Can you believe Republican voters are still in thrall to someone who doesn’t know how magnets work? Strange but true. Donald Trump, who this time last year was still in the doghouse for doing things like dining with anti-Semites, is back on top in GOP polling. He’s even doing this while juggling multiple court cases, including one for defamation over sexual assault. This surreal situation proved fodder for SNL’s first Cold Open of 2024.
The sketch found James Austin Johnson’s acclaimed take on the 45th president where he is when he’s not holding rallies: standing in courthouse lobbies, ranting to reporters. He began by insulting his permanently revolving door legal iunit.
“Look at this team,” he said, motioning to a row of generic middle aged lawyers. “This is the bottom of the barrel, folks. This is ‘Who said yes.’ I’m in the lead for president and this is the best I can get. Feels like a red flag, no?”
He then turned to his team, telling them, “You’re not getting paid, by the way. You know that? Of course you do.”
“As you can see, I’m doing very well cognitively,” he claimed. “I’m doing great with cognitive. I think I’m doing great with cognitive. I’m more cognitive than ever. The doctor said, ‘Sir, you have to be in the top 99% of all the concussion and dementia people we give this test to.’”
Trump also praised his campaign. “We’ve seen a lot of success with saying things that did not happen,” he said, of his longtime habit of straight-up lying. “I think we’ll continue to do that. It’s an innovation I’m particularly proud of, seems to be working very well.”
“I love this country, and its traditions. That’s why I’m not doing any debates and barely doing election. I don’t need to, my people love me. I’ve got the old people, they’re waiting in snow for two hours to vote for Trump. ‘Oh darling, I’m dying, I’ve got to do one last thing. I gotta vote for Trump.’ We just need them to stay alive till November. Stay alive till November. Just pull that lever and drop dead. Why? Because I’m sent by God and God has a plan for me or whatever, I dunno.”
He ended on a cautiously optimistic note, saying, “2024 is going to be a very exciting year. I’m either going to jail, be president or, frankly, the purge. Perhaps all three, let’s spin the chamber!”
In 2022, Chris Pratt returned to television in a much less comedic capacity than the Parks and Recreation role that made him a household name. For the same audience that loves Alan Ritchson’s Reacher and John Krasinski’s Jack Ryan, Pratt sprang into action in Amazon‘s The Terminal List. This adaptation of former Navy SEAL Jack Carr’s conspiracy-laden novel tells the story of Navy SEAL James Reece seeking vengeance (and compiling a death list, hence the name of the series) following unfathomable tragedy.
Plot
The first season of The Terminal List thrilled action junkies with intricate action sets and choreography. Heck, Pratt even fought in his underwear at one point while telling Variety that when his character fights, “I want it to be dirty. So I’m gonna punch him in the balls… It’s raw, visceral and vulnerable.”
That’s certainly an effective way to hook an audience that needs a fix in between Reacher bingewatching sessions. On a more serious note, audiences (and particularly Amazon’s viewers lately) cannot get enough of no-nonsense, military officers (ex or current) putting their enemies where they belong, and there is now a The Terminal List prequel series in the works (starring Taylor Kitsch as Ben Edwards), too.
We are here today to discuss the second season, however, and where Pratt’s lieutenant commander/combat leader will go after he achieved vengeance for the deaths of his teammates and family. The series will now move into source material that can be found in Carr’s True Believer novel (also of The Terminal List series, obviously). On Instagram, Pratt promised that hardcore fans can expect “more military authenticity and heart-pounding action. You spoke. We listened.”
True Believer picks up with Reece, listed as a domestic terrorist by the U.S. government, hiding out in the South African nature of Mozambique. His location eventually becomes known by the CIA, which dangles immunity and a presidential pardon in his face, and since Reece wants immunity for those who aided him, yep, he reluctantly climbs onboard. He’s ostensibly on the prowl for an Iraqi ex-commando coordinating terrorist attacks on the West when Reece discovers that even more geopolitical conspiracy is afoot, and you can bet that the bodies will start to hit the floor again.
“I’m excited to announce that the second season of The Terminal List is on its way, and I couldn’t be more thrilled to reprise my role as James Reece. This season promises to be even more intense and action-packed than the first, and I can’t wait for everyone to see it. And for those who are fans of Taylor Kitsch’s Ben Edwards, I’m happy to say that we’re also working on a spinoff series that will delve deeper into his story and follow his journey from a Navy SEAL to a CIA operative. And to make it even more exciting, I will also be appearing in this prequel series! I promise you it will be just as thrilling and engaging as The Terminal List. Stay tuned for more updates and we can’t wait for you all to join us on this journey.”
Cast
Chris Pratt reprises his role as James Reece, and Taylor Kitsch returns as as CIA operative Ben Edwards, a former SEAL and old Reece buddy. Potentially, we will see Constance Wu’s reporter, Katie Buranek, again. We will definitely not be seeing Jai Courtney or Patrick Schwarzenegger’s characters for obvious reasons. The latter appears to have developed a knack at dying early in popular streaming shows, but hey, that kind-of frees him up for the next gig.
Expect a fresh new cast of characters that are available to meet violent deaths. That’s how this series goes!
Release Date
Production is set to begin soon, so stay tuned on a release date. Early 2025 seems like a realistic target.
Trailer
Given that the season has been newly announced, no hope for a trailer exists yet. However, there’s no time like the present to rewatch Pratt taking out Jai Courtney’s baddie while proving that, beyond a doubt, Andy Dwyer is but a distant memory.
Every single week, our TV and film experts will list the most important ten streaming selections for you to pop into your queues. We’re not strictly operating upon reviews or accrued streaming clicks (although yes, we’ve scoured the streaming site charts) but, instead, upon those selections that are really worth noticing amid the churning sea of content. There’s a lot out there, after all, and your time is valuable.
TIE: 10. The Boys in the Boat (Amazon MGM Studios film streaming on VOD and Amazon)
George Clooney, conga-line hand shaker extraordinaire, hopped back into the director’s seat to adapt the 2013 novel about the real-life U.S. rowing team that went to the 1936 Olympics in Germany ahead of World War II. Callum Turner stars as a student who didn’t plan on Olympic glory when he simply signed up for his school’s rowing team, but he rolled with it. You can also see Turner soon in Masters of the Air, so this is a good appetizer as well as a worthwhile watch on its own merits.
TIE: 10. The Holdovers (Focus Features film streaming on Peacock)
Paul Giamatti Oscar nomination coming? This is entirely possible, considering that he won a Globe for his role as a boozed-up teacher who isn’t thrilled to be stuck on campus over the holidays. The Billions star is having a pretty fine year already, so let’s hope that trend continues. Also, get ready for those many Billions spinoffs that will eventually come to Showtime.
Our own Brian Grubb power ranked the season finale, and finally, pancakes and biscuits (along with Ole Munch) are receiving the recognition that they deserve: “I do not think I have ever seen a television show that featured this much graphic violence and gory open wounds that also made me hungry for baked goods almost every week.” Yes, and John Sasquatch somehow fared better than Jon Hamm’s nipple rings. We love TV.
Martin Scorsese’s adaptation of David Grann’s nonfiction narrative saga takes a different route to than the books to shine a same-themed light on a devastating chapter in U.S. history. Many incredible indigenous actors (including Yancey Red Corn, Everett Waller, and Cara Jade Myers) hold their own alongside powerhouses including Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert De Niro, Jesse Plemons, and Brendan Fraser, but Lily Gladstone’s performance as Mollie Burkhart will be the most remembered of the bunch.
If you are looking forward to Charlie Cox’s Daredevil standalone show, then you will definitely want to tune in for his cameo opposite Alaqua Cox’s Maya Lopez. Once you are on the scene, then you will hopefully want to keep watching this origin story, which is unlike any recent Disney+ show in recent memory. Unfortunately, there’s plenty of MCU (and DCEU) burnout of late, but this show should hang on for another weekend because the entire season is available for binging.
The rise of Cousin Richie is something that few people could have seen coming, which is an overriding reason why this show only gets better with time. The third season is in the works, and hopefully, the writers can find a way to work in Ayo Edebiri’s shoutout to her Irish people in between moments of Carmy totally losing his sh*t. What do y’all think will happen with the restaurant? I’m thinking that the Chefs will aim for a Michelin star, and maybe Jamie Lee Curtis’ horrible mother character will drive attempt to drive through the front door, but Lionel Boyce’s Marcus will use his donuts to save the day.
Everything is being revived or rebooted, so Seth MacFarlane is taking another swing with this profane teddy bear. This series acts as a prequel film to the films starring Mark Wahlberg, Mila Kunis, and Amanda Seyfried, but don’t worry, MacFarlane’s voice definitely showed up to drop all of those F-bombs because the franchise demands it.
Those who miss the first-season supernatural elements and chemistry of Woody Harrelson and Matthew McConaughey will enjoy the push-pull of Jodie Foster and Kali Reis’ investigators as they battle the elements to solve an eerie mystery. Foster’s police chief has seen some sh*t, and that sh*t gets stirred back up when an unsolved bunch of homicides isn’t the freeze-and-dried case that it might have initially seemed to be. The season co-stars John Hawkes, so you know that something sinister will definitely go down, and the chilly ensemble cast includes Christopher Eccleston, Finn Bennett, and Fiona Shaw. Issa López wrote, directed, and acted as showrunner while doing justice to the original spirit brought to screen by Nic Pizzolatto before, well, you know.
Harlan Coban readers are here for his next chess move to streaming TV supremacy, and the binging is ongoing for this adaptation of a nanny-cam that changes everything with two possibly connected murder cases. The first of which involves a woman who believes that her husband was killed, but somehow, he still lives and appears on camera, and there are many disturbing truths that will come to the forefront during the course of this twisting tale.
Less than two weeks after its debut on Netflix, this movie emerged on the streamer’s Most Popular Non-English list, and it will likely end up on the service’s top All-Time film list, too. This story brings the Andes Mountains crash survivors in 1972 onscreen in vivid detail, and given that both arctic blasts and air-travel chaos is in the news these days, this might feel too timely of a watch in a way. That hasn’t discouraged the binging, however, and this film continues to rack up view and critical acclaim alike.
The second season finale streamed this week, and once again, Reacher and the Special Investigators have lived up to their motto. Star Alan Ritchson has already delivered a peek at his third-season crustiness, and now, everyone can wonder exactly which of Lee Childs’ Jack Reacher books that the show will adapt next. Seriously, nobody would be upset if they managed to write Roscoe into the show again, too. She did receive a shoutout this year, after all. Details matter!
Discus du Plessis (21-2) defeated Sean Strickland (28-6) via split decision to earn the UFC Middleweight title from Scotiabank Arena in Toronto at UFC 297.
Strickland was the aggressor to open the fight, with du Plessis sitting back and looking for counter opportunities. Just like he did with Israel Adesanya, Strickland did well jabbing and checking kicks. Toward the end of the round, du Plessis shot Strickland against the cage, took him down and Strickland quickly moved back to his feet. Strickland continued to chip away with jabs and landed a big right hand to end the round.
Strickland continued to jab du Plessis and the challenger had trouble finding his range. Late in the second, he began to find his openings, getting his own shots in before taking the champ to the ground for another takedown.
The third saw du Plessis continue to move forward, sticking to his gameplan despite Strickland’s success jabbing and checking his shots. Du Plessis continued to toss one-two shots, as Strickland moved more firmly into a defensive position.
The championship rounds opened with both corners urging their fighters to attack. Du Plessis opened up a cut on Strickland with a big elbow and it seemed to wake Strickland up, who followed with a few right hands of his own. Another right from du Plessis really opened up the cut on Strickland. Strickland attempted to clinch, which led to another takedown for the challenger. Du Plessis shot again, taking Strickland down with ease. Back on their feet, du Plessis went right back to work with lefts and rights before the end of the round.
In the fifth and final round, Strickland tried to get back to his pinpoint striking. Du Plessis changed levels over and again, kicking at Strickland’s legs, then going up top. Du Plessis shot for a takedown, but Strickland stuffed it. The last minute of the round came with both fighters throwing everything they had, doing what they could to gather the last few points before a decision.
Du Plessis turned down the UFC’s first offer for a title fight against Adesanya last September. Du Plessis is unbeaten in his UFC career, with two knockout victories over former title contenders last year in Derek Brunson and Robert Whittaker.
Strickland headed into Saturday night’s fight with his first title defense after shocking Adesanya in a decision victory at UFC 293. Strickland stepped in after du Plessis skipped out on the UFC’s offer for a title shot. Strickland came into Saturday night’s main event with consecutive wins in 2023 after losing both fights in 2022 at the hands of Alex Pereira and Jared Cannoneir.
In his debut Saturday Night Live appearance, Australian actor Jacob Elordi laid it all out on the table, beginning with his opening monologue. He addressed one of the many shocking scenes in his latest film, Saltburn, and displayed a clip of Barry Keoghan’s character Oliver inserting himself into Elordi’s character, Felix’s grave.
The clip, for the sake of a TV-14 audience, was censored, however, Elordi clarified “I was the one in the grave.”
He continued, saying “If you saw the movie, thank you. If you saw the movie with your parents, I’m sorry. And if you saw the movie with your girlfriend, you’re welcome.”
After this, Elordi takes a few questions from the audience. One fan tells him “Loved you in Priscilla” then asked “What’s your favorite version of Elvis? Young Elvis or Old Elvis?”
Elordi then offered a cheeky response, saying “Probably Lilo And Stitch Elvis.”
This clarification comes after an October 2023 interview on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, during which he revealed that he wasn’t super familiar with Elvis Presley’s catalog ahead of Priscilla.
“The most I knew of Elvis was in ‘Lilo & Stitch,’” Elordi said. “Which is a lot, by the way.”
In Lilo And Stitch, Lilo (Daveigh Chase) is a super fan of Elvis, and plays songs like “Heartbreak Hotel,” “Hound Dog,” and “Burnin’ Love” throughout the movie.
You can watch Elordi’s full opening SNL monologue above.
Reneé Rapp is kicking off the year with a bang. The movie-musical adaptation of Mean Girls, in which she plays queen bee Regina George, has garnered a lot of buzz, and for many reasons. Of course, Rapp wowed audiences with her comedic timing, strong acting, and powerful vocals, but equally as entertaining have been her interviews during the Mean Girls press tour.
In one notable video interview, she recalls a tour bus manager being rude to her and her friends. In another, she comments on her “Not My Fault” collaborator Megan Thee Stallion’s assets. While many fans have revered Rapp’s unfiltered and honest nature, some viewers have accused her of lacking media training.
She remedies this in a new Saturday Night Live sketch, in which she plays the “lesbian intern” of lip-readers played by Bowen Yang, and the episode’s host, Jacob Elordi.
Throughout the sketch, Yang and Elordi appear on Entertainment Tonight to lip-read clips from the most recent Golden Globes awards, and TMZ footage of Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce. However, they just can’t seem to get the words right. They call upon Rapp, who is actually fulfilling an obligation.
“I’ve been going absolutely off in every single interview lately,” says Rapp, “so now I have to do 40 hours of court-ordered media training.”
Reneé Rapp is kicking off the year with a bang. The movie-musical adaptation of Mean Girls, in which she plays queen bee Regina George, has garnered a lot of buzz, and for many reasons. Of course, Rapp wowed audiences with her comedic timing, strong acting, and powerful vocals, but equally as entertaining have been her interviews during the Mean Girls press tour.
In one notable video interview, she recalls a tour bus manager being rude to her and her friends. In another, she comments on her “Not My Fault” collaborator Megan Thee Stallion’s assets. While many fans have revered Rapp’s unfiltered and honest nature, some viewers have accused her of lacking media training.
She remedies this in a new Saturday Night Live sketch, in which she plays the “lesbian intern” of lip-readers played by Bowen Yang, and the episode’s host, Jacob Elordi.
Throughout the sketch, Yang and Elordi appear on Entertainment Tonight to lip-read clips from the most recent Golden Globes awards, and TMZ footage of Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce. However, they just can’t seem to get the words right. They call upon Rapp, who is actually fulfilling an obligation.
“I’ve been going absolutely off in every single interview lately,” says Rapp, “so now I have to do 40 hours of court-ordered media training.”
In her second performance of the night, Reneé Rapp turned up the heat on the Saturday Night Live stage with a performance of “Not My Fault” from the Mean Girls soundtrack.
In the 2024 movie-musical adaptation of Mean Girls, Rapp plays queen bee Regina George, reprising her role from the Broadway adaptation. Ahead of the “Not My Fault” performance, Rachel McAdams, who played Regina in the original 2004 movie, introduced Rapp, who was then seen rocking a flowing black coat and pants, with a matching top.
Surrounded by background dancers, all dressed in pink, Rapp maintained the fun, flashy spirit of Mean Girls, switching up the energy from her previous performance of “Snow Angel.” Behind Rapp, at the center of the stage, was a large pink cake, which rotated midway through the song.
As the cake made a 180-degree rotation, Megan Thee Stallion was revealed, then joined Rapp to perform her verse of the song. As Meg delivered her fire bars, the two matched each other’s vibes, as they twerked it out to the beat.
RENEÉ RAPP AND MEGAN THEE STALLION PERFORMING THEIR SONG “NOT MY FAULT” ON #SNL TONIGHT (FULL) pic.twitter.com/FHwKpoQCK0
Tonight (January 20) marked a very special night for Reneé Rapp. Hot of the premiere of the movie-musical adaptation of Mean Girls, in which, she reprised her role of Regina George from the Broadway adaptation, Rapp made her debut on Saturday Night Live as the first musical guest of 2024.
In her first performance of the night, Rapp delivered a raw, emotional performance of “Snow Angel,” the title track from her debut album.
During the performance, Rapp laid flat on the floor, letting her vocals take charge. Dressed in a white corset and a matching leather coat, she rises up maintaining an ethereal presence throughout. White fog adds to the the icy, cold feeling of the emotional, gut-wrenching ballad.
Last September, Rapp opened up about the songwriting and production process on Jay Shetty’s On Purpose podcast and revealed that it was written after a traumatic experience. It was one of the final songs she recorded with producer Alexander 23.
“We started writing it, and it was just the two of us. And the entire time I was writing it, I felt nothing,” Rapp said. “Until we recorded the song and the whole thing was done and I played it for my friends and my manager and everybody was like, ‘This is insane.’ But for me, that whole year of my life was inherent resilience.”
The Green Bay Packers will spend the next eight months haunted by squandered opportunities from Saturday night’s Divisional Round game against the 49ers, as they were the better, more consistent team for most of the night but also made the most costly errors.
The Packers trailed 7-6 at the half after scoring just six points on three red zone drives in the first half before trading touchdowns with the Niners early in the third quarter. However, they seemed to finally take control of the game when Keisean Nixon returned a kickoff deep into Niners territory, with Eric Wilson saving the day with a diving fumble recovery to set up a go-ahead TD and two-point conversion from Jordan Love.
The defense would continue to do yeoman’s work against Brock Purdy and a 49ers offense that looked flustered, but then Love suddenly started to look like a young quarterback as it came time to finish the game. First came an interception at midfield after he rifled a ball high and behind his tight end on third down, bouncing into the hands of Dre Greenlaw.
That set up a Niners field goal to close the gap to four, and after back-to-back drives ending in punts, the Packers would find some life thanks to Aaron Jones and drive down into San Francisco territory. However, they would come up empty for the third time on the night after a Anders Carlson 41-yard field goal pulled just wide left of the uprights, and that was all the invitation the Niners needed to walk through the door.
After a dreadful night for the first three-plus quarters, Brock Purdy finally found a rhythm to move San Francisco down the field, where Christian McCaffrey punched in his second TD of the game to give the Niners a 27-24 lead.
The Packers would get a first down on their final minute drive trying to tie or win the game, but with just under 50 seconds left, Love made a terrible decision to just huck the ball up into the middle of the field, where Greenlaw came away with his second pick of the night to seal a Niners win.
It’s about as bad a throw as you’ll see in that situation, as the Packers had timeouts and it wasn’t fourth down, so they would’ve been perfectly fine with a throwaway. Instead, he forced it into triple coverage, throwing across his body in the rain with no juice on the ball, and it fluttered into Greenlaw’s arms to put the game on ice.
The pick that sent the 49ers to another NFC Championship game
Love was great for much of the game, including a pair of touchdown passes in the third quarter, but red zone stallouts and his two miscues in the middle of the field will haunt him for months to come. He and the Packers will hope they become learning experiences for the future, but given how well the Packers played and how poorly Purdy and the Niners offense looked for much of the game, it will be a long time before Green Bay comes to terms with losing this game.
San Francisco meanwhile will feel like they escaped one, and after their injury luck a year ago, they might feel they were owed this kind of win. Deebo Samuel’s injury status will be a big story going into next week as he left with a shoulder injury early on, but San Francisco played about as poorly as they have all year and managed to come out with a win, allowing them to now try to settle in for the NFC title game back at home.
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