Month: April 2022

If you’re anything like me, you probably figured Marvel hit the undeniable point of diminishing returns for trying to turn obscure comic book properties into massive franchises right around the time Eternals was released. Yet that movie, which (lest we forget) featured superheroes having slow missionary sex on the beach as well as a suicide-by-the-Sun, was produced entirely by Marvel/Disney.

The real heads out there know that there’s a whole separate class of Marvel movies produced by Sony, who, through a curious arrangement of corporate IP, kind of have to keep making these in order to retain the rights, whether they want to or not. As we learned from Venom, this can be kind of fun (and less than two hours long, praise the lord). On the other hand, Sony was probably due for an Eternals-style disaster of their own, and by most accounts, Morbius seems to be it.

In what I’m sure they once envisioned as their answer to Joaquin Phoenix in a dark-and-gritty Joker movie, they hired Oscar-winning actor Jared Leto (still feels weird to type that, doesn’t it?) to play Morbius, a Spider-man antagonist and “living vampire” first introduced in 1971.

Considering Jared Leto is my favorite sexy buffoon not named Tyrese Gibson (who, by the way, is also in Morbius, and was recently fooled by a fake rave attributed to Martin Scorsese), all of this sounded pretty good to me. What could go wrong?

If you read the reviews, a lot. Beginning with trailers that seem to advertise a completely different movie and post-credit “teasers” for movies that have already come out. There’s something so right about a movie that goes so wrong, isn’t there? Isn’t it so much more interesting when the algorithm breaks down than when it functions as expected?

That doesn’t always mean you want to watch these kinds of movies, but luckily I have a feature designed specifically for just such instances. In Plot Recreated With Reviews, I attempt to piece together the entire plot of a film, from start to finish, using only expository quotes (no analysis! …okay, maybe a smidge) from reviews of that film. It’s predicated on the idea that for some films, hearing them described is more entertaining than sitting through them.

Now then, let’s get to Morbius, starring Jared Leto as a living vampire.
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THE OPENING FRAME

Michael Morbius is a genius doctor who has assembled a team of unnamed characters to travel, by helicopter, to Costa Rica’s Cerro de la Muerte, which translates into English as “The Mountain of Death.” (Vox)

An emaciated Dr. Michael Morbius (Jared Leto), barely able to walk, disembarks from a helicopter to approach the opening of a large cavern that is home to a colony of vampire bats. (ReelReviews)

As a roar of batwings echoes from inside the cave, he murmurs to the copter pilot “if you’re gonna run, do it now.” (NPR)

Morbius, a darkly romantic vision with a curtain of jet-black hair, billowing clothes and hired guns, (New York Times)

is trying to capture a bunch of vampire bats to take home with him to New York City. He slices his palm open, blood drips down, and thousands of bats come shooting out of the cave trying to lick his pale little hand. (Vox)

After his bat procurement trip, Morbius’s fellow doctor and potential love interest Martine Bancroft (Adria Arjona) wants to know why he’s shunned the King of Sweden and the Nobel Prize, and why and how he managed to install a large glass pillar full of bats in the middle of their office. (Vox)

THE DISEASE

With exposition, flashbacks, and monologue masquerading as a conversation, Morbius explains to her that he has (Vox)

a rare disease that prevents his body from creating new blood (Vulture)

(something she presumably knows since she has been working with him for a very long time). (Vox)

This incurable illness’ name and exact symptoms are not really explained; all that really matters is that it makes the perpetually weak and sickly Michael Morbius and his good friend Milo (or Lucien; he seems to have two names for some reason) need constant transfusions. (ScreenCrush)

We’re treated to a flashback from Michael’s childhood at a sanitarium (Reel Reviews)

set 25 years ago in Greece, (Vulture)

(Why Greece? I have no idea.) (New York Times)

showing him as a lonely 10-year-old patient at a private hospital, meeting fellow child patient Lucien, whom he dubs Milo, a name Michael apparently gives to every kid who comes through the hospital and dies. (Vulture)

ARTIFICIAL BLOOD

After a leisurely flashback to his sad childhood, Morbius is back in his New York lab, (New York Times)

where Michael has relocated as an adult. During his life, in an attempt to find a cure for the rare blood disease that afflicts him and Milo, he has invented a form of artificial blood (ReelReviews)

(it’s blue, not red). (Boston Globe)

which he explains by spending an extremely inappropriate length of time repeating the word “coagulants.” (Vox)

Morbius comes to rely on drinking blood, and he sucks down his packs of blue goo like a kid crushing a juice box after soccer practice. Soon the synthetic stuff just isn’t doing it anymore, and he needs real blood to quench his increasing thirst. (Detroit News)

THE CARGO SHIP?

With the insinuation that human-bat DNA splicing is illegal in the US, Morbius explains to Milo and Bancroft, separately, that the experiment must be done in secrecy and in international waters (Vox)

— literally, a title card onscreen reads “INTERNATIONAL WATERS” — (ScreenCrush)

the international waters in question end up being a Panamanian cargo ship 12 miles off the coast of Long Island (Vox)

THE SERUM

In the bowels of the Panamanian cargo vessel, (Vox)

he injects himself with bat serum and develops a swooshy Fields of the Nephilim cloak, a man bun and the ability to see sound. (TheGuardian)

The bat juice cures Morbius’s illness and somehow also gives him muscles and a tan. (Vox)

After a hit of serum, he goes from needing crutches to swinging midair on pipes like an Olympic athlete. “I don’t know what I’m capable of,” he says. (AP)

He becomes inhumanly fast and strong, and can even fly through the air on wind currents. (ScreenCrush)

For a fleeting moment, Morbius looks like a sexy Jesus. (Vox)

He’s also good at origami. (Boston Globe)

SIDE EFFECTS

Less salutary effects include new fangs that sprout from his gums with decades of decay baked in, and claws that erupt from his fingers pre-filthed. (NPR)

If Morbius consumes blood, he can maintain his hot and sexy human form and possess superhuman strength and speed. Morbius also says the bat-juice has given him echolocation, which is depicted as being able to hear conversations from miles away. If he doesn’t consume blood, he turns into the uncontrollable, screeching creature, and becomes a danger to everyone around him. (Vox)

In this form, he murders and exsanguinates his hired mercenaries on the rented Panamanian cargo ship. (Vox)

Morbius is chained to a desk in a police department’s interview room and says: “I’m starting to get hungry and you don’t want to see me when I’m hungry.” (AP)

THE RUB

Morbius’s gimmick is that Morbius is now essentially a vampire, but without any tether to existing mythology. (Vox)

Here, lights are actually turned on and sometimes the sun even shines, if only to explain that Morbius isn’t your granny’s Dracula. (New York Times)

He’s not bothered by daylight or garlic, nor does he have aversions to Catholic iconography. But he is biologically bound to blood-drinking. (Vox)

MILO/LUCIEN GETS THE SERUM

Michael is horrified by the implications but Milo, who steals a vial of the serum and injects himself, doesn’t share his friend’s compunctions. (ReelReviews)

Milo isn’t perturbed by his transformation. He’s delighted. (Vulture)

Matt Smith morphs into a Wall Street rogue trader, made entirely of pinstripes and evil. (Guardian)

Milo doesn’t want to die. Milo also wants to be hot. Milo, furthermore, wants to drink tequila and live deliciously. Milo is honestly a lot more fun, if rooted in impulsiveness, which results in the murders of finance bros and cops. (Vox)

At least Smith seems to be amusing himself, (Thrillist)

embracing his villainy and delivering many a florid monologue about how great it is to suck people’s blood out of their neck, (TheAtlantic)

dancing around while Leto takes his work Very Seriously. (Thrillist)

This, and their mutual need to chug pints of blood, rather strains their friendship. (TheGuardian)

Milo’s rising body count puts the city on alert for a “vampire murderer” which seems hilariously redundant, but nonetheless puts Morbius in the uncomfortable position of asserting his innocence and dispatching his fanged friend. (Vox)

MARTINE BANCROFT

The two become rivals and, as Michael hunts down Milo with the goal of stopping him, Michael’s girlfriend, Martine Bancroft (Adria Arjona), continues to work diligently in the lab. (ReelReviews)

Adria Arjona gets the thankless role of right-hand-woman/love interest Dr Martine Bancroft, whose main skills seem to be ponytails and pouting (TheGuardian)

a throwback to the era – not really longer ago than yesterday – when love interests were often guarantees of the hero’s heterosexuality and little more. (TheAge)

JARED LETO’S ACTING

His dramatic physicality — his body fluctuates between the skeletal and the pumping-iron robust — read as more vainglorious than strictly necessary, (New York Times)

often left here looking like the snarling lead singer of a death metal band. (AP)

Those sad, intense eyes, that gaunt visage, and that slightly aloof presence… (Vulture)

…does his best to sell the monster within through lots of anguished screaming. (TheAtlantic)

There’s no accent, no ticks, nothing loud that announces he’s performing here. There are a handful of scenes between him and Adria Arjona, who plays his assistant and fiancée, Martine Bancroft, that could pass as an episode of network TV. It’s Leto as Leto, and he just happens to be a bloodthirsty vampire. (It’s funny that this is the role where he comes off as somewhat normal.) (Detroit News)

THE ACTION

From the moment Morbius begins the pacing seems off. It bounces around in time, and moves through exposition without grounding it in any sort of real place or emotion. (Thrillist)

the dour color palette, phrases like “bat radar” said with no hint of irony, (Thrillist)

jiggly camerawork and a buffet of previous films — “The Matrix,” “American Psycho,” “The Usual Suspects” and “An American Werewolf in London.” Typical Marvel violence is unleashed, including so much muscle that our hero smashes though New York City concrete streets to the subway system below. (AP)

The special effects team work overtime to give Leto, unfortunately wearing a messy manbun throughout the film, a sort of bat-ness — his pupils cloud and his ear hairs vibrate like he’s using sonar. His skin will suddenly stretch over bone and he snarls a lot, too. For some reason, whenever he leaps, he is enveloped by a viscous cloud. He can also slo-mo and duck bullets and the action sequences build to moments when everything is suddenly stylistically still and quiet, like inside a hurricane’s eye. (AP)

MARVEL TIE-INS

The references to the Marvel Cinematic Universe are dropped in two nonsensical credits sequences, where Michael Keaton, reprising his role from Spider-Man: Homecoming, shows up in an apparent tease of Spider-Man: No Way Home, a movie which has already come out. (Thrillist)

[The trailers] implied that Michael Keaton’s “Spider-Man: Homecoming” character Adrian Toomes was going to be a major presence throughout the film when in actuality he only pops up in a totally unrelated post-credits sequence. (Fox10)

In those trailers, Tyrese Gibson’s character, an FBI agent named Simon Stroud, has a big robotic arm. In the film, he’s just an ordinary guy, and he only pops up occasionally to examine Morbius’ crime scenes. He also has a line in the trailer about how Morbius “has been missing for two months” something that never happens in the finished movie, which appears to take place over the course of a couple days. (ScreenCrush)

In the actual film, Morbius still says “I… am… Venom!” but that’s it; the punchline is completely missing. Why would he call himself Venom? What is the point? What is the point of any of this? (ScreenCrush)

THE DENOUEMENT

At its core, “Morbius” is a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde ripoff about a good doctor who heals himself thorough illegal experiments that turn him into a monster with pointy teeth. (ABCNews)

As with Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise in “Interview with the Vampire,” there’s an undercurrent of romantic longing to the brotherly bond between Milo and Morbius. And it feels like a better version of “Morbius” would’ve put their complicated dynamic even more front and center. Alas, “Morbius” is too bound to comic book movie convention to become the overt gay vampire superhero melodrama it probably should have been. Instead, Adria Arjona is there because Morbius needs a (female) love interest. (Fox10)

Adria Arjona doesn’t have much more to do than look concerned. She’s not especially good at it (BostonGlobe)

It follows a familiar trajectory that shows the hero and villain gaining their powers, baiting one another, then eventually fighting to the death. (ReelReviews)

Morbius must defeat his childhood best friend and share an erotically violent kiss with his doctor lover in rapid succession to wrap this entire thing up. (Vox)

The five minutes or so in which this all happens borders on psychotic; (Vox)

a nosedive of a final act, during which any sense of climactic action is masked completely by incessant swarms of bats, poorly rendered breaking glass and blurry, crumbling buildings. (Empire)

I found myself hollering an obscene and inhuman hoot — a gurgling death rattle from the last vestiges of my sanity. (Vox)

In the end, we may not feel we need to know much more about Michael Morbius than this movie has already told us, even though a stinger alerts us that we’re due to see more of him in the future. This is a movie that feels like one big windup for something else, even if we walk out feeling we’ve already seen plenty. (Time)

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There you have it, folks! I know the theme of this post is that the adage “show don’t tell” doesn’t always apply, but now I feel like I might have to see this one. Or at the very least, see the featurette of Jared Leto and Tyrese Gibson hanging out on the set.

Vince Mancini is on Twitter. You can access his archive of reviews here.

We apparently live in a golden age of game show blunders. Recently there’s been a spate of cartoonishly wrong Wheel of Fortune answers. Now the trend is infecting other shows. On a recent episode of the U.S. reboot of The Weakest Link — which swaps out original terrifying host Anne Robinson for the comparatively warmer Jane Lynch — one contestant was asked to show off his knowledge of legendary filmmaker Martin Scorsese. Not only was his expertise lacking, but his answer was powerfully, inventively wrong.

The viral clip shows a man named Sean being asked by Lynch a simple question: Of the nine Oscar nominations the Marvel villain has earned for directing over his long career, which film did he wind up winning for? The answer is one of Scorsese’s most popular films, 2006’s star-studded gangster epic The Departed, which grossed a pretty penny back in the day and has been a home video/streaming favorite ever since.

Sean did not know that. “I’m horrible with films,” Sean admitted while visibly wracking his brain. He admitted he would “have to guess.” And so his mind landed on…8 Mile. The 2002 biopic about Eminem, starring Eminem as himself.

Sadly, the director of Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, The Last Temptation of Christ, and the lengthy video for Michael Jackson’s “Bad” has never once directed the onetime Slim Shady. Those duties went to another Oscar-nominated director, the late Curtis Hanson, the versatile filmmaker of L.A. Confidential who directed 8 Mile in between the comedic dramas Wonder Boys and In Her Shoes. So it’s not too far-off.

There is one other connection between the two: At the 2020 Oscars, when Scorsese’s The Irishman was up for a pile of awards, the great director was forced to listen to “Lose Yourself,” the song that won 8 Mile’s lone Academy Award. And he did not exactly seem to be enjoying it.

(Via The Independent)

What else does the world need right now, other than not one, but two spinoff shows from a decade-old franchise? It seems to be the trend at the moment. This time, it’s Robert Downey Jr.’s Sherlock Holmes that is getting the TV show treatment.

Sherlock Holmes hit theaters in 2009, just a year after Downey Jr. starred in the first film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Downey Jr. played the titular character, while Holmes’ sidekick Watson was portrayed by Jude Law. The second film was released in 2011, and a third was set for 2021, though that has obviously been delayed.

According to Variety, HBO Max and the Downey family are currently developing two series for the network which will focus on new characters that are set to be introduced in Sherlock Holmes 3. A series has been in the works ever since the massive success of Downey Jr.’s Marvel movies, which allegedly taught him about the expansive idea of “world-building.” In 2020, the Downey family expressed interest in the idea of a whole Sherlock Holmes universe, which is definitely helped by the fact that there is a massive amount of source material from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

“We think there’s an opportunity to build it out more,” Susan Downey said in 2020. “Spin-off characters from a third movie, to see what’s going on in the television landscape, to see what Warner Media is starting to build out, things with HBO and HBO Max.”

It should be noted that these characters are unrelated to the Enola Holmes Netflix franchise, though seeing Millie Bobby Brown and Robert Downey Jr. trying to out-wit each other would be quite entertaining. Also not to be confused with Will Ferrell’s 2018 forgotten film, Holmes And Watson.

With Morbius now out in theaters and, uh, not exactly wowing critics (Or Martin Scorsese. Sorry, Tyrese.), director Daniel Espinosa has been an open book about the process behind bringing the film to life after it experienced a record-breaking amount of delays due to the pandemic. What’s become abundantly clear in these post-release interviews is that Espinosa is clearly a huge fan of Michael Morbius The Living Vampire, particularly the Marvel Comics character’s hey-day in the ’70s. It’s that love of the character that made him deliberate over how Morbius should look in his first film, and that includes getting Jared Leto‘s hair just right even though the actor basically looks like his usual rock star self.

“I think that he should be like the long hair, Tony Stark-y kind of person,” Espinosa told The Wrap before steering the conversation towards the debate on whether or not to use prosthetics or CGI to create Morbius’ vampire appearance, which involved some advice from Ryan Reynolds:

Yeah, but first we went to this idea that it would be prosthetics. Because I know Ryan Reynolds, we had done two movies before, so I called him because I knew that he was a big prosthetics guy, that he really liked what he did on “Deadpool.” And who doesn’t love “Deadpool”?

And so we started with prosthetics, but the hard thing with Morbius is that his look is that his nose goes back. There were like parts of the look of it that has to do with negative space, that you can’t really do that with prosthetics. Then we had to consider if we’re going to do the head extra-large.

Ultimately, Espinosa was talked into going the CGI route by his VFX supervisor, who worked on Thanos’ face for The Avengers movies and said that he could deliver something even better because the tech had already improved so much. To Espinosa’s surprise, Sony ponied up the extra cash, and Morbius‘ got his photorealistic “pig nose” that fans of the comic will easily recognize.

(Via The Wrap)

Johnny Depp’s delayed defamation trial against ex-wife Amber Heard will begin on April 11, and it will be televised. That’s a lot already, so let’s back up a bit.

This U.S.-based trial is entirely separate from Depp’s 2020 U.K.-based libel trial against The Sun, which did not end well for Depp. That court shut down Depp’s claim and (devastatingly) ruled that the tabloid’s “wife beater” claim about him was “substantially true.” Not to be deterred from his lack of desired “vindication,” Depp forged ahead with his U.S. civil trial, in which he’s sued Amber for $50 million.

Depp alleges that Heard defamed him while penning a Washington Post op-ed (in which Depp is not named) about her history as a domestic abuse survivor. After a few years of pandemic-and-schedule-related setbacks, this trial’s about to happen in Fairfax County, Virginia, and Court TV will air the proceedings. Via Deadline:

The network will be the pool feed provider for the trial, and plans to provide coverage of the proceedings.

Ethan Nelson, Acting Head of Court TV, said in a statement, “Court cases that are as high-profile as this one often create a lot of noise, and it can be difficult for viewers to break through these distractions to have a clear picture of the facts, but that’s where we come in.”

Both TMZ and Deadline have both reported word on the apparent (virtual) witness lists for the trial. It seems, well, wild, but Heard is apparently calling Elon Musk and James Franco to testify on her behalf while Depp is calling upon Paul Bettany’s testimony.

Hmm. Musk previously seemed to challenge Depp to a “cage fight” while denying allegations that Musk had an affair with Heard while she was married to Depp. In other words (and if Elon is really going to testify), this trial could be a real (televised) circus.

(Via TMZ & Deadline)

Representative Matt Gaetz who, last time we checked, was still under investigation on sex trafficking charges, peacocked his way through yet another congressional hearing this week.

This time, the Republican from Florida used his time in front of the cameras to grill a retired four-star Army general on a proposed defense budget. U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin appeared before Congress to lay out the Defense Department’s 2023 fiscal plan but, instead of quizzing the man on how the money might be spent, Gaetz used his time at the mic to berate our military for not doing enough to stop Russia from invading Ukraine and for its newfound “woke-ism.”

“While everyone else in the world seems to be developing capabilities and being more strategic, we got time to embrace critical race theory at West Point, to embrace socialism at the National Defense University, to do mandatory pronoun training,” Gaetz complained while failing to specify exactly how countries like China and North Korea were outpacing the U.S. in terms of weapons capabilities. When pressed, Gaetz maintained that Austin and the Defense Department had “blown many calls,” chief among them, the situation in Ukraine.

“Mr. Secretary, you guys told us that Russia couldn’t lose,” Gaetz continued. “And so I guess I’m wondering what in the $773 billion that you’re requesting today is going to help you make assessments that are accurate in the face of so many blown calls.”

That’s when Austin, who gamely sat for a large portion of his idiotic tirade, let loose on Gaetz.

“I’m sorry you are embarrassed by your country,” the retired general replied.

Gaetz became so angry at Austin’s accusation he stumbled over his words a bit, finally spewing out a rant about how the U.S. Defense Department had predicted Russia would overtake Ukraine in just 36 days. “You totally blew those calls and maybe we would be better at them if the National Defense University actually worked a little more on strategy and a little less on woke-ism,” Gaetz said.

And because this whole inquisition was a PR move on Gaetz’s part to appeal to his anti-woke base, Austin ended the argument by pointing out just how irrational the Florida congressman was being.

“Has it not occurred to you that Russia has not overrun Ukraine because of what we’ve done and our allies have done?” Austin asked. “Have you ever even thought of that?”

(Via The Recount & The Independent)

Late last month, educators and school district officials in Minneapolis, Minnesota came to a tentative agreement that ended a three-week-long teachers’ strike. The agreement put an end to a standoff that closed classrooms for around 30,000 public school students.

The strike was the first for Minneapolis Public Schools in 52 years. In April 1970, teachers left the classrooms and grabbed picket signs for a historic 20-day standoff. At the time, the teachers took a huge risk because public employees were banned from striking.

“The moment they picked up a placard and set foot on the pavement to join a demonstration, they had violated state law,” Dr. William Green, an Augsburg University history professor, told WCCO.

Although the teachers eventually returned to work without a pay raise, the strike prompted the state to give public workers the right to bargain collectively.

As part of its coverage of the 2022 strike, Minneapolis CBS affiliate WCCO hunted down some archival footage of the 1970 demonstrations to show the common themes between both movements. WCCO Production Manager Matt Liddy dug up 13 minutes of restored footage from the original strike in the station vault to use in his new report.

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The footage included a reporter interviewing schoolchildren as teachers picketed near a school. Liddy was shocked when he noticed that one of the children being interviewed looked a lot like Minneapolis and worldwide music icon Prince. In 1970, the artist was known as Prince Nelson.

“I immediately just went out to the newsroom and started showing people and saying, ‘I’m not gonna tell you who I think this is, but who do you think this is?’ And every single person [said] ‘Prince,’” Liddy said.

The newsroom didn’t have the correct equipment to hear the recording, so it found a specialist to extract the audio of the interview.

“I think they should get a better education too cause, um, and I think they should get some more money cause they work, they be working extra hours for us and all that stuff,” the child suspected to be Prince said.

It’s pretty clear why Liddy thought the child in the footage was Prince. The kid physically resembles Prince and his smile is definitely reminiscent of the “Raspberry Beret” singer.

Unfortunately, the child doesn’t say his name to the interviewer. But one of his friends in the video enthusiastically announces that he is “Ronnie Kitchen.” The news crew attempted to find Kitchen but their contact information turned up dead ends.

WCCO then reached out to Kristen Zschomler, a Twin Cities historian who is also a big fan of Prince. She had collected a large, 100-page document following Prince’s rise from Minneapolis to worldwide fame that included pictures of him as a kid.

“I think that’s him, definitely. Oh my gosh. Yeah, I think that’s definitely Prince,” she said.

Zschomler connected them with Terrance Jackson, a boyhood friend of Prince’s who played in his first band, Grand Central. When shown the video, Jackson immediately noticed Kitchen and Prince.

“Oh my God, that’s Kitchen,” Jackson exclaimed as the video began. “That is Prince! Standing right there with the hat on, right? That’s Skipper! Oh my God!”

Prince’s friends called him Skipper when he was a kid.

Liddy’s find is an incredible discovery for Prince fans and people who grew up in Minneapolis. It shows that even before Prince was a teenager he had a twinkle in his eye that would become a trademark of his larger-than-life personality. Nobody knows where incredible charisma comes from, but after seeing this footage, maybe Prince was just born with it.

The Weeknd is one of the most decorated artists both in recent years and over the course of the modern music industry more broadly. That’s true pretty much regardless of whatever measure you use, but right now, let’s look at certifications from the RIAA (Recording Industry Association Of America). There’s actually some news on that front today, as two The Weeknd songs — “Blinding Lights” and “Starboy” — have now achieved Diamond certification, indicating sales of at least 10 million units in the US.

That in itself is a big deal, but what’s even more noteworthy is what this does for The Weeknd’s placement on the all-time ranks: According to the RIAA website, today’s certifications put The Weeknd at three total Diamond singles, which is the second-most ever. (His other Diamond single, by the way, is “The Hills.”)

He’s now behind only Bruno Mars, who has four Diamond singles. The Weeknd is currently tied with Ed Sheeran, Eminem, Imagine Dragons, Katy Perry, and Maroon 5, at three. All those artists are among the few who have multiple Diamond singles: Those with two Diamond singles are Cardi B, Justin Bieber, Lady Gaga, Post Malone, and that’s it.

Meanwhile, The Weeknd got some other RIAA certifications today, too: “I Feel It Coming” is now 6-times Platinum, “Die For You” is 4-times Platinum, “Heartless,” “Party Monster,” and “Reminder” are 3-times Platinum, and as far as albums, Starboy is 4-times Platinum. Overall, The Weeknd now has 30 Gold singles, 30 Platinum singles, and 16 multi-Platinum singles.

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

Today’s hearing in the Megan Thee Stallion shooting case against Tory Lanez turned out to be an eventful one. Tory was handcuffed and taken into custody for violating the court’s protective order against him (again) and ordered to pay $350,000 in bail. While that event was the one that rightly got the lion’s share of the attention, another detail emerged thanks to Rolling Stone‘s Nancy Dillon that undermined a key — if unofficial — part of Tory’s defense.

In February, Megan Thee Stallion lit into social media personality DJ Akademiks, who “reported” that “Tory Lanez DNA WAS NOT found on the weapon in the Meg Thee Stallion case.” Megan accused Akademiks of being a stooge for Tory Lanez — an accusation supported by the fact that Akademiks tweeted the tidbit before the hearing had even begun. While he deleted the tweet, he also maintained that he’d obtained the information from court documents, not from Tory or Tory’s lawyer.

Today, Tory’s lawyer corroborated Akademiks’ claim, saying that Tory didn’t provide Akademiks the documents, but complained that if the judge “had seen this document, he presumably would have got it right.” However, some are pointing to the wording of his description of the DNA test, which they say suggests that Tory fudged the results of the test. According to Dillon, Tory’s lawyer, Shawn Holley, “confirmed the swab on the gun came back ‘inconclusive’ with 4 contributors while the magazine swab ‘excluded’ Lanez.”

The obscure wording has fans duking it out via Twitter, with some believing Holley meant that Tory was cleared and others thinking Tory’s DNA was never submitted. In any event, any physical evidence would only suggest that Tory came into contact with the gun or its magazine, not whether or not he fired the gun, which is the claim that will actually be contended on September 14 when the actual trial begins.

Alexander Skarsgard is known for two things: playing a mean guy, and playing a hot guy, and most of the time they are the same guy. But what happens when his character actually translates into real life? This time, the Swedish actor almost hit a child while riding his bike. That child is climate activist Greta Thunberg.

In a new interview with The Times, the actor admitted that he narrowly missed the teenager while he was cycling to the interview in Stockholm. “I nearly ran over Greta Thunberg. She’s how we sell our country now,” he said, adding, “I almost hit her with my bike. Greta is like a modern-day Viking and, like Greta, the Vikings refused to fly.” Some would say that the viral marketing campaign for his new movie The Northman has gone a bit too far.

Thunberg is known for climate activism and was allegedly protesting at the time of the near-hit. Skarsgard is known for his hit TV shows True Blood and Big Little Lies. His latest movie, The Northman (no relation to his True Blood character of the same name) hits theaters later this month. In the film, Skarsgard plays a very shredded Viking who raids Slavic villages. Perhaps accidental violence is his way of method acting.

The Northman also stars Skarsgard’s Big Litte Lies wife Nicole Kidman (though she plays his mom in the film, so it’s fine), Anya Taylor-Joy, Björk, Ralph Ineson, Ethan Hawke, Claes Bang, and Willem Dafoe. The movie hits theaters on April 22nd.