Jon Gruden’s tenure at the helm of the Las Vegas Raiders came to an end last month after a handful of emails from his time as an analyst for ESPN became public and showed him using racist and homophobic language. Now, Gruden has decided to take the league and its commissioner to court over allegations that he lost his job due to a “Soviet-style character assassination.”

According to a lawsuit filed in Clark County District Court on Thursday, the NFL and Roger Goodell are being sued for “a malicious and orchestrated campaign” that “sought to destroy the career and reputation of Jon Gruden.” The now-former coach’s lawyer released a statement to Tom Pelissero of NFL Network, pointing out that Gruden’s emails were the only ones out of the entire 650,000 that the league collected as part of his investigation into the Washington Football Team that were made public.

Gruden used racist language in one email to describe NFLPA executive director DeMaurice Smith during the time of the 2011 NFL lockout, while others included homophobic slurs being used to describe Goodell and former Rams and Cowboys Michael Sam, who was the first openly gay player to get drafted.

While the Raiders did not fire Gruden as the result of these emails, the lawsuit alleges that the “Defendants ratcheted up the pressure by intimating that further documents would become public if Gruden was not fired. They followed through with this threat by leaking another batch of documents to the New York Times for an October 11, 2021 article.” Gruden was hired by the Raiders in 2018, his second stint as the franchise’s head coach, and compiled a 22-31 record before his resignation.

Over the summer, Jason Momoa and Dave Bautista started joking about a Lethal Weapon-style buddy cop movie that initially began as a tweet from Bautista before Momoa picked up the ball and ran with it during an appearance on The Late Late Show. Of course, you can’t toss out an idea like that without turning a few heads, and that’s exactly what happened as barely a week later, things started moving to get the film off the ground and shooting in Momoa’s home state of Hawaii. (The Aquaman star sweetened the deal by telling James Corden that Bautista will wear a Speedo and Momoa will bust out his trademark board shorts.)

Jump to this week, where the future buddy cop team are now wrapping up a four-studio bidding war, which reportedly saw MGM walk away with the winning bid for the untitled film. Via Deadline:

The duo pitched it all over town this week, with Jonathan Tropper writing. The connection between the writer and stars comes from See, the Apple TV+ drama series that stars the duo. Tropper also scripted the upcoming Shawn Levy-directed The Adam Project with Ryan Reynolds. The film came from an original idea from Momoa, Bautista and Tropper. The studio will develop it, but the principals have made rich deals that kick in when the picture goes into production.

While there’s no director attached yet, Momoa and Bautista are hoping to start filming in 2023 after they finish up production on Aquaman and The Lost Kingdom and Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol 3. respectively. Also, after a global pandemic, we all need this win sooner rather than later. Momoa and Bautista stopping crime on the beach with huge Lethal Weapon vibes? Pour it in our veins.

(Via Deadline)

Home Sweet Home Alone (Disney+ film) — There’s no Macaulay Culkin, no Joe Pesci, and No Daniel Stern here, but this still looks like a marvelous reboot to the franchise. Archie Yates stars as Max Mercer, who’s as resourceful as Kevin McCallister when his family inadvertently leaves him behind while on vacation. Ellie Kemper and Rob Delaney star as two married thieves who wanna steal a priceless heirloom, and expect Kenan Thompson to make an appearance amid all the holiday hijinks.

The World According to Jeff Goldblum: Season 2 (Disney+ series) — Jazzy Jeff Goldblum (no really, he’s a best-selling jazz artist, and not a DJ) catapulted to fame while unbuttoning his shirt during the first Jurassic Park film. These days, however, Jeff’s pursuing more intellectually curious endeavors, and that’s going down on his delightfully quirky National Geographic show on Disney+. After exploring the origins of ice cream (you must watch that episode), he’s about to leap into your heart for another round of episodes, this time while exploring magic, fireworks, monsters, dogs, and dance.

More Disney+ Day Content:: Under the Helmet: The Legacy of Boba Fett, Shang-Chi and The Legend of The Ten Rings, Jungle Cruise, Olaf Presents, Ciao Alberto, and Marvel Studios’ 2021 Disney+ Day Special will arrive as previously announced. In addition, expect some new documentary action in Billie Eliish’s The Making of Happier than Ever: A Love Letter to Los Angeles, Marvel Assembled: The Making of Shang-Chi and The Legend of The Ten Rings, and Marvel Studios Legends: Hawkeye.

Red Notice (Netflix film) — A few years ago, Netflix set the stage for their supposed biggest (and most expensive) movie ever, and a lot of that has to do with the leading cast: Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, Gal Gadot, and Ryan Reynolds. Well, we’re finally about to see what hundreds of millions of dollars purchased. Gal plays a notorious crook who mops the floor with Johnson’s FBI agent and Reynolds’ (also notorious) art thief, and yeah, I hope they never catch her. Even though she won’t be wielding the Wonder Woman magic lasso, she’s guaranteed to kick ass.

Here’s some regularly scheduled programming:

SNL (Saturday, NBC 10:29pm) — Host Jonathan Majors and musical guest Taylor Swift.

Blade Runner: Black Lotus (Saturday, Crunchyroll and Adult Swim) — This anime series takes place in 2032 LA, where a young woman awakens with deadly skills, a wiped memory, a locked data device and a black lotus tattoo. She sets off in search of her lost identity, and you can stream this new event series in Japanese (with subtitles) on Crunchyroll or watch the English dub on Adult Swim.

Succession (Sunday, HBO 9:00pm) — The annual shareholders’ meeting sees Logan’s health deteriorate, and Kendall learns to get along with the fam, for appearance’s sake.

Fear The Walking Dead (Sunday, CBS 9:00pm) — Dwight and Sherry’s entire future is up for grabs, along with their code, during a rescue mission.

Dexter (Sunday, Showtime 9:00pm) — The most beloved serial killer of all time, is back with a brand new life. The old life, however, is coming for him, and he’s way out of his element and out of practice. The new season is a bloody good time, and this week, Dexter’s gotta mop up his return to homicide and, you know, that Harrison thing.

BMF (Starz 8:00pm) — Meech is plotting for revenge while Lamar’s seeking shelter, and blood’s pouring in the streets while everything’s more complicated than ever.

Mayor of Kingstown (Paramount 9:00pm) — Jeremy Renner alongside Kyle Chandler and Dianne Wiest as a member of the power-brokering McLusky family, who are running their Michigan town with no hope for anyone else to prevail. Expect explosive drama and a gritty outlook, all while exploring the themes of justice and corruption and inequality. Taylor Sheridan (Yellowstone, Sons of Anarchy) co-created here. He did not come to play.

Hightown (Starz 9:00pm) — Frankie’s looking over one shoulder while Renee’s getting ruthless, all while Jackie and Ray are feeling some unsettling realities.

Insecure (Sunday, HBO 10:00pm) — Issa’s dealing with awkwardness while mixing a work event with a new relationship, all as Molly’s got multiple suitors coming her way.

The Walking Dead: The World Beyond (Sunday, AMC 10:00pm) — Someone’s under suspicion, and it’s a full-on investigation.

Yellowjackets (Sunday, Showtime 10:00) — This show’s an intense survival epic and a psychological horror story with plenty of coming-of-age touches, too, all revolving around plane crash survivors in the wilderness. They’re initially a thriving team that divides without conquering and the show also visits their future, decades later, while they’re reliving trauma and realizing that you can never leave a past like that one behind for good. As if you needed another reason not to hop on an airplane these days, right?

Curb Your Enthusiasm (Sunday, HBO 10:30pm) — Larry’s attempting to appeal to Woody Harrelson, and that dream brings unintended consequences, all after Larry takes Susie’s rabbi out golfing.

Last Week Tonight (Sunday, HBO 11:00) — John Oliver, baby.

Here’s some more streaming goodness for your weekend.

Clifford The Big Red Dog (Paramount+ film) — This live-action movie is both adorable and symptomatic of utter chaos, but the first thing that’s worth remembering about the original animated series that “love” is the reason why Clifford is so big. Remember that when you start thinking about Venom tongue-reveal after spotting the “cute” tail wagging from underneath a blanket, and when he sprints into Central Park, attempting to “play” with an unfortunate human who’s stuck inside of a giant plastic hamster ball. Don’t even try to resist the Big Red Charisma.

The Shrink Next Door: Season 1 (Apple TV+ series) — Paul Rudd stars as the therapist from hell, who simply does not believe in boundaries, as the title of this show suggests. Will Ferrell plays his unfortunate patient, and the dark comedy series builds an unnerving tension while also charting decades of a relationship between these two men. Both Rudd and Ferrell can’t help but be funny, but their dramatic sides will shine through here, too. Fortunately, they’ve also got Kathryn Hahn and her serious wig game on board for extra clout, but when and where will Paul Rudd end up dancing in this story?

Always Jane: Season 1 (Amazon Prime series) — This series follows a transgender teen in rural New Jersey. Jane wants more than small-town life, but her family is pretty amazing, too, all while finding humor in the most unexpected places.

The Freak Brothers: Season 1 (Tubi series) — Woody Harrelson, Pete Davidson, and John Goodman play the title-character freaks in this animated series that updates The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers comic (created by Gilbert Shelton) that first surfaced in 1968. They’re all stoners, and Tiffany Haddish voices their ornery cat as they barrel through San Francisco, looking for their next high.

Kamikaze: Season 1 (HBO Max series) — This Polish show might not be on your radar yet, but it arrives with a riveting premise: what happens to one’s identity when everything that matters in your life disappears in one panicked heartbeat? Marie Reuther portrays a young woman who gets a terrible text message — her entire family is about to go down in a plane crash — that changes everything.

Ragdoll: Season 1 (AMC+ series) — The Killing Eve producers are on the case in this psychological thriller series that follows a disgraced London Police detective, who’s making a sort-of comeback in a particularly grim case. That would be the discovery of a literal “ragdoll” of body parts (from six murder victims), and it’s the work of a serial killer who’s already got a hit list for six more people, including Mr. Detective Himself. He joins the team to race against time, and the series also captures the fractured personal lives of several people on and connected with the case.

Narcos: Mexico: Season 3 (Netflix series) — Drug lord extraordinaire Félix Gallardo warned Agent Walt Breslin that he’d freed a circus of animals within the drug war, and he wasn’t joking. The cartels are poppin’ while the show does a hell of a wrap-up job on the dramatization of a real-life saga (and the Pablo Escobar-centered beginnings of Narcos). Fortunately, the spirit of Pablo is still around, sort-of, given that actor Wagner Moura has returned to direct, and Breslin and the fledgling DEA sure have their work cut out for them with hydra heads springing up everywhere.

For better or worse, the world just can’t seem to stop talking about Guardians of the Galaxy star Chris Pratt, and Busy Philipps is merely the latest celebrity to join the conversation. Following Pratt announcing his leading roles in both the upcoming Super Mario Bros. and Garfield movies, the actor came under some serious fire for sharing a tribute to his wife to his Instagram with what many are calling a somewhat patronizing caption.

Shared on November 2, the post was made to serve as an early birthday present to Pratt’s wife, Katherine Schwarzenegger. While the photo itself is fairly innocuous, the caption almost immediately set off alarms with some people, with Pratt writing, “she helps me with everything. In return, periodically, I open a jar of pickles. That’s the trade. Her heart is pure and it belongs to me. My greatest treasure right next to my Ken Griffey Jr Upper Deck Rookie card.”

While Pratt might not have intended for the post to come across maliciously, some were quick to point out how possessive Pratt sounded in his caption. Others drew attention to how strange it was to thank Schwarzenegger for a “healthy baby” following his first child with actress Anna Farris having various medical issues. Among those to critique Pratt’s words is Busy Philipps, who addressed the post in the latest episode of her podcast Busy Philipps Is Doing Her Best. On the podcast, Phillips criticizes Pratt for “centering himself” and making “tired gender jokes,” telling listeners:

“You’re probably not the type of lady that will laugh enthusiastically if you’re with a man and he starts to make very tired gender jokes about responsibilities and duties and even like, the f***ing tired bit that he’s doing which is, ‘She runs the show I occasionally open a bag of pickles. That’s how f***ing dumb what he said is. You are a Marvel superhero. You made $480 million last year. You work non-stop. You don’t just open a f***ing jar of pickles.”

Phillips then continued to dig into Pratt, saying the post was “patronizing” and reinforced the notion of a power imbalance seen in many households. She also said Pratt saying Schwarzenegger is his “greatest treasure right next to my Ken Griffey Jr Upper Deck Rookie card” makes it seem as if the star views his wife as an object.

“He has possessions, and she’s one of them .. What she does in their household is probably a lot. She probably does a lot of the domestic labor. They have a kid and whatever. That is actually legitimately a lot of f***ing work. But by the way he’s talking about himself, putting himself in it, in the center of it, it makes it seem like it’s bulls***.”

Prior to Pratt remarrying, Philipps admitted the two were friends and she even went on a vacation with Pratt and Farris while the two were expecting their son, Jack. Philipps said in the “before times” the actor was “super nice and funny,” but also “drank a lot” and was a bit of a “doomsday prepper.” She then added she no longer has any relationship with Pratt.

The best new hip-hop this week includes albums, videos, and songs from French Montana, Polo G, and more.

Here is the best of hip-hop this week ending November 10, 2021.

Albums/EPs/Mixtapes

Femdot — Not For Sale

Chicago rapper Femdot is a proud member of Windy City’s introspective, hyper-articulate underground scene, much like lyrical stalwarts Mick Jenkins, Noname, and Saba. His newest project, released Monday after he premiered one of its songs on COLORS a few weeks ago, continues his tradition of aching interiority and dazzling displays of wordplay.

French Montana — They Got Amnesia

French Montana is convinced that the rap game has forgotten about all the hits he’s delivered — as evidenced by memes to that effect, which he responded to in a good enough nature. With that said, it appears he’s on a mission to remind us all that he’s a relatively strong hitmaker in his own right.

Joell Ortiz — Autograph

One of the last standing members of the blog era explosion of the late noughties, Ortiz remains laser-focused on delivering bruising, surprisingly poignant bars over neck-cracking beats. Autograph is billed as his most personal project to date, with features from fellow rap-first veterans Cyhi The Prynce, Kxng Crooked, and Sheek Louch of The Lox.

Landstrip Chip — Catch My Good Side

Atlanta behind-the-scenes string-puller Landstrip Chip hasn’t always flourished in front of the cameras, preferring instead to pen hits for the likes of City Girls, Dreamville, Gucci Mane, Latto, Tinashe, and more. Now, though, he’s got a new deal with Asylum and this new nine-track project teed up to reintroduce the world at large to his lustrous songwriting and performance.

Smiley — Buy Or Bye 2

OVO Sound’s newest signee looks to capitalize on the viral buzz from last year’s YYZ – LAX EP, delivering a longer tracklist this time around and tapping the talents of fellow Toronto rising star Pressa, LA underground upstart OhGeesy, Mobile, Alabama crooner Yung Bleu, and, of course, OVO headman Drake.

Polo G — Hall Of Fame 2.0 [Deluxe Edition]

Following up his No. 1 album from June this year, Polo records a full album worth of material — 14 tracks — for a deluxe re-release.

Wynne & Christo — Do My Own Stunts [EP]

The Portland rapper and Pittsburgh producer teamed up to produce a six-song joint EP showcasing her deft, rapid-fire rhymes and his woozy, ribcage-rattling beats. Ranging from fast and furious battle rap to outer-spacey abstract braggadocio, the EP covers a lot of musical territory in a relatively short span, painting an optimistic picture of both artists’ respective futures.

Singles/Videos

Berwyn — “MIA”

Hailing from the streets of East London, Berwyn is a year removed from his debut mixtape Demotape/Vega and just months away from Tape 2/Fomalhaut and showing no signs of letting up anytime soon.

Blimes — “Swym”

After putting her stamp on the game with partner-in-rhyme Gifted Gab with last year’s Talk About It, the MC formerly known as Oh Blimey is back on the solo grind with a woozy, haunting comeback single packed with witty wordplay.

Loopy Ferrell — “Can’t Quit” Feat. G Herbo

A street-bred rapper from Mount Vernon, New York, Ferrell introduces his upcoming In The Loop We Trust, Vol. 1 project.

Pressa — “Dead Body” Feat. Rowdy Rebel

Toronto rapper Pressa taps in with the recently returned Rowdy Rebel for a haunting, chest-beating pledge of allegiance to the streets.

Remedy — “The Pulpit” Feat. Cappadonna, Conway The Machine & Ghostface Killah

Longtime Wu-Tang affiliate Remedy recruits two of the legendary rap crew’s members along with the Griselda ghoul for a four-minute onslaught of street-saturated lyricism.

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

I don’t think I’m alone when I say that a Home Alone sequel isn’t something that I was exactly dying to see in 2021. Even in 1990, when the original Home Alone was released, I probably wasn’t the target audience for it. Telling the story of Kevin McAllister, the forgotten child of a big Chicago area family who accidentally gets left behind on Christmas, it was a kind of wish-fulfillment fantasy for kids who, like Home Alone writer John Hughes, probably had huge families with lots of siblings and big, noisy Christmases and got sick of never having their own space.

As a rural only child (there are literally dozens of us!) with older cousins and no neighborhood children to speak of, I was alone often enough that it bordered on torture. As escapism, Home Filled With Other Kids For Some Reason probably would’ve been more my speed. In 2021, with the average household size steadily declining and most elementary school-aged kids coming off a year when they only got to see their friends through a computer screen, I have to imagine that the target demo for 2021’s version of Home Alone might be a lot more like me than like John Hughes. Loneliness seems more endemic to our current condition than parental neglect.

Yet we also live in a world where zombie IP seems to dictate a large chunk of our viewing options, timely or not. Remakes must flow! So it is we have a new Home Alone movie, Home Sweet Home Alone, the first Home Alone sequel since 1997’s Macauley-free Home Alone 3, though there were two more made-for-TV Homes Alone in 2002 and 2012. Thus, “another Home alone” isn’t exactly a fresh idea, but Disney+ sort of is, and so the latter demands the former.

All that being said: whichever crazy bastard decided to combine a Sacha Baron Cohen collaborator director (Dan Mazer) with Rob Delaney from Catastrophe, Ellie Kemper from The Office, Aisling Bea, and the chubby kid from Jojo Rabbit (Archie Yates) was clearly on to something. Or at least, this bastard was certainly more inspired than the last four or five Home Alone film creators, give or take. Home Sweet Home Alone has a unique comedic flavor that’s one part British comedy and one part American prestige television (Tim Simons, aka Jonah from Veep, also shows up playing Rob Delaney’s brother).

All these R-rated comedy heavy hitters and improvisers (combined with sharp dialogue, written by Mikey Day and Streeter Seidell) make for a shockingly successful mix in this PG-rated comedy. At least for a while. Delaney and Kemper play Jeff and Pam McKenzie, a Winnetka couple on the verge of losing their house while Jeff struggles to find a job. Young Max Mercer (Yates) and his mum (Aisling Bea) bumble Britishly into the McKenzies’ open house one day, and through a series of coincidences, Max ends up in possession of a creepy antique doll Jeff thinks might be the key to solving all his money problems. But how to get that doll back??

When Home Sweet Home Alone is just a general, light-hearted Christmas comedy, about down-on-his-luck Jeff and his obnoxious brother (Tim Simons) and this odd little British kid, it’s surprisingly enjoyable (minus a way over-the-top Pete Holmes who luckily ducks out early). There’s a subversive edge to the light comedy that you wouldn’t expect in Christmas comedy. “Is it even illegal to steal back something that was stolen from you in the first place?” Delaney asks.

“Yes!” Kemper hisses. “That’s what OJ got in trouble for! …The second time.”

Yet just when Home Sweet Home Alone seems to be firing on all cylinders, you can practically hear a studio exec demanding “But where are the booby traps?!”

Ah, yes, that.

Sadly, a little kid catching adults in a series of slapstick, weirdly mean-spirited booby trap gags is acknowledged as canon in the Home Alone series. No one denies this, and yet, I have to wonder: was that even really what people liked about Home Alone? Seems to me it was more about the fantasy of Kevin McAllister being all by himself on Christmas than Joe Pesci taking a flamethrower to the scalp (though Joe Pesci really was unmatched in the field of sounding like you’re swearing without really swearing). Home Sweet Home Alone seems slightly embarrassed to have to go throw this whole Nerf punji stick rigamarole, and maybe it should be.

The logic of IP maintenance dictates that certain parts of an original work are canon, and thus must reappear in the new iteration of that IP, regardless of how much it makes sense, or if the creators happened to accidentally discover a better movie along the way. The bits of Home Sweet Home Alone that are surprising and fun are in direct conflict with the bits that are required for it to be called “Home Alone.” Home Sweet Home Alone seems like it would’ve been a much better remake of Christmas Vacation than of Home Alone, when it could’ve been free to be about a dopey dad’s clumsy attempts to save Christmas for his family rather than about a little kid who outsmarts adults with a series of painful traps.

The booby trap bits of Home Sweet Home Alone are by far its weakest element, but there are at least 40 solid minutes of pretty funny light-hearted Christmas comedy outside of that, which is probably 30-35 more than anyone could or should expect from a Home Alone sequel. Does that make it a win? Probably so.

While I was watching, it felt like the specter of an inevitable cameo by adult Macauley Culkin was haunting the entire thing, like some post-modern version of Chekhov’s gun where ancient IP is not just mined for content but begging to be congratulated for it. Perhaps the ultimate testament to Home Sweet Home Alone is that this cameo never came.

‘Home Sweet Home Alone’ is available November 12th, exclusively on Disney+. Vince Mancini is on Twitter. You can check out his film review archive here.

There are still a lot of questions about this year’s fatal Astroworld festival, and it would seem some of those are coming from Travis Scott himself, who apparently didn’t know about the chaos that was happening in the crowd while he was on stage.

Edwin F. McPherson, Scott’s lawyer, spoke about it on Good Morning America today. He was asked how much responsibility Scott bears for what happened and he said, “That’s what the investigations are about, that’s what we’re trying to get to the bottom of is: who is responsible. Because it obviously was a systemic breakdown that we really need to get to the bottom of before we start pointing fingers at anyone.”

He also said that information about what was happening didn’t get to him while he was performing, saying, “I think we’ve seen footage of police half an hour later just walking about and not looking like it was a mass casualty event. Clearly, the important thing is that never got to Travis, that never got to Travis’s crew. He’s up there trying to perform, he does not have any ability to know what’s going on down below, certainly on a mass level.”

McPherson went on to say that Scott didn’t really have the full picture of what happened until the next day, saying, “Travis didn’t really understand the full effect of everything until the next morning, truly. He did not know what was going on. […] Understand that when he’s up on the stage and he has flash pods going off around him, and he has an ear-monitor that has music blasting through it and his own voice, he can’t hear anything, he can’t see anything.”

Watch McPherson’s interview above.

In what has to be Joe Rogan‘s boldest and most unbelievable claim yet, the podcaster is now boasting that he’s so “super flexible” that he can orally satisfy himself if he wanted to. Yup, you read that right. Rogan, who’s been making headlines after being name-dropped in the Aaron Rodgers COVID vaccine fiasco, made the proud declaration on a recent episode of The Joe Rogan Experience where he made sure to note that he didn’t actually go through with the act. But he totally could! Via The New York Post:

“I’m super flexible. I’ve never done it — but I’ve put it around my face just to know I could do it,” Rogan bragged.

“What are you doing here then?” one of his guests quipped in disbelief, implying they’d constantly be performing the raunchy act on themselves if they were capable of doing so.

“You still have a d–k in your mouth — you can’t enjoy it!” Rogan replied with a laugh.

While it’s debatable that the bulky Rogan has that level of flexibility — and, hey, maybe he does — at least he’s not spreading vaccine misinformation or touting ivermectin to his millions of users. At this point, Joe Rogan can say he has the power of flight, and it’d be better than filling his audience’s head with quack cures in the middle of a pandemic. You can bench press Superman, Joe? Awesome. Just as long as no one’s talking about horse paste.

(Via New York Post)

When Saweetie’s “Get It Girl” was teased in a Beats By Dre ad earlier this month, many assumed it would be a part of her upcoming album. Well, the full song was shared today and it turns out that it’s actually appearing on the upcoming soundtrack album for the fifth and final season of Issa Rae’s HBO series Insecure.

Rae recently told Billboard of the important role music plays in the show, “From the beginning, music has played an integral part in Insecure. The music itself is a character — it’s a friend, it’s a familiar voice and that’s always been the intention. Music has a way of taking us back to a specific memory or moment in time and I think a lot of people can relate to that when they hear a song on the show. When it came to developing the final soundtrack, I knew [Insecure music supervisor Kier Lehman] and [Rae’s record label Raedio] could capture that feeling and leave our fans with something they can always return to, while also providing a platform for emerging artists to have their voices heard on an international scale.”

Benoni Tagoe, Raedio president and Rae’s longtime business partner, also noted, “Insecure and the Insecure soundtrack acts as a tool to break artists or at least introduce people to artists. [Rae has] told me there’s times when she may have picked a song, and she feels like if she watches a cut of Insecure and the song doesn’t fit, it really ruins it for her.”

Meanwhile, Saweetie is getting ready for a major step in career, as she’s set to make her first appearance as a Saturday Night Live musical guest on November 20.

Listen to “Get It Girl” above.

Insecure: Music From The HBO Original Series, Season 5 is out 12/3 via Raedio/Atlantic Records/HBO.

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

In a recent appearance on the “Marchand and Ourand” podcast, Shaquille O’Neal refuted Charles Barkley’s longtime claim that Barkley’s current contract with TNT’s Inside The NBA will be his last. When John Ourand inquired about the legitimacy of that stance, O’Neal was adamant in his skepticism.

“He’s never gonna quit,” O’Neal said. “Charles is gonna be here forever. We need him, and he needs us. I’m convinced that if I’m retired and I don’t do nothing, I will falter away. This is what we do and what we live for. It’s what we’ve been doing, and we need each other.

“We keep each other going. Look, I’ve been here 11 years. I’ve heard that spiel before, but he’s gonna be here till the wheels fall off.”

In June, Barkley, 58, said he’s “trying to hang on for another couple years” and intends to retire from the show at that point.

“Then, they can kiss my ass,” said Barkley, who’s been a member of Inside The NBA for 20 years. “I’m only working until I’m 60.”

At the very least, it is nice to get the occasional reminder of how much everyone at Inside likes working with one another, because when they argue with each other — like when they were discussing whether Shaq was better than Wilt Chamberlain or whether or not James Harden is the best 1-on-1 player of all-time — things get heated. Then again, they are willing to turn to one another for support when their hamstrings tighten up, which is a tried and true sign of friendship.