The Tiger King documentary series proved to be a raging success for Netflix while claiming the streaming giant’s “Most Popular” list spot for weeks, and for solid reason. The project piled on heaping helpings of insanity within seven episodes — not only from the big-cat trading standpoint but through wild mullets, extreme polygamy, drug use, faux country music, and exhausting rivalries — while shining the light on frontman Joseph Maldonado-Passage, also known as “Joe Exotic.”

The streaming crowd couldn’t get enough of Mr. Exotic, who arguably tapped into the zeitgeist with his showman’s flair, and although Netflix also aired an aftershow episode, the thirst for guilty documentary pleasures shall not be quenched. Tiger King followup projects continue to simmer while Exotic languishes behind bars (that murder-for-hire business sealed the deal), but the streaming world is here to give the people what they want. Here are similarly bonkers TV docuseries and documentary films that you can watch right now.

Finders Keepers

Run Time: 102 minutes | IMDb: 6.8/10

There’s retroactive Tiger King flavor in this story of two North Carolina men who duked it out over a mummified foot, which happened to rightfully belong to one of men, yet he initially lost it in a small plane crash. I can’t believe that I just typed those words, and it gets even stranger as this documentary traces the steps where this foot went amiss, somehow got basted-mummified, tucked into a storage space, and then put up for auction. The purchaser discovered the foot (what a day that was) and marketed his discovery into a tourist attraction, and that’s only the beginning of the madness. Yet this story isn’t simply an oddity-filled circus. Nope, filmmakers Bryan Carberry and Clay Tweel manage to stir up some genuine emotion in this story, which ends up being slightly heartwarming despite all the voyeurism and grossness on display.

Watch On Amazon Prime

McMillion$

1 season, 6 episodes | IMDb: 7.3/10

Mark Wahlberg executive produced his addictive and twisty saga of fast-food fraud — which transpired through the innocent-enough looking 1990s McDonald’s Monopoly promotional game — that spanned a decade. Mafia dons were in on this thing, the FBI got big-time involved, and Agent Doug had the time of his life in a story that’s so strange, it must be true. Before all was said and done, this scam produced $24 million worth of stolen, black-marketed winning tickets and corresponding dirty deeds until an anonymous tipster set things in motion for the whole scam to come crumbling down. There’s blackmail, intrigue, duped players, and an honest-to-god sting operation with insane “undercover” tactics, all to nab the scoundrels and bring them to justice. It’s great.

Watch On HBO

Sour Grapes

Run Time: 85 minutes | IMDb: 7.3/10

The greatest conman among wine connoisseurs, Rudy Kurniawan, gets the spotlight here for his elaborate schemes carried out upon members of the ultra-swanky community of serious wine tasters and collectors. His high-stakes game involved infiltrating a massive market while pocketing millions from CEOs who believed his charade. It’s difficult to feel too sorry for some of Kurniawan’s targets, including a Koch brother who dropped several million on falsified vintage wine. And while Kurniawan is undoubtedly a smooth operator, he’s still the Joe Exotic of wine snobs, so this conman’s maneuvers (and his swagger) are truly engrossing to behold.

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Cold Case Hammarskjöld

Run Time: 128 minutes | IMDb: 7.6/10

Conspiracy theories abound in this film from Danish filmmaker Mads Brügger, who digs into the 1961 plane crash that killed Swedish diplomat and former United Nations Secretary General Dag Hammarskjöld. The cause of the crash serves as the jumping-off point for one bonkers theory, but somehow, another conspiracy theory about white supremacists and HIV/AIDS surfaces, and then there’s an explosion of shadowy mercenary organizations. One gets the sense that Brügger (who shoots this project with a vaguely theatrical flair at times) is unreliably presenting this tale because it feels like a mockumentary. In the end, perhaps he got in far deeper than he ever planned with this project, and it’s difficult to know what to believe, but that’s part of the fascination factor.

Watch On Hulu

Abducted in Plain Sight

Run Time: 91 minutes | IMDb: 6.8/10

At first, this doc presents what seems like a straightforward enough situation — a 12-year-old girl in 1970s Idaho is seduced and kidnapped by a neighbor, but this is no cut-and-dried story. There are no easy answers here, given that this neighbor excelled as a conman and somehow managed to fool the girl’s family away from believing the truth. Manipulation and coverups abound, along with a critique on suburbia and the blind spots that can arrive with religion. It’s a confounding story that will cause viewers to gasp at the screen in disgust and disbelief, all while unable to stop staring at the increasing outlandishness that continues to unfold. It’s grim stuff but nonetheless transfixing.

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Don’t F**k With Cats

1 season, 3 episodes | IMDb: 8.1/10

If you’ve spent much time online over the past year — and let’s face it, you know the truth here — you’ve at least heard about this series (which carries a subtitle, Hunting An Internet Killer). This truly absurd documentary found its roots in an animal rights-focused Facebook group, which included members that tracked down the person responsible for viral animal cruelty videos. Two members of the Facebook group followed painstaking clues and obvious giveaways from the cat-killer, and after one serious snafu, they ended up tracking down Luke Magnotta, who (of course) graduated from murdering animals to killing people. Magnotta’s thirst for attention and notoriety not only got him busted, but his acts turn this doc into a disturbing sociological study for the Internet age.

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Three Identical Strangers

Run Time: 96 minutes | IMDb: 7.7/10

This project digs deeper into the relatively well-covered 1980s media circus surrounding three triplets, David Kellman, Eddy Galland, and Bobby Shafran, who were separated and adopted out to different families, only to encounter each other around college age. Archival footage and interviews follow the reunion stories of these three charismatic, Jewish-American young men, yet the media whirlwind and celebratory times gradually give way to a slightly darker side of the story. There, we see an examination of family and ethics by director Tim Wardle, who found himself intrigued by Laurence Wright’s coverage of the trio in the New Yorker. However, even the more serious aspects of the story are outshined by plenty of humor and heart in this documentary.

Watch On Hulu

The Pharmacist

1 season, 4 episodes | IMDb: 7.8/10

The opioid epidemic gets personal in this Netflix documentary series about a small-town pharmacist, Dan Schneider, whose pursuit of justice for his son’s killer came back to haunt him on the job. Doctors who become dealers come under harsh scrutiny here as Schneider becomes an unlikely hero while helping to expose the river of alarmingly powerful OxyContin prescriptions coming his way from seemingly healthy patients. This leads him back down the tragic path that led to his son’s addiction and demise, and Schneider makes it his mission to prevent other families from suffering the same fate. Big Pharma never faced down such a formidable foe, and this documentary is for anyone who needs to be convinced that one voice can make a world of difference.

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Blackfish

Run Time: 83 minutes | IMDb: 8.1/10

Tiger King exposed the downright appalling behavior of the big-cat-people culture, but 2013’s Blackfish laid the animal-abuse illuminating blueprint for at least one of the Netflix documentary’s subjects. Carole Baskin straight-up claimed that she was convinced to participate in Tiger King by directors who promised to shine the same light on the big-cat trade that Blackfish did while exposing SeaWorld for its shameful captivity practices. Baskin’s expectations didn’t exactly work out for her, but Blackfish is nonetheless worth revisiting for the eye-opening story within this activist project, which made the case that the aggressive behavior of so-called killer whales is actually a product of SeaWorld practices. The documentary isn’t an easy watch and argues that Tilikum the orca had no chance at a normal demeanor, given the unethical and reckless manner in which he was raised, and the film acts as a cautionary tale to all of mankind.

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Evil Genius

1 season, 4 episodes | IMDb: 7.6/10

The full title of this true-crime documentary series is Evil Genius: The True Story of America’s Most Diabolical Bank Heist, and that’s not an overstatement. Known as the “pizza bomber case,” this series follows the tragic 2003 results of an elaborate robbery scheme (in Erie, Pennsylvania) that ended with the death of a pizza delivery man, Brian Wells. He appeared to have been forced to walk into the bank to demand money while believing that this act would spare him after an elaborate scavenger hunt. However, the neck-collar bomb around Wells’ neck exploded, and the series attempts to unravel the bizarre path that led him to participate in this heist. The project ultimately delivers insight into the various parties involved, but it’s still a somewhat frustrating exercise to witness, along with being an unpredictable and unsettling ride.

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The Wolfpack

Run Time: 90 minutes | IMDb: 7.0/10

It’s always refreshing to highlight a documentary that isn’t tragic, although that easily could have been the case. Filmmaker Crystal Moselle (the Skate Kitchen director who will soon bring the follow-up Betty series to HBO) introduced the world to the six Angulo brothers, an extremely sheltered set of siblings who were essentially raised on Reservoir Dogs, The Dark Knight, and The Nightmare Before Christmas, among other badass movie selections. Their tastes seem atypical at best, given that the siblings were mostly confined to their small NYC apartment by a mentally-ill father and homeschooled by their mother. The boys eventually take to the streets in this doc, though, and they are a sharp-dressed vision to behold, given their penchant for costume-and-prop crafting and cinematic flair. It’s somehow an uplifting tale, even though story edges into exploring childhood abuse, and there are unsettling moments and suggestions of trouble brewing behind the brothers’ smiles. However, it’s clear that the group has become as well-adjusted (and personable) as possible by not only leaning on each other but on their favorite films while making the most of an extraordinary situation.

Watch On Amazon Prime

Ticketmaster caused a stir earlier this week with a quiet update to their refund policy. The page previously indicated that “refunds are available if your event is postponed, rescheduled or canceled, with the only exception reserved for MLB games and US Open events.” However, the update changed it so postponed and rescheduled shows were no longer eligible for refunds. This came after Live Nation, which owns Ticketmaster, postponed all upcoming tours back in March.

Now, Live Nation and AEG, the two biggest players in the live entertainment space, have updated how they are handling all the rescheduled shows. Ticketholders can now get refunds, but there is a catch: The shows have to have been rescheduled with new dates announced (as The New York Times notes). This means that fans with tickets to shows that have been postponed indefinitely are not eligible for refunds.

AEG will offer refunds under those conditions, and buyers will have a 30-day window to request their money back, beginning on May 1 or on whenever the new dates are announced. Live Nation’s timeline is less clear, as they note, “Live Nation’s plan is to continue offering an opportunity for refunds on all of its rescheduled shows as new dates are set. We anticipate those windows will begin to open up on an event by event basis in the next few weeks.”

Ticketmaster previously offered a statement about their new policies, saying, “In the past, with a routine volume of event interruptions, we and our event organizers have been able to consistently offer more flexibility with refunds for postponed and rescheduled events. However, considering the currently unprecedented volume of affected events, we are focused on supporting organizers as they work to determine venue availability, new dates and refund policies, while rescheduling thousands of events in what continues to be an evolving situation.”

Movie productions will eventually resume. It’s true. The Directors Guild Of America has even appointed Steven Soderbergh to help get the ball rolling again, which means that Taika Waititi will get to do his offbeat thing with Thor: Love And Thunder after no one realistically (at least, not after The Dark World) expected a fourth Thor movie to materialize. Thanks to Taiki’s masterminding of Ragnarok, though, and added fuel from Chris Hemsworth’s jolly Thor in Avengers: Endgame, nerds are very excited to more of the God of Thunder, even if he’s no longer the King of New Asgard. Will Thor shed his “Fat Thor”/”Bro Thor” physique, though? That’s been a major question, especially while knowing that Natalie Portman’s Mighty Thor will pick up the hammer.

Do the powers that be want Thor to go back to being buff, or not? Tony Stark’s “Lebowski” comment hit the mark on the character’s Endgame vibe, but Taika Waititi doesn’t sound like he wants to continue with the Thor incarnation that launched so many Halloween costumes. When Waititi hosted an Instagram live viewing of Ragnarok earlier this week, he made it sound like Thor got on a Peleton kick. Via Comic Book Resource:

During a recent Instagram Live watch of Thor: Ragnarok, Waititi said the Marvel Cinematic Universe is done with “Fat Thor” and Hemsworth probably won’t put on a padded suit for Love and Thunder. “We haven’t figured that out, but I feel like that’s done,” Waititi said.

As much joy as Lebowski/Bro Thor brought to audiences, it makes sense to put that phase to sleep. “Fat Thor,” as he was initially dubbed, was a byproduct of the depression that consumed the Avengers in the first five years of Endgame‘s timeline. Even though Cap kept shaving, Black Widow let her red hair roots grow absurdly long, while Thor hit the bread bowl and beer. So yeah, he turned into an Asgardian Lebowski, but times have changed. Thanos went down, and Thor’s glee from that victory (and watching Cap swing the hammer) lifted his gloomy mood, even with Loki’s fate still ambiguous. Thor’s probably gonna get ripped again, and that’s definitely not the worst news in the world today. It’s be just fine.

Thor: Love And Thunder‘s new release date is February 28, 2022.

(Via CBR)

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The coronavirus pandemic continues to be an issue worldwide, and artists are doing their best to help through music. Some have even released new songs to benefit relevant causes, like Bon Iver with “PDLIF” and Death Cab For Cutie’s Ben Gibbard with “Life In Quarantine.” Now Florence And The Machine have thrown their hat into that ring with a tune called “Light Of Love.” The anthemic ballad comes from the same sessions that yielded the 2018 album High As Hope.

Welch said on Instagram of the song, “‘Light of Love’ is an unreleased song from High as Hope, it never made it to the record, but I thought I would release it at midnight tonight, as a little token of my love. And to raise awareness for the Intensive Care Society, […] which provides care and support for the incredible doctors, nurses, and healthcare professionals on the front line of this crisis. I will be donating all of my income from this song to the Intensive Care Society. I love and miss you all so much. With you in spirit from South London lockdown.”

Listen to “Light Of Love” above.

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

Big Thief had a busy 2019, as they released a pair of new albums that year: U.F.O.F. came in May, and it was followed in October by Two Hands. It turns out both of those albums stemmed from February 2018, when the group spent the month recording in a Topanga Canyon, California cabin. 34 demos came from those sessions, some of which went on to appear on the aforementioned albums. Now, some of the other ones feature on a new EP from the group, Demos Vol. 1 — Topanga Canyon, CA — Feb 2018.

The band shared the EP today to benefit their touring crew, and it features three previously unreleased songs from the group. “Live Young” can be heard now, while the others can only be experienced after buying the EP on Bandcamp. The EP also features full-band recordings of two songs that ended up on Adrianne Lenker’s solo album Abysskiss: “Blue And Red Horses” and the title track.

Big Thief shared a statement about the release, writing:

“We spent the month of February 2018 in a cabin in Topanga Canyon, California, recording 34 demos that were boiled down to become UFOF and Two Hands, and we’re bringing a handful into light now to share with everyone. We chose 5 of our favorites – none of which appear on any Big Thief records and a couple of which appear in different forms on Adrianne’s abysskiss. 100% of the funds we make from this release will go to our faithful road crew, whose income has been impacted by the disruption in our touring schedule. They are the lifeblood of the Big Thief shows and we care so deeply for each and every one of them.”

Listen to “Live Young” below.

Being in a quarantine is a big adjustment for most people, but not Seth Rogen.

As host Jimmy Kimmel put it during Thursday’s episode of Jimmy Kimmel Live!, the number-one fan of Cats is “a person who was actually cut out for this stay-at-home thing. I mean, your hair, your beard, just the kind of stuff you’re into.” Rogen did not disagree. “We are not all in this together,” he joked, “because this has not been that bad for me.” He’s gotten into pottery, and speaking of words that begin with the letters p-o-t, he’s been smoking an “ungodly” amount of pot. Thankfully, weed dispensaries are essential.

Kimmel also asked Rogen (who, I should note, was wearing an Alanis Morissette sweatshirt during the interview) about his live-tweeting of Cats. He knew nothing about Cats, either the musical or the movie, before watching the box office bomb, but was “shocked” to see how “crazy” and “appalling” it is. “It long supports a theory I have that when something is live, you have a much lower tolerance for how good or bad it is. Cats is the perfect example,” he continued. “That survived on Broadway for like 40 years. It sucks! As soon as you commit it to film, you see how it makes no sense.”

I’m guessing, unlike Hugh Jackman, Rogen wasn’t asked to be in Cats.

This week’s episode of Better Call Saul was intense. The episode sees Jimmy return from the desert, barely clinging to life after having survived dehydration by drinking on his own urine. He takes the $7 million he managed to haul across the desert after sharp-shooting Mike Ehrmantraut killed a gang of rivals, turns it over to the city to pay his client Lalo’s bail, and returns back home to convalesce.

Lalo, however, catches wind that not everything was as he was told. In the desert, Lalo’s curiousity is piqued when he spots Jimmy’s abandoned car full of bullet holes. Lalo returns to Kim and Jimmy’s apartment to question Jimmy about his story, and this is where the episode goes from heart-thumping to heart attack. Lalo has a gun; Jimmy is delivering the same story over and over while Lalo tries to catch him in a lie; Mike, on the roof of a nearby building, has his rifle trained on Lalo in case he decides to pull his gun, but Kim is standing between Mike and Lalo.

The situation does not look good, and it feels all but certain that someone in this scenario is not going to make it out alive. But it’s not just because there are two guns and a tense stand-off in the sequence. It’s also because of a scene earlier in the episode that teases a potential death.

But let’s back up for a moment. Remember Ted Beneke? The man, who Skyler White was sleeping with in Breaking Bad, that tripped and hurt himself so badly that he had to be hospitalized?

Note that those oranges are a reference to Godfather, because oranges in The Godfather appear whenever death is in the air. This callback has been made numerous times in other TV shows and movies, including Mad Men and The Wire. That’s exactly how they are used in Breaking Bad, as well. Remember Carol, the woman who dropped oranges out of her grocery bag?

In other words, The Godfather and Breaking Bad have primed us for what to expect when we see oranges. And what did we see in this episode? Oranges basically being murdered. Early in the episode, Kim spends a few minutes making orange juice, which is not only triggering Jimmy’s PTSD, but the orange juice sprays all over Kim’s shirt.

I don’t mean to frighten anyone, but orange juice spraying like blood is not a good omen here.

That is either some very scary foreshadowing, or a remarkable piece of trolling by director Thomas Schnauz. Combine that with this particular shot of Kim staring through a bullet hole in Jimmy’s mug, and I would be very worried for someone in the season finale, although not necessarily Kim.

The oranges mean that death is in the air, but it doesn’t have to mean that Kim is going to die. We know that Jimmy and Mike will make it, but we don’t know what happens to Lalo or Nacho (or Nacho’s father). What we do know, however, is that as far as Jimmy knows, Lalo and Nacho are still alive during the events of Breaking Bad. He does not, however, even mention Kim during Breaking Bad, so we don’t even have a clue at the moment as to her ultimate fate.

Next week’s season finale is going to be insane.

Armed with wild twists and silly accents, Rian Johnson’s Knives Out became a surprise box office hit last year.

A modern homage to the classic whodunnits birthed by writers like Agatha Christie, the murder mystery flick was packed with a ridiculous amount of top-tier talent who looked to be having a hell of a time romping around a New England-set mansion, playing increasingly problematic characters who may, quite literally, have blood on their hands.

The many memes and odes to Chris Evans’ waffle-knit sweater were enough to justify the twist-filled plot – a famous crime novelist named Harlan Thrombey (Christopher Plummer) is killed and it’s up to Detective Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig sporting a slow Southern drawl as thick as molasses) to suss out which privileged heir is the culprit.

He’s got plenty of suspects to choose from – Evans’ arrogant Ransom; Michael Shannon’s bitter Walt, Thrombey’s son who wanted to push his father’s publishing arm into the 21^st century; Harlan’s daughter Linda (Jamie Lee Curtis), a shrewd businesswoman who never earned her start; Marta (Ana de Armas), the hired help constantly enduring the family’s thinly-veiled classism; Toni Collette’s Joni, a woman we can only guess is based off Gwyneth Paltrow’s Goop-persona … and that’s without mentioning the grandkids which include a self-righteous college-aged Meg (Katherine Langford) and a neo-Nazi troll (Jaeden Martell).

Watching these elitists bicker and squabble over their right to their father’s fortune as Blanc narrates flashbacks that reveal a bit more of the crime with each new clue uncovered is more than just a good time – it’s good cinema, the kind that harks back to films like The Last of Sheila and Murder on the Orient Express. Johnson gave us colorful, eccentric characters with depth and motivations that made the film’s selling gimmick – the silent “Can you guess who did it” challenge – that much more interesting.

And he did it so well he’s left us craving more, which is why we’re digging into the roots of the genre to find a couple of movies that trade in the same spirit as this modern mystery masterpiece. These are films that inspired and laid the groundwork for Johnson’s eventual murder plot and they’re worth a watch, especially if you can’t get enough of iconic characters, bloody crimes, and thrilling twists.

Brick (2005)

If this neo-noir mystery proves anything it’s that Johnson’s been honing his skills in this particular genre for quite a while. His directorial debut stars a fresh-faced Joseph Gordon-Levitt as a high school student trying to piece together the events that led to his girlfriend’s death. Steeped in a hardboiled detective style, littered with snappy lines of dialogue and head-scratching wordplay, and borrowing character inspiration from cult anime series Cowboy Bebop, Johnson gave audiences a dark teen thriller that would stand the test of time.

As Brendan Frye, Gordon-Levitt is an emotionally tortured young hero, looking to uncover the truth about his girlfriend Emily’s (Emilie de Ravin) disappearance. He’s forced to trade with drug-dealers and kingpins and fellow students who play in this underground world of crime and Johnson’s able to weave classic murder mystery tropes within this high school hierarchy.

Brick is significantly darker than Knives Out, which serves the story better. Adding too much humor might’ve reduced this to a parody. So don’t come to this film expecting many laughs – though the quick-witted dialogue is often entertaining. Instead, view Brick the first stage in Johnson’s genre evolution, a serious, strait-laced undertaking that proves just as inventive as his current work but with less cheek.

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Clue (1985)

In fact, if it’s more slapstick comedy you’re looking for, you need to revisit this 80s romp starring Tim Curry which is based on the classic board game of the same name.

The film’s become a cult hit over the years and it shares plenty of similarities with Johnson’s modern tale. Both stories are set in elaborate New England mansions. Both center around an unsolved crime – in Clue’s case, quite a few unsolved crimes. Both boast a cast of chaotic, memorable characters whose place in the bigger mystery remains up in the air into the closing act.

Clue trades in more over-the-top physical comedy led by Curry’s butler, Wadsworth (whose fast-paced reenactment of the night’s events in the film’s final scenes is a work of comedic brilliance) and supported by talents like Eileen Brennan, Madeline Kahn, Christopher Lloyd, Michael McKean, Martin Mull, and Lesley Ann Warren. Filled with cheesy jokes and secret passageways, alternate endings and screwball humor, Clue’s character-work feels like the most direct inspiration for Knives Out. The film established archetypes with characters like Kahn’s suspicious widow, Mull’s corrupt Colonel Mustard, and Llyod’s disgraced Professor Plum, each assigned a colorful pseudonym harking back to the boardgame.

These characters are confined in a space that feels like its own distinct character in the film, one where bodies can be hidden in cupboards and hidden tunnels spill out into servants quarters. The film’s director, Jonathan Lynn, makes use of the set in much the same way Johnson does in his film, having it play a key role in how the crime was committed, helping audiences eliminate suspects by setting certain scenes in specific rooms at various times of the day. Wadsworth, much like Benoit Blanc, feels very in the know, even as he plays dumb about the motives and likeliness of each culprit, eventually walking us all through the night’s events with a sureness that makes us suspect he was in control the entire time.

If anything, Knives Out feels like a slightly more sophisticated riff on this cult comedy, one that’s happy to poke fun at its shared themes. At one point in Johnson’s film, LaKeith Stanfield’s detective describes Harlan Thrombey as a man who “practically lives on a Clue board.”

What both films share is a commitment to squeezing the most from their talented casts and the knowledge that the best murder mysteries don’t rely on twists and turns in the plot, but the characters steering it to make the story memorable.

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Sure, there are plenty of other whodunnits you can try that live in the same world as Knives Out – Donald Glover’s Mystery Team, Laurence Olivier and Michael Caine in Sleuth, the fresh horror-comedy Ready or Not, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, Murder on the Orient Express … we could go on – but to understand the film’s essence and to bask in its original inspiration, you’ll need to add these two films to your list.

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