Month: May 2022

Every time a school shooting happens, the idea of arming teachers and school administrators gets floated out by folks who believe the NRA mantra, “the only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.” That notion is so ingrained in parts of the American psyche that a common response to repeated mass shootings of schoolchildren in their classrooms is to add more guns to the equation.

I understand the argument being made. If someone already on the scene was armed and prepared to respond to an active shooter without having to wait for law enforcement, perhaps a maniacal killer could be stopped sooner. And if maniacal killers knew that teachers and administrators were likely to be armed, perhaps they wouldn’t target schools as much. I get the seeming logic of the idea. I really do.

However, there are several fatal flaws with the argument, starting with the fact that the data simply does not back it up.

Armed guards aren’t the help people think they are, so why would armed teachers be?

According to a study published in the journal JAMA Network Open in 2021, there were armed guards present at 23.5% of school shootings from 1980 to 2019. In their analysis, the study authors found that “armed guards were not associated with significant reduction in rates of injuries; in fact, controlling for the aforementioned factors of location and school characteristics, the rate of deaths was 2.83 times greater in schools with an armed guard present.”

In other words, having armed guards standing at the ready doesn’t actually help like people think it does. There was an armed guard who was a former police officer in the Buffalo shooting earlier this month—he was was able to get one shot off and then was killed by the gunman. According to Texas Public Radio, the Uvalde gunman was engaged by law enforcement before entering the school—that didn’t stop him from killing 19 children and two teachers.

And we’re talking about security guards and police officers, whose entire job is to look for and respond to danger. If their “good guy with a gun” presence doesn’t help, why do we think putting guns in the hands of teachers would help?

I’ve been a teacher in a classroom. Teachers are already thinking about and juggling a dozen different things at any given moment. It’s already insane that we expect teachers to drop what they’re doing to run stressful, sometimes traumatizing active shooter drills. The idea of having to switch gears from dividing fractions or analyzing poetry to becoming a trained marksperson when you’re also trying to wrangle a couple of dozen kids in a terrifying and chaotic situation is utter lunacy.

Even trained police officers only have an 18% accuracy rate in high-stress shootout situations. And they are constantly preparing for it. Are we really going to add onto the workload of school personnel by expecting them to be able to take out a gunman that law enforcement often struggles to subdue?

Come on, now. Let’s be reasonable.

u201cI am a teacher. nI’m also a 20 year retired National Guard veteran with two overseas tours. I’ve fired nearly every firearm in the U.S. Army.nI would be the ideal candidate for this “arming teachers” solution. nAnd I’m also the 1st person to tell you it would be a massive mistakeu201d

— Jeremy Kasperson (@Jeremy Kasperson)
1653487851

Guns and classrooms full of immature humans don’t mix.

The Harvard Injury Control Resource Center has found that, across the board, more guns = more gun deaths. Even just having a gun in the house increases a person’s risk of dying by gun homicide, as well as dying by suicide.

Now let’s imagine putting guns in schools and classrooms, strapped onto teachers and administrators. There is no way that makes kids safer. There’s just no way.

I’m 5 feet 5 inches and 130 pounds. One average high schooler could overpower me in five seconds. Against two kids, I wouldn’t stand a chance. How many incidents of kids taking guns from teachers would we see if teachers were carrying? How many incidents of teachers shooting their own students to prevent them from taking their gun would we see? How many more kids would be traumatized by witnessing such scenarios?

What if a teacher loses it in an altercation with a student? What if an armed adult accidentally shoots inside a school (it’s happened, in California and Virginia). What if a teacher takes off their gun to go to the bathroom and forgets about it? (That’s also happened in Pennsylvania and Florida—at Marjory Stoneman Douglas high school, of all places.)

And the idea of armed teachers being a deterrent? How many active shooters, who are often on a suicide mission anyway, would be deterred by the possibility of school personnel being armed? If 23.5% weren’t deterred by armed security guards, why would they be daunted by an armed teacher?

And we haven’t even gotten into what happens when law enforcement arrives and gets confused about who the good guys with guns are and who the bad guys with guns are.

Schools shouldn’t have to be turned into fortresses in a civilized nation.

If we really want to claim “greatness” as a nation and imagine that we hold any standing in the world as a beacon of freedom, we can’t turn schools into armed fortresses. No other developed nation has to do that. In no other developed nation are guns the No. 1 cause of death for children and teens. No other nation, developed or developing, has more guns than people.

We can talk all day long about mental illness and poor parenting and lack of moral compass, but every other country has those issues too. What they don’t have is easy, ubiquitous access to obscene numbers of guns and a culture that celebrates guns as symbols of freedom.

When guns are the leading cause of death for American children, they don’t mean freedom. When our babies can’t sit in a classroom without fearing for their lives, they are not free. The gun nuts can rant about tyranny all they want, but regular school shootings are not the price we have to pay for freedom.

In fact, the opposite is true. Freedom is literally the price we are paying to keep the gun lobby happy and politicians’ pockets lined. It’s long past time we recognized it and it’s certainly time to do something meaningful about it.

Over the past couple of weeks, we’ve seen a few artists make their return to the music scene after years of staying quiet. Kendrick Lamar delivered his fifth album Mr. Morale & The Bigger Steppers a couple of weeks ago and it came five years after DAMN. My Chemical Romance also released “The Foundations Of Decay” this month and that record was the band’s first in eight years. Now, Sky Ferreira is joining in on the fun as she returns with “Don’t Forget,” her first single since 2019.

Ferreira’s new record is a shimmering release that brings new hope to fans that her long-awaited second album, Masochism will arrive at some point in the near future. “Don’t Forget” is also Ferreira’s first song since she released “Downhill Lullaby” back in 2019, and that record at the time was her first in six years. With that in mind, it’s unknown when Ferreira’s next release will arrive, so for the time being, it’s best that we appreciate this new record for the foreseeable future.

Back in 2013, Ferreira released her debut album Night Time, My Time. It delivered 12 songs to listeners and by the end of the year, Night Time, My Time was heralded as one of the best albums of 2013. Fans of Ferreira are hoping for the same with Masochism.

You can listen to Ferreira’s “Don’t Forget” here.

In 2011, romance novelist Nancy Brophy wrote a curious blog post. It was called “How to Murder Your Husband,” and it detailed how she, in a purely speculative fashion, would do just that. One commenter joked that she would check up on her husband. Then, in 2018, Brophy’s husband was murdered. Nancy was a suspect and now, after a seven-week trial, she has been convicted of that very deed.

As per The New York Times, a jury found Brophy guilty of shooting her husband, chef Daniel, at the Oregon Culinary Institute, where he taught. The weapon was a “ghost gun,” or a handmade weapon used so as to be untraceable, which she made from parts ordered from separate outlets, including an extra slide and barrel she purchased on eBay. He was killed in the morning, before classes. Students arriving for class found his body.

The case against Nancy was, prosecutors admitted, all circumstantial. But they concluded that not only was there enough of such evidence, but also that no one else but her could have committed the crime. Nancy and her lawyers contended that she and her late husband were happily married and that she had no motive for killing him. She also claimed a fictional version of the deed for which she has been convicted would not hold up to scrutiny, saying, “An editor would laugh and say, ‘I think you need to work harder on this story. You have kind of a big hole in it.”

Nancy’s aforementioned blog post is not as incriminating as it sounds. In it, she runs through a list of weapons, whose efficacy she rates. Guns, like the one she’s said to have used, are “too loud and noisy.” Knives are too bloody. Garrotes require too much upper-body strength. She seems to conclude that poison is the best bet. The judge in her murder trial tossed the post as evidence.

The second-degree murder charge for which Brophy has been convicted carries a punishment of life in prison. She will be sentenced on June 13.

(Via NYT)

Since 2014, The Onion has run the same satirical and heartbreaking story nearly every time there’s a mass shooting. Each time, it has the same devastating headline: “‘No Way To Prevent This,’ Says the Only Nation Where This Regularly Happens.” Each time, the words are the same. Only the details are changed. But after the massacre in Uvalde, Texas, in which a gunman killed 19 children and two adults at an elementary school, they stepped up.

As caught by Deadline, the satirical site devoted the entirety of their homepage real estate to over 20 of the variations they’ve run over the years. In the top lefthand corner, is the story, altered for Uvalde. To its right is one for the 2021 FedEx shooting in Indianapolis. To that one’s right is one for the 2020 massacre in Minneapolis. And so on and so forth, reminding people about the mass shootings in Boulder, Colorado, in Atlanta, Georgia, in Dayton, Ohio, and on and on and on and on and on, etc.

Here is a sample of the article, in the version they did for Uvalde:

UVALDE, TX—In the hours following a violent rampage in Texas in which a lone attacker killed at least 21 individuals and injured several others, citizens living in the only country where this kind of mass killing routinely occurs reportedly concluded Tuesday that there was no way to prevent the massacre from taking place. “This was a terrible tragedy, but sometimes these things just happen and there’s nothing anyone can do to stop them,” said Idaho resident Kathy Miller, echoing sentiments expressed by tens of millions of individuals who reside in a nation where over half of the world’s deadliest mass shootings have occurred in the past 50 years and whose citizens are 20 times more likely to die of gun violence than those of other developed nations. “It’s a shame, but what can we do? There really wasn’t anything that was going to keep this individual from snapping and killing a lot of people if that’s what they really wanted.” At press time, residents of the only economically advanced nation in the world where roughly two mass shootings have occurred every month for the past eight years were referring to themselves and their situation as “helpless.”

The latest massacre, the deadliest K-12 school shooting since the Sandy Hook massacre in 2012, has prompted a tidal wave of pushback, from Beto O’Rourke, from Matthew McConaughey, from Whoopi Goldberg and Stephen Colbert and Taylor Swift and Steve Kerr and more. The GOP, meanwhile, has been slammed for threatening to do what they usually do in the face of mass shootings: nothing, apart from collecting NRA money.

You can check out the Onion’s homepage while it lasts.

(Via Deadline)

Pepsi has announced that the company will no longer sponsor the NFL’s Super Bowl Halftime Show after 10 years as the musical partner for the show. In that time, fans have seen memorable performances from the likes of Beyonce, Bruno Mars, Lady Gaga, The Weekend, and most recently, Dr. Dre and friends. Although the beverage company didn’t give a reason for the change, a release on Twitter thanked the 26 musical acts who played the show over the past decade.

“After 10 years of iconic Pepsi Super Bowl Halftime Show performances, we have decided it’s time to pass the mic,” Pepsi’s official Twitter posted. “Thank you to the amazing artists and fans who helped us create some incredible moments along the way. Now on to the next stage… ” A follow-up tweet recounted some of the Halftime Show’s accolades over the past few years. Pepsi touted, “26 musical acts representing 168 Grammys and almost 1,000 Billboard hits have rocked the Pepsi Super Bowl Halftime Show stage over the past 10 years.”

There have been no similar announcements from the official NFL or Super Bowl Twitter accounts, the latter of which hasn’t been updated since December of 2021. Meanwhile, a press statement from Pepsi says that the company’s overall partnership with the NFL will continue, introducing new programming, sports drinks, and activations for the NFL.

You know what they say about the best laid plans? Well, it’s true. And no one knows that better than Jada Sayles. On May 15, Sayles was all set to graduate from Dillard University, a historically Black university in New Orleans. Around 4:30 a.m., she realized that her plans were about to change in a big way. Instead of getting ready for her graduation, she was in labor and being admitted to the hospital.

“I thought I was gonna walk across the stage to get my degree, instead I got my baby,” Sayles tweeted, along with a series of photos. “My sweet face decided to make his way on MY big day (now his). Shoutout to my university for still bringing my graduation and degree to me.”

That’s right, even though her sweet baby kept her from walking the stage at her graduation, all was not lost. Her college stepped up and made sure that she was still able to experience her graduation to the fullest.

“Jada went into labor on Friday evening. Texted me around 4:30 am Saturday saying she was being admitted, & the baby was born on her graduation day, May 14th. So we rolled up to the hospital so I could finish my tenure in the most special way,” Walter M. Kimbrough, president of Dillard University tweeted.

I did something today I have never done before in 18 years as a college president. I conferred a degree in a hospital… pic.twitter.com/Ro7TR2gtYC

— Walter M. Kimbrough (@HipHopPrez) May 15, 2022

“I did something today I have never done before in 18 years as a college president. I conferred a degree in a hospital…” Kimbrough stated in another tweet. It’s clear that he is a very involved and caring administrator.

He shared a video of his bedside speech, captioning the tweet: “I even did the tassel part of commencement! This really was a very sweet moment. I’ll never forget it.”

Jada Sayles swapped her hospital gown for her graduation gown (and cap!) and stood in her hospital room to be officially declared a graduate. On Twitter, she shared a snapshot of her decorated graduation cap, which included balanced scales (she graduated with a degree in Criminal Justice), the phrase “Black girl magic” and a square for her sweet baby boy.

“I was scheduled to get induced Saturday at 5 p.m.,” Sayles told New Orleans news outlet WDSU. “So after graduation, I was planning on heading to the hospital.” Obviously, the baby, a boy she named Easton, had other plans.

“It happened so fast. I didn’t even realize I was missing graduation because it was just such a fast labor.”

Clearly, Sayles will have a story to tell her son many times for years to come. The special bond between a mother and her child is only made stronger by something like sharing this momentous occasion for them both.

With only three weeks to go until its premiere, critics got a chance to watch the first two episodes of the upcoming Disney+ series, Ms. Marvel, and the consensus is clear: Iman Vellani crushes it as the teenage superhero. Despite early criticisms about her powers being changed from the comics, the series appears to be winning people over thanks to its charm and Vellani’s charisma in the title role.

Naturally, not much is shared in the way of plot — like who are the mysterious villains shown in the trailer — but phrases like “delight” and “fun” appear prominently in the first round of social media reactions. One critic even called the series a spiritual successor to Spider-Man: Homecoming, which is pretty high praise.

“I’ve seen the first episode of #MsMarvel and spoiler free – I love this show,” Preeti Chhibber writes. “It is everything I could have wanted. I say this a lot about our girl Kamala Khan, but I’ve literally never felt so seen. But like me… specifically. Iman Vellani is a DELIGHT. Put her in everything.”

“I adore #MsMarvel, and I will fight anyone who is mean to her,” Drew McWeeny tweeted. “The show is so good, and this is absolutely the Kamala I hoped we’d get.”

“The first two episodes of #MsMarvel are delightful and so much fun,” Arezou Amin writes. “Part superhero origin story, part young woman coming of age and into her own. The cast are wonderful, and newcomer Iman Vellani is especially charming as Kamala Khan. I cannot wait to see where this series goes!”

“So I would die to protect Kamala Khan,” Rachel Leishman tweeted.

“It may be the best MCU show since WandaVision (which is saying a lot since there has seemingly been hundreds),” Karl Delossantos writes. “Its playful energy is perfect for the title character and moves Marvel TV into exciting new directions.”

“Iman Vellani’s Kamala Khan is an instantly relatable Marvel fan girl. People are going to love her and her family! Most surprising was the tone it’s VERY stylized, upbeat, and a little dark. I’m hooked!” Cris Parker tweeted.

“Ms. Marvel is super cute,” Roxy Striar writes. “It’s definitely for a young audience. At times feels younger than the DC CW shows. ‘Never Have I Ever’ vibes. A fun introductory superhero show for kids. Iman Vellani is precious. Ready to watch her for a long time.”

You can see even more reactions below:

Ms. Marvel premieres June 8 on Disney+.

J.J. Abrams hasn’t written a show since Fringe, but those waiting for a follow-up may have to wait a bit longer. Sources tell The Hollywood Reporter that Demimonde, his long-in-the-works sci-fi/fantasy/drama, is likely to be put on hold at HBO, in part because it’s super, super expensive.

The show, which Deadline once described as being about “a world’s battle against a monstrous, oppressive force,” was considered a major pick-up when HBO gave it the go all the way back in 2018. Jump four years later, and Warner Bros. Discovery brass are reportedly balking at the budget, which may be as high as $200 million. For contrast, that’s slightly more than the budget for House of Dragons, the itself very expensive Game of Thrones prequel.

Sources also say Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav is frustrated with Abrams’ lack of output since signing a five-year contract with his production company, Bad Robot, back in 2019. Three years in, Abrams has yet to finish a project for them, though he has several in the works, including an animated Batman series with his old cohort (and The Batman director) Matt Reeves, as well as the dramas Subject to Change and Duster.

The corporation is also reportedly unhappy that Abrams has yet to complete the DC projects to which he had laid claim, namely a reboot of Constantine and Madame X, though they’ve seen scripts for the former and the pilot for the latter. Still, the Bad Robot deal itself is not in jeopardy. Maybe the problem is Abrams is busy working on projects with other companies, including a Netflix series about U2. Or perhaps Abrams is still licking his wounds over the bad Rise of Skywalker reviews.

(Via THR)

The era of people scoffing at “sourced” bourbon as something inferior is a long-distant memory. Some of the greatest bottles of whiskey on the shelf today are sourced from MGP of Indiana, Castle & Key, Barton 1792, Four Roses … I could go on. Those whiskeys are being used to assemble some truly great brands and expressions — Redemption, Old Carter, Belle Meade, Old Elk, and Penelope are a mere few labels with just the Indiana juice in the mix.

In 2022, sourced whiskey deserves as much respect as any other bottle on the shelf. To that end, I decided to taste 12 sourced bourbon whiskeys “double-blind” from my shelf to see what’s really up with them.

For this tasting, I had my wife grab some bottles from a shelf of sourced bourbons I set up. She poured and numbered them and I dove in. What was a looking for exactly? Quality. Is there a continuity between these sourced bourbons? Sometimes. Are they really that different? Absolutely.

Our lineup today is:

• Widow Jane 10
• Jefferson’s Reserve Very Small Batch
• Pursuit United
• DIGITS Bourbon
• Yellowstone Hand-Picked Collection Single Barrel
• Redemption High-Rye Bourbon
• Nashville Barrel Company Single Barrel Bourbon (5-Year)
• Traverse City Barrel Proof Bourbon
• Belle Meade Sour Mash Bourbon
• Uncle Nearest 1884
• Elvis Tiger Man Tennessee Whiskey
• Pinhook Bohemia 2020 High Proof Bourbon

Let’s dive in!

Also Read: The Top 5 UPROXX Bourbon Posts Of The Last Six Months

• The 50 Best Bourbon Whiskeys Of 2021, Ranked
• Every Winning Bourbon From Our 2021 Taste Tests, Blind Tasted And Re-Ranked
• The 100 Best Whiskeys Our Head Drinks Writer Tasted In 2021
• We Blind Tasted A Whole Bunch Of $30-60 Bourbons To See If Any Could Beat Weller
• The Best Ten-Year-Old Bourbon Whiskeys, Tasted Blind And Ranked

Part 1: The Tasting

Taste 1

Tasting Notes:

This is fresh on the nose while being somewhat classic with hints of mulled wine spice and orange rinds next to pancake batter and dried mint. The palate leans into dark chocolate-covered marzipan with a hint of woody maple syrup. The end layers in some black cherry with a note of that dark chocolate sneaking back in before a garden shop note arrives at the very end.

Taste 2

Tasting Notes:

This opens pretty thin with hints of caramel, vanilla pods, and maybe a touch of leather and oak with a mild berry vibe. The palate is either subtle or thin … I can’t decide. There are notes of classic bourbon caramel and vanilla countered by a hint of stewed apple, buttery toffee, and maybe a hint of nutmeg. The end stays pretty mild but does build to a nice finish full of classic bourbon notes.

Taste 3

Tasting Notes:

Old wood and dried fruit lead the way on the nose with a rich and creamy eggnog with plenty of nutmeg and maybe a hint of pine resin. The taste is all about the salted caramel candies with plenty of dark chocolate bespeckled with orange zest. That sweetness carries on through the mid-palate toward a finish of vanilla cake with chocolate ice cream countered by dry and spicy pipe tobacco with a nice layer of cherry in there.

Taste 4

Tasting Notes:

Hum, a hint of popcorn leads to vanilla extract and flat cream soda on the nose. There’s plenty of spice, caramel, and vanilla on the palate but each one feels cut short. The finish is very cherry-vanilla chew with a touch of whiskey warmth but little else.

Taste 5

Tasting Notes:

Stewed pears and spicy dark chocolate open up the nose toward hints of cedar and vanilla oils. The palate is kind of like a vanilla candle next to almonds toffees with minor notes of cedar and old moss. The fruit comes back around on the mid-palate and finishes with leather apricot and pear tobacco layering into the nutty toffee and moss.

Taste 6

Tasting Notes:

Rich vanilla wafers with nougat and orange zest mingle with tart berries and winter spices on the nose. The palate is all about the dried cherries dipped in chocolate with lemon pepper spice, a hint of cedar, and old leather. The end feels part vanilla-cherry tobacco and part mint chocolate ice cream with a touch of cedar tying it together.

Taste 7

Tasting Notes:

This is like walking through a State Fair in my best memories thanks to a nose full of candied apples, cotton candy, vanilla cakes, cherry hand pies, and touches of sandy dirt on well-oiled boot leather. The palate starts off warm with sharp brown spices — clove, anise, allspice — that lead to soft sweetgrass with Almond Joy and salted caramel apples. The almonds and chocolate combine with the spice and builds to a big finish with a nice warmth and fruitiness.

Taste 8

Tasting Notes:

Wet oats, corn husks, and butterscotch lead toward raw leather, orange slices, and a touch of caramel. The palate leans into almond and toffee with plenty of vanilla and old oak staves. The finish is chocolate-covered almonds with a hint of vanilla tobacco.

Taste 9

Tasting Notes:

This is nicely floral with layers of orange oils, maple syrup, and caramel-mocha latte. The taste leans into the caramel and mocha with a big pump off the vanilla syrup bottle as sharp winter spices and candied nuts lead to a big Christmas cake vibe. The end feels like mincemeat pies and eggnog with a creamy and lush finish.

Taste 10

Tasting Notes:

Pecan Sandies and leather pouches that once held cinnamon sticks dominate the nose. The taste is more about the vanilla ice cream over a fresh piece of apple pie with plenty of brown spice and brown sugar with a hint of butter. The end brings about some walnut, cherry, and chocolate powder with a touch more of that cinnamon-infused leather but ultimately kind of peters out.

Taste 11

Tasting Notes:

This is a light one with notes of oak, popcorn, apple pie crust, and a dash of orange zest. The palate is oaky with a touch of maple syrup, vanilla pudding cup, and maybe some tart apple skins. The end then blows up with dark cherry, cinnamon, and caramel candy before it suddenly plunges to a watery grave.

Taste 12

Tasting Notes:

Okay, this is a bit more than the last one! The nose is all about that pecan pie with vanilla ice cream, caramel drizzle, and flake of salt. The palate pops with tart fruit and raw biscuit dough before a big wave of heat arrives. That heat takes the sip toward marzipan-laced tobacco hot end with plenty of “spice.”

Part 2: The Ranking

12. DIGITS Bourbon — Taste 4

ABV: 46%

Average Price: $70

The Whiskey:

This bottle is a collaboration between Bulls superstar Scottie Pippen and Napa wine superstar Dave Phinney. The juice is a sourced five-year-old whiskey that’s distilled in Tennessee, likely in a place that rhymes with “Tacoma”, alongside some MGP whiskey from Indiana. The barrels are sent to Mare Island, off San Francisco, where they continue aging before vatting, proofing, and bottling.

Bottom Line:

This just didn’t deliver today. It was fine but I can’t imagine ever reaching for this to mix or sip. Sorry, Pip.

11. Elvis Tiger Man Tennessee Whiskey — Taste 11

ABV: 45%

Average Price: $50

The Whiskey:

This bottle from Grain & Barrel Spirits is a sourced Tennessee whiskey, likely Dickel. The mash bill is 80 percent corn, ten percent rye, and ten percent malted barley. The juice is aged for two years before blending, proofing, and bottling.

Bottom Line:

This had all the notes of a basic bourbon. Nothing less. Nothing more. That makes this hard to justify at this price point.

10. Jefferson’s Very Small Batch — Taste 2

ABV: 41.5%

Average Price: $27

The Whiskey:

This is a sourced bourbon from around Kentucky. The age, mash, and vital details are undisclosed. What we do know is that the team at Jefferson’s spends a lot of time tinkering with their barrels to create accessible and affordable bourbons.

Bottom Line:

This was so close to hitting high marks today. It was just a little thin from top to bottom. Look, that’s not entirely fair given the ABVs of some of these bourbons. Yet, here we are.

9. Uncle Nearest 1884 — Taste 10

ABV: 46.5%

Average Price: $51

The Whiskey:

This whiskey is built from a batch of barrels that are a minimum of seven years old. Nearest’s Master Blender, Victoria Eady-Butler, builds the blend according to classic flavor notes first put into Tennessee whiskey by her ancestor, Nearest Green, back in the 1800s.

Bottom Line:

This is where the list gets interesting. While this is clearly a mixing bourbon with a basic vibe to build upon, it’s perfectly good for what it is.

8. Pinhook Bohemia 2020 High Proof Bourbon — Taste 12

ABV: 47.5%

Average Price: $48

The Whiskey:

Pinhook Bourbon made a pretty big splash this year with a deep bench of well-made bourbons and ryes. The shingle brings a wine sommelier’s sense to the world of Kentucky whiskey and the results are worth tracking down. This particular juice is a fairly low-rye mash bill (only 15 percent) bourbon from Castle & Key Distillery.

Bottom Line:

I hadn’t tried this in a while and it hit nicely today. It felt a little one-note (hence being ranked this low) but still delivered a nice sipping experience.

7. Traverse City Barrel Proof Bourbon — Taste 8

ABV: 57.8%

Average Price: $75

The Whiskey:

This expression is comprised of single barrel selections of seven-year-old MGP that are taken up to Michigan and finished. The juice goes in the bottle uncut and unfiltered at barrel proof.

Bottom Line:

This was well rounded but, again, just classic and note much more. It didn’t jump out at me today.

6. Widow Jane 10 — Taste 1

ABV: 45.5%

Average Price: $79

The Whiskey:

This is sourced from Kentucky, Indiana, and Tennessee bourbons (though that’s likely to change since Heaven Hill bought the brand). The hand-selected barrels are sent to New York where they’re blended in small batches of no more than five barrels, proofed with New York limestone mine water, and bottled. What you’re paying for here is the exactness of a whiskey blender finding great barrels and knowing how to marry them to make something bigger and better.

Bottom Line:

Again, this felt nice and well-rounded but there was nothing there to grab me and wow me. Looking at it now with the reveal, I feel like, for $80, there should be a bit more there.

5. Yellowstone Hand-Picked Collection Single Barrel — Taste 5

ABV: 57.5%

Average Price: $70

The Whiskey:

These bottles are part of an exclusive run of bourbon barrels that are “hand-picked” by Steve Beam out at Limestone Branch Distillery (from sourced barrels). Beam pulls these exceptional barrels in and releases them for special retailers, bar accounts, and collections. Each release is around 200 bottles and they tend to be rare finds.

Bottom Line:

Nice! I always liked this bottle but it’s one I always forget about too. It’s always like, “Oh, yeah, that is good isn’t it?” Then I forget about it again. I need to stop doing that as this was really well-rounded and had a solid character that stood out from the crowd.

4. Pursuit United — Taste 3

ABV: 54%

Average Price: $65

The Whiskey:

This is a vatted from 40 total barrels from three different states, making it a “blended” straight bourbon whiskey. While the team at Pursuit United doesn’t release the Tennessee distillery name, we know the juices from Kentucky and New York are from Bardstown Bourbon Company and Finger Lakes Distilling, respectively.

Bottom Line:

I felt like I went somewhere with this sip. There was a solid beginning, middle, and end that leaned into classic and craft bourbon vibes. Had it been a tad bolder, it might have ranked higher today.

3. Belle Meade Sour Mash Bourbon — Taste 9

ABV: 45.2%

Average Price: $40

The Whiskey:

This revival from the Nelson brothers of Nelson Green Brier has become an almost instant classic. The juice is a high-rye bourbon (MGP) that’s small-batched from only four barrels per bottling. The juice is then proofed with that soft Tennessee water and bottled.

Bottom Line:

There’s that boldness. This hit well and had a nice depth, but it still feel a little short as it tasted more like a bourbon to make an old fashioned with instead of a sipper.

2. Nashville Barrel Company Single Barrel Bourbon (5-Year) — Taste 7

ABV: Varies

Average Price: $90

The Whiskey:

Nashville Barrel Co. is doing some of the best work in the bottling game, full stop. They’re sourcing incredible barrels (a lot from MGP) and bottling them as-is without any cutting, filtering, or fussing — they let the whiskey speak for itself and it’s kind of magical. This expression tends to be five to eight-year-old barrels that will vary slightly in the flavor profile while always leaning into bold and distinct flavors.

Bottom Line:

This was nearly number one. In fact, this and the next one are basically a tie. The only reason this is slightly below is that this was a tiny bit hotter. I could have used a rock here. But, come on, that’s splitting a tiny hair.

1. Redemption High-Rye Bourbon — Taste 6

ABV: 52.5%

Average Price: $50

The Whiskey:

These bottles are the masterwork of chef-turned-master-blender David Carpenter. The juice is hand-selected MGP single barrels that provide a classic bourbon base that then leans a little softer on the palate.

Bottom Line:

Again, this took me somewhere. It was fresh, deep, and felt like it had a point of view. It was also very easy to drink without sacrificing flavor and feeling. Plus, this didn’t feel like it needed a rock, so, huzzah, it wins!

Part 3: Final Thoughts

And look at that. The top three were all MGP of Indiana. Coincidence?

Let’s look at the top three’s tasting notes again:

#1 — Taste 6: “Rich vanilla wafers with nougat and orange zest mingle with tart berries and winter spices on the nose. The palate is all about the dried cherries dipped in chocolate with lemon pepper spice, a hint of cedar, and old leather. The end feels part vanilla-cherry tobacco and part mint chocolate ice cream with a touch of cedar tying it together.”

#2 — Taste 7: “This is like walking through a State Fair in my best memories thanks to a nose full of candied apples, cotton candy, vanilla cakes, cherry hand pies, and touches of sandy dirt on well-oiled boot leather. The palate starts off warm with sharp brown spices — clove, anise, allspice — that lead to soft sweetgrass with Almond Joy and salted caramel apples. The almonds and chocolate combine with the spice and builds to a big finish with a nice warmth and fruitiness.”

#3 — Taste 9: “This is nicely floral with layers of orange oils, maple syrup, and caramel-mocha latte. The taste leans into the caramel and mocha with a big pump off the vanilla syrup bottle as sharp winter spices and candied nuts lead to a big Christmas cake vibe. The end feels like mincemeat pies and eggnog with a creamy and lush finish.”

Are there parallels? Sure. Are these the same whiskeys? Not even a bit. That just goes to show the power of excellent barrel selection by a blender when making a great whiskey. Yes, even a sourced one. It also goes to show the power of MGP of Indiana (and others) to make some truly unique barrels that we’re lucky enough to actually get to taste widely these days.

Stranger Things is a show steeped in Dungeons & Dragons lore. So much so that rabid fans of the fantasy role-playing game often spot easter eggs planted specifically for them in each season. You don’t have to be a hardcore gamer to understand the basic gist of things like The Upside Down and Demogorgons — the show does a good enough job of explaining them while setting up the bigger storylines centered around Hawkins — but that kind of knowledge definitely helps, especially when it comes to sussing out the show’s next big bad.

After making use of Demogorgons, Demodogs, and Mindflayers, Stranger Things needed a new villain. One that felt even more terrifying. One that could raise hell in Hawkins, literally. And, if you happen to be a long-time D&D player, you know Vecna definitely fits that bill. Let’s break down who this mind-melting terrorist is and why he’s got it out for our favorite group of cosplaying weirdos.

Lich Lore

To understand why Vecna is so frightening we first need to dig into some Dungeons & Dragons lore about a group of undead spellcasters called liches. Once mages, these typically evil beings have found a twisted way to secure their immortality through necromancy, storing their souls in something called a phylactery — an object like an amulet or a rune-covered box that holds some kind of meaning for the lich. It’s basically D&D’s version of a Horcrux and destroying it is the only way to guarantee a Lich won’t reform once killed. Liches have some spine-chilling abilities too. They’re practically immune to disease and decay, terribly difficult to kill, and often wield an unequaled mastery of sorcery thanks to their extremely long lifespans and their ability to retain their memories and personalities in death.

Vecna’s Origins

Vecna is hailed as one of the greatest villains in D&D history, appearing in the earliest versions of the game as a god-lich that you simply didn’t mess around with. A student of magic and powerful wizard in his own right, Vecna became a lich, then a god who was motivated by an all-consuming need for power and a personal quest for vengeance. He destroyed entire cities to get both as few of his enemies posed any real threat to his unlimited magical abilities. He’s described as a desiccated corpse missing his left hand and eye — two artifacts that become powerful tools for those willing to cut off body parts to harness them.

Vecna In Stranger Things

Now, it’s likely some (if not all) of Vecna’s D&D backstory is going to get scrapped when it comes to his role in season four. The Duffer Brothers seem to like tease random monsters and storylines from the popular role-playing game without completely co-opting characters and plot points so while their version of Vecna borrows the same name and possibly similar abilities, he’s not a carbon copy of the D&D villain.

That being said, the show is really leaning into the horror element of the character as he operates in the shadow world of The Upside Down. Demonic possession, paralyzing hallucinations, and an army of undead humans to protect him. That all fits the bill of what we know about this creep. He’s certainly a smarter, more calculating bad guy than the Stranger Things characters have faced before, and he seems to be selective of his victims in a way that’s particularly unnerving. Still, there has to be a way to destroy him and, if we’re borrowing from the character’s D&D origins for it, that might mean there’s an object Vecna’s storing his soul in that the kids need to be on the lookout for.

Whoever this version of Vecna is, he’s the most formidable villain the show has introduced so far and that should terrify all of us.

Netflix’s ‘Stranger Things’ returns on May 27.