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This season on Abbott Elementary, we’ve seen job changes, guest stars, and even a heated AI debate, so it’s hard to even imagine what they will come up with next. Perhaps they will incorporate the real-life union efforts of Philadelphia Public School teachers! Or they will bring The Phanatic in for a cameo. It could go either way. We probably won’t see Big Bird around campus any time soon, though.

Unfortunately, Abbott Elementary will be on an extended spring break for the next few weeks. Teachers need vacations too sometimes! There won’t be any new episodes until Wednesday, April 10th. The episode will arrive on Hulu around 3 a.m. on Thursday, April 11th.

Episode nine will be titled “Alex” and it seems like we’ll be getting some more screen time between Greggory and Janine. It’s what the fans want! Here is the official synopsis:

Jacob is shocked when he finds out his colleagues are not invested in his frequent email messages and haven’t even been writing their own replies. Meanwhile, Gregory turns to Janine for help with a former student.

After episode nine, there are only a handful of episodes left in season three. Luckily, the hit show has already been renewed for a fourth season after a nice long summer break!

Godzilla and Kong haven’t quite settled their beef yet. In Godzilla v Kong: The New Empire, set after the events of Godzilla vs. Kong, Kong leads a seemingly peaceful life in the center of the Earth. Godzilla now roams the planet, defending it from assorted monsters that show up – usually causing a lot of damage in the process, but better than no protection at all. And Godzilla has taken up a residency of sort in the Roman Colosseum, which he now uses as a bed. The good news is, these two are living far apart. That is, until Kong gets a nasty tooth ache and comes back to the surface seeking help, which sets off a whole host of problems for Rebecca Hall’s Dr. Ilene Andrews – who must first call in Trapper (Dan Stevens, seemingly having the time of his life) to fix Kong’s tooth. Then she must reunite with Brian Tyree Henry’s Bernie Hayes, who can help her with all the monster activity now going on.

This is the first of the new Monterverse movies to bring back members of the human cast from the previous films. As director Adam Wingard says ahead, it’s really the first direct sequel in the series so far so it made sense to bring back some characters. Ahead, Wingard explains why this movie isn’t just a “rematch” movie and that it’s more complicated than that. That’s the thing about Wingard, he truly does love these characters. And even though we might be tempted to have Godzilla do a little dance like he does in the Showa-era film Invasion of Astro-Monster – or really wonders what Godzilla would look like flying backwards using modern CGI – he knows how much others care about these characters, too, and as he puts it, doesn’t want “death threats.”

He also still plans on making a Thundercats movie and still plans on making a sequel to Face/Off with both Nicolas Cage and John Travolta. The last time we spoke to Wingard, for the release of Godzilla vs. Kong, these were his priority then, too. But, of course, the pandemic and a writers strike slowed down both projects. But, according to Wingard, they are still very much a priority.

These two, they’re at it again.

Yeah… But it’s one of those things where, yes, this is a rematch. But it’s not as straightforward as that, right? These monsters are complicated characters.

Over the last few months, I’ve been going through the Showa-era Godzilla movies. The monsters are actually complicated. Mothra is pretty complicated.

Well, that’s the thing, I always remembered, as a kid, that was so inspiring. Now making this film as an adult is that when you’re watching the films as a kid, you really understand the interactions. There’s a shorthand to Godzilla and Mothra being buddies and all the allegiances and those kind of things they have towards each other or not. Even though the monsters don’t talk, it’s easy to understand how they’re communicating with each other and what they are communicating.

Though you could have gotten away with Mothra talking. Well, not “talking,” but in the original we see her subtitles.

There are obviously a lot of sequences in this film which are just full monster sequences told from their POV. And what’s kind of funny is whenever you send out a script to people, a lot of the time people tend to just sort of skim over a lot of the full descriptive sequences and they just go right to the dialogue. And so knowing that, even when we were creating the monster scenes we actually wrote out what that dialogue would be in the script. So when you read it would say, Kong says, “Hey, back off.” And Scar King’s like, “Don’t tell me what to do.”

So in your mind they use slang? “Hey, back off, man.”

I’m giving you sort of more of a shorthand.

Oh, I see. Because I’d pay to see the version where they all speak in casual American slang.

I know, they should do a special edition though with subtitles like you’re saying so that you can just follow it.

“Take a long walk off a short pier, Godzilla.”

“You son of a bitch.”

Now you’ve escalated things. Now they’re going to come to blows.

Oh, you don’t think they’d be swearing? They would definitely be swearing at each other, yeah. These be some filthy monsters.

I also like how, going through the Showa films, Godzilla goes from a pure force of destruction to this ambivalent grump.

I had a conversation with Takashi Yamazaki recently, who directed Godzilla Minus One, and I was impressed to find out what a big fan he was of the Showa films, which are my favorite ones. And you haven’t gotten to it yet, but Godzilla versus Hedorah, that’s probably my favorite of that era because of how just over the top … like psychedelic, colorful…

I know I haven’t gotten to that one yet. You’re the second person I’ve interviewed that’s just randomly brought that one up. You know who the other person was? Nicolas Cage.

Oh really?

Yeah. And I know you still hope to do Face/Off 2 with him.

I specifically had a meeting with Nic Cage about Face/Off 2. And one of the things we specifically talked about a lot is Hedorah, because that’s also his favorite Godzilla movie. And probably for all the same reasons that I love it. It’s almost borderline experimental sometimes. I mean, there’s a sequence with 50 split screens going on at once. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a movie do that outside of that film. But again, going back to your question, I mean, that’s the thing about Godzilla is that he has been overtly a metaphor. He’s been good, he’s been bad.

I love in Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster, Mothra tries to get Godzilla to fight Ghidorah to save Earth. Mothra has to report back to the humans, “Godzilla says he doesn’t care.”

[Laughs] Totally. Especially in the monster verse, he’s the protector of the world. But at the end of the day, I don’t think he’s going to lose sleep if he crushes a building filled with people. You’ve got to stay out of his way because he’s going to do everything he can to, in the long run, protect you. But he’s not going to go out of his way directly to protect anybody.

Did you ever think about putting that little dance Godzilla does on the alien planet in Invasion of Astro-Monster?

I love that dance. Hey, I mean, anything’s possible in time. I will say we did not get around to the dance in this movie, but it’s one of my favorite things in the series, because it’s just so celebratory, isn’t it?

It is.

It’s kind of cute and I like it. I mean, Godzilla can be cute.

He’s also cute when he’s shooting the energy from his mouth and he’s flying backwards.

Well, and in a weird way, we kind of pay homage to some of that in this movie, in one of the battle sequences, but we do it in kind of a grounded way. I think if I ever just had Godzilla specifically do that, the fans would never forgive me. Even though I’d love to see that with modern expensive CGI technology. I think I’d get death threats after that.

Why would you get death threats for that? It’s fun.

Some people like it, and some Godzilla fans don’t want to see that. They take Godzilla very seriously. And I take Godzilla very seriously. And there are just certain things that are a bridge too far when it comes to that character. And it’s always about the context. We find pretty crazy things to have Godzilla do in this movie, but I think we always try to ground it within the context of the movie.

You know what else is unusual for this movie? You bring a lot of the human characters back, which is unusual for the movies back then and unusual for this series now.

I mean, in a lot of ways, this film is a direct sequel to Godzilla vs Kong, whereas the MonsterVerse films up until this point had really been, even though they were part of a larger series, they had a little bit more of a one-off feel. And even though I think King of Monsters kind of kicked it off, obviously our film really follows much more directly within the same plot line and characters as GvK. And I’m the first director that’s come back for one of the MonsterVerse films, and I don’t take that kind of responsibility lightly. So I try to use everything I learned in the last film and bring it back to this. And one of the main lessons is that being able to build characters and be able to allow the film to focus on them in a more intimate way was very important.

Dan Stevens is certainly enjoying himself.

Well, we wrote that character specifically for Dan. Because I worked with Dan on one of my first films called The Guest, and it’s one of my favorite movies that I’ve made. Dan has these very specific qualities that are rare in a Hollywood actor. He could both be the handsome leading man, but he’s also not afraid to be really quirky and a little weird, but it doesn’t take away from his charisma.

So I read the interview where you say making ThunderCats is a top priority. But “top priority” kind of comes off like the “top men” line in Raiders of the Lost Ark. So I’m worried that means no “top men” are actually looking at the Ark.

No, I mean, I was just having a conversation with Simon Barrett, who’s writing it with me, on the phone yesterday because we’re kind of in our final push on this next draft. So there’s still a lot happening with it. And I’m really excited in the direction that it’s going. And I mean, it’s super cool. So yeah, I wouldn’t downplay it necessarily either.

We mentioned Face/Off 2. That one seems like we might be waiting a little bit, at least reading between the lines.

Well, who knows? Like I said, I’ve already met with Nic and John and really hit it off with them. It’s just a matter of the script’s actually not that far off. We’re kind of in that final phase of like, okay, let’s try a couple of other little things and then it’s going to come back around and we’ll do another pass on it. And it’s been a good process.

I mean, Simon and I started that during the pandemic and because I had to prioritize making this film. That’s the only thing that slowed it down. But I mean, in terms of what’s next, I mean, Face/Off 2 or ThunderCats could take off really quickly. But frankly, I’ve been in the middle of Godzilla-land for a little while and haven’t decided what’s going to be the next actual priority in terms of getting made. But we’ll see. I’m excited about both of them honestly. I know that there are so many filmmakers who always have a ton of different projects that they’re into, and half of them never get made. But I’m equally excited about both of them. It’s just a matter of what’s going to magically come forward in that studio sort of way – where it’s always a miracle when things get made and it’s just about timing a lot of the time.

Here’s my one suggestion, if I may, with Face/Off 2. Get them in a room and switch their faces.

Great idea.

You can contact Mike Ryan directly on Twitter.

Mexico’s Tecate Pa’l Norte Festival is set to kick off this Friday, March 29 in Monterrey. With Kendrick Lamar, Blink-182, Anitta, and more set to appear at various stages as the festival’s top-billed acts, there is a ton of good music not to miss.

However, catching every single dream set at a festival is tough. As there are just a few more days to go, Tecate Pa’l Norte Festival unveiled the schedule for the set times — so fans can feel at ease knowing exactly when they can catch their favorite performers.

Here’s what to expect.

Here Are The Tecate Pa’l Norte Festival Set Times For 2024

Friday, March 29

The Tecate Pa’l Norte Festival will have three main stages this year: Tecate Light, Tecate Original, and Fusión Telcel. On the headlining Tecate Light stage, Cimafunk kicks things off, playing from 2:25 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. that afternoon. From there, fans can catch The Vaccines (3:25-4:10 p.m.), Keane (7:45-8:50 p.m.), Peso Pluma (9:35-10:40 p.m.), and Kendrick Lamar (11:30 p.m.-1 a.m.).

Saturday, March 30

On the Tecate Light stage for Saturday, it will feature Timø (3:10-3:40 p.m.), Clubz (4:10-4:50 p.m.), Latin Mafia (5:20-6:10 p.m.), Louis Tomlinson (10:05-11:10 p.m.), and Blink-182 (12:00-1:30 a.m.). Over on the Tecate Original stage, the performers will include La Delio Valdez (2:35-3:15 p.m.), DLD (5:00-5:45 p.m.), Danna Paola (6:25-7:20 p.m.), and Anitta (11:35 p.m.-12:35 a.m.).

Sunday, March 31

Finally, for Sunday, the Tecate Light stage will include El Mato A Un Policia Motorizado (3:00-3:45 p.m.), Lagos (4:10-4:50 p.m.), Enjambre (5:10-6:20 p.m.), and Maná (8:30-9:50 p.m.). For the Tecate Original stage, fans can catch Sexy Zebras (2:15-2:45 p.m.), Bratty (3:10-3:55 p.m.), Daniel Me Estas Matando (4:20-5:05 p.m.), Kenia OS (5:50-6:40 p.m.), and Fuerza Regida (11:00 p.m.-12:00 a.m.).

For a complete breakdown of set times, visit the festival’s official website.

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

At this point, to say that the fallout from all the lawsuits against Sean “Diddy” Combs is “settling” would be a massive misnomer. Every time it seems to be doing so, the dust swirls up again, setting off a new round of rumors and speculation as the music mogul’s misfortunes continue to pile up. Case in point, even as reports that Diddy’s properties in Los Angeles and Miami were raided by federal agents riled fans on social media, outlets across the pond were noticing some of their own controversy-magnet celebrities popping up in Diddy-related legal paperwork.

According to The Telegraph and The Standard, two UK-based outlets, Prince Harry was one of the many celebrities named in Rodney Jones’ $30 million lawsuit against Diddy for sexual harassment. Lil Rod, who had worked with Diddy on his last album, Off The Grid, makes a number of eyebrow-raising allegations against the music impresario in his suit, from violent shootings to hosting sex parties. One of the names mentioned by Jones as one of Diddy’s connections is the Duke of Sussex himself, Prince Harry. However, he does not accuse Harry of any wrongdoing, merely noting the acquaintance and how it lent cachet to Diddy in his ability to entice guests to attend his lavish soirees.

The NFL has played games on Christmas Day over the last two years, first taking the opportunity in 2022 of Christmas being on a Sunday to play a trio of games and, because that did so well, they ran it back this past year with Christmas falling on a Monday.

However, in 2024, the holiday falls on a Wednesday which meant most expected the league to take at least one year off from its Christmas programming, as they don’t ever play games on Wednesday. However, the NFL can’t help but look at the ratings for their Christmas slate the last couple years and not have their eyes do the cartoon slot machine thing with money signs, so as reported by Jonathan Jones of CBS and Adam Schefter of ESPN, the league will indeed put a game on Christmas this year.

One would think they will have to schedule a bye (or Thursday night games) the week before for whoever plays that Wednesday, and that’ll be a trick for the NFL schedule maker. While I’m not sure the players on the teams that draw the Christmas assignment will be thrilled with a Wednesday night game, the team owners will be and fans will gobble it up. The real loser here is the NBA, which has always made a 5-game Christmas slate its marquee day of the regular season, only to have the NFL slide on in to steal away a chunk of the spotlight.

Yes, Robert Kirkman’s Invincible only recently returned for the back half of the second season. Already, it’s almost time for Episode 7, which means that the season finale is coming soon, too. Even in the age of the Viltrum Empire and its foes, time (as you know) flies/soars, but weekly rollouts from Amazon are clearly working because viewers look forward to every installment of this Steven Yeun-starring series.

What Time Will ‘Invincible’ Season 2, Episode 7 Be On Prime Video?

Thursday, March 26 is the date when we will visit the rest of the mayhem of this sophomore round of episodes. Perhaps we’ll see more of the Atom Eve issue develop, but we will surely see more of Mark attempting to juggle being a college student with attempting to save humanity from an intergalactic dictatorship. Two rough missions from the Guardians of the Globe will also challenge that end of the story, and can we get Debbie a vacation in Aruba? Cut that lady a break, man.

From there, Episode 8 will be the season finale, but don’t fear. Soon enough (June 13), The Boys will return for Season 4, in which Homelander will go on trial, and Billy Butcher will follow up on making his fellow vigilantes bugger off and that lab discovery he made over on the Gen V spinoff.

It will be High Supe drama for sure.

Will Smith and Martin Lawrence are officially back in Bad Boys: Ride or Die. The latest film in the Miami cop series briefly appeared to be in jeopardy after the infamous Oscars slap, but Lawrence assured fans that Bad Boys 4 was still coming. He was right.

Sony dropped the first trailer this week, which also revealed the title change to Bad Boys: Ride or Die. The film once again features Smith and Lawrence in an all-out action spectacular as they work to clear the name of their long-time captain played by Joe Pantoliano. Bad Boys for Life directors Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah are also back at the helm.

Here’s the official logline:

This Summer, the world’s favorite Bad Boys are back with their iconic mix of edge-of-your seat action and outrageous comedy but this time with a twist: Miami’s finest are now on the run.

Rounding out the cast are Alexander Ludwig, Vanessa Hudgens, Eric Dane, Paola Núñez, Tasha Smith, Ioan Gruffudd, and Rhea Seehorn coming in hot after her critically acclaimed performance in Better Call Saul that was robbed at the Emmys. Maybe the Bad Boys can solve that crime next.

Bad Boys: Ride or Die hits theaters on June 7.

To borrow a line from Jay-Z, it’s no fun when the family feud. But it is quite interesting to watch when celebrities kinfolk get involved in public disputes.

According to Drake, Metro Boomin and Future’s diss song “Like That” featuring Kendrick Lamar (apparently a longtime foe) didn’t ruffle his feathers. However, the “Rich Baby Daddy” rapper’s father, Dennis Graham, seems far more bothered by the remarks made on wax. To air out his frustration, the Papa Bear reportedly clapped back at the trio and Drake’s former industry friend, who has unfollowed his son online since the track’s release.

On March 25, in a now-deleted post on Instagram, Graham supposedly delivered the heat Drake’s response lacked. “Yo, I am about to drop some new music,” he sarcastically wrote. “And I am not sure if it’s going to sell, but I am going to call some of my homies and get them to start a beef with Drake and get them to unfollow him, and that’s going make my shit shoot up to number 1. I’m sure this is going to work, so let me get some people on board for this and watch what kind of attention this gets!!!!!!!!!!!! I WILL BE NUMBER ONE 1Day!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Folks online are divided on Graham’s involvement. Some consider it corny. Others declare that all is fair in love and rap beef. But hey: If Beyoncé’s mother, Tina Knowles, can thumb thug it out with trolls when it comes to her superstar daughter, Graham should be granted the same parental grace.

Yesterday was an eventful day for rap record mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs. The music impresario saw his homes raided and family members detained as part of an investigation into alleged sex trafficking that arose as a result of a slew of sexual assault lawsuits against him.

It was also, coincidentally, the anniversary of two albums heavily connected to Combs’ musical legacy: The Notorious B.I.G.’s Life After Death and The Diplomats’ Diplomatic Immunity. Cam’Ron and Mase commented on the “eerie” timing of the raids on the latest episode of their sports podcast It Is What It Is, calling Diddy’s misfortunes “reparations” as they gloated over their former business partner’s legal troubles.

“Reparations is getting closer and closer,” Mase chuckled during the show’s intro. “I ain’t got nothing to do with that money, that’s all yours,” Cam responded. He also noted, “The last year has really been the been payback for you.”

The crux of their comments was Mase’s ongoing financial disputes with Combs, which started in the early 2000s and continued until last year, when Combs finally sold Mase the publishing rights to his music recorded under Bad Boy, along with a slew of other Bad Boy artists. Mase, of course, heavily contributed to Life After Death and became the Bad Boy golden child in the wake of B.I.G.’s 1997 murder, but felt that he was never paid fairly by Diddy, resulting in stints as a pastor and rapper on other labels.

In the prior week’s episode of It Is What It Is, Mase said he had to “escape” Bad Boy, recalling, “Even though I made those decisions and it cost me money, that’s why [when] I got with [Cam’Ron], [God] gave me the money back. I didn’t [really] lose no money. Destiny.”

You can watch the full episode above.

The NFL’s annual owner meetings have produced a handful of significant rule changes after a vote by ownership on a number of proposals from teams and the competition committee.

Among them include approval of the proposal to eliminate the hip drop tackle, which garnered attention after injuries to some players and has sparked plenty of controversy as, unlike the horse collar, it figures to be much more difficult to legislate out. It is used frequently by defenders as a legitimate tackling technique that avoids the previous points of emphasis on not hitting players in the head or dragging them down from up high, and the NFLPA even put out a statement requesting it not be removed.

Beyond that, there are now more reviewable plays — a passer’s knee being down before throwing a pass and the game clock being at 0:00 before a snap (not the play clock, crucially) — and a massive kickoff change that is attracting most of the attention.

The NFL will enact the XFL model that places the kicker back at the 35, a returner (or two) between the goal line and the 20, and the other 19 or 20 players on the field lined up within 5-10 yards of each other. The kicking team’s players will all line up on the opposing 40, while the receiving team can have players between the 30-35, limiting high speed collisions. The players can move once the ball hits the ground or when it’s fielded.

In practice, it looks like this.

The idea is to create more returns, something the NFL wants desperately after the new touchback rule led to a steep dropoff, without the risk of the massive collisions we used to see with players flying downfield at each other. The touchback rule also changes, as there are no fair catches but a touchback that hits the endzone gets brought out to the 30, not the 25, encouraging kickers to thread the needle and put the ball in a returnable spot.

I personally enjoyed the XFL kickoff in the brief time period in which the XFL existed before the merger to become the UFL. It will take some time for NFL players to adjust, and you can bet teams are going to have to spend a lot of time working on their new coverage and blocking technique in camp this year. That said, it does keep the return a part of the game, albeit in a different format, and once fans get past the immediate “change is bad” reaction that always happens, I think it’ll be mostly a positive.

There are tradeoffs though, and this will kill the surprise onside kick. That’s not a frequent thing in the NFL, but it is a bit of a shame to lose that element of surprise, as you now must declare you are going for an onside kick beforehand to let the other team get their personnel out there. Still, onside kicks were already dying out and the league opted to keep the return game alive over onside kicks.