Month: February 2022

(Spoilers from Netflix’s Ozark will be found below.)

The first half of the fourth (and final) Ozark season recently dropped on Netflix. These seven episodes, of course, satisfied the masses (multiple seasons continue to land in Netflix’s Top 10 charts each week), but it already feels like it’s been a long time since January 21. When will the final seven episodes (technically referred to as Season 4, Part II), including the finale, arrive?

Well, the Byrde family’s money laundering ways will eventually come to an end. No one knows who will make it out alive (especially after that major car wreck) or if it’s even possible for them to go back to their Chicago social circle. Let’s just say that getting in deep with drug lords does not bode well for anyone’s wellbeing. And we need to find out what happens when Ruth goes after Javi (because, despite Marty’s warnings, that’s almost certainly what she will do) to avenge Wyatt’s death.

As for the “when” of things, Netflix has kept quiet on a firm date, but they’re beginning to reveal their pattern for two-part season release formats. After Masters of the Universe: Revelation launched on July 23, 2021 with a second part on November 23, 2021, and Unsolved Mysteries debuted on July 1, 2021 with a second half on October 19, 2021, we can guess that Ozark will followup within four to six months.

So, hopefully this means that we’ll see what happens with explosive Ruth and the harrowing-looking car wreck by summer. And given Netflix’s usual release format, people should be able to start binging at 12:00am PST on release date. So… it could be finale time by 7:00am PST? The most dedicated viewers might be on it by early morning.

‘Ozark’ is currently streaming (through Season 4, Part 1) on Netflix.

Like a good handful of her music peers, Megan Thee Stallion is giving acting a shot: Variety reports today that she has been cast in F*cking Identical Twins, alongside Nathan Lane, Megan Mullally, and Saturday Night Live‘s Bowen Yang.

The A24 film is an R-rated musical comedy from comedians Aaron Jackson and Josh Sharp, who are adapting it from their two-man stage show, which they premiered at Manhattan’s Upright Citizens Brigade in 2014. They’re writing the script as well as playing the two lead roles.

This one has been in the works for a while, as 20th Century originally acquired the rights to adapt the stage musical in 2016. Larry Charles, director of Borat and a Seinfeld staff writer, is directing the movie, which is currently in production.

Variety notes of the movie, “F*cking Identical Twins takes inspiration from Hallie and Annie’s mischievous exploits in The Parent Trap and follows two business adversaries who realize they’re identical twin brothers. They decide to switch places in order to reunite their divorced parents and become a family again.”

Meg has a bit of acting experience, as she popped up in a 2020 episode of Good Girls.

Megan Thee Stallion is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Busy day in the world of television. Two powerhouse series, Atlanta and Stranger Things, have both confirmed that after airing new episodes this year, their next season will be their last. In fact, in Atlanta‘s case, the show is already wrapped. The show’s third and fourth season were shot back-to-back and will both air this year starting with the March premeire of Season 3, according to FX chairman John Landgraf.

“After a four year absence, we’re graced with the return of Atlanta. Donald Glover and his team have shot the final two seasons of the series,” Landgraf said in a statement to Deadline. “The fourth and final season is slated to debut in the same manner in the fall. The new season is everything you’d expect from Atlanta – which is to say expect the unexpected. Sit back and enjoy the trip.”

As for Stranger Things, the Netflix series’ fourth season will be split into two installments that will drop this summer. After that, the fifth season will be its last. Via The Hollywood Reporter:

“Seven years ago, we planned out the complete story arc for Stranger Things,” creators Matt and Ross Duffer wrote in an open letter to fans. “At the time, we predicted the story would last four to five seasons. It proved too large to tell in four but — as you’ll see for yourselves — we are now hurtling toward our finale.”

However, while the main series is coming to an end, the Duffer Brothers all but confirmed talks of a Stranger Things expanded universe.

“There are still many more exciting stories to tell within the world of Stranger Things: new mysteries, new adventures, new unexpected heroes,” The Duffer Brothers wrote. “But first, we hope that you stay with us as we finish this tale of a powerful girl named Eleven and her brave friends.”

(Via Deadline, The Hollywood Reporter)

Go ahead and file Too Short’s Tiny Desk Concert as one of the most unexpected entries in NPR’s series, but the Oakland rapper totally owns it. Literally sitting on a makeshift desk made to look like an 808 drum machine and backed by a full band, he delivered a slew of classics new and old in a unique fashion.

The set opened with “The Ghetto” featuring backing R&B singer Maurice Smith humming the chorus. “Yo waddup? It’s ya boy Too Short in the house,” he said introducing the details of the set. “Yeah, we doin’ it like this: We’re gonna run through some Too Short classics. Basically, I’mma play you a Too Short song from the past five decades. The ’80s, the ’90s, the 2000s, the 2010s, and the 2020s. How many artist you know that got relevant records in five decades? That’s what I’m talkin’ about. Classic man, legendary, Too Short. Representin’ East Oakland, California. Biiiiitch, yea!”

That’s exactly what he and the band did, playing a jazzy R&B version of “Gettin It,” with a saxophone bellowing and silky keys guiding the track. Then a string-section sample paints the canvas for an expansive rock and roll version of “Blow The Whistle” that culminates with a guitar solo. The instrumental hook of “Big Subwoofer,” by the Mount Westmore rap supergroup of Too Short, E-40, Snoop Dogg, and Ice Cube, brought things to a close as Short said, “The new thang is Mount Westmore….We been doing this sh*t since the ’80s and we ain’t gonna stop any time soon! Short dawg in the house! Biiiiitch!”

Too Short has indeed been a prolific force in West Coast rap since the 80s and this performance flashes unprecedented range. Give the man his flowers. He’s earned them.

Watch Too Short’s NPR Tiny Desk Concert above.

Lizzo is on the lookout for new dancers to join her tour and what better way to find them than a reality TV competition? That’s the premise of Watch Out For The Big Grrrls, coming to Amazon Prime Video on March 25. In the show, Lizzo recruits 10 women for a dance boot camp at the Big Grrrls House, as they compete for a spot on Lizzo’s tour team.

Throughout her career, Lizzo has been very vocal and earnest about her experiences maneuvering in the entertainment industry as a plus-sized woman, and she makes it clear in the trailer above that she wants to use her power as a superstar to extend more opportunities to women like herself. “Girls that look like me don’t get representation,” she says. “It’s time to pull up my sleeves and find them myself.”

Despite her struggles, Lizzo has been extremely body-positive through the years, and very successful whether you believe it’s because or despite her appearance. She’s unafraid to strip down to promote her music and even enthusiastically reached out to Cardi B for a potential Playboy pictorial. Meanwhile, her music has appeared in countless avenues, from television and film to the Grammys to Barack Obama’s list of favorite songs. It seems almost certain that her show will have the same impact.

Watch the trailer for Lizzo’s Amazon series, Watch Out For The Big Grrrls above.

It’s only guest host Lauren Wright‘s second day on The View, and already, the panel is basically comparing her to Meghan McCain. On Thursday morning’s episode, Wright, who’s a guest lecturer on Princeton and a conservative commentator, battled with the co-hosts over masks and claimed they didn’t work, which did not go over well with Joy Behar.

“Oh god, if I hear that again,” Behar audibly muttered as Wright went on her rant that, naturally, included barbs at Dr. Fauci and the CDC.

After Wright called mask messaging “inconsistent.” Whoopi Goldberg entered the fray, and while she didn’t use McCain’s name, it was pretty clear who she was talking about. Via Primetimer:

“We had somebody here who used to get very upset with people who said you should be wearing a different kind of mask, or you shouldn’t be wearing a mask. They didn’t know! So I can give them that.”

After Wright advocated for eliminating federal mandates — “We can be smart, capable adults about this,” she said — she did exactly what Whoopi just cautioned her not to do. “This whole thing started, by the way, with Dr. Fauci saying, ‘Masks don’t really work, we don’t really need them,” said Wright, as the entire table protested.

If Wright was hoping her arguments would earn her attention, it worked. Her anti-mask rant quickly started trending on Twitter where people absolutely loved Behar shutting her down and giving her side-eye the whole time. Whoops.

You can see some of the reactions below:

(Via The View on Twitter)

One of the surest ways to get sweet, sweet engagement on social media is to post a map of the United States with the most popular [insert literally anything here] for each state.

Whether it’s favorite candies, Thanksgiving sides, most searched celebrities, or most sold items, people love to yell about how the maps, which are almost always based on some questionable metrics, are wrong and laugh at the ridiculous preferences of certain states. On Thursday, the NBA world got their version of this when Lids released maps of its top selling jerseys, both by player and team. The player selections weren’t terribly surprising, with a lot of LeBron James across the country and stars dominating their own home markets, but there were a few bizarre choices.

Vince Carter’s popularity in West Virginia and Maine is odd, as is Steve Smith in Idaho, but the strangest one has to be Mike Bibby leading the way in jersey sales for the state of Alabama. The former Kings and Hawks guard has not played has not played since 2011, which means for some reason the people of Alabama are clamoring for a decade-old jersey of a solid starting guard, but one who was never an All-Star. Given this is just sales at Lids, there’s a very good chance this was a few people buying Bibby jerseys at an Alabama mall swinging this number, as I can’t imagine it’s a hotbed of NBA jersey sales overall. It’s funnier to imagine there is just a rabid Mike Bibby fan base in Tuscaloosa that just can’t get enough of Bibby merch, though.

The star-studded cast of Showtime’s upcoming The First Lady was revealed in the trailer for the historical drama, which debuts on April 17th.

Featuring Oscar winner Viola Davis as Michelle Obama, Michelle Pfeiffer as Betty Ford and Gillian Anderson as Eleanor Roosevelt, the show is a retelling of America’s most impactful political moments, though the eyes of the first ladies themselves. Weaving together past and present, the show promises to tell some monumental stories, with some political drama thrown in for good measure, because that’s what makes good TV.

According to the official synopsis, “The series will peel back the curtain on the personal and political lives of three unique, enigmatic women and their families, tracing their journeys to Washington, dipping into their pasts and following them beyond the White House into their greatest moments. Through interweaving storylines so intimate it’s as if the White House walls are talking, season one focuses on the enlightening lives of Michelle Obama, Betty Ford and Eleanor Roosevelt.”

In addition to the A-list ladies, the cast also includes Jack Bauer himself, Kiefer Sutherland, as President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who will no doubt get into it with former Detective Dana Scully Gillian Anderson, who plays his wife. Also starring is Dakota Fanning, Aaron Eckhart, Regina Taylor, O-T Fagbenle, Judy Greer, Ellen Burstyn, among others.

Check out the trailer above.

There have been quiet mumblings of toxic drama on the set of HBO’s hit teen drama Euphoria, which is only in its second season. Lately, the mumblings have gotten louder, as cast and crew begin to discuss what’s been happening behind the scenes, and it seems that the high school drama of it all might be impacting the show’s production.

According to a new report from The Daily Beast, many of the show’s cast are feeling confused about where the season is headed, with certain characters blending into the background, while others have had questionable storylines. There have been rumors of on-set beef between creator Sam Levinson and Barbie Ferreira, who plays Kat, a central character in the first season. In season two, Ferreira’s character doesn’t get much screen time. Rumor has it the lack of character development was due to a rift between Levinson and Ferreira, which caused the actress to storm off set more than once.

If there is on-set drama, the cast is doing a pretty good job of handling it in interviews. Ferreira herself hasn’t spoken out, though she did reference her character’s internal turmoil in a recent interview with The Cut.

“Kat’s journey this season is a little more internal and a little mysterious to the audience. She is secretly going through a lot of existential crises,” Ferreira said, discretely shifting the focus from any on-set drama. “She loses her marbles a little bit — just like everyone else in this season. The theme is everyone’s gone a little crazy.”

Ferreira was famously absent from the show’s season 2 premiere.

In addition to the lack of Kat this season, it’s also been reported that long set days and lack of preparation have left many of the show’s stars feeling drained. Sources told The Daily Beast that the crew worked long workdays that could stretch anywhere from 15 to 17 hours, while Levinson came to set frequently unprepared.

In another interview with Thrillist, star Jacob Elordi said filming certain scenes were draining, specifically the New Year’s Eve party scene. “We shot that party for over a week, so very quickly it’s like being in Hell,” Elordi said. “It’s like being in a party that you don’t want to be in. At all. And you can’t wait [to leave].”

Hopefully the crew can hold it together for a third season, which has already been ordered by HBO.

The RX is Uproxx Music’s stamp of approval for the best albums, songs, and music stories throughout the year. Inclusion in this category is the highest distinction we can bestow and signals the most important music being released throughout the year. The RX is the music you need, right now.

Teenage rebellion has long been considered part and parcel of the hip-hop package and perhaps no modern rapper exemplifies this like $NOT. Emerging from Florida’s SoundCloud rap scene in 2018 with the pulverizing “Gosha,” the 24-year-old rapper could have been described as “teenage rebellion” personified. But what happens when teenage rebels grow up? $NOT shows glimpses on his new album, Ethereal, but he isn’t quite ready to leave his punk-rap roots completely behind.

Born in New York, but raised in West Palm Beach, Florida, $NOT bears every hallmark of the scene’s flourishing heyday. Like many other members of the Florida rap community, many of his more popular songs feature tortured, distorted bass, screaming, thrash-inspired vocals. He even has a signature look: A light hoodie pulled tight around his face that he’s rarely seen without – much like Ski Mask The Slump God’s durag or the mask of MF DOOM.

But he’s also always been something of an outsider to that culture as well. While he’s been largely defined by the accouterments of the scream-rap style, he’s also shown a more tender side. For instance, on “Revenge” from his debut album Beautiful Havoc, he dabbles in more melodic production, with mellow acoustic guitars and a singsong vocal delivery. And on Ethereal, he pursues these instincts much more enthusiastically, on introspective cuts like “Blue Moon” and “5AM,” which he calls his favorite song from the album on a Zoom call with Uproxx ahead of its release.

“I’m just like, ‘Yo, let me use my sound but let me add a little spice to it,’” he says of the departure. “It’s just one of those songs that hit different when it’s slow, but it’s still crazy when it’s fast, when it’s normal. When I recorded it, I didn’t have a thought process or anything. I just did what I wanted to do on it.” He does confess that the sharp left turn could alienate some of his day-one fans, but he also accepts that as part of the bargain when it comes to expanding his sound and doing what he wants.

“I don’t know if the fans will receive it well,” he admits. “That’s how it always is. Those are really experimental to me. ‘5 AM,’ that’s really experimental to my sound. It’s still true to my sound, but it’s like… it’s in my world but it’s in a different universe.” $NOT accepts that the perception of him as an artist doesn’t necessarily jive with the musical output he’s released so far. Part of that is down to the viral videos of his raucous performances, which he uses to grow his legend by reworking even his more mellow material to suit the live format.

“Even my name sounds crazy – like me in a mosh pit, it fits the name and everything,” he says. “But if you listen to the music, it’s very calm like chill. That’s how I am. But when I perform, I try to rage with those songs too. It’s kind of crazy, I’ll be trying to get the crowd to open a mosh pit for the saddest song.” That reputation for turning up has made him one of the more exciting talents, but he’s learning that his recklessness can have as many negative effects as positive ones.

Case in point, lead single “Doja” featuring ASAP Rocky. The song is a classic slice of that anti-establishment formula, fitting right into the skate-punk rap aesthetic that Rocky and ASAP Mob cultivated in the early 2010s. $NOT admits that the song’s title is a double entendre, and could refer to either the rapper Doja Cat or the slang term for weed, but in his verse, he mentions her by name. “I’ll f*ck a b*tch named Doja Cat,” he gibes, gloating in that exaggerated way common to hip-hop. However, a mistranslation on lyrics sites brought the song to the attention of the actual Doja Cat, who shot back, “You f*cked who?” on Twitter. After she deleted the reply, $NOT himself clarified that the lyric was misconstrued but by then, the damage had been done – or the song’s attention-grabbing purpose was served, depending on how you look at it.

“When all that shit was happening, I didn’t care,” he admits. “I was like, ‘Whatever. If this is going to bring more shit to the song, go ahead. It’s working.’ Some people thought it was a diss track towards Doja, but I’m like, ‘I got no animosity towards Doja.’ She looks good and I didn’t really think much about it, and plus, I needed some shit to rhyme with. So I’m saying ‘scat, pack, Doja Cat.’ It ain’t nothing too deep about it. They just think I’m trying to degrade women and all that, but I don’t know, it’s rap. I’m just being real grimy.”

Ironically, for such a reckless rapper, one who admittedly doesn’t put much thought into lyrics or even his album’s title (“I thought it was a cool word,” he explains. “It was a tattoo on a girl’s neck”), he’s already got his retirement plan figured out. When asked what he wants to have accomplished by next year, he says, “I’ll be like, ‘Yo, I own a gas station, bro. Come get this gas, it’s the cheapest gas out here, $1 a gallon.’” It’s hard to tell if he’s joking. The music on Ethereal is the same way; it could be deadly serious or totally frivolous, but it’s always captivating.

Ethereal is out now via 300 Entertainment. You can stream it here.

SNOT is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.