Month: March 2023

(WARNING: Spoilers for The Mandalorian Season 3 episode “The Mines of Mandalore.”)

In the second episode of The Mandalorian Season 3, Mando makes good on his vow to travel to the planet of Mandalore thanks to the quasi-assistance of his new droid, R5-D4. While there, Mando confirms his belief that the surface of the planet is not poisoned after being ravaged by civil war and The Great Purge carried out by the Empire. Now, all that’s left to do is bathe in The Mines of Mandalore and redeem himself in the eyes of The Armorer. Naturally, things don’t go as planned.

While traversing the wreckage of Mandalore’s capital city, Mando is captured by a weird half-creature half-droid contraption that gives off major General Grievous vibes. He tells Baby Yoda to go find Bo-Katan (Katee Sackhoff), who soon arrives on-planet and opens an entire can of whoop-ass on everything in the place. Seriously, Mando should be taking notes.

With Mando now rescued, Bo-Katan leads him to the mythical mines so he can get his bath over with and restore his honor. But before Mando enters the water, Bo-Katan reads an old plague detailing how Mandalore the Great tamed the mighty mythosaur and rolls her eyes at the whole thing. She’ll be a believer very soon.

As Mando enters the water, he’s quickly pulled under and Bo-Katan dives into save him. While pulling him back, she spots a mythosaur and cannot believe what she’s seeing. The legends are true: they’re actually real. But what the heck are they?

First teased in The Mandalorian premiere by Kuiil, who chided Mando for not being able to ride a simple blurggs when his people used to ride mythosaurs, they’re massive horned creatures whose skulls are prominently featured on Mandalorian armor. However, they’ve never been shown in the Star Wars universe until now.

As for what the first appearance of a mythosaur means, nobody knows. Fans are convinced that Mando is going to ride one like Boba Fett with his Rancor, but there’s also a compelling theory that Bo-Katan will be the one to mount the mighty beast. Either way, Mandalorian fans were freaking out, and you can see some of the reactions below:

New episodes of The Mandalorian stream Wednesday on Disney+.

If you’re waiting for new music from Billie Eilish, you probably shouldn’t hold your breath. As we are a few months away from the two-year anniversary of her sophomore album, Happier Than Ever, anticipation is high for Eilish’s new era.

In December 2021, just months after the release of Happier Than Ever, her producer and brother Finneas revealed in an interview with Rolling Stone that he and Eilish had begun working on her follow-up album.

“We’ve got the net in the ocean, and we’re picking up detritus,” said Finneas. “And then you sift through all that, and you pick out the treasure, and then you have an album. I’m really excited. I think we’ve got a lot to say.”

More than a year after the interview, fans are antsy for new music. Yesterday (March 7), a fan resurfaced the interview, calling attention to the time that has passed since.

“it’s been one year and three months since this interview, you lie as much as your sister,” said the fan to Finneas.

Finneas, not one to mince words, offered a response to the fan, simply saying, “Great things take time.”

Though, if Eilish’s upcoming album follows the same two-year pattern between her 2017 EP Don’t Smile At Me, her 2019 debut album When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?, and 2021’s Happier Than Ever, we may be getting a new album from her as early as this year. She also dropped off the three-track Guitar Songs EP in July 2022.

House of the Dragon had a lot of dragons during season one, but honestly? It could have used more. A house isn’t single digit dragons; it’s at least double digits. Thankfully, the Game of Thrones prequel series is giving the people what they want (more fire-breathing, flying beasts) in season two.

“Production begins pretty shortly,” showrunner Ryan Condal revealed during an FYC event in Los Angeles on Tuesday. “In season two, you’re going to meet five new dragons.” Comic Book reports that this news “got a loud applause from the crowd,” but it’s more fun to imagine pure chaos. Chairs are thrown, curtains are torn, one guy dressed up as Syntax screams “LET’S GOOOOOO.”

George R.R. Martin also added how the novel Fire & Blood is only serving as an outline for House of the Dragon. “It was an imaginary history book,” Martin explained. “In Fire & Blood, it stated that Queen Emma Arryn dies in childbirth and the son dies [within the hour]. There is nothing about it being the most horrendous childbirth scene ever seen on TV. That’s all the work of [Condal] and his writers.”

House of the Dragon — now available in Oops! All Dragons form — is expected to return to HBO in 2024.

(Via Comic Book)

BTS’ RM recently opened up about the band’s indefinite hiatus during a new interview with EFE. Given that Jin is currently doing South Korea’s mandatory military service, the group isn’t expected to return until at least 2025.

Because of this, the remaining members have begun pursuing their solo material — and discovering who they are outside of being in one of the biggest global groups.

“After 10 years as a member of BTS, I didn’t know who I was and I wanted to know,” RM said. “I started out as a teenage rapper, then BTS came along and it was all very intense. Now that the group is inactive, I’ve gone back to thinking about the beginnings and the real reasons why I joined BTS.”

“When you are famous, staying on top is very difficult, but I think BTS will make it,” he added.

As for what he’s done with the time off, RM dropped his album, Indigo, in December of last year, which featured collaborations with Erykah Badu and Anderson .Paak. He’s also been sightseeing and taking in the art scene in Spain to gain a “timeless outlook” that will shape his future creative endeavors.

“I wanted to see artworks by Goya, Velazquez and Picasso for inspiration and I’ve been to the Prado and other museums,” RM noted. “I came to Spain because of my love of its art and, if someone learns about my country’s culture through my songs, it is an honor that makes me happy.”

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

A reason exists why the Paramount Network, as I once chatted about with soap opera king Darren Star of all people, was known as “Yellowstone territory” for years. Before Paramount+ launched with a vast movie library, the Taylor Sheridan-created series starring Kevin Costner took off like a bucking bronco in 2018. This, of course, is wild and something that everyone wants to harness. After all, Sheridan was previously best known as the Sicario screenwriter and an ex-Sons Of Anarchy cop (RIP), and now, he’s TV royalty.

These days, several helpings of Taylor Sheridan-involved series, both of the Yellowstone proper and adjacent varieties, still dominate the Paramount Network and Paramount+. Collectively speaking, those shows not only star Costner but also Harrison Ford, Helen Mirren, Sam Elliott, Jeremy Renner, and Sylvester Stallone. Upcoming shows will star Zoe Saldana, Nicole Kidman, Billy Bob Thornton, and maybe even Matthew McConaughey. A-listers want in, and that’s evidence that Westerns are truly alive in well in an unexpected time, but perhaps there’s never been a better time for a resurrection.

Not only has Sheridan himself spawned a host of “imitators” (a less awkward word won’t come to me at this moment) within his own universe, but other streaming services want to get in on that sweet Western windfall, too. Let’s list several of them right here. Before we begin, though, I feel the need to mention a few shows and set them apart from this list:

Justified: City Primeval: To be super clear, this Neo-Western joint will completely stand on its own, given that it’s a Justified revival, and no other solitary cowboy can compare to the Elmore Leonard-forged Raylan Givens (and the man who wears that hat, Timothy Olyphant). We will, of course, be talking about this show a lot when it arrives, so let’s keep moving.

Godless: Also to be fair, this Netflix show probably would have landed on this list (with bonus mustaches), had it not preceded Yellowstone a year in 2017.

Now for the Yellowstone-esque or -inspired shows, here or coming your way:

Outer Range (Streaming on Amazon Prime)

Whenever I first mentioned this show on our streaming lists, I wrote, “This ain’t Yellowstone,” and that’s correct. This story is more of a thriller with a side of the supernatural, but comparisons have been made. Also, Brolin may be far away from his former No Country For Old Men territory while portraying a Wyoming rancher, but there’s still a gravitational force to be reckoned with here, not from a questionably-haired Javier Bardem but from a dark void. When quizzed about whether this series is capitalizing upon the Amazon trend, Brolin told Variety that he’s already been there and done that, multiple times.

“Yellowstone was the first — like we were with True Grit — in bringing back the Western, and that’s a great thing,” Brolin asserted. “If you piggyback on that trend, you feel like you are piggybacking… But if you are coming with something within the genre that’s wholly original, then you feel good about it. There’s nothing other than horses and cowboy hats and maybe warring families in Outer Range that reminds me of Yellowstone.” Fair enough.

The English (Streaming on Amazon Prime)

This series will not only scratch the Western itch but also deliver nearly unparalleled visuals (in our current TV landscape which loves to spend millions upon production and then light it with a 15-watt bulb). And the show’s a standout for the surprisingly revelatory pleasure of being able to see the action, but more than that, Emily Blunt (Cornelia) and Chaske Spencer (Eli) wonderfully embody a story where an Indigenous character serves much more purpose than propping up white characters’ stories. Likewise, we don’t have to worry about this story being bogged down in romance because Cornelia vows to never marry, and Eli happens to be the only male character in the show without ulterior motives towards her. Together, they form a splendid team for dodging murderous parties to make their way across the wild frontier.

The Thicket (Peter Dinklage series coming to Tubi)

Game of Thrones fan-favorite and multi-Emmy winner Peter Dinklage will star in (and executive produce) a Western-thriller adaptation of Joe R. Lansdale’s same-named novel. A dastardly kidnapper, known as Cut Throat Bill, will be portrayed by none other than Juliette Lewis. And the former Lannister will portray a bounty hunter who helps the fresh-faced Jack (Levon Hawke) rescue his sibling (Esme Creed-Miles) from Cut Throat Bill. Of course, there’s a full-on motley crew here (including a sex worker played by Leslie Grace and a grave digger played by Gbenga Akinnagbe) to help with that task. Metallica lead singer James Hetfield has a role as well. Thank you, Yellowstone.

The Abandons (Kurt Sutter series coming to Netflix TBA)

Sons Of Anarchy creator Kurt Sutter will be showrunning again following his 2019 exit from Mayans M.C. That dustup involved Sutter labeling himself as an “abrasive dick,” and as it turned out, he clashed with FX’s new Disney way, but he’s in his own driver’s seat again while executive producing under his Sutterink umbrella. When we first mentioned this show here, I noted that the first Western project for Kurt will be a nice little pop-cultural intersection, given that Taylor Sheridan portrayed a cop on Sons Of Anarchy. I don’t imagine that The Abandons will hone in on the same conservative-leaning audience as Yellowstone, but we’ll eventually find out.

Can we get a Charlie Hunnam role up in here, Kurt? I’ve got my fingers crossed that you’ll make it happen. From the show’s synopsis:

As a group of diverse, outlier families pursue their Manifest Destiny in 1850s Oregon, a corrupt force of wealth and power, coveting their land, tries to force them out. These abandoned souls, the kind of lost souls living on the fringe of society, unite their tribes to form a family and fight back. In this bloody process, ‘justice’ is stretched beyond the boundaries of the law. The Abandons will explore that fine line between survival and law, the consequences of violence, and the corrosive power of secrets, as this family fights to keep their land.

Untitled Nic Pizzolatto Series (Coming to Amazon Prime)

When The Hollywood Reporter first broke news of this series from True Detective creator Nic Pizzolatto, the outlet reported that Amazon had “fast tracked” the show with the online-retailer-turned-streaming-service’s U.S. head of content, Nick Pepper, having “the streamer’s version of Paramount Network mega-hit Yellowstone” in mind. The series will boast an ensemble cast as well as a story about “a former outlaw who must reckon with a threat from his past in order to keep the life and family he has worked so hard to build.” This character “sets out on an epic journey that unites a formidable gang of indelible figures to face an even greater danger, in an epic saga of adventure and romance that forces this former criminal to become the hero he’s been pretending to be.” Yes yes, very Western in scope and theme. Hmm, this sounds like something that McConaughey might want to get on, too?

American Primeval (Peter Berg series coming to Netflix in 2024)

The dream team of Peter Berg (Friday Night Lights), Eric Newman (Narcos), and Mark L. Smith (The Revenant) will executive produce this project that stars Taylor Kitsch amid an ensemble cast including Betty Gilpin, Dane DeHaan, Jai Courtney, and Shea Whigham. The Hollywood Reporter relayed that the show will be a “raw, adventurous exploration of the birth of the American West. The violent collisions of cultures, religions and communities as men and women fight and die for control of this new world — for a land they truly believe is their destiny… a story of the sacrifice all must pay when they choose to enter a lawless and untamed wilderness.” The scripts will come from Smith, and clearly, Netflix is going all in on Westerns with this set for a 2024 arrival.

Best Actress at the 2023 Oscars is — with all due respect to Michelle Williams, Andrea Riseborough, and Ana de Armas (who was nominated for the wrong movie) — a two-person race between Michelle Yeoh and Cate Blanchett.

The Everything Everywhere All at Once actress believes it’s her time, because a) Michelle Yeoh is an icon and it’s nuts that she doesn’t have an Oscar already, and b) doesn’t Cate Blanchett (who, to be fair, gives an admirably prickly and career-best performance in Tár) have enough trophies already?

Yeoh thinks so. On Tuesday, she shared a Vogue article about the lack of diversity at the Academy Awards. (The last non-white Best Actress winner was Halle Berry for 2001’s Monster’s Ball.) There’s also an excerpt about “how it should be noted that [Blanchett] already has two Oscars. A third would perhaps confirm her status as an industry titan but, considering her expansive and unparalleled body of work, are we still in need of yet more confirmation?”

The article continues:

“Meanwhile, for Yeoh, an Oscar would be life-changing: her name would forever be preceded by the phrase ‘Academy Award winner,’ and it should result in her getting meatier parts, after a decade of being criminally underused in Hollywood”

Yeoh’s Instagram post has since been deleted, possibly because, as noted by the Daily Beast, it’s “a potential violation of the Academy’s campaign rules. In no. 11, ‘References to Other Nominees,’ Part B reads: ‘any tactic that singles out ‘the competition’ by name or titles is expressly forbidden.’ The words aren’t Yeoh’s, but sharing an article that wonders if Blanchett should win could still be considered a “tactic.” The Academy hasn’t commented yet.

Imagine if Instagram had existed in the 1940s. Humphrey Bogart would have been such a b*tch to Mickey Rooney.

(Via the Daily Beast)

Ask ten people who the best rapper of all time is and it’s possible you’ll get ten different opinions. It’s a question that’s been pondered and debated for decades, and one that has only subjective answers. Still, Jonathan Majors couldn’t help but be taken aback by Creed III co-star Michael B. Jordan’s take on the conversation.

On a new episode of Complex’s “GOAT Talk” series, the question of who the best rapper ever is came up. Both actors hesitated and contemplated the tough question, with Majors saying it’s between Jay-Z and Tupac. Eventually, Jordan worked up the courage to declare, “Drake, fight me.”

Majors was shocked, as he burst out into boisterous laughter after responding, “You said Drake?!” Jordan continued, “Jay-Z, Drake? Yeah, it’s tough! It’s tough!” After some more discussion (in which Majors made Jay-Z his final pick), Jordan elaborated, “This is what it is: to have an artist, rapper to rap about things I’ve been through, situations that I can relate to the most… literally, like it literally, [I listen to his music and I think], ‘Oh, I’ve been through that. Oh, I’ve thought that.’ So how it relates consistently, I gotta go there.”

The conversation wrapped up with Majors concluding that he picks Jay-Z for similar reasons.

Watch the full video below.

Yesterday (March 7), Nick Cannon and Kevin Hart announced Who’s Having My Baby? with a trailer. What is it? It looked like an upcoming game show on E! hosted by Hart, in which Cannon looks for a new woman to impregnate and add to the whopping 12 children he already has.

Now, Who’s Having My Baby? is a ridiculous concept for a game show, but in some ways, it seemed somewhat plausible. Cannon has been eager to joke about his prolific paternity and Hart previously got in on the fun by sending Cannon a condom vending machine. Furthermore, perhaps impregnation wasn’t the literal goal of the game show, and the promo was just a clickbait-y sort of introduction for a show with a less atypical premise. E! getting in on the video made everything seem more real, too:

Ultimately, though, it does appear that Who’s Having My Baby? is fake, at least in terms of it being a genuine game show. Variety reports that the idea is “actually a gag, orchestrated by comedian Kevin Hart, as a sketch for an upcoming, not-yet-announced project,” which could be announced as soon as today, per “insiders.”

Neither Cannon nor Hart have yet to drop the bit and reveal the show isn’t real, but it appears an announcement on that front is coming soon.

In a world in which most movies are available at the touch of a button – or the touch of a button and a rental fee; or, in some rarer cases, the touch of a button and a disc shows up a couple days later – it’s weird to think there was a time period where it was near impossible to watch Star Wars. (Okay, if we are getting into semantics, yes the original, non-Specialized version is pretty difficult to watch right now, but that’s not what this is about.) When I was five years old my parents took me to see The Empire Strikes Back and this was my first cinematic introduction to the Star Wars galaxy. I was too young to see Star Wars in theaters when it came out so that was that and I’d have to wait until a 1981 theatrical re-release before I ever saw the first movie. (Star Wars would not be released on home video until 1982, which I made my parents rent 50 times, in Betamax.)

I mentioned The Empire Strikes Back was my cinematic introduction, but it wasn’t my first experience with the characters because I had already gotten a bunch of Star Wars action figures made by the good folks at Kenner. The brand new toys from The Empire Strikes back then were all anyone could talk about at school and I had been counting the days until I could finally see this movie. So the way it works is, Kenner made 20 figures from the first Star Wars movie. Then they made Boba Fett with the promise he’d be a big part in the new movie that was still many months away. (This is a big reason Boba Fett still has the following he does today among Gen X, even though he’s not really even in Empire that much. The action figure had been released long before the movie so kids had him going on hundreds of adventures long before he just kind of stood around in the actual movie.)

When the new figures from The Empire Strikes Back hit stores, the original Star Wars figures were still there, too, and just kind of all blended together. There was no rhyme or reason to what my parents got me, so I’d get a figure of Walrus Man, then wonder what adventures this Walrus Man fellow will be on in The Empire Strikes Back. (Walrus Man, now better known as Ponda Baba, is not in The Empire Strikes Back.) Speaking of rhyme and reason, there didn’t seem to be a lot of it when Kenner decided what action figures to actually make. Did they make the actual head villain from the movie, Grand Moff Tarkin? Nope, they sure didn’t. Did they make R5-D4? Yep, they sure did.

I truly didn’t realize a good amount of these action figures were only in the movie for a few seconds. I just assumed R5-D4 was R2-D2’s pal. Look at the picture that comes with R5-D4’s action figure, we see our hero Luke Skywalker really having what seems to be an important moment with R5-D4. No doubt thanking R5-D4 for saving the day once again. Anyway, I had had an R5-D4 action figure for well over a year before I ever saw the original Star Wars. And when I finally did, R5-D4 shows up, shorts out, his head explodes and catches on fire. Then some Jawas wheel him away. That was it.

I can only assume Jon Favreau had a similar experience with R5-D4 and wanted to change this narrative. When Favreau was teasing The Mandalorian before its premiere, one of the first photos he shared was of R5-D4, who would eventually show up in the fifth episode, eventually becoming the droid belonging to Amy Sedaris’s Peli Motto. And it was nice that R5 finally had a nice home.

But that now has all changed as R5-D4 has now actually joined the adventure in this second episode of the season, accompanying Din Djarin and Grogu, serving as the astromech droid for Din’s Naboo Starfighter. And, as luck would have it, without R5-D4, that would be it for this season of The Mandalorian. Grogu can do some impressive things, but he probably can’t pilot a starfighter back to Bo Katan. But R5-D4 sure can, and does, paving the way for a rescue. (Well, technically two recuses. It probably wasn’t Din Djarin’s finest hour.)

But it’s a moment that had to make me step back and re-calibrate a bit. What a motley crew. A guy who kind of looks like Boba Fett, with a kid who looks like Yoda, with the actual R5-D4, just cruising around the galaxy looking for memory chips for IG assassin droid units and magical lakes of redemption. What a strange thing to exist. But, most importantly, finally, after all these years, that R5-D4 action figure has finally paid off. Now let’s get Snaggletooth into some action.

You can contact Mike Ryan directly on Twitter.

Blondshell — the indie project of 25-year-old Sabrina Teitelbaum — is building up the anticipation for her self-titled debut, whether that’s with singles taken from the record, such as the explosive “Veronica Mars” or the haunting “Olympus,” or one-offs like the Spotify single “Cartoon Earthquake.” Or this new Cranberries cover of “Disappointment.”

It’s safe to say that Teitelbaum’s take on “Disappointment” is not a disappointment. The build-up is beautiful and potent, her vocals and the guitars blending together and sweeping the listener into the hypnotic storm of sound.

“I wanted to sing a song off of No Need To Argue, which is one of my favorite albums ever. Dolores’ voice carries so much emotion throughout the entire album, not just on the big hits like ‘Zombie,’ but on the more understated songs as well,” the New York City-native singer said in a statement about the cover. “‘Disappointment’ hits me so hard because it feels like heartbreak disguised as apathy. I wanted to sing the song how I heard it, with the intensity of the pain behind those airy, relaxed vocals and drums.”

Listen to her cover of The Cranberries song above.

Blondshell is out on 4/7 via Partisan Records. Find more information about it here.