

Trump’s habit was one of many norms and even laws that Trump gleefully violated during his single term. A New York University law professor told the Post that, because the documents Trump tore up are technically government property, what he did “could be a crime under several statutes.”

Then again, Trump’s made it pretty clear that should he ever have to pay for any of his many alleged crimes, he may just summon his supporters again.

(Via The Post)

After months of hype and unrecognizable promo pictures, the highly-anticipated Pam & Tommy will finally hit screens this week. With all of the streaming options out there, it can be confusing to try and figure out how to watch.

Well, first things first: Pam and Tommy is an eight-part mini-series, not a movie. That said, the first three episodes are set to stream on Hulu on February 2nd. After the first three episodes, the rest of the series will air on Wednesdays until March 9th. If you don’t have Hulu, the series will also be available on Star+ and, believe it or not Disney+ with Star, if you are outside the US.

Pam & Tommy will follow the notoriously over-the-top relationship between Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee, played by Lily James and Sebastian Stan, respectively. The cast also includes Nick Offerman, Seth Rogan, Taylor Schilling, and Jason Mantzoukas, who will be voicing Tommy’s penis, obviously, because what else.

Despite the cast of comedians, the show promises some darker moments, which sparked the downfall of the infamous marriage, which was four days after the pair met. James and Lee supposedly tried to reach out to the real-life couple before shooting, but sources close to Anderson said she believes the whole thing is “a joke.” Well, when there is a talking penis involved, one would hope it would be a little light-hearted.

How was your weekend? Probably not as productive as Donald Trump’s. In the span of about 24 hours, the former president a) vowed to pardon any jailed Jan. 6 rioters, who stormed the Capitol in an attempt to overturn democracy; b) promoted unrest should he be prosecuted for crimes he may have committed; and c) straight-up admit he wanted ex-veep Mike Pence to “overturn the election” of 2020. Meanwhile, all you might done is shovel snow.

Trump’s comments — which, again, include confessing to a crime he’s previously tried to bury under an avalanche of voter fraud nonsense — sparked outrage, even from cronies like Lindsey Graham. Perhaps the most forceful pushback came from Liz Cheney, the longtime traditional Republican (and, lest we forget, daughter of one of the least-liked conservatives in American history), who has seen herself all but booted from the party for daring to stand up to Trump. Well, she’s still not backing down.

“Trump uses language he knows caused the Jan 6 violence; suggests he’d pardon the Jan 6 defendants, some of whom have been charged with seditious conspiracy; threatens prosecutors; and admits he was attempting to overturn the election,” Cheney wrote on Twitter, adding, ominously, “He’d do it all again if given the chance.”

Cheney’s ire wasn’t meant exclusively for Trump. It was also for fellow Republicans, most of whom have turned their gaze as the 45th president and his minions have shredded democratic norms and punished Republicans like her for not marching in lockstep.

“The leaders of the Republican Party have made themselves willing hostages to a man who admits he tried to ‘overturn’ a presidential election and suggests he would pardon Jan. 6 defendants, some of whom have been charged with seditious conspiracy,” Cheney told The Washington Post. “I’m a constitutional conservative and I do not recognize those in my party who have abandoned the Constitution to embrace Donald Trump. History will be their judge. I will never stop fighting for our constitutional republic. No matter what.”

Meanwhile, Cheney’s fellow Republicans are busy doing other things, like quoting neo-Nazis who pled guilty for possession of child pornography.

(Via Yahoo! News and The Washington Post)

Texas senator, noted vacationer, and offense to beards everywhere Ted Cruz has a couple good opinions. He likes The Princess Bride, even though its star hates his guts. (Ditto, probably, its noted lefty director, Rob Reiner.) But many of his opinions are, to put it mildly, bad. So here’s another: While a lot of Republicans are tellingly up-in-arms over the idea that President Joe Biden seems intent on nominating a Black woman to the 5/7ths white Supreme Court, Cruz went farther than most.

On Monday’s episode of Verdict with Ted Cruz, the podcast/streaming show he hosts with conservative pundit Michael Knowles (whose name is suspiciously not in the show’s title), the most dunked-on person in America sounded off on the idea of nominating the first-ever Black woman to replace the departing Stephen Breyer (though Biden has yet to name a anyone).

“The fact that he is willing to make a promise at the outset that it must be a Black woman I’ve got to say that’s offensive,” Cruz said. “Black women are what, six percent of the U.S. population? He’s saying to 94 percent of Americans ‘I don’t give a damn about you, you are ineligible.’”

He then took his already strange argument in an even more surreal direction. “It’s actually an insult to Black women, if [Biden] came and said ‘I’m going to put the best jurist on the court’, and he looked at a number of people and he ended up nominating a Black woman he could credibly say ‘OK, I’m nominating the person who is most qualified.’ He’s not even pretending to say that,” Cruz said. “He’s saying if you’re a white guy, tough luck. If you’re a white woman, tough luck, you don’t qualify.”

After whining about how tough life is for white guys, Cruz added, “It is an example how Democrats, in particular the far left, everything is race, everything is that they will discriminate based on race, they will pigeonholed you, they don’t care about the individual.”

Well, at least one person thought Cruz was insightful, even funny: His co-host, who was once called “disgraceful” by Fox News for describing teenage climate change activist Greta Thunberg as “mentally ill.”

(Via ABC News)