Category: News

Rod Wave has been lauded for years for his innate ability to convey sadness that many listeners feel as well through melodies and croons. Thus, his new album Beautiful Mind is being well received by the people and they are making their voices heard.

One Twitter user labeled the 22-year-old as “Fantasia for n****s,” referencing the “Free Yourself” singer’s 2000s music loaded with heartbreak and internal turmoil. Another said that his music gets listeners in their feelings from the very first beat, and the album has zero skips. In true Twitter fashion, the album led another person to fantasy book a dream collaboration between the St. Petersburg artist and the legendary band Nickelback, which many people seemed to agree with.

Despite Rod Wave being a “sad boy,” the people are pleased with his offering to a music landscape where sad boys arguably thrive more than ever before. Beautiful Mind clocks in at 24 songs with features from Jack Harlow and December Joy. It comes almost a year and a half after his 2021 album Soulfly.

Unfortunately, Rod Wave most recently made headlines for being arrested and charged with strangling his ex-girlfriend.

Beautiful Mind is out now via Alamo Records. Listen to it here.

On January 6, 2021 (the day of the MAGA insurrection), rootin’ tootin’ Lauren Boebert woke up and tweeted, “Today is 1776.” That tweet somehow still exists.

Although no one would ever accuse Boebert of knowing the particulars about the Revolutionary War (she once confused “Samuel” and John Adams and doesn’t give a flip about education), it’s clear that she was attempting to reference that specific period in U.S. history. And that tweet is a big reason why the Proud Boys indictment made people side-eye Boebert for her possible contribution to planning what happened that day.

Fast forward to Trump’s announcement that the FBI raided his beautiful Mar-a-Lago compound, and Boebert has already made her perspective known. She called this “Gestapo crap,” and following Attorney General Merrick Garland’s poker-faced declaration that he authorized the raid, Boebert is hopping mad.

The Rifle Republican is, naturally, tweeting up a storm with one standout remark. “AG Garland personally approved the raid on President Trump,” she typed before making a huge leap. “This is nothing short of a coup.”

In response, people quickly mentioned the “1776” tweet from yesteryear.

That wasn’t all. Boebert doesn’t understand (or she’s willfully ignoring) how Garland is not trying to seize power from Trump. He is no longer the president but a private citizen who shouldn’t have access to those boxes of classified documents that could even contain nuclear dirt. And furthermore, the feds only went in to recover these improperly placed (and some might say stolen) documents. So, people pushed back at Boebert while also telling her that the word “coup” doesn’t mean what she thinks that it means.

In other words, what Merrick Garland did is not “1776.”

One of the cooler parts of Madden 23 this year is all the ways it plans to honor the iconic coach and namesake for the game, John Madden. Not only is he going to be on the cover of the game, but he’s going to be all over the game itself from his virtual appearance in modes like Ultimate Team to a game mode dedicated entirely to him.

The John Madden Legacy Game is a mode in Madden 23 where players will be able to play with one of two John Madden’s, one dressed in his iconic pinstripe and tie look, and another in the same outfit he won Super Bowl XI in. Both teams are full of some of the NFL’s greatest to ever play including players who were named to John Madden’s personal “All-Madden” team.

This is another really cool way EA and the Madden devs are choosing to honor John Madden and remind everyone about his legacy as not only a football coach and broadcaster, but everything he did for video games. It’s hard to believe, but the next game in the franchise comes out in only seven days so we don’t have to wait too long to experience everything EA has waiting for us.

The Rundown is a weekly column that highlights some of the biggest, weirdest, and most notable events of the week in entertainment. The number of items could vary, as could the subject matter. It will not always make a ton of sense. Some items might not even be about entertainment, to be honest, or from this week. The important thing is that it’s Friday, and we are here to have some fun.

ITEM NUMBER ONE – I need you to understand that I am serious about this

You know how sometimes a thought will come screeching into your head out of nowhere and kind of set up residence in there for a while? Maybe not. Maybe this is just how my dilapidated funhouse brain works and the rest of you are thinking about, like, important issues facing the nation or which supermarket has the best deal on paper products. I don’t know. What I do know is that it happened to me again this week when, while minding my own business and watching a Phillies game, this sentence popped in there fully formed: What if Henry Winkler goes on Hot Ones?

I need you to understand a couple of things here: One, I have been thinking about this a lot, so much, in the past few days, in part because I’ve been kind of watching a lot of old episodes of Hot Ones lately and in part because I think about Henry Winkler a lot. It’s the fish pictures, mostly. I have written about this and retweeted the tweets and even asked him about them when I had a chance to interview earlier this year, which is a lot of fun to explain to people when I try to tell them about my job and use “I interviewed Henry Winkler” as a reference point and they Google the interview and see like five questions about fishing. But, like, come on, look at this.

Which brings us back to the Hot Ones thing. Henry Winkler, if you are reading this, please go on Hot Ones. Please. For me. Henry. HENRY. Go on Hot Ones. Listen to me.

Hmm. I suspect a list of reasons will help. Let’s do that:

• Henry Winkler has had a long career in Hollywood, dating way back to playing The Fonz on Happy Days and continuing all the way up through his work on Barry in the present
• He seems by all accounts like a delightful man
• I want to see what happens when Henry Winkler tries to answer a question after eating a very spicy wing

That’s it. That’s all I got, at least by way of logic. All of it really just boils down to “because I would like it,” which is probably not enough to get an idea in Hollywood greenlit, at least not yet. But still. I would really like it. And it’s not an unreasonable ask. We can have Henry Winkler on Hot Ones. That’s within the realm of possibilities. It would be like the time Paul Rudd showed up on the show and did this…

… but way more sincere. I really must stress that I am serious about this. I know I’ve said that a few times now but I worry some of you might think I’m funning around here. I am not. I simply would like to see Henry Winkler go on Hot Ones and I am using the fact that I have a silly Friday column where I can say almost whatever I want to put it out into the universe.

That’s all that’s happening. I feel okay about it.

ITEM NUMBER TWO – CIGARETTE SHOWDOWN

It brings me great pleasure to report that I saw a good tweet. It was in response to my recap of this week’s episode of Better Call Saul, an episode in which a lot of things — important things! — happened, some of which involved Life Alert pendants and brown hair dye and signed affidavits. It was, again, a lot, and not something I’m going to spoil for any of you on the off-chance you have somehow not seen the show and are planning to get in there. But, that said, the good tweet.

Context will help, at least a little. In this week’s episode of Saul:

• Kim Wexler was going through it
• Rhea Seehorn put on a damn acting clinic
• At one point near the episode, she was smoking a cigarette in the rain and just kind of processing a lot

Then, she did… well, this:

Which was maybe the coolest thing I’ve ever seen. And yet still maybe not the best bit of cigarette-related business on television this year because, in an episode of The Righteous Gemstones, for reasons I could explain but absolutely will not, Judy Gemstone, played by Edi Patterson, who has been putting on a different kind of acting clinic, did this:

The takeaways here are as follows:

• I love both of these moments very much and I refuse to choose between them
• We are so blessed to have both of these women on our televisions just revolutionizing the genre of tobacco disposal
• I think, when this is all over, the two of them should play mismatched cops in a Knives Out-style murder mystery, either episodic or feature-length, which is only slightly complicated by the fact that Edi Patterson was actually in the first Knives Out

This was an excellent conversation.

ITEM NUMBER THREE – Casa Bonita chaos

Hey, let’s check in with the South Park guys and their recent acquisition of the actual Casa Bonita restaurant that they once depicted on the sh-… aaaaaaand it’s chaos. Just madness straight through. We go now to the Denver Post for an update.

It’s been nearly a year since “South Park” creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone purchased Lakewood’s iconic restaurant Casa Bonita, but they’re no closer to figuring out when it may open.

Not ideal. Could be better. Sounds kind of like an episode of that show Kitchen Nightma-…

“Have you ever seen ‘Kitchen Nightmares’? It’s the very, very worst one of those you could possibly ever imagine,” said Parker. “What we thought would be, ‘Oh this will be cool. We can buy this and open it and it’ll be around again,’ turned into ‘Oh this is going to be what we have to put all our money into and hope that it works.’”

Putting aside the obvious point that this is a joke and they have more money than one can possibly sink into a local Mexican restaurant, it would be really, really funny if two cartoon entrepreneurs run themselves bankrupt due to food-based calamities. Imagine explaining that to anyone. “Yeah, the South Park guys are broke now because they bought a real restaurant they depicted on the show and it was a disaster” is just a deeply wild collection of words.

As for other landmarks, such as the Coney Island Boardwalk hot dog stand, that have since hit the market, Parker and Stone said they’ve considered saving them.

“I told Les Claypool (of Primus) about the hot dog and he [expletive] flipped out. He was like, ‘You have to buy that hot dog,’” said Stone.

Is it weird that I think this might be a better show than another season of South Park? Like, we’ve seen plenty of that show. We will all be okay if they decide to close up shop and move on to a reality show where they buy famous food-related landmarks and attempt to save them, potentially with disastrous results. Get Guy Fieri in there to help. I don’t think the South Park guys would love that part but we’ve moved beyond that into the realm of goofus hypotheticals. Let’s just do the weirdest stuff we can think of here, just to see what happens.

Something to consider.

ITEM NUMBER FOUR – I must have this immediately

A couple of things are important to note before we get to a pretty incredible quote, so let’s do that in the name of professionalism. The first thing is that Jason Momoa is going to appear in Fast X, the tenth Fast & Furious movie. Good for him. Good for all of us, really. “Jason Momoa appearing in a Fast & Furious movie” is one of those things that is so perfect and obvious in hindsight that the most notable aspect of it all is that it had somehow not happened already. It’s great. It makes me very happy. I’m still a lot upset that they’re calling it Fast X instead of FasTen Your Seatbelts, but I’ll get over it. I can deal. Probably.

The second important thing is that Jason Momoa spoke to British GQ about it all a little bit this week. Look at this blockquote.

In the tenth Fast and Furious film, Momoa plays a villain whose toenails are painted purple and pink, with a lavender car to match, and who enjoys laughing maniacally as he blows up co-star Ludacris’s car. “I’m a peacock at the highest level and I’m having the time of my life,” he grins.

This is fascinating to me. What could possibly be a better development for this franchise than “Jason Momoa as a pastel aficionado and madman who blows up a car belonging to Ludacris, who went to outer space in a NoS-powered Pontiac in the previous movie”? I honestly do not know. I keep wondering where the franchise can go from the absurd lengths it reaches each movie and then, pow, here we are. It’s thrilling, in a way. I hope Jason Momoa’s character drives a hovercraft through the streets of Paris.

The best part is that we really can’t rule this one out. We can’t rule anything out. There is almost nothing that could happen in these movies that would shock me at this point. Again, thrilling.

ITEM NUMBER FIVE – Fargo… still good

The television version of Fargo is better than it has any right to be and has been since the very first season, thanks in large part to Billy Bob Thornton playing a hitman named Lorne Malvo and the guy in the screencap up there whose name was Calamity Joe and sold various forms of illicit paraphernalia out of the back of his van, including bags of clean urine. Every season has told a new story with all new characters and almost everything has been a blast. It’s a good show.

I think my favorite part of the show, because I am an idiot first and foremost, is the thing where it takes pleasure in casting an impressive group of actors and giving their characters the silliest names you can imagine. Allison Tolman played a cop named Molly Solverson. Mary Elizabeth Winstead played a hustler named Nikki Swango. I’m still not over that last one. And, because sometimes things can be pretty okay out there, the new season appears to be pressing forward with this strategy.

Fargo has rounded out the main cast of its upcoming fifth installment, with Joe Keery (Stranger Things, Free Guy), Lamorne Morris (New Girl, Barbershop: The Next Cut) and Richa Moorjani (Never Have I Ever) joining the previously announced Juno Temple, Jon Hamm and Jennifer Jason Leigh.

This is good. This is very good. But tell me some names.

GIVE ME SOME NAMES.

I NEED IT.

Set in 2019, Season 5 of the Noah Hawley-created anthology series answers the question, when is a kidnapping not a kidnapping, and what if your wife isn’t yours?

Joe Keery will play Gator Tillman; Morris will play Witt Farr; Moorjani will play Indira Olmstead.

Gator Tillman.

Yes.

Yes, this will do just fine.

Fargo is still a good show.

READER MAIL

If you have questions about television, movies, food, local news, weather, or whatever you want, shoot them to me on Twitter or at [email protected] (put “RUNDOWN” in the subject line). I am the first writer to ever answer reader mail in a column. Do not look up this last part.

From John:

Why does Bosch write with his left hand but shoot with his right? His daughter also does this.

This is a wonderful email that I do not have anything approaching an actual response for. I include it here for three important reasons:

• I am so jealous of John for noticing this and for the rush he must have felt upon putting it together
• I am honestly kind of honored/touched that anyone would have this realization and think “I should email Brian about this,” in a way that somehow validates every career-based decision I’ve made to this point
• I am going to post some screencaps of Lance Reddick grumbling Bosch’s name

Yes, again.

And that was not the only objectively perfect email I received this week. That’s right, ladies and gentlemen, we have a TWO EMAIL SITUATION. Look at this.

From Joe:

Do you ever think about how the Fast and Furious movies are our generation’s version of the Beatles? They both came onto the scene when we were teens or young adults and grew/matured with us as we got older. Both introduced western audiences to eastern culture, the Beatles with religion and philosophy, and Fast and Furious with the concept of Tokyo Drifting. Both were super popular, but also had groups of people who will say they never “got them.” Obviously Paul Walker is the John Lennon of this analogy, each dying much younger than anyone expected. Lastly, both the Beatles and Fast and Furious will cause men of certain ages to go on long rants, much like this email I sending to you. Not sure how fleshed out this idea is, but somehow it makes sense to me and I knew I had to send it to you.

The thing I enjoy about this, in addition to, like, all of it, is that this analogy almost certainly means Ludacris is Ringo. That was a fun thing to get to think and type. I do not take any of this for granted.

AND NOW, THE NEWS

To Texas!

An unknown suspect reportedly stole “thousands of dollars worth of briskets” from an Austin favorite, la Barbecue, early Thursday morning.

BRISKET HEIST

WE HAVE A BRISKET HEIST

I NEED EVERYONE TO FOCUS

According to the restaurant, the unknown suspect allegedly broke into the restaurant on East Cesar Chavez Street in East Austin shortly after 4 a.m. The restaurant said he jumped over the side fence, cut off barbecue pit locks and loaded more than twenty whole briskets into an SUV before driving off.

There’s a lot going on here in a lot of ways but I want you to stop and take a second and think about this guy’s entire day leading up to the moment he decided to hop a fence and steal 20 whole briskets. That is so much brisket. What is he even doing with it all? I need a six-episode docuseries about it as soon as anyone can get one shot and edited.

The restaurant is asking for help in identifying the suspect and asks that anyone with information call the Austin Police Department. The incident is reportedly la Barbecue’s fifth break-in.

I changed my mind. I want a 10-episode docuseries now. There is too much to get to in six. Especially now that we might have a meat heist epidemic on our hands. I like to think it’s all the same guy and he has a walk-in cooler full of slow-cooked meats the way an art thief has a room full of paintings he stole. I hope he just sits there and admires them sometimes, like how Thomas Crown stole a painting just for the rush and kept it in his house hidden in a wall.

But with brisket.

I cannot stress this last part enough.

The meat bandit rides again.

After already dropping $3.1 million to purchase Casa Bonita, a beloved Mexican restaurant in their hometown, South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone are reportedly spending more than four times that amount in renovations. According to plans, permits, and photos obtained through an open records request in Lakewood, Colorado, Parker and Stone are dropping over $12 million to restore the restaurant to its former glory after years of neglect.

Via 9NEWS:

For the most part, the plans indicate the iconic elements inside Casa Bonita such as the dive pool, Black Bart’s Cave and seating areas will undergo repairs and improvements to match the original feel of the restaurant.

Yet the kitchen and bathrooms are undergoing substantial renovations while audio and visual elements are being improved, such as new projectors, loudspeakers, lighting, and security cameras throughout the restaurant.

The South Park creators are also dropping a significant amount on better accessibility for Casa Bonita. The duo are building ramps, adding a new vertical platform lift, and clearing space for “increased accessible seating.” In short, they’re not sparing any expense in bringing Casa Bonita back to life even though they’ve fully admitted that the situation is a “nightmare” and taking on the project was “really dumb.”

During a recent interview, they revealed that the previous owners did nothing to bring the building up to code, and that’s required the South Park duo to basically redo everything including razing and reinstalling Casa Bonita’s iconic fountain.

“The previous owners deferred maintenance in an almost superhuman way,” Stone told The Denver Post. “They just didn’t take care of anything. And they ran it completely into the ground.”

(Via 9NEWS)

Jessie Reyez is back with the announcement of her new album Yessie out this fall. This comes with the release of her new single “Mutual Friend,” a sonically haunting track with vividly resentful lyrics that tell an immersive story: “Our mutual friend / Don’t know that you’re too self-serving / But I do and that’s why your words don’t mean sh*t,” she sings, and adds: “And guess what? / This heartbreak morphed into hate.”

The video is as powerful as the song, depicting Reyez singing in a house and getting swept up into a visceral dance choreography. One scene captures the singer sitting on a couch surrounded by dying flowers — a heavily symbolic image that evokes the same intense emotions as the ballad does. The lyrics grow even more clever and razor-sharp as the song continues to build over the course of nearly four minutes: “And guess what / Your karma’s that you love me still,” she sings.

Yessie follows the eclectic 2020 LP Before Love Came To Kill Us, which soon after became extended as a surprise deluxe album that features verses from A Boogie Wit Da Hoodie, Rico Nasty, and more.

Watch the stunning video for “Mutual Friend” above.

Yessie is out 9/9 via FMLY/Island Records.

After watching the first episode of the record-breaking fourth season of Stranger Things, I nearly pitched an article to my editor with the headline, “Stranger Things Has A Toy Story Problem.” The gist of the post would have been with every season and movie, Stranger Things and Toy Story, respectively, add new characters, leading to diminished screen time for our old favorites. I enjoyed Ducky and Bunny in Toy Story 4, but not as much as I love Rex, who barely factored into the (still very good) film. The reason I never pitched the piece, however, is because by episode two of the Netflix series, I was obsessed with Eddie, Chrissy (even if she didn’t make it past the premiere), Argyle, Enzo, and most of the new characters. Except Jason. Jason deserved what he got.

It must be tempting for creators Matt and Ross Duffer to try and find another Eddie for the fifth and final season of Stranger Things (Metallica would enjoy that), but in an interview with IndieWire, the brothers vowed to keep the focus on the original cast. “We’re doing our best to resist [adding new characters] for season five. We’re trying not to do that so we can focus on the OG characters, I guess,” Ross said.

Matt also discussed the process behind adding a new character:

“Whenever we introduce a new character, we want to make sure that they’re going to be an integral part of the narrative. So that’s something with Eddie this season, where we go, ‘Well, we need a character here for this storyline to really work, and to give it the engine that is needed.’ But every time we do that, we’re nervous, because you go, ‘We’ve got a great cast of characters here, and actors, and any moment we’re spending with a new character, we’re taking time away from one of the other actors.’ So we’re just very, very careful about who we’re introducing. And then specifically in the casting process, it took a very long time to find Joe Quinn, and you just go through so many edits, because you know that we can’t add someone that’s going to just take away from our characters if they’re not terrific.”

Stranger Things season five is expected to premiere, well, there’s no expected premiere date yet. But hopefully it comes quicker than the three years between seasons three and four.

(Via IndieWire)

The past few days have been tough for Michelle Branch. On August 11, she accused husband and The Black Keys drummer Patrick Carney of infidelity, writing in a now-deleted tweet, “Just found out my husband cheated on me with his manager […] while I was home with our 6 month old daughter.” This morning, she confirmed she and Carney are separating, saying in a statement, “To say that I am totally devastated doesn’t even come close to describing how I feel for myself and for my family. The rug has been completely pulled from underneath me and now I must figure out how to move forward. With such small children, I ask for privacy and kindness.”

Now, there’s another layer to the story: Branch was reportedly arrested for domestic violence against Carney.

TMZ reports that police were called to Branch and Carney’s home for a possible domestic disturbance. This happened at around 2 a.m. on Thursday morning (August 11), which was shortly after Branch shared her aforementioned tweet, which was posted just minutes earlier at 1:28 a.m. According to court documents, Branch admitted to slapping Carney in the face “one to two times” and was arrested and taken into custody. Carney did not appear to have any visible injuries.

Page Six notes the Davidson County Sheriff’s Office confirmed with them that Branch was released late Thursday after posting a $1,000 bail. TMZ notes “it appears she was released from custody early because she’s breastfeeding the couple’s 6-month-old.” Page Six reports Branch has a hearing scheduled for November 7 to face a charge of domestic assault by offensive/provocative conduct.

Carney has yet to offer a public statement about the alleged infidelity or Branch’s domestic assault charge.

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

A spicy, lime-filled, ice-cold cocktail is perfect for the dog days of summer. The sweltering heat of August cries out for a little chili pepper to help us sweat and cool down while also demanding something deeply thirst-quenching and citrus-y. Enter the spicy vodka gimlet.

While the classic gimlet is generally made with gin and Rose’s Lime, a hot summer day feels more like a vodka day. It’s simpler and less taxing without those gin botanicals. Add in some serious chili pepper that mimics the cooling juice from the bottom of a cold ceviche or pico de gallo bowl, and you’re really set.

To achieve that we’re using a very specific chili pepper vodka for this recipe, St. George Green Chile Vodka. That expression is made with layers of fresh bell peppers and various California-grown hot and mild chili peppers, along with a touch of lime and cilantro. The corn-vodka base is also dialed in and doesn’t have any of that “crafty” butterscotch or steely note that so many small producers can’t seem to get past when making their juice. This is high-quality flavored vodka that over-delivers on the promise of its label, making it perfect for this cocktail.

Now then, let’s get shaking!

Also Read: The Top Five Cocktail Recipes of the Last Six Months

• Our ‘Perfect Whisky And Coke’ Recipe Uses The Last Brand You’d Expect
• The Hemingway Daiquiri Is A Deeply Refreshing Summer Cocktail — Here’s The (Very Simple) Real Recipe
• The Godfather Is A Simple Scotch Cocktail To Power You Through Winter
• Recipe: The Amaretto Sour Is The Ideal Cocktail To Close Out January
• The Tom Collins Is A Classic Cocktail That’s Perfect For The Hotter Days Ahead

The Spicy Vodka Gimlet

Ingredients:

• 2 oz. St. George Green Chile Vodka
• 0.75 oz. Rose’s Lime
• Lime peel
• Ice

This is all pretty straightforward. I won’t restate everything about St. George’s chili pepper vodka from above. Still, this is the perfect base for this recipe. You can get the bottle here. Alternatively, you can use a standard chili pepper vodka if you can’t find this. Or you can infuse some standard vodka with sliced chili pepper overnight and then strain the pepper from the vodka and, voila, you have pepper vodka. But be warned, you won’t get the same depth/nuance as using St. George Green Chile.

Lastly, any legit gimlet needs Rose’s Lime, which you can find at any grocery or liquor store.

What You’ll Need:

• Cocktail shaker
• Cocktail strainer
• Coupe or lowball glass
• Jigger
• Paring knife

Method:

• Prechill the glass in the freezer for at least an hour.
• Add the two ounces vodka, .75 ounce lime cordial, and a handful of ice to a cocktail shaker. Affix the lid and shake gently for 10 to 15 seconds or until the shaker is ice cold to touch.
• Remove the glass from the freezer and strain the cocktail into it.
• Cut a thin slice of peel from a lime and express the oils over the glass (gently bend with your thumb and index finger with the outside of the long edges of peel toward the glass, making sure not to break the peel).
• Drop in the peel and serve.

Bottom Line:

This is great. It’s kind of like a spicy lime shooter in a cocktail format. The citrus is soft and welcoming, creating a limeade vibe while the chili, cilantro, and bell pepper all make appearances, which really add some depth.

This isn’t too hot but there is a fresh green chili pepper edge that kind of feels like standing in a pepper field and taking a bite of a fresh green chili pepper right off the vine. The mild cilantro and almost creamy lime really help balance the heat toward citrus and sweet, creating a nice nuance to the cocktail.

Overall, this is one of those cocktails that goes down almost too easily on a hot summer day. Consider yourself warned.

At some point over the last decade, there was a shift in how people responded to certain movies. Instead of getting one good Marvel movie every few years that satisfied fans and critics alike, the studio decided to jam-pack as much superhero content as they possibly could in one year, releasing various streaming shows, movies, and even some multiverse one-shot episodes. Yes! They are fun! But as time went on…they just became the standard. And fans have grown to expect handfuls of trailers and movies every year.

Others in the industry have noticed this. While fans love getting to see their favorite Marvel superheroes as much as possible, it becomes less of an exciting thing and more of an expected thing, which is the problem, according to the Watchmen showrunner Damon Lindelof.

Lindelof joined Vulture’s “Into It” Podcast to talk about a number of fun topics, including why Marvel just won’t let some of their storylines get a nice easy ending. He explained, “It’s always going to be hard because once you’ve got someone’s attention, you want to keep it. And so the idea of letting it go and not knowing if you’re ever going to get it back again is sort of like, it’s antithetical to the way that we’re wired.” It’s true: everyone loves to see Thor onscreen, as they have for the last decade. But when is it time to, you know, let Chris Hemsworth do anything else?

“From a slightly sort of more cynical standpoint, this is a business. It’s an industry. And if you make a couple of great Marvel movies, the instinct is, ‘We need to make more Marvel movies, and we need to expand this,’” Lindelof explained. “And I have this sort of interior feeling of like, ‘Wow, I wish they made less because it would make each one that came out a little bit more special. But I watch all of them. … People don’t want things to end. I do.”

It can make things seem a little less exciting when fans are constantly bombarded with new superheroes and content every few months, instead of taking the time to appreciate what they had so they can be praised individually instead of lumped together with seven other movies. As Marvel’s VFX artists have been pleading with the company for more time and pay, it’s time we learn to spread out these releases a bit more. It’ll be like 2008 again! So retro!

Of course, Lindelof knows that it’s ultimately a business that needs to keep making money. “I don’t begrudge them the right to keep it going. I’ve made prequels and sequels and reboots, so I can’t be a hypocrite and say, ‘God, come up with an original idea.’ Meanwhile, I’m making two Star Trek movies and Prometheus.” There is nothing wrong with a couple of fun reboots here and there….as long as they are good.

(Via Variety)