Category: News

Ted Cruz often makes it too easy for the internet to mercilessly drag him but that didn’t stop Anderson Cooper from bringing his “A” game during a CNN segment blasting the Texas senator for comments he made about America’s military servicemen and women.

During a weekend taping, Cooper sharpened his linguistic knives to publicly humiliate the man whose recent accomplishments include falling asleep during a presidential address and inspiring the trending hashtag #FatWolverine after Cruz shared a Russian propagandist video that seemed to dunk on our troops. The original tweet showed footage of Russian military members training before cutting to an American woman who credited her two Queer moms as her inspiration for joining the service. In response, Cruz posted this:

And sure, Twitter almost immediately came for the human possum with some brilliant digs and clever wordplay, but we’re here to show some respect for Cooper, who dedicated a handful of on-air minutes to absolutely shredding what little is left of the man’s dignity.

After confirming that he does indeed still think about the time Cruz abandoned his fellow Texans, leaving them to die in a snowstorm while he jetted off to Cancun before later blaming the ill-timed trip on his pre-teen daughters (we do too, Anderson), the CNN host suggested Cruz might have first seen the video on far-right, fascist-supporting media since that’s where the video originated. He then mocked Cruz’s shockingly lazy follow-up post, one that employed the use of the “old anti-gay slur” to call our troops “pansies.”

“A word I’m quite sure he’s familiar with,” Anderson solemnly stated. “From his youth.”

Anderson then played an interview clip that shows Cruz confirming he did “think” about serving in the military at one point, but decided not to, stating it’s one of his biggest regrets. Anderson fired back, “I bet he does wish he served because it’d be better for him politically now” before adding that Cruz was “too busy in college pursuing other manly, un-pansy-like pursuits.” Those pursuits, according to a Daily Beast article written with the help of Cruz’s former classmates, included Cruz walking around the dorms in a “paisley bathrobe” and joining the “colonial eating club,” whatever the hell that is.

But, perhaps Anderson’s best dig doubles as a piece of advice Cruz should definitely follow in the future: if you didn’t serve in the military, don’t attack the men and women who did.

9-1-1 (Fox, 8:00pm) — A sniper’s targeting Los Angeles Fire Department members, which puts the 119 on the highest of alerts. Meanwhile, someone’s gotta make a life decision.

9-1-1: Lone Star (Fox, 9:00pm) — Austin is engulfed by a massive dust storm, which sends Rob Lowe and the 126 into action, so maybe they can intimidate the dust away through the power of handsomeness? It’s worth a shot.

All American (CW, 8:00pm) — Grace skipped her own college graduation ceremony, which spurs Spencer into party-planning mode with the help of Grace, and all of this puts reality on the back burner.

Black Lightning (CW, 9:00pm) — The series finale has arrived to put this game-changing and relevant series in the record books.

Debris (NBC, 10:00pm) — The Debris that’s sought after by Bryan and Finola end up in other parties’ hands, which changes everything.

Jimmy Kimmel Live — Elizabeth Banks, Danny Pudi, The Band Camino

The Late Show With Stephen Colbert — Anthony Anderson, Dr. Francis Collins

The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon — Dave Grohl, Jim Jefferies, Blake Shelton

Late Night With Seth Meyers — Ewan McGregor, Casey Wilson

The Late Late Show With James Corden — Don Cheadle, Rafe Spall

In case you missed these streaming picks:

Master of None: Season 3 (Netflix series) — It’s been (four) years since we’ve seen Aziz Ansari’s brainchild do its thing, and that’s not even (officially, at least) down to the pandemic. Ansari’s been largely out of the public eye following sexual misconduct allegations, although he did emerge a few years ago for an insightful comedy special that goes a long way to show that gazing inward, and this new batch of episodes proves it. Aziz takes a step behind the camera to direct in a season that he cowrote with the Emmy-winning Lena Waithe, whose character moves to the forefront.

Marvel’s M.O.D.O.K. (Hulu series) — Patton Oswalt’s indisputable knack for voice work recently managed to shock The Boys audience (that’s what happens when you “cameo” as a set of gills for the lead pervert character), and now he’s the leading man in a very adult-oriented animated series. Here, Oswalt’s portraying an egomaniacal supervillain (with a massive, unwieldy noggin) who’s struggling to balance his day job as a bad dude with family life (it happens, even to the most evil among us!). In the process, he’s gotta deal with a certain busybody named Tony Stark/Iron Man, who’s voiced by freaking Jon Hamm. Expect to hear Bill Hader, Whoopi Goldberg, Ben Schwartz, and Nathan Fillion all join the chorus as everyone on this show seems to want to push a bad man down.

Steve-O is living the good life. He’s 13 years sober, he’s vaccinated, and he reunited with Johnny, Wee Man, Chris Pontius, and the rest of his boys (minus Bam Margera) for Jackass 4. In a video on his YouTube channel, Steve-O discussed how he’s preparing for the fourth installment of the best film series of all-time (I am only sort of kidding).

“I might have actually talked a doctor into dressing up as a clown so that he could put a four inch needle into my spine and inject me with a drug that would paralyze me from the waist down while I was sprinting and before all kinds of terrible sh*t happened to me,” he said. It’s unclear whether Dr. Clown will be part of Jackass 4 or if it’s a solo stunt, but Steve-O is in the Bahamas with the Jackass gang “and we came first to Florida, where I took a detour to surprise my family.” He also broke a rule he has with his parents.

“In hindsight, that was a mistake because I broke a rule that I have with my family. Which is, they don’t want to hear about any dangerous stuff until it already happened and I’m OK. And I went to surprise them at the beginning of the trip, and I’m not good at keeping secrets.”

Luckily, as Steve-O told his mom and dad, he has “really good” insurance. He doesn’t reveal what the stunt was, but the video cuts to Steve-O telling Pontius that he “narrowly escaped with your life.” We’ll find out on October 22 when Jackass 4 is released.

“Go Bag” features interviews with our favorite actors, musicians, chefs, athletes, and thought leaders on how they stay mentally and physically fit on the road.

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Corey Caillet met Michael B. Jordan in Georgia while the actor was filming his 2015 comic book action movie, Fantastic Four.

“One of the crew said he was looking to get in shape,” says Caillet. “That same day, I met up with him for a workout at the gym.”

The rest is fitness history. The two have continued to work together, with Caillet guiding Jordan through body transformations for Creed, Black Panther, and, most recently, Amazon Prime’s Without Remorse. And though the trainer has gotten increasingly busy, he still travels with the superstar actor to film sets all over the world.

So it seemed only fitting to kick off our “Go Bag” series with Caillet and hear how he kept Michael B. military-level fit while living overseas in Berlin, Germany. All words are his.

ENERGY | Trail Mix

On the road, trail mix is one of our favorite snacks to have. I like that it is a healthy, fun snack and Michael likes that too. I could lie and tell you that we eat the super organic, dried fruit kind, but that’s not the truth. The truth is we like that classic trail mix with the chocolate pieces. I like dried fruit as a snack too, like apricots, cherries, and bananas, but you have to have the chocolate in the trail mix.

For a drink during the workouts, I like Reign energy drink, which has BCAAs and electrolytes. It is important to get something in the body before a workout.

BUY CLASSIC TRAIL MIX HERE: $2

STRENGTH | Iron Infidel Resistance Bands

I think having a set of resistance bands is crucial. The bands can address the whole body, but they are especially great for the arms and the back when you are isolated. They are also great to increase the difficulty of your pushups — put them around your back and they help the resistance both ways.

I like to put together a little high-intensity cardio workout, that could use bodyweight, but adding the resistance band in there to increase the tension. 30 seconds on, 30 seconds off. Curls, Thrust, Squat.

That hits everything.

BUY IRON INFIDEL BANDS HERE: $80

BODY ARMOR | Wolf Tactical Weighted Vest

Michael was wearing a lot of military gear for Without Remorse so we got him prepared for that by putting a weighted vest on him during our training sessions. That was during our prep, and when we got out to Germany we went into a store and purchased a vest. I think that we will use one during our training for Creed 3, too — I like how it adds that continuous load and makes him stronger.

We started training last week for Creed 3, I want to make sure that we outdo what we did before.

BUY A TACTICAL WEIGHT VEST HERE: $119

HYPE | Beats By Dre Headphones

The music is important to keep the vibes right. I like these noise-canceling headphones so that you can hear your tunes without bothering others. They are great for traveling too. Michael and I will have a lot of rap going when we are training, like Drake, DaBaby, Young Jeezy, and Old Jeezy too.

I particularly like The Recession. I also don’t mind a little different vibe like Tuxedo.

BUY BEATS WIRELESS HEADPHONES HERE: $199

MUSCLE FUEL | Dymatize ISO 100 Whey Protein

I like for us to hit a shake after we do our workouts. We train hard and we want to make the most out of all of them. This protein powder is great, just adding water. Michael likes the classic chocolate flavor, but I personally prefer the Fruity Pebbles version.

BUY HERE: $30

INTELLIGENCE | Whoop

My biggest thing these days is recovery, and I have been able to track that closer with the Whoop band. It provides a lot of great information that I want to know, like what our heart rates were at all times of our session. That is when you know the real work that is being done. I like to track my sleep as well. This is a whole other level to our game, and given us a deeper focus on meditation and sleep.

It is always good to know where your body is at. It is good to know whether or not you should go hard or not.

SUBSCRIBE TO WHOOP HERE: $30/MONTH

RECOVERY | Hyperice Go

I am a big fan of Hyperice for massage guns, and I like their new model which is smaller. Great for taking on the road, and makes sure that we are ready for the next session.

We all wish we could play every single video game that crosses out radar. There was a time where that was possible, but those days are long gone. With indie titles, the latest AAA, and the cost of some games exceeding $70 it’s harder than ever to play every game you’d like. Not to mention that some of us partake in service games such as Final Fantasy XIV, Destiny 2, or sports titles like FIFA or Madden. It might sound silly, but it’s quite frankly a lot of work to keep up with everything in gaming these days.

At least until the bizarre space the industry has been in for about a year now. While many studios were still able to release their titles amid a pandemic, the large majority of those were approaching completion anyways. It was the games that were still deep in development that felt the most impact from 2020. This is why multiple titles have seen delays such as Hogwarts Legacy, Gotham Knights, and Deathloop.

All these delays have left 2021 feeling light in terms of must-play video games. Sure, there’s been a handful of titles that have garnered attention such as Outriders, Returnal, and Resident Evil: Village. For many gamers, though, recent months have been a chance to get deep into their backlog of games by the time E3 approaches in June. The dearth of new mega titles has left a lot of us scrolling through Steam or the PlayStation Network looking for something new to play. In a way, though, this is perfect for those of us that want to play every game possible. We have backlogs going back years and it’s given us a chance to play through older games again, or remakes of older games.

2021 is in many ways the year of the backlog. Have an old RPG that you really wanted to try and couldn’t find the time for? Well, there’s no better time than now. The value of retro games increased by 33 percent since lockdowns began in early 2020 and there’s not much evidence of it slowing down. This is, at least in part, because everyone is breaking out old consoles or seeking out nostalgia to provide comfort.

Don’t have a way to play older games or older consoles? Another trend that’s seen a bump in gaming is remakes of older titles. Final Fantasy VII had a critically-acclaimed remake in 2020 that will be seeing PS5 exclusive DLC in the near future. Nintendo re-released three of Mario’s 3D adventures in one game, but that is unfortunately no longer being sold. The entire Mass Effect trilogy was recently remastered and packaged into one for anyone that has never gotten the opportunity to experience that franchise.

As video game fans seek comfort or nostalgia they look to remakes as their way to experience them in a modern environment. A lot of us sold our old consoles growing up, or they broke, some of them are complicated to set up on modern TVs — Don’t forget that the GameCube required an RYW cable. Retro gaming is hard and sometimes it’s easier to have a remake available, or at least a PC port. It’s also, relatively speaking, easy money for game companies to keep bringing back their most-beloved titles in new ways.

Remakes, retro dives, or just going through an old backlog of games are all perfectly reasonable ways to experience video games in 2021 while we wait for something new and truly great from developers. We’ve seen a lot of delays and there’s a good chance of seeing even more as the year goes on. But, in a lot of ways, the video game industry needs a gap year to get everything back to normal, and that doesn’t mean we can’t enjoy older experiences while we wait. There’s more to games than the newest release or the latest hot indie title. If there was ever a year to embrace the history of video games and actually play the games you bought but never gave a shot, this is the one.

Prince Harry has been refreshingly open about his mental health struggles for years, but in his new Apple TV docuseries on mental health, he’s bringing the public into a therapy session with him.

Harry, has spoken about the trauma of losing his mother when he was 12 and how therapy has helped him. In his new series, he shares the role that one form of therapy—EMDR—has played in dealing with past trauma.

EMDR stands for Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing and is a therapy that was developed in the 1980s. Dr. Francine Shapiro was walking through a park one day when she noticed that her eye movement seemed to ease her negative emotional responses to distressing memories. Over several years, she studied and tested that theory and discovered that others experienced the same kind of desensitizing with rapid eye movement. She added a cognitive component to process traumatic memories, and EMDR therapy was born.

Practitioners don’t just utilize eye movement, but also sounds or taps or movements that alternately stimulate both sides of the body. In the preview for the show, we see Prince Harry crossing his arms and tapping his shoulders. He says he uses the therapy when he flies into London, which he says reminds him of the loss of his mother.

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“One of the biggest lessons that I’ve ever learned in life is you’ve sometimes got to go back and to deal with really uncomfortable situations and be able to process it in order to be able to heal,” he said in the show.

EMDR is designed to facilitate that processing. Good Morning America shared a segment on Harry’s use of the therapy.

Prince Harry opens up about EMDR therapy in new show l GMA

www.youtube.com

The first time my own daughter was treated with EMDR, I was skeptical. She was seeing a therapist for emetophobia—a debilitating fear of vomiting—and EMDR was used to address traumatic memories she had of throwing up. I had heard of the treatment but had no idea what to expect.

“It’s a way of helping the brain recategorize the memory,” the therapist explained. “Imagine the brain is a hard drive, and you a memory that is filed under ‘trauma.’ Whenever you access that memory, feelings of trauma come up. With EMDR, we basically pull the memory from the trauma file, process it, and refile it into a different emotional category.”

“It’s almost like a therapy shortcut,” she said. “We can do essentially the same thing with talk therapy, but it takes a lot longer.”

The therapist then handed my daughter two paddles, one for each hand, connected by wires to a device. She asked her to visualize the memory she wanted to address, and while they talked it through, the paddles would alternately vibrate in her hands, right then left, right then left. It seemed odd, but research so far backs up its effectiveness. I’ve since met several people who credit EMDR with huge leaps in dealing with their trauma and its popularity seems to be increasing.

“It’s almost a wave that can’t be stopped because people are hearing their friends talk about it, they’re seeing the changes in their family members,” Wendy Byrd, a professional counselor and president of the board of directors at the EMDR International Association, told USA Today. “When I was trained in 2008, I would have to go in and explain what EMDR was and tell my clients why I thought it was such a good therapy. … Now, I would say almost everyone that comes into my door is asking me for EMDR.”

In the series, Harry talks to Oprah about the stigma surrounding mental health issues and the importance of seeking help when we need it.

“To make that decision to receive help is not a sign of weakness,” Harry says. “In today’s world, more than ever, it is a sign of strength.”

The Me You Can’t See — Official Trailer | Apple TV+

www.youtube.com

If you have traumatic experiences that you want help with, a therapist trained in EMDR might be able to help. Check out the EMDR International Association’s search tool to find an EMDR trained therapist in your area.

Since their respective passings, late rappers Juice WRLD and Nipsey Hussle have popped up on a number of projects. Now their posthumous catalogs will expand further with the release of Maroon 5’s upcoming album Jordi, on which both rappers feature. Juice guests on a track called “Can’t Leave You Alone,” while Hussle appears alongside YG on a remix of “Memories.”

Last month, Adam Levine explained the meaning of the album title, telling Ellen DeGeneres that it was named after Jordan Feldstein, the band’s former manager who passed away in 2017 at 40 years old of a pulmonary embolism. He said, “[It’s] named after our late, great, fabulous amazing ex-manager, who passed away a few years ago, sadly. And so we thought there was no better tribute than to name the album after our boy.”

Check out the full Jordi tracklist below.

1. “Beautiful Mistakes” Feat. Megan Thee Stallion
2. “Lost”
3. “Echo” Feat. Blackbear
4. “Lovesick”
5. “Remedy” Feat. Stevie Nicks
6. “Seasons”
7. “One Light” Feat. Bantu
8. “Convince Me Otherwise” Feat. HER
9. “Nobody’s Love”
10. “Can’t Leave You Alone” Feat. Juice WRLD
11. “Memories”
12. “Memories (Remix)” Feat. Nipsey Hussle & YG
13. “Button” Feat. Anuel AA & Tainy
14. “Lifestyle” (Jason Derulo Feat. Adam Levine)

Jordi is out 6/11 via 222/Interscope/Polydor. Pre-order it here.

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

Elon Musk, last seen dancing on national television dressed as Wario, continues his campaign in favor of joke cryptocurrency Dogecoin even as he irks others in the space with his comments and decisions. Dogecoin, which started as an essentially valueless cryptocurrency based on a dog meme, has risen to improbable heights in recent months, capping out ahead of Musk’s appearance on Saturday Night Live.

Musk tweeted about Dogecoin and encouraged investments into it a number of times, and as the crypto space has grown many new challenges have cropped up in recent weeks. There’s evangelical support and an influx of interest in the space, but with that comes very practical technical challenges in the physical world that can sink any crypto and other computing-based products. And Musk has started sparring with Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin about Dogecoin’s long-term prospects and viability challenges in recent days.

As Yahoo Finance detailed, Buterin was critical of Musk’s suggestions about Dogecoin in a blog post published on Sunday, where he directly advised against Musk’s suggestions to improve network speeds in an effort to make Dogecoin more scalable and, in effect, make it more popular.

There’s a lot going on here, as cryptocurrencies are all competing in some fashion. So while Musk’s suggestions here were not well-received by others in the space, there are a number of reasons why Dogecoin and Musk would get criticism. But Buterin, whose Ethereum has become the platform for many various non-fungible token (NFT) endeavors in 2021, certainly has the experience to weigh in on the practical impacts of Musk’s assumptions. Which is why his post contradicting Musk caused a stir this week.

Buterin begins the post by questioning how far one can “push the scalability of Blockchain,” before immediately tackling Elon Musk’s tweet about upping Dogecoin network parameters. After pointing out the complications of centralization and compromises on the technology, he says that there are important subtle factors that influence scaling.

Buterin argues that it’s “crucial for blockchain decentralization for regulators to be able to run a node.” He cites a striking example of how influential groups on a network if they wished to change protocol parameters, could very easily do so at the cost of regular users.

Buterin wasn’t alone in criticizing Musk, but the critique did get his attention. Musk responded on Twitter with, of course, a meme.

Musk has impacted the market in a number of ways recently, starting with his Tesla no longer accepting Bitcoin as payment for its vehicles until it is mined using a sustainable energy source. Sustainability and growth is a huge area of concern for digital currencies, as countries like China look to ban bitcoin mining amid indications that “mining” the currency shockingly uses more energy annually than entire modern industrialized nations. And on Monday, he asked for help in new ideas for Dogecoin on Twitter.

Even with its recent crashes, cryptocurrency is an extremely valuable sphere where innovation and influence will get people a lot of money, blockchain-based or otherwise. But the battle over just how to grow the market, and who will get that money, will apparently be waged in memes and blog posts between billionaires while the rest of us try to parse just exactly what it all means.

One of the biggest storylines to emerge with the release of J. Cole’s highly anticipated sixth studio album The Off-Season was the North Carolina rapper’s admission that his last fight was with Sean “Diddy” Combs in 2013. Until he confirmed it on “Let Go My Hand,” the fight was one of rap’s most mysterious rumors, growing out of murky reports of a heated exchange between Cole, Diddy, and Kendrick Lamar during an MTV VMA party in 2013. Cole’s manager and co-founder of Dreamville, Ibrahim “Ib” Hamad, further elaborated on the scuffle during a recent appearance on the Say Less podcast with Hennypalooza founders Kazeem “Kaz” Famuyide and Nile “Lowkey” Ivey.

“I just remember hearing about it and laughing,” Ib says of the speculative reporting surrounding the event that emerged in its aftermath. “‘Cause I was there. I’m not gonna go into detail, but it’s definitely not what people are saying.” While the widely circulated rumor has it that a piqued Puff tried to throw a drink on Kendrick Lamar in the wake of his saber-rattling “Control” verse (in which he declares himself “King of New York” despite originally hailing from California — a lyrical homage to hometown favorite Kurupt) and Cole intervened, Ib insists things happened differently.

“It was definitely not like he was defending Kendrick or something,” he claims. “It wasn’t like, ‘Don’t talk to Kendrick like that!’ Kendrick was there, Top was there, Jay was there, Beyoncé was there. Me and Cole. Grown men got a little heated. All I remember is, me and Jay looking at each other like, ‘Oh, these n****s ‘bout to fight.’ And then just being like, ‘Oh no, this is ‘bout to happen.’ I’ll leave it at that.” He also made sure to clarify that everyone talked it out later and settled matters relatively quickly.

If nothing else, it provided good content: J. Cole was able to incorporate the story — sans details, naturally — on his album. Cole verse on “Let Go My Hand” recalls, “My last scrap was with Puff Daddy, who would’ve thought it? / I bought that n**** album in seventh grade and played it so much / You would’ve thought my favorite rapper was Puff.”

You can check out the story at around 12:00 in the video above.

Since the NPR Tiny Desk Concert series has gone remote due to the pandemic, performers from all around the world have been more easily able to participate. Niger guitarist and singer Mdou Moctar is fresh off releasing his latest album, Afrique Victime, last week, and now he’s fresh off a new Tiny Desk performance, which was filmed in Niger.

The three-song set features “Ya Habibti,” “Tala Tannam,” and “Afrique Victime.” Mikey Coltun, Moctar’s bass player and producer, says of the performance, “The concert was filmed outside of the house we were all staying at in Niamey, Niger, in November/December 2020. As with any sort of musical happenings in the region, once some music is blasted, that’s an invitation for anyone to come join, sing, clap, dance, and just come together as a community. We wanted to present the Tiny Desk exactly like this, from when we started playing to finally the energy growing with fans crowded around filming on their cell phones and passing around Tuareg tea.”

In his review of Afrique Victime, Uproxx’s Steven Hyden notes of Moctar’s guitar skills, “Afrique Victime is loaded with moments where Moctar steps out of the song in order to ram his guitar directly into your guts. He does this for emotional effect, bending and blurring notes with the furious energy that defines one of his most obvious influences, Jimi Hendrix. But you suspect that Moctar also believes that ripping off a sick solo is extremely dope, which on this record it absolutely is.”

Watch Moctar’s Tiny Desk performance above.

Afrique Victime is out now via Matador. Get it here.