Category: Worldwide

As the NBA season approaches and training camps get underway, we’ll be taking a look at the player on each team that holds the key to unlocking their full potential.

For the Detroit Pistons, this season is about continuing to lay a foundation, with top overall pick Cade Cunningham at the center of it all. There’s a pretty good sense that Cunningham will, at the least, be very good in the NBA, it’s just a matter of what level of star he can reach. That takes time and also requires him to have a quality supporting cast around him. Last year’s No. 7 overall pick, Killian Hayes, had a tough go as a rookie, with early struggles compounded by a hip injury that caused him to miss 41 games. But how he bounces back in his sophomore campaign will be important for how the Pistons evaluate who is part of their long-term vision, which is the most important part of this coming season.

Hayes never really got a chance to get into a rhythm as a rookie, playing seven games before getting hurt and then returned, bouncing in and out of the lineup out of precaution. He averaged 6.8 points, 5.3 assists, and 3.2 turnovers per game on 35.3/27.8/82.4 shooting splits that tell the story of a rookie point guard trying to find his way in the NBA on a bad team, although he showed some flashes towards the very end of the season that produced a bit of optimism for the future. With Cunningham now alongside, Hayes has another ball-handler to play off of and someone who will draw significantly more attention in the backcourt. It’s hard to take too much from Hayes’ rookie season, but the NBA has never been a particularly patient place. The reality of today’s NBA is that moment they took Cunningham, the clock had already begun on the Pistons needing to build a winner around him.

What Hayes is as an NBA point guard remains to be seen, but hopefully he can find a rhythm now that he’s healthy and prove himself as a worthy member of the Pistons young core. If so, Detroit can feel more comfortable at point guard and start looking into the next phase of rebuilding, which is seeking out young veteran talent to fill in the gaps, on top of what figures to be a high draft pick again. If not, then point guard will remain a position of need and it figures to be another summer spent mostly in asset and rookie talent acquisition mode, as they try to piece together a group around Cunningham that can grow together into, hopefully, an eventual playoff contender.

This weekend is all about DC FanDome, where the comic book label’s cinematic wing gets to show off their forthcoming wares. The Batman, starring Robert Pattinson and Zoe Kravtiz as Catwoman, is scheduled to bow its first trailer. The next Aquaman showed off a behind-the-scenes video. And then there’s Black Adam, in which Dwayne Johnson goes back to playing bad for the first time since he debuted the Scorpion King in The Mummy Returns. (That is, unless you count his doofus murderer in Michael Bay’s Pain & Gain.)

The movie, due on July 29, is still in post-production, but Johnson was there to introduce what he described as “one of its opening scenes,” which introduces his fearsome antihero. He’s one of DC’s most notorious supervillains, and at some point he’ll do battle with Zachary Levi’s Shazam. And if the brief clip, only about a minute long, is any indication, he’s in a lot of trouble.

You barely catch a glimpse of Johnson’s face, which is cloaked in shadow and obscured by a hoodie. But you see enough of him having his way with the team that’s happened upon him in a secret lair of some sort that he more than makes an impression. In his introduction, Johnson reminds viewers that this has long been a “passion project” of his, and that he “was born to play Black Adam.” That said, if you ever happen upon Johnson, it’s probably not a great idea to piss him off, lest he do what he does in the above clip.

The only Heisman Trophy winner in Louisville history is getting his number retired. Lamar Jackson, who suited up for the team from 2015-17 en route to being named the best player in the sport and becoming a first-round draft pick by the Baltimore Ravens, will see his No. 8 immortalized by the program, making him the second Cardinals player to earn this distinction alongside legendary signal caller Johnny Unitas.

The news came as a surprise to Jackson, as the university didn’t let him know his jersey was going to be retired. In a video posted to their Twitter account, the school pulled a fast one on Jackson, making him think he was going to meet with some members of the media before Louisville athletic director Vince Tyra and head football coach Scott Satterfield told him the news.

Jackson won just about everything there is to win during his 2016 campaign with the Cardinals en route to being named a unanimous All-American as a sophomore. He played one more year in college, and in the years since, things have gone pretty well for him. The Ravens’ signal caller won an unanimous NFL MVP award in 2019 and is currently at the helm of a 4-1 team with Super Bowl aspirations.

The jersey retirement ceremony will take place on Nov. 13 against Syracuse. Jackson and the Ravens will play two days earlier on Thursday Night Football against the Miami Dolphins.

Sometimes a legend’s “retirement” doesn’t last long. (See: Jay-Z, Steven Soderbergh.) Other times the report has been greatly exaggerated. Such seems to be the case with Michael Caine. On Friday, the world was stunned to hear when the screen legend and famous non-blinker, who went from poverty to becoming one of movies’ biggest and most beloved stars, appeared to say that at 88 he was done with dragging his old bones to movie sets. But on Sunday, he appeared to reverse course.

“I haven’t retired and not a lot of people know that,” Caine wrote cheekily on Twitter following widespread social media mourning. That’s all he wrote, but it suggests that in the offending interview, which he gave to the BBC, he may have simply misspoke and the media and the internet ran with what they assumed was a bombshell.

In the interview, it sure sounded like Caine, who first rose to prominence in the mid-’60s with British films like Zulu, The Ipcress File, and Alfie, was throwing in the towel. He said that Best Sellers, his new film with Aubrey Plaza, “turned out to be what is my last part really.” He also said he hadn’t “worked for two years” — in the middle of an industry-shuttering pandemic, mind you — and said that he has a “spine problem which affects my legs so I can’t walk very well, so…”

But it’s not as though he was done working. “And I also wrote a book, a couple of books, which were published and were successful, so I’m now not an actor, I’m a writer,” Caine said, seemingly alluding to his memoirs. “Which is lovely, because as an actor you have to get up at half-past six in the morning and go to the studio. As a writer, you can start writing without leaving the bed.”

When asked if Best Sellers would wind up being his last film, he replied, “I think it would be, yeah.” He admitted that for the last two years there hadn’t been any offers for “movies I’d wanna do,” adding, “Also, you know I’m 88. There’s not exactly scripts pouring out with a leading man that’s 88, you know?”

It certainly sounds like Caine was retiring. Well, anyway, he’s not, at least according to him. So if you’re Christopher Nolan, or even if you aren’t, please reach out to the guy so Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon can continue having new impersonation material.

Coldplay kicked off the weekend by finally releasing their ninth album, Music Of The Spheres, which features appearances from Selena Gomez, We Are King, Jacob Collier, and BTS. They’ll now do what bands do after a big release: They’ll play it live. But there’s one place they won’t be playing: Glastonbury’s 2022 music festival.

Coldplay shared the news during an interview with NME, saying, “Glastonbury is our spiritual home, but even your parents say you need to leave home sometimes.” The band has made several appearances at the Worthy Farm festival dating back to 1999 and as recently as earlier this year. Over this two-decade span, Coldplay headlined the legendary festival in 2002, 2005, 2011, 2016, and 2021, so it’s understandable that some might be disappointed at the band’s choice to skip next year.

The news comes as Coldplay recently announced a livestream concert in support of Music Of The Spheres. The performance will air on a number of Amazon platforms, the Amazon Music app, the Amazon Music channel on Twitch, and Prime Video, on October 22 at 10 p.m. EST at Seattle’s Climate Please Arena, a venue that will also celebrate its grand re-opening with the performance.

You can read their full conversation with NME here.

Music Of The Spheres is out now via Parlophone. Get it here.

Coldplay is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

Warning: This post contains spoilers for Season 2 of Succession, which you should watch.

Remember Succession? It’s been a whopping two years since the HBO favorite ended its latest season with one of TV’s all-time great mic drops, concluding on a cliffhanger that left viewers clamoring for more as soon as possible. Then a badly managed, once-in-a-century public health crisis happened. But patience is a virtue, and on Sunday the show is belatedly back. If you didn’t revisit the previous season, your memory of Season 2 may be a little fuzzy. But HBO’s got your back.

The station dropped a nifty, quick recap of the most dramatic — and most ridiculous — moments from our last look at the evil Roys. It kicks off with Kendall (Jeremy Strong) publicly kowtowing to cold-hearted patriarch Logan (Brian Cox). That, of course, did not last. But there was more than Kendall turning heroic quisling. There was Shiv (Sarah Snook) developing a lust for power and estranging her doofus husband Tom (Matthew Macfadyen). There was Cousin Greg (Nicholas Braun) growing some balls and (maybe) a conscience. There was whatever was going on between Roman (Kieran Culkin) and longtime Waystar RoyCo counsel Gerri (J. Smith-Cameron).

And of course, there was also that New York Magazine piece unveiling the company’s cover-up over a cruise ship tragedy, which leads to the season’s thrilling cliffhanger. Will it be worth the wait? Critics have said hell yes. But if you need a brush-up — as well as a reminder, in case you forgot, of Kendall’s Squiggle-backed rap — you can do so by clicking in the video above. It will take you all of three minutes.

Succession returns on October 17 at 9pm on HBO and HBO Max.

(Via The Wrap)

Warning: This post contains spoilers for The White Lotus, so get on that if you haven’t.

The White Lotus was supposed to be a one-off. A miniseries about random tourists congregating at the same Hawaiian resort, it’s a tough show to bestow with a second season, unless the creators switched to different characters. That’s exactly what creator-writer-director Mike White is doing when he brings the show back for another round. But there’s (at least) one character he’s bringing back: Jennifer Coolidge’s hot mess Tanya McQuoid.

According to Deadline, the actress, who first came to prominence with her scene-stealing turns in American Pie and Legally Blonde, is in talks to have her character once again go on a splashy, trashy vacation where terrible (and sometimes good!) things happen. Perhaps she’ll be the only one to come back. Any more and that would simply beggar belief. (Although maybe a couple of them will make glorified cameos.)

When last we saw Tanya, she was on the up-and-up — sort of. She arrived at the titular resort in bad shape, mourning the death of her mother, about whom she had complicated feelings, and unsure where to go with the rest of her life. Then she met two people, one of whom she wound up screwing over. The latter move will likely hang over the character in Season 2, and perhaps over the next batch of episodes she’ll have to regain viewers’ trust. But it will be good to see the show’s second best stand-out, the first best (you know who) having perished spectacularly.

(Via Deadline)

It’s a big weekend for DCEU heads, with Fandome set to unveil a treasure trove of comic book movie goodies. One of them is the long-awaited trailer for The Batman, the latest, Robert Pattinson-led gritty reboot, which had to pause production mid-stream thanks to a little once-in-a-century public health crisis. But of course, those behind it have been dropping little shards ahead of the big drop, including posters and fuzzy images of figures with pointy bat ears. And now we have our first look the latest Catwoman, Zoe Kravitz.

Mind you, it’s a mere still, and it doesn’t feature the actress in full Catwoman regalia. It’s her as Selina Kyle, her alter ego, looking like a normal person, her eyes vaguely watery. We’re still not sure which tack The Batman will take with the character. Will she be a cucumber cool criminal who turns goodie à la Anne Hathaway in The Dark Knight Rises? Will she have some massive freak-out after being murdered and brought back to life by cats à la Michelle Pfeiffer in Batman Returns? Something else?

The image was dropped by director Matt Reeves himself, who boarded the Batman train after grimming up the Planet of the Apes series. He also helped spread the word for a few other Batman tidbits.

The trailer for The Batman is set to drop mid-afternoon Saturday.

As she’s done often the last couple of years, Britney Spears recently used her Instagram page to speak about her conservatorship. Last month, a judge suspended her father Jamie Spears from the role, and in a lengthy post, the singer opened up about her fears for the future.

“I’ll just be honest and say I’ve waited so long to be free from the situation I’m in … and now that it’s here I’m scared to do anything because I’m afraid I’ll make a mistake !!!” she wrote in the caption under a photo of fully-decorated Christmas tree. She also spoke about some of the things that “scare” her, like paparazzi following her outside an elementary school. “It’s like they want me to do something crazy,” Britney added. Spears added that she’ll have to “do things a little differently from now on.”

This comes after she criticized her family and thanked her lawyer Matthew Rosengart following her father’s suspension. “If you’re like my family who says things like ‘sorry, you’re in a conservatorship’ … probably thinking you’re different so they can f*ck with you !!!!” she wrote. “Thankfully I found an amazing attorney Mathew Rosengart who has helped change my life !!!!”

You can view the post from Britney above.

Back in May Bleachers announced their new album, Stop Making This Hurt, would be coming out at the end of July. Jack Antonoff finally took a break from working with super stars like Lana Del Rey and Taylor Swift and focused on his own music, kicking off the new album with the new single, “Stop Making This Hurt.” That track was somehow both upbeat, jazzy and incredibly sad, which set the tone well for the whole album. Yes, the album includes a track with Bruce Springsteen, and yes, there are plenty of other jazzy moments on the record, including a saxophone-spiked track called “How Dare You Want More.”

Another early single off the record is simply titled “91,” and that’s the one Antonoff and co. opted to perform during a recent late night appearance. This performance, too, had lots of saxophone moments (are you sensing a theme here?) and came during the middle of a brand new tour for the band. Appearing on Jimmy Kimmel Live for the performance, Antonoff sat and sang while playing the piano, with not one but two saxophonists playing along with him. Part of the reason this new album is such a sad one is that Antonoff said he wrote it after his breakup with Lena Dunham. If that’s your vibe this weekend, check out the performance above to put some sadness back into your Friday night.