Category: News

The Mandalorian season two finale is on December 18, but don’t you dare think about canceling your Disney+ subscription.

For one thing, when was the last time you watched Adventures of the Gummi Bears? Do it for the theme song alone. Also, and more importantly, WandaVision begins shortly after the adventures of that egg-eating monster Baby Yoda ends (until season three).

Disney+ revealed on Thursday that WandaVision, the bonkers-looking superhero series (that’s also an old-school sitcom?) starring Elizabeth Olsen as Wanda Maximoff/Scarlet Witch and Paul Bettany as Vision, premieres on January 15. It’s the first new installment in the Marvel Cinematic Universe since Spider-Man: Far From Home in July 2019, as Black Widow and Eternals were delayed until next year, and the first MCU show on Disney’s year-old streaming service. It will (hopefully) be joined by The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, Loki, and Ms. Marvel throughout 2021. Watch a brief teaser below.

“The show is a love letter to the golden age of television,” WandaVision head writer Jac Schaeffer told Entertainment Weekly. “We’re paying tribute and honoring all of these incredible shows and people who came before us, [but] we’re also trying to blaze new territory.” That shouldn’t be too hard, considering the apron-wearing housewife is a telekinetic witch and the dopey husband is a big red dude. I don’t remember that episode of Father Knows Best.

It’s not often that we hear from indie mainstays Fleet Foxes but every time we do, they have something exciting in the works. Back in September, Fleet Foxes returned to announce their fourth studio record Shore was arriving the next day at the exact moment of the autumn equinox. While much of their album’s recording process happened under wraps, the band are offering an inside look at their Shore studio sessions with the soothing “Sunblind” video.

The visual is compiled of short video clips filmed throughout their Shore recording process. It shares a look at each one of their studios — from a cozy wooded cabin to a grand sound booth in Paris, and everywhere in between.

Ahead of the “Sunblind” video’s release, Fleet Foxes’ vocalist Robin Pecknold spoke with Uproxx and explained how “Sunblind” was written:

“There was a moment when I thought it would be cool to have a gang vocal with a ton of people singing on it, but then that started to seem a little too ‘We Are The World’ or something. But I really wanted Kevin on there, so I asked him just a few weeks ago. One of the small upsides of the lockdown situation is that everyone has the home recording situation pretty dialed in. And Kevin was really close with Richard Swift, Joshua Jaeger played drums on this song, and Homer Steinweiss plays drums on this song as well — and he played drums with Richard in The Arcs. I wanted to involve people who knew those guys, and that were a little younger than me. Mentioning a bunch of people that had passed that were our heroes, and then to include the guys that were younger than me, in a way keeping that memory alive.”

Watch Fleet Foxes’ “Sunblind” video above.

Shore is out now via Anti-. Get it here.

The Walking Dead universe, which has been reluctant to do so in the past, is getting into the product placement game. In the past decade, the series has only placed a product into the show for promotional purposes once, in an opening season episode that featured a Hyundai Tucson as a getaway car. However, it’s leaner times now; viewership is dropping (and therefore ad rates), and so I expect are carriage fees, as more people cut the cord and get their zombie fix from Netflix. AMC is casting a wider net now for revenue opportunities.

This weekend’s of The Walking Dead: The World Beyond will reintroduce product placement, beginning with Mtn. Dew, and the insertion will not be subtle. From Variety:

Viewers on Sunday will see one of the “World Beyond” characters, played by Annet Mahendru, surprise another, played by Nico Tortorella with a full bottle of Mountain Dew, cloaked in a label that might have greeted a consumer around 2010. “Is this legit?” he asks, mentioning the soda by name. “I will never stop missing these. I mean, I used to drink this like water, back in the day.”

The clip is already online if you don’t want to wait until this weekend’s episode of The World Beyond to watch it:

I should note that the Mtn. Dew he is drinking — which Mahendru’s character, Huck, tells him she found “chilling out back in the stream” — has to be at least a decade old because the series is set ten years after the apocalypse. A quick search reveals that carbonated beverages are only good for 9 months, and it’s unlikely that “chilling out in a stream” for a decade will preserve the soft-drink any better than a refrigerator might. I’m not sure how “refreshing” that drink will be.

I suppose, however, that artistic license for profit is totally acceptable. It’s not the first time product placements have been introduced to the apocalypse, either. Remember Tallahassee’s frantic search for Twinkies in Zombieland? Contrary to urban myths, Twinkies do not remain fresh forever. In fact, according to NPR, Twinkies shelf life is only 45 days, which means that survivors in zombie apocalypses must eat a lot of really stale and rotten foods. After all, the chocolate pudding that Carl ate many seasons ago on The Walking Dead had only a shelf life of three to four weeks. Gross, Carl.

(Via Variety)

The Weeknd and the NFL have announced that the Canadian superstar will perform at the next Pepsi Super Bowl Halftime Show on February 7, 2021.

In a press statement, Pepsi’s Vice President of Marketing, Todd Kaplan, said, “The Pepsi Super Bowl Halftime Show is one of the most anticipated performances of the year and we are thrilled to welcome The Weeknd to the stage,” said Todd Kaplan, VP of Marketing, Pepsi. “Pepsi has worked with some of music’s biggest artists over the years – from Prince to Lady Gaga, Beyoncé, Bruno Mars, and most recently, Jennifer Lopez and Shakira. After a year that’s largely been void of live music, we can’t wait to watch The Weeknd transform the world’s biggest stage with his limitless talent and creativity, delivering what will most certainly be an unforgettable performance that will be remembered for years to come.”

Adam Harter, Senior Vice President of Sports, Media, and Entertainment added, “We can’t wait to welcome multi-award-winning artist The Weeknd to the Pepsi Super Bowl LV Halftime Show stage. In collaboration with the NFL and Roc Nation, we continue to reimagine what a Pepsi Halftime Show looks like with some of the biggest musicians in the world. We expect The Weeknd will continue to raise the bar, setting a new precedent both musically and visually for the most-watched performance of the year.”

The announcement caps a stellar year for The Weeknd, whose March album After Hours has proven to have legs a mile long, with a deluxe version featuring a who’s-who of star artists, a string of well-received television appearances including a VMA win for Best R&B, and a virtual concert on TikTok. The Weeknd himself has also popped up Ariana Grande’s new album, Oneohtrix Point Never’s new EP, and Calvin Harris’ latest single.

As Stan culture evolves and grows, artists’ superfans are going to greater and greater lengths to get their faves’ attention. While the Barbz still relentlessly hound anyone who speaks ill of Nicki Minaj — or even her collaborators — Eminem, the man who coined the term Stan, had a run-in with a stalker who broke into his house this year. Another Eminem fan got into the Guinness Book Of Records for inking her 16th tattoo of the star’s face on her. And the wrath of the Beyhive knows very few bounds.

However, the latest superfan shenanigans led to the fan being arrested after trying to illegally board a Los Angeles-bound flight to try to meet her hero. According to The New York Post, 23-year-old Yaazmina Payton was stopped from boarding a flight at O’Hare International Airport on Sunday, November 8 after ducking the ropes at the boarding gate for an American Airlines plane headed to LA. She was charged with felony criminal trespassing after failing to produce a boarding pass. On Monday, her counsel at a hearing said that she suffers from PTSD and anxiety disorder and she was released on $500 bail. She’ll have a hard time flying out of O’Hare in the future; she was banned from visiting the airport.

Meanwhile, Jay-Z himself is launching his own cannabis brand, which might help Payton with that anxiety.

Tiffany is the forgotten Trump… to everyone except Matt Gaetz.

On Wednesday, while her father continued to refuse to concede the election, Donald’s daughter posted a photo of herself in the White House on Twitter, adding a heart emoji for good measure. The typical reply ranged from “remember having a lavish birthday party while Covid is a raging pandemic?” to “I, too, randomly pose with drapes,” but the weirdest response came from Gaetz, the conservative congressman from Florida, who one-upped Trump’s heart emoji with the fire, heart-eyes, and thumb-up emojis. Weird!

This isn’t the first time Gaetz has turned into the Tex Avery wolf for Trump, either. In response to the president congratulating her for graduating from Georgetown Law earlier this year, he wrote, “Tiffany is a beautiful person inside and out! It’s so great to see her success.” Trump “liked” Gaetz’s new tweet, but everyone else was creeped out.

It’s unknown what Nestor thinks of Gaetz, a publicly-elected official, getting “horny on main” for the president’s daughter, but Ron Perlman might have something to say about it. The pair were locked in a long Twitter feud, where the Sons of Anarchy actor called Gaetz a “dipsh*t,” among other amusing insults. “A guy who wins a totally gerrymandered district with daddy’s money deserves our deepest admiration. You’re right… I only PLAY scumbags and grifters. You’re the real deal!” he tweeted. Perlman hasn’t said anything about Gaetz, but he has been unloading on the president.

Haim aren’t usually purveyors of intense guitar-driven rock, but that’s just what they’ve made for the new animated film The Croods: A New Age. Their contribution to the soundtrack, “Feel The Thunder,” is the theme song for the movie’s Thunder Sisters characters, and it was inspired by Guns N’ Roses.

The band recorded and co-wrote the song with producer Ariel Rechtshaid, who Danielle Haim told Rolling Stone is “the biggest Guns N’ Roses fan,” saying, “He’s obsessed with them — he went and saw them on their most recent tour a bunch of times. And so I figured that that’s what we were looking for. We were like, ‘Let’s get Ariel.’ But I’d never tried to make music like that before, so it was fully like a crazy experiment.”

Danielle also said of the track, “We grew up listening to rock music, pop, a healthy smattering of a ton of different kinds of music. I don’t know how often you really hear rock music in a kid’s film anymore, or rock music in general anymore.”

The band also worked on the track with Croods composer and Devo leader Mark Mothersaugh, who spoke highly of the group: “I thought it was cool how these young women are in this cool part of their trajectory right now. I look at them and think about what a great time Devo had when we were where they are right now. They’re very talented ladies who are very fun to work with.”

This song isn’t terribly unlike another track the group made for an animated film this year, as their Trolls: World Tour cut “Rock N Roll Rules” is also an uncharacteristically rocking tune for them.

Listen to “Feel The Thunder” above.

It’s no secret that longtime actor Jon Voight is a huge Trump supporter who regularly finds himself being dragged on Twitter for his outlandish takes backing the president. This time around, Voight caught the attention of Samuel L. Jackson after the Ray Donovan star made a new Twitter video that essentially calls for war over the (fake) “lie” that Joe Biden won the 2020 election. Voight even goes so far as to accuse Biden’s supporters of being “evil” and says that the right is now locked in a “battle of righteousness versus Satan.” Via The Hill:

“We must fight this corruption that has taken over and fight for the good that seems lost,” he said. “Let us give our trust to God, and fight now for Trump’s victory because we all know this ballot count is corruption like they are. So let us not back down. Let us fight this fight as if it is our last fight on earth.”

After catching wind of Voight’s rhetoric, Jackson fired back with one of his trademark F-bombs. “First, you gotta stop looking at this insanity!!” Jackson tweeted. “The Civil War was about Slavery so pay attention to the symbolism. Lastly F*CK. John Voight!!!”

Jackson’s fiery condemnation of Voight did not sit well with right-wing Twitter users, who fired back at the Pulp Fiction actor and chastised him for his use of profanity, which is like chastising McDonald’s for serving hamburgers, but okay.

But it wasn’t all backlash in the replies. Jackson had plenty of supporters who were very happy to see him call out Voight in pure SLJ style.

(Via Samuel L. Jackson on Twitter)

Pharrell is known for his Grammy Award-winning music and his work in the film industry, but everyone can also agree on one thing about the musician: he doesn’t seem to age. Pharrell has been questioned about his flawless skin for many years, and he’s now finally ready to reveal his secrets through a line of carefully-developed skincare products.

Pharrell has been praised for his age-defying skin for years. Travis Scott even quizzed him on his routine last year, asking if it was true that the musician only washes his face with cold water, to which Pharrell replied: “You gotta exfoliate like a f*cking madman.”

But now taking things one step further, Pharrell teamed up with his longtime dermatologist Elena Jones for the product line Humanrace. The skincare line will be released everywhere November 25 and includes include cleansers, creams, exfoliators, and more.

The products are also made with waste-reduction in mind. Each bottle comes with a removable chamber at the bottom to allow an easy way for refilling products without needing to toss the entire container. Speaking about the products in a statement, Pharrell said: “Humanrace Skincare doesn’t differentiate by race or gender. We’re creating for humans; we are all born in the same skin.”

Check out a preview of Pharrell’s Humanrace skincare line above.

Busta Rhymes has long been viewed as one of hip-hop’s most exuberant and active artists, so the news he almost died due to unhealthy habits may come as a surprise to those who remember his as the vivacious ball of cartoonish energy who made hits like “Woo-Hah!!” and “Put Your Hands Where My Eyes Could See.” In a recent interview with Van Jones for the latter’s YouTube show The Messy Truth, Busta revealed just how bad things got and what pulled him out of his health slump, inspiring him to get more fit.

“I’m in the car and I go to sleep, and I’m snoring crazy,” he recounts. “And it gets to this point where I’m trying to inhale, and not I’m able to inhale. My son got so scared that he spoke to the security about this fear that he had. My son was so scared of how he was gonna hurt my feelings by having this conversation with me directly that he had to tell someone else to tell me. That sh*t f*cked me up — I just felt like I was letting my son down, I felt like I was letting a lot of people down.”

Busta reveals that he’d developed polyps (abnormal tissue growths) in his throat and was up to 340 pounds. His doctor told him, “‘Your polyps grew so big that it blocked 90 percent of your breathing passage and if I send you home tonight and you sleep under the AC and catch a cold and that last 10 percent of breathing of your breathing passage gets blocked up…you are going to die tonight.’” The revelation prompted Busta to change his ways and from some of his recent Instagram posts (and the rejuvenated rapping on his new album Extinction Level Event 2, it looks like it’s paid off.

Watch Busta’s full interview with Van Jones above.