Category: Worldwide

After a lot of anticipation, The Super Mario Bros. Movie finally hit theaters, and so far, it has been a massive success. Despite some concerns over Chris Pratt’s voice as Mario, the movie very clearly does what it intended to do. The stand out of the entire film, though, was Jack Black’s Bowser.

Black perfectly encapsulated the silly side of Bowser that is prevalent in a lot of the Mario RPG games while still having a bit of a sinister tone to him that was necessary for when he had to remind everyone he was the Koopa King. This led to a thought: With Jack Black so perfectly encapsulating a video game character in a movie, how has he done in all of his actual video game voice acting roles? I put some thought into it and here is what I consider the definitive Jack Black video game character ranking.

1. Psychonauts 2, Helmut Fullbear

Psychonauts 2 is a wonderful game. It also features Jack Black’s best character of any game, Helmut Fullbear. When the player initially comes across Helmut, he’s nothing but a brain in a jar, but through a ridiculous ’70s-inspired world, the player eventually helps him return to his old self.

Helmut is the best performance of Black’s voice acting career. He hits every emotional note perfectly, but he also manages to leave you laughing until your sides hurt — the player gets to experience a great concert scene involving him that single-handedly makes purchasing the game worth it. If you want to see Black show some incredible range as a voice actor, then Psychonauts 2 is the game to play.

2. Brutal Legend, Eddie Riggs

This is the only game where you will get to play as Black voicing the main character. Brutal Legend is an extremely weird game. It’s set in a world run by Metal (the music genre) and in many ways is an homage to rock and metal icons with actual voice roles given to Lemmy Kilmister, Rob Halford, Ozzy Osbourne, and Lita Ford. The combat frequently flips between a third-person adventure hack and slash to a real-time strategy game, and all of it features Black as Eddie Riggs.

When Black agreed to voice Riggs, it still wasn’t common for celebrities to do voice roles in video games and Black was still better known as the guy from School of Rock and Tenacious D than as a voice actor. As a result, it was a little surprising when Black went on to give a genuinely good performance. He’s funny, charismatic, and fits into the role of a roadie thrust into becoming a hero perfectly. The game itself was well received and the relationship he formed with creator Tim Schafer lasts to this day.

3. Broken Age, Harm’ny Lightbeard

Double Fine games are historically very silly, but every once in a while they’ll hit you with an emotional gut punch the way Broken Age does. It’s a story about growing up, and it will leave many of us wondering if we have made the right decisions when setting up the future for the children in it. Unfortunately, part two left many disappointed with some of its writing decisions.

What didn’t disappoint was the character voiced by Jack Black, Harm’ny Lightbeard. A total delight, laugh-out-loud funny, and also a crook trying to scam you out of your money, what’s not to love about this character? He even dropped the O from his name because “it makes him lighter,” which makes absolutely no sense. This minor character was perfect for Black to play and is one of his funniest, but it’s this low on the list primarily because it’s such a minor character.

4. Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1+2, Officer Dick

Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1+2 is one of the best examples of how to do a remake and a total joy to play. The controls are crisp, the music is full of nothing but winners, and every guest character is perfect. This includes a longtime staple of the series, Officer Dick. A recurring character throughout the series, Officer Dick has always been meant to be played for laughs, but Pro Skater 1+2 took it a step further and gave us Jack Black voicing the character.

He’s funny, all his lines are well delivered, and he’s a fantastic addition to the game. Unfortunately, this is not exactly a character but more just Black delivering quippy one liners while you do tricks. He can’t be any higher on this list because that would be putting him above actual characters, but even in a small role, his performance here is great.

5. King Kong: The Official Game of the Movie, Carl Denham

Let’s keep this one brief. King Kong: The Official Game of the Movie is Black voicing a character that he already voiced in a movie. The performance itself is not awful considering this was his first foray into video games, but it is far from his best. His actual performance in the King Kong movie is underrated, in my opinion, but this one isn’t. However, if this is what inspired him to go on and do more video games down the line, then it’s great that he did it.

Meghan Smith is the owner of Melody Note Vintage store in the eternally hip town of Palm Springs, California, and her old-school Gen X advice has really connected with younger people on TikTok.

In a video posted in December 2022, she shares the advice she wishes that “somebody told me in my twenties” and it has received more than 13 million views. Smith says that she gave the same advice to her partner’s two daughters when they reached their twenties.

The video is hashtagged #GenX advice for #GenZ and late #millennials. Sorry older millennials, you’re too old to receive these pearls of wisdom.

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Here is some of the timeless advice that Smith shares in the video.

Perfection is bullshit.

You will never be more good-looking than you are today.

Put your phone down and enjoy your life.

Don’t change for anybody.

Don’t worry about making mistakes.

Laugh at yourself.

If somebody shows you their true colors, believe them.

Travel.

You end up dating the people you think you deserve. Usually, you deserve better.

Don’t forget to always wear your sunscreen.

@melodynotevintage

This might only help one person and thats ok. Advice I wish somebody told me in my twenties. #genx advice for #genz and late #millennials #adviceforyour20s #lifeadvice #fyp dont be an asshat in the comments if you are older, its not helpful.

She followed up the video with a sequel with even more sage advice.

Know who’s on your side and who you can ask for help.

Don’t smoke.

Don’t spend longer than one year with the wrong person.

Find your own style.

Don’t stress over the small stuff.

Good manners don’t go out of style.

Do the work that it takes to be really good at something.

Your happiness is more important than other people’s disappointment.

@melodynotevintage

This might only help one person and thats ok. Advice I wish somebody told me in my twenties part 2 #genx advice for #genz and late #millennials #adviceforyour20s #lifeadvice #fyp

This article originally appeared on 1.18.23

The world was given a rare but beautiful gift this week when the teaser trailer for the John Wick spinoff series The Continental dropped and gave us a first look at all of the gratuitous violence and the unexplainable horrors of New York City in the 1970s. Although it’s being called a “three-episode event” instead of limited series, you understand the gist of what they’re going for.

The Continental will bring guests back to a time when assassins roamed free throughout the city, way before John Wick was given his first puppy. The series will focus on a young Winston Scott (portrayed by Ian McShane in the films) who makes his way to New York to hide out at the assassin-friendly hotel while learning about the inner workings of its hierarchy. Similar to Hotel For Dogs, but with people instead of pups. For the most part.

Colin Woodell will lead the series, joined by Peter Greene, Ben Robson, Ayomide Adegun, and Mel Gibson (yeah, really). But the most jaw-dropping moment of the show’s teaser trailer doesn’t even include a jaw at all, and that’s the debut of Katie McGrath as The Adjudicator.

First introduced in John Wick Chapter 3, The Adjudicator is a High Table agent who tries to maintain the balance in the tight-night assassin community. As the main antagonist in Chapter 3, The Adjudicator (who is non-binary) was keen on taking down John Wick, who, to be fair, didn’t play by the rules. In the film, this character was portrayed by Asia Kate Dillion, though Dillion did not reprise their role in Chapter 4, as The Adjudicator was missing from that film, though there was no clarification of whether they were dead or alive.

Seeing as The Continental will be a prequel, it seems like we will learn the origins of this High Table agent who seems to have a ton of power and surely loves to use it. While McGrath only appeared in the trailer for a split second, it’s clear that she is getting comfortable as a cold-blooded killer by wearing a chic Hannibal Lecter-inspired look. Hopefully, they don’t eat people.

The Continental will debut on Peacock this September.

Fresh off the release of her debut solo album, In Pieces, buzzing pop-R&B vocalist Chlöe popped by Uproxx Studios to deliver a virtuoso performance of her album’s Usher-sampling second single “How Does It Feel.”

While the single’s controversial guest star, Chris Brown, doesn’t make a physical appearance, Chlöe opts to leave Brown’s vocals intact, keeping a melodic counterpoint to her own dazzling display of dynamic range.

Chlöe confronted the criticism about her collaboration with Chris Brown head-on recently, telling Big Tigger of her hometown radio station V-103 Atlanta, “I always just wanna let the music speak for itself, and to be honest, no matter what I do, people always find things to say about it, so I’m used to it. I just choose to ignore it. People have every right to their opinions, freedom of speech, and it’s up to me to choose what I give my attention and energy to.”

In a separate interview on another Atlanta radio station, Chlöe likewise brushed off some of the main criticisms of her new album, saying, “The same people who say that weren’t fans of Halle and [me] when we had our Ungodly Hour album out… So, it’s a bunch of people who are just putting in their two cents now just to really say things.”

And just to hammer the point home, during the opening of her tour for the album, she displayed some of the most common critiques, while telling haters, “They can kiss my Black ass.”

That’s how she feels, since everybody else gets a say.

Check out Chlöe’s UPROXX Sessions performance of “How Does It Feel” above.

UPROXX Sessions is Uproxx’s performance show featuring the hottest up-and-coming acts you should keep an eye on. Featuring creative direction from LA promotion collective, Ham On Everything, and taking place on our “bathroom” set designed and painted by Julian Gross, UPROXX Sessions is a showcase of some of our favorite performers, who just might soon be yours, too.

Before there was Tucker Carlson, there was Bill O’Reilly. For 20-plus years before Carlson was the biggest name on Fox News, O’Reilly held that title. So the No Spin Zone czar knows a little something about the network, including when it’s in trouble. And according to O’Reilly, Fox News is definitely in trouble.

On Wednesday night, as Mediaite reports, O’Reilly joined fellow cable news network fallen angel Chris Cuomo to chat about Dominion Voting Systems’ defamation lawsuit against Fox and what it could ultimately mean for the network and its owner, Rupert Murdoch (a.k.a. the real-life Logan Roy). In O’Reilly’s words, it could end up being a total “catastrophe.”

While Cuomo made it clear that he wasn’t wishing the network “ill,” he did admit that he is “shocked they’ve let it go as far as they have, especially when they’re obviously worried about what they’re disclosing.” Like, say, the fact that — despite his recent fawning interview — Carlson hates Donald Trump “passionately” and thinks the former president is a “demonic force.” But O’Reilly’s belief is that Dominion doesn’t want to settle — even if Fox News did. And he doesn’t think things are going to turn out so rosy for the network.

O’Reilly noted that jury selection was set to begin today with initial testimonies being heard on Monday. “Rupert Murdoch will be called very quickly,” he said, “and a good lawyer will not make him look good. There’s no doubt about it. So you would think that Rupert Murdoch — who calls the shots — would try to settle. So now I believe that Dominion doesn’t want to settle. That Dominion believes it’s going to win its case and, on top of the $1.6 billion it’s asking, the jury of regular folks will give it punitive damages as well.”

Ultimately, O’Reilly concluded, “It’s a catastrophe for the Fox News channel” — which really seemed to surprise Cuomo to hear.

While O’Reilly says that having no cameras in the courtroom will benefit Fox News in that people who watch the likes of Tucker, Sean Hannity, and/or Laura Ingraham won’t get to witness a skilled lawyer cut them to pieces while under oath, he also thinks it could hurt Team Murdoch. “Because now literally every news organization covering the trial wants Fox to lose,” O’Reilly opined. “So the American people are going to get filtered through that.”

When Cuomo suggested that having one opinion within the network, then telling audiences something completely different, is a bad thing, O’Reilly said that he really doesn’t know “if hypocrisy is worth $1.6 billion.” And when it comes to the charges against Fox — “reckless disregard for the truth” — O’Reilly believes that Dominion will indeed be able to prove that standard.

You can watch the clip here.

(Via Mediaite)

The Super Mario Bros. Movie is breaking records faster than Mario with a Super Star. The Nintendo and Illumination collaboration, featuring Chris Pratt as Mario, Charlie Day as Luigi, Jack Black as Bowser (in an Oscar-worthy performance), and Anya Taylor-Joy as Peach, had the biggest opening weekend for an animated film ever; it’s also the highest-earning video game movie of all-time and the top-grossing movie of 2023 at the domestic box office. Not bad for a movie that’s been out for all of a week.

The Super Mario Bros. Movie leaped over Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania to become the biggest movie of 2023, followed by Creed III, John Wick: Chapter 4, and Scream VI. It’s also number three worldwide for the year, behind two China releases, Full River Red and The Wandering Earth 2. Mario won’t have much competition at the domestic box office until Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One or Barbie, both which I plan to see 200 million times. At least. It’ll be a real toss-up.

“The industry finally has a pre-pandemic level of consistent animated and family-friendly flicks throughout the summer and year-end holiday season,” Shawn Robbins of Box Office Pro told the Hollywood Reporter. “All of which are kickstarted by the Mario juggernaut.”

I checked: there isn’t a Mario character called Juggernaut. Maybe he’ll be created for the 17th film in the inevitable MCU (Mario Cinematic Universe).

(Via the Hollywood Reporter)

Drake is one of the world’s most recognizable entertainers now, but once upon a time, he was just another kid growing up in Toronto. During that time, though, Drake met a global star in Denzel Washington, who recently spoke about the encounter in a new interview with Good Morning America.

Towards the end of the segment, Washington told the story:

“You just never know who you touch. I met a kid in Toronto who came up and was fascinated because I was like this star, and he wanted to talk to me, and he couldn’t believe that he met me. Well, 10 or 15 years later, he came up and he said, ‘You don’t remember when you met me.’ I said, ‘No.’ His name is Drake. And he said what I said to him, he never forgot.”

Washington was on the show to discuss the Boys & Girls Clubs opening its 5,000th location, since he’s a spokesperson for the organization who benefited from it as a child. He explained, “I was that 6-year-old kid that was nervous. What am I now? I’m still that 6-year-old, wide-eyed kid who’s curious about life. I was being taught about grace, about winning with grace and losing with grace, and being a leader and all of these things.”

Check out the segment above.

When the first Scream movie premiered in 1996, it bucked Hollywood conventions by casting a major star like Drew Barrymore and then immediately killing her off in the opening scene. (Sorry, spoiler alert!) Barrymore’s character, Casey Becker, was the first victim of the now iconic Ghostface, who taunted her over the phone with the infamous “Do you like scary movies?” line before hanging her from a tree by her own intestines.

Casey’s murder was a brutal setup for the rest of the film, and for the sake of this post, a pretty definitive death. Yet, if you ask Barrymore, she thinks there’s a chance Casey might still be alive out there.

Here’s what she told her talk show sidekick, Ross Matthews, via Entertainment Weekly:

“It’s funny. I’ve never thought of it this way, but I’m pretty sure a C-section is comparable to what happened to her,” Barrymore replied. “Like, literally. And I’m here! I’m fine! So, maybe Casey Becker will be okay.”

“Okay, who’s buying their tickets for Scream VII you guys?” Matthews enthusiastically asked the audience. “Let’s make it happen!”

To which Barrymore teased, “With good writing, you can make anything happen.”

We’re not medical doctors, but we’re pretty sure you cannot get brutally stabbed, disemboweled, hung by said bowels, and then walk around later like it was no big thing. We also have some serious questions about who’s been giving Drew Barrymore advice about childbirth. Is everyone okay here? Like, other than Casey Becker, who is, to be clear, extremely dead.

(Via Entertainment Weekly)

TORONTO — The problem was the same mystifying one it had been all season.

From a distance, there was no reason the team should be this way. On paper, not much changed throughout the roster or its rotational capabilities. Its core group and newest additions both went away in the summer and got better. Ostensibly, they were all — front office included — coming back one season deeper into an experimental system of length and range meant to upend and confound traditional thinking across the league.

Even with their slow start this season, the problem — or reality of there being a problem — didn’t come to the foreground until an uncharacteristically bad road trip in December, where the team lost two in a row to the Orlando Magic. From there, the Toronto Raptors would slip into a six game losing streak and the surety of their season began to slide.

Looking back, it’s easy to see the problem was assigning the Raptors carryovers as if they were a given. Small things, like competency and familiarity with schemes, were natural to assume intact. Big problems — lack of size, dependable shooting, bench depth — weren’t addressed in the offseason, or as things got progressively worse. And when they did, well, it’s not all that difficult to put yourself Toronto’s shoes and feel the same measure of confusion they did when looking around at the kitchen, the place they’re meant to cook, being so busted. But by then it hardly mattered, because the house was on fire.

The way Toronto came out in their play-in game against the Chicago Bulls was near identical to their astigmatic season. Early on, there was hope. O.G. Anunoby hit an easy corner three seconds after the tip and Fred VanVleet looked like a decisive, quietly controlled menace, working the floor and timing all his drives on a dime. Ripples of enthusiasm went through the arena. There was recognition, a rubbing of eyes, a ray of light.

To Toronto’s credit, they kept it up. For two solid quarters, the starters worked on an efficient string. The ball movement was pleasant whiplash, like having your neck cracked by a professional. The shooting didn’t look so needlessly effortful; Pascal Siakam careened and contorted up close for layups, VanVleet hit seven of 13 from deep (and still managed to be the Raptors most prolific rebounder and assists leader with 12 and 8, respectively).

The speed wobble started when the bench came in.

Scrambling defense, rebound tip-outs to nobody, robotic ball movement — the regression didn’t matter so much initially with the comfortable padding of 19 points, Toronto’s biggest lead all game. The fact of the regression, that it looked so identical to the 41 other losses the team had this season, and that the Raptors had no answers despite all that experience, is the most telling thing.

This is not to knock the Bulls’ full-hearted fourth quarter performance, or Zach LaVine’s magnificent performance, but for the majority of the matchup, Chicago was not the better team. The Bulls season has been just as long and arduous as the Raptors, and through the first three quarters, it showed. Between two groups so evenly matched — pest defense, spotty shooting — the winner was going to be the team that wanted it, and could dig in, that much more.

The Bulls waited the Raptors out. Chicago’s head coach, Billy Donovan, played the long game, letting Toronto throw their best defensive efforts at DeMar DeRozan (while DeRozan’s daughter, Diar, threw her best defensive efforts at the Raptors); ratcheting Siakam, VanVleet and Anunoby’s minutes up past the 40-minute mark; and turned LaVine and Alex Caruso loose.

Nick Nurse, for his oft-nodded to defensive mind, made some strange decisions on that end when it counted. Putting, and keeping, VanVleet on LaVine all game, when VanVleet’s energy was flagging, just wasn’t enough for the way LaVine exploded in the second half. And yanking Toronto’s only anchor big of Jakob Poeltl in the fourth left the paint wide open for DeRozan to cruise through for layup after uncontested layup. The seeming unfamiliarity with his roster, in this game, at this point of their season, puts more than the possibility of Nurse’s departure this summer into immediate focus. Though Nurse was questioned in his end of season availability about his hope to stay with the franchise, the signal that in-game, psychic absenteeism sends is: does he have the desire to stay?

A trickle-down effect of that question mark was apparent in the trepidation of Scottie Barnes. Whenever he took the floor in place of VanVleet, even as part of an adjusted starting lineup, Barnes looked trepidatious, a bit shook, and lost. Sophomore slump aside (because Barnes has, on the whole, improved this season), that the reigning Rookie of the Year isn’t taking the floor with confidence and direction, even a little bravado, is a coaching failure during a postseason that was, according to the front office, for his own experience.

Barnes isn’t blameless but this part, the game at home with the season on the line, is supposed to be the exciting part. None of that exhilaration was there. It’s not there for the rest of the roster, either. That the Bulls chipped away at the lead and eventually took it with no discernible energy shift or renewed urgency from the Raptors is indicative of chemistry gone flat.

It’s entirely possible that the Raptors baseline was too high going into this season, that the team overachieved last year and this was the inevitable correction. It’s not enough to stay good in this version of the NBA and stay reliably competitive, or even above .500. Franchises have to be great, and figure out how to do it in lasting, individualized ways. The silver lining for Toronto is that from here — whether that’s a head coaching change, roster shake-ups ranging from total upheaval to tremors, new additions over the summer, and the potential of a draft pick — one (or possibly numerous) things will be different next season. The Raptors problems are too obvious, glaring now in lurid neon light, to ignore.

The National are preparing for the release of their new album First Two Pages Of Frankenstein. So far, they’ve released singles “Tropic Morning News,” “Eucalyptus,” “New Order T-Shirt,” and “Your Mind Is Not Your Friend” featuring Phoebe Bridgers.

The Punisher performer discussed her singular appreciation for The National in a new interview with Uncut. “My friends and I have this joke about The National,” Bridgers said. “Obviously they’re hugely popular, but we still feel this ownership over them.”

“‘No, but you don’t like them in the right way! Do you even understand how profound this band is?’” she continued. “Because they are profoundly f*cking amazing.”

The National drummer Charlie Forbes discussed the collaboration with Bridgers in an interview with NME in January. “We thought the song had an American edge to it, and thought it would sound nice with a woman’s voice,” he said. “By chance, [Bridgers] was recording in the same studio as us, and one day we did a trade where Josh went and did some tambourine on her new track, and she came in and did the vocal line on our track — which you can’t actually hear at all.”

First Two Pages Of Frankenstein is out 4/28 via 4AD. Find more information here.