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Nearly two years ago, Bryan Danielson turned the wrestling world on its head when he became the latest WWE superstar to jump to AEW. His arrival signaled an opportunity to become the face of the company, and it’s one that remains top of mind as he approaches another shot at the promotion’s biggest prize on Sunday. Danielson will hit the squared circle in the main event of AEW Revolution, where he’ll face Maxwell Jacob Friedman with the opportunity to ascend to the top of the company.

“The AEW World Championship is the centerpiece of the promotion,” Danielson tells Uproxx Sports. “You can’t say that about every wrestling company in the world, but you can say that about AEW. That’s why guys like Jon Moxley have been considered the man in AEW for the last couple years, Kenny (Omega), a little bit after that. When you’re the champion, you’re the one in charge of carrying the company. And it would be … for really the first time since I was in Ring of Honor that I’d get the opportunity to do that.

Danielson views it as a privilege to be the face of a promotion, even if he understands there’s an inherent challenge which comes from having that much responsibility. When Danielson was in WWE, he main evented WrestleMania 30 and won the World Heavyweight Championship in one of the best examples in wrestling history of an individual’s undeniable popularity with the fans serving as a springboard to the title.

But despite that, Danielson recalls, he “was never the guy” in WWE.

“After WrestleMania 30, when I had won the championship and just main evented WrestleMania, they had a meeting with me where it was like, ‘Okay, what we’d really like is to do is to set this other guy up to be the guy,’” he says. “I think the phrase was the next John Cena. And I was like, ‘I would like to be the next John Cena,’ (and they said) nobody can be John Cena.

“I literally just main evented WrestleMania, and you’re already telling me directly — and I actually appreciated that — that you don’t see me as the guy,” he continues. “That’s good for me because (I knew) this is what I have to overcome if I want to be that. I never got there in WWE as far as being the company’s guy. When Ric Flair talked about to be the man, you gotta beat the man. In AEW, that’s really how it is. To be the man, you’ve gotta be the AEW World Champion.”

Danielson’s decision to go to AEW involved much more than simply becoming the face of a promotion. He jokes about being the “best first match wrestler in the history of WWE” — Rey Mysterio is, in his eyes, the exception — and he loved the opportunities he was afforded, specifically calling back to his program with Drew Gulak. But he saw more main event opportunities in AEW, the latest being his program with the controversial MJF.

“Everybody unanimously agrees that he is an asshole,” Danielson says with a laugh when describing his working relationship with the champ. “So, you have to deal with that. But I’m ok with people being assholes. The one thing I want out of people is to put effort and thought into it. And MJF is very thoughtful and he loves wrestling.”

Outside of main eventing another show for AEW, Danielson points to the opportunities to work with emerging talent and pass knowledge to the next generation as a source of joy for him in AEW and a factor in his decision to join the company.

He sees individuals like Darby Allin, Wardlow, FTR, the Young Bucks, and Dante Martin as folks he’d love to get in the ring with. Backstage, there are plenty who stop by to seek advice when he’s watching the show on a monitor — Danielson identifies Wheeler Yuta and Daniel Garcia as the ones who are most often reaching out for mentorship.

With a heavy mix of young talent and veterans — Danielson makes it a point to call out Blade as a veteran leader no one talks about — the locker room is a blend of lightheartedness and “very good, serious conversations” about shared experiences, mental health, and how to navigate life on the road.

Part of that shared knowledge includes what it takes to rise to the top of a promotion — his championship run at WrestleMania 30 is a perfect example. Should the stars align, he sees Wardlow, Hangman Page, Ricky Starks, and Garcia as talents who could eventually reach the level of global superstardom these days associated with the likes of Roman Reigns and Kenny Omega.

“Where I got to in wrestling is partially because of working hard and being good at what I do, but also it’s a lot of luck, too — luck in not getting injuries, luck in being at the right place at the right time,” Danielson says. “I felt like I’ve wrestled people who, if things fell into the same place, same kind of positions that I’ve been, could have been just as successful, if not more successful. And they never got those things right. And so, wrestling is not like basketball where if you score 25 points a game, somebody’s gonna put you on their team in the NBA. Wrestling’s not like that. In wrestling, it’s not always the cream rises to the top. So, that’s all of that to say with the right bit of luck, any of those guys could do it.”

Danielson compares his love for professional wrestling to an artistic expression, like gardening, pottery, or playing music. It’s a release that gives him a feeling of freedom, and it’s something he wants to do as long as he possibly can. But of course, Danielson’s life has changed considerably over the years, which in turn means wrestling is no longer his top priority.

“You have to be smart because, MJF cut a promo on me last week saying you’re not gonna be able to hold your children or play with your kids and all that kind of stuff,” Danielson says. “And one of my things that I’m very diligent with is working with neurologists to keep an eye on how I am physically, from a brain perspective, at all times. I’m constantly getting checkups on it. My number one priority, more so than wrestling, is my family.”

Keeping his health top of mind, Danielson believes his decision to join AEW allowed him to very easily change his in-ring style and extend his wrestling career.

“(WWE) hires these enormous humans, and then you get somebody like me, who is 5’8, two inches below average height, I think, for an American male. But you take me and then automatically, part of my role is to go in there as an underdog and get bumped around,” Danielson says. “In AEW, the hiring practices aren’t necessarily that we’ve got to get all these big guys. It’s most people my size, some a little bigger, some a little smaller, but what that does is it allows me to do more mat wrestling, more hard-hitting stuff. For example, if you look at some of the people from a longevity perspective to do really well in Japan, they do hard shots, but they’re not taking these huge bumps, the stuff that really wrecks your neck. I’ve cut some of the stuff that literally I just can’t do anymore, like springboard dives in to the crowd.”

On the subject of Japan, Danielson would love to return to the country and wrestle, particularly if it would involve the opportunity to compete in the upcoming G1 Climax tournament. He’d need an extended break from AEW, though, and understands why his pursuit of the title might make that untenable.

“I don’t know because that requires Tony (Khan) to allow me to be off of TV for four weeks or whatever,” Danielson says. “You have to look at it from a Tony investment point of view, right? Does he really want somebody like me who is older to go through that many hard matches, be off of TV for four weeks, and potentially get injured? Probably not.

“Although, I do have a dream that me, Mox and Claudio [Castagnoli] and maybe Eddie Kingston, just so we have somebody to pick on, would all be able to go do one G1 together, because that would be just so much fun,” he continues. “To go do those incredible matches, but do it with your friends so that you all have this experience together. I think that would be incredible. Now, if you’re asking me if Tony is going to let me go do a G1 and is it a smart move for him? Probably not, but the odds of him letting me do it, I would say a 33 percent chance. The odds of him letting me, Mox, and Claudio all be gone for a month off of TV, an astronomically small percentage, but I haven’t even talked to him about it. So maybe with this interview he’ll see it.”

For now, Danielson will focus on the job at hand: winning the belt from MJF on Sunday, and just maybe becoming the next face of AEW in the process.

A spokesman for Marjorie Taylor Greene really did not appreciate the congresswoman getting fact checked for her false remarks about President Joe Biden. After watching a women testify in Congress about both of her sons dying of a fentanyl overdose, Greene lashed out at Biden and blamed his drug policies for their deaths.

“Listen to this mother, who lost two children to fentanyl poisoning, tell the truth about both of her son’s murders because of the Biden administrations refusal to secure our border and stop the Cartel’s from murdering Americans everyday by Chinese fentanyl,” Greene tweeted along with a video of the woman’s testimony.

There was just one small problem with Greene’s rant: Both men died in July 2020 when Donald Trump was president. Whoops! When CNN fact checker Daniel Dale attempted to get a comment from Greene’s office on her now-debunked tweet, he was cursed out by a spokesman.

“I asked Greene’s office last night about her tweet blaming the Biden administration for these deaths in 2020 under Trump,” Dale tweeted. “Spokesman Nick Dyer responded by saying lots of people have died from drugs under Biden and ‘do you think they give a f*ck about your bullsh*t fact checking?’”

Dale also attempted to get a comment on Greene’s recent accusations of election fraud and received another profane answer.

“I also gave Greene congressional spokesman Nick Dyer an opportunity to comment regarding Greene’s multiple false claims yesterday about the 2020 election, such as the lies that Trump won Georgia and that there were thousands of dead voters there,” Dale wrote. “His response: “F*ck off.’”

(Via Daniel Dale on Twitter)

Last week we blind-taste tested some of our favorite fast food French fries (guess who won), which resulted in a handful of emails from people telling me that “seasoned fries” are superior to the classic salted variety. I’m not sure that I completely agree with that assessment — salted fries walked so seasoned fries could run and there is a reason there are more salted fries out there than seasoned — but there is no doubt that the curly and seasoned type can be as good and in some cases better than plain old salted.

So who makes the best? Because I will use any excuse to eat fries for work, I knew I had to find out. So we’re back it, blind taste testing the best curly/seasoned fries in the fast food universe in search of the most flavorful. Our seasoned/curly fries today come from Arby’s, Carl’s Jr., Jack in the Box, Popeyes, and Rally’s. But before we get into all of that, allow me this mini-rant:

We need a better name out there than “seasoned fries.” The category of seasoned fries is a weird one, it consists of fries of many different shapes, from curly to waffle to straight, all battered in some way with a mix of spices that can include paprika, black pepper, garlic, and onion powder. But aren’t all French fries, even the salted ones, seasoned? We should call them something else, like “zesty fries,” or “fun fries, “or hell make them all curly — we just want some consistency here!

Is this going to stop us from eating them? Absolutely not. Does this matter to anyone who isn’t a food writer? Probably not. Okay, I’ll shut up, let’s eat some fries.

PART I — Methodology

This was the hardest fast food blind taste test I’ve embarked on so far. When I tasted burgers, chicken sandwiches, and salted French fries blind it was incredibly convenient. Almost all of the fast food joints selected were relatively close to one another. For this one… they weren’t. Four of them were close enough but Rally’s, which I knew I had to include considering not many chains sell seasoned fries to begin with, was completely out of the way. So I had my girlfriend head out to Rally’s while I scooped up the other four (three of which were on the same street).

By the time we arrived back home with the fries, 30 minutes had passed (and she arrived about 8 minutes before I did), much longer than I wanted. I’m sure time is going to have an effect on at least some of these fries. But luckily we hit up all of these fast food restaurants at 10:30 AM, a time more likely to have hot fresh fries. as most restaurants were switching over from breakfast or barely opening their doors. Each seasoned French fry order was lukewarm to hot. I would’ve preferred to have them all piping hot but this was the best I could do.

As with my other blind taste tests, I wore a blindfold for this test but I have to admit, given all the different shapes, it was pretty easy to pick out Carl’s Jr’s waffle fries from the lineup. As for the others, I tried to grab a sizable handful so I wouldn’t focus too much on the shape. Here is how it went down.

PART II — The Taste Test

Taste 1

A great balance between onion, garlic, and fluffy and buttery potato. The breading the fries are dusted in here comes across as light and not overly distracting. It has crunch but isn’t so crispy that you can’t taste any of the actual potato. A great start!

Taste 2

With a softer chew than Taste 1, this fry is a lot less crispy but the flavor is on point. I’m getting more prominent black pepper notes which are mingling with garlic powder in a really nice way. There is a sort of smokey aftertaste to this fry. I’m liking this one a lot, it presents all the flavors as a journey though I wish it was just a bit more crispy.

Great flavor; a so-so mouthfeel.

Taste 3

Heavy on the breading here, this fry is the crispiest so far, by a lot. I’m not tasting a lot of potato here, but I’m getting a strong blend of spices. Garlic and pepper dominate, with a sort of lingering oniony aftertaste. They’re incredibly addicting, but they come across as a bit over-fried to me.

Taste 4

This is without a doubt the waffle fry, it is by far the softest of all of the Tastings so far. The flavor leans more on onion here, I’m getting prominent spice from the blend of onion and black pepper with a hint of garlic on the backend and a whole lot of potato flavor. The potato itself is a bit bland once I make it past the seasoned outer layer.

I love the flavors here, but I think it needs a touch of salt to really elevate it. I can’t believe I’m writing “needs more salt” about fast food fries.

Taste 5

Awful. Stale, oily, and dirty tasting. While the fries are warm, they taste stale and old, like they’ve been sitting under a heat lamp for too long. They have a rancid flavor to them that makes them nearly inedible.

I’ve never hated a fry more. I never even thought it was possible to hate fries this much.

PART III — The Ranking

5. Rally’s — Seasoned Fries (Taste 5)

I know there are a lot of Rally’s fans out there but I have to ask — what happened to your taste buds? Seriously, did you consume so many Mother Crunchers and Big Bufords that you’ve burned off your flavor receptors? Because these are the worst fries I’ve ever eaten in my life, and yet they’re cited as a favorite of so many.

Now granted, I might’ve just gotten a bad batch, but I’ve had these fries before, and even at their best they’ve always tasted a bit dirty — like the oil wasn’t changed out in the year that I’m eating them in. Rally’s may have the best names for their sandwiches, but they need some serious quality control.

The Bottom Line:

If you want the worst seasoned fries ever, go to Rally’s.

Find your nearest Rally’s here.

4. Arby’s — Curly Fries (Taste 3)

Arby’s is often cited as having the best curly fries, if not the best fries, in all of fast food and I get it, but I don’t agree. Call me crazy but I like my seasoned fries to taste at least somewhat like potatoes, and these just don’t. They’re overly battered to the point that all I can taste here is the seasoning.

I’ll give you the flavor — it is an amazing blend of spices, but at the end of the day I’m just not getting enough potato in the mix, and I need that.

The Bottom Line:

If you like heavily battered and seasoned fries, Arby’s might just be your favorite, but if you want seasoned fries that have a great balance between breading, flavors, and fluffy potato, these are going to miss the mark.

Find your nearest Arby’s here.

3. Carl’s Jr. — Waffle Fries (Taste 4)

Carl’s Jr has the opposite problem from Arby’s, there is simply too much potato here and not enough of that seasoned goodness. Yes, I’m the Goldilocks of seasoned fries, I’m looking for something that has balance, something that is just right. Talk all the trash on Goldilock’s you want for breaking into some bear’s home and messing with a bunch of shit that wasn’t hers, but the girl knew her porridge!

Carl’s Jr.’s Waffle Fries are off balance, there is so much potato here that it actually needs seasoning, and for a category of fries that has ‘seasoned’ right in the name, that means this misses the mark and must leave this blind tasting with a bronze medal. Luckily, this is easily remedied, just sprinkle some salt or dip these fries in some sauce and you’ll instantly solve all the problems this potato-heavy fry presents while elevating the flavor.

Unfortunately for Carl’s Jr, this wasn’t a best-dipped fries blind taste test.

The Bottom Line:

You’re going to feel like these fries are missing a bit of something, whether that’s salt or sauce will be up to your personal tastes. But because of that, this one lands in third place for us.

Find your nearest Carl’s Jr. here.

2. Jack in the Box — Curly Fries (Taste 1)

The biggest surprise in this blind taste test and last week’s salted fries taste test is the power of Jack in the Box. As a whole, I consider JiB to be bottom-tier fast food but whatever they’re doing with the fries, they’re doing it right. Jack in the Box’s Curly Fries are amazing, they’re lightly battered, heavily seasoned, and have a great mix of natural potato flavor (or as natural as processed frozen fries can be) and black pepper, onion, and garlic flavors.

I was very close to giving this one the number one spot, but our actual number had a better overall flavor to my palate.

The Bottom Line:

Deliciously balanced and very crispy. Jack in the Box’s Curly Fries are nearly perfect. Nearly.

Find your nearest Jack in the Box here.

1. Popeyes — Cajun Fries (Taste 2)

I have to say it was incredibly close between our number one and number two picks, but I have to give the top spot to Popeyes. I’m sure both JiB and Popeyes are using the cheapest oil they can find to fries these fries in, but Popeyes comes across as less greasy and puts the focus on where it matters, the seasoning. I’m getting garlic, black pepper, onion powder, and a smokey paprika top note that just makes these fries a bit more flavorful than the other four.

I’d say their weakest aspect is that they aren’t very crispy, they’re almost soft, but the flavor more than makes up for it. Is that because it’s fried in the same oil as their chicken? Maybe, I’m not sure, but I do know that I couldn’t stop eating these fries and that’s the sign of a true winner.

The Bottom Line:

They’re still not quite perfect but they’re closer to perfection than our number two choice. While I wish the fries were crispier and provided a better mouthfeel, from a flavor perspective this was the clear winner. The big question is, how does this stack up to our number one choice from last week’s tasting? We’ll have to find out!

Find your nearest Popeyes here.

Is Chris Pratt’s Mario voice in The Super Mario Bros. Movie “unlike anything you’ve ever heard”? I mean, I’ve never heard Andy Dwyer say the word “mushroom” with a cartoonishly exaggerted Italian accent before, so, yes, technically. But there’s still a lot of skepticism over whether Pratt was the right choice to play Nintendo’s most popular character.

The Super Mario Bros. Movie filmmakers do not share that concern, however. “For us, it made total sense,” co-director Aaron Horvath told Total Film. “He’s really good at playing a blue-collar hero with a ton of heart. For the way that Mario is characterized in our film, he’s perfect for it.”

Horvath described The Super Mario Bros. Movie as “a bit of an origin tale. It’s the story of Mario becoming Super Mario.” He continued, “When you play the game, if you don’t give up, Mario will succeed. So we transferred that player experience from the game to a characteristic that [movie] Mario would have.” Unless you’re like me and rage-quit Super Mario Bros: The Lost Levels, in which case Mario will not succeed. He’s still out there somewhere, trying to advance past world seven. Poor pixelated guy.

The Super Mario Bros. Movie, which also features the less controversial casting of Charlie Day as Luigi, Anya Taylor-Joy as Princess Peach, Jack Black as Bowser, Seth Rogen as Donkey Kong, Keegan-Michael Key as Toad, Fred Armisen as Cranky Kong, and Kevin Michael Richardson as Kamek, comes out on April 5th, two days earlier than expected.

(Via Total Film)

Kodak Black is reportedly set to enter a drug rehabilitation facility in Broward County, according to Rolling Stone. The order comes from Judge Barbara Duffy, who apparently made the ruling this past Tuesday (February 28) after Kodak allegedly tested positive for fentanyl in a drug test. According to the report, the test results were revealed as Kodak was awaiting trial for charges relating to drug trafficking.

Duffy’s order holds that Kodak is allowed to remain free until March 7, which is when he is set to perform at Rolling Loud Los Angeles.

The “Super Gremlin” hitmaker’s first arrest for drug trafficking charges dates back to July 2022, when he was arrested in relation to his drug trafficking charges during a traffic stop in Fort Lauderdale. 31 oxycodone pills were found in his vehicle, along with nearly $75,000 in cash.

He was later released on a $75,000 bond and charged with a felony one charge of trafficking oxycodone, along with a lesser charge of possession of a controlled substance. At the time, Kodak pleaded not guilty to the drug trafficking charge.

According to the Associated Press, Duffy was heard telling Kodak “You better get it together” during his court appearance this week.

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

HBO’s upcoming series The Idol is already proving to be one of the most talked about series of 2023, despite not having an actual premiere date. However, the Sam Levinson and Abel “The Weeknd” Tesfaye-created series seems to be proving rather chaotic and disastrous behind the scenes, not unlike the second season of Levinson’s teen drama, Euphoria.

Last April, the show was reported to go into an overhaul, with Levinson taking over as the show’s director, in place of Amy Seimetz, who was originally set to direct the series.

According to several anonymous sources, who spoke to Rolling Stone, Levinson ramped up the sexual content during the overhaul.

According to Rolling Stone:

“At various points, Levinson’s scripts contained disturbing sexual and physically violent scenes between [Lily Rose] Depp and Tesfaye’s characters, three sources familiar with the matter claim. In one draft episode, there allegedly was a scene where Tesfaye bashes in Depp’s face, and her character smiles and asks to be beaten more, giving Tesfaye an erection. (This scene was never shot, the source says.) Another proposed scenario was for Depp to carry an egg in her vagina and if she dropped or cracked the egg, Tesfaye’s character would refuse to “rape” her — which sent Depp’s character into a spiral, begging him to ‘rape’ her because she believed he was the key to her success. (This scene also was not filmed because production couldn’t find a way to realistically shoot the scene without having Depp physically insert the egg, another source explains.)”

Another source claimed that while The Idol was supposed to explore and satirize the dark side of 21st-century stardom, the show lost its original messaging amid the overhaul.

“It was a show about a woman who was finding herself sexually, turned into a show about a man who gets to abuse this woman and she loves it,” said the source.

At the time of writing, it is unclear which scenes will make it into the final show, as many of the sources say that scripts were being changed and rewritten daily. According to one source, Levinson had stopped turning in scripts to the higher-ups at HBO at one point during production.

Hopefully, we engage in acts of kindness for their own intrinsic rewards. However, it’s also pretty amazing when generosity gets reciprocated.

TikTok creator Zachery Dereniowski is best known for approaching random strangers, requesting a dollar, then giving the first person to offer one a large sum of money and helping make one of their dreams come true.

On February 17, Dereniowski stood on a street outside the University of Windsor in Ontario, Canada, holding a yellow, smiley-face balloon, asking folks if they’d buy it for a dollar.

Everyone turned him down until he was approached by a friendly man named David Kamara. Kamara handed Dereniowski a flyer, explaining that he was a musician. Whipping out an iPad to show off some of his work, Kamara’s energy was instantly infectious.

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“I grew up in the hood, so when we were little we used to go to the Dollarama to get the dollar store mics…I never knew it would manifest into this,” he told Dereniowski.

It wasn’t until after he listened to the song that Dereniowski asked Kamara if he’d like to buy the balloon for a dollar. Without missing a beat, Kamara upped the offer to an e-transfer of $5, saying “a dollar is not going to do much.”

For helping him out, Dereniowski gave Kamara the “magic” balloon, telling him that it would help “manifest” his biggest wish once he let it go in the air.

Kamara knew exactly what he wanted to manifest—a Grammy.

@mdmotivator “I’ll be sending the money to my family in Africa” 🥺❤️ (L1NK 1N B10) #mystery #music #money #africa #spotify #viral #kindness ♬ original sound – Zachery Dereniowski

(Note: We don’t recommend letting balloons go for environmental protection and safety reasons.)

Dereniowski didn’t come with any trophies up his sleeve, but he did give Kamara $2,000 on the spot to use towards his music career. Kamara, unsurprisingly, was absolutely elated.

“I can’t believe you just did that bro. Nobody would do that for me!” he exclaimed, adding that he would be sending some of the 2,000 to his brothers and sisters in Africa.

“You just blessed me, so I can bless,” he told Dereniowski.

To Kamara’s surprise, the blessings would keep coming. Dereniowski informed Kamara that his millions of followers would now know where to stream Kamara’s music. The good deed influencer even wrote an on-screen caption showing that Kamara’s work was available on Spotify and Apple.

The clip, which received over 11 million views, gave Kamara an instant surge to his fan base. According to an interview with Insider, his Instagram following grew from 16,000 to over 63,900, and his TikTok (which was only recently created) went from only 40 followers to over 43,600. Holy moly.

Just as he dreamed of, Kamara’s music career has seen a major shift as well. His two most popular songs, “Replay” and “For you,” now have been listened to on Spotify over 280,000 times collectively.

See on Instagram

Kamara told Insider that he had no idea who Dereniowski really was, but thought he might need money to get home, which is why he offered $5. That good deed has been reciprocated beyond his wildest imagination. And true to his word, he continued to share his blessings with others. In addition to sending that money back to his family, he plans on giving it to some of Dereniowski’s fans who shared their personal situations in the video’s comments.

Kindness really can be the gift that keeps on giving.

While many Blackpink fans were excited to see Jennie appear as an acting role in HBO’s upcoming series, The Idol, a new piece in Rolling Stone is now revealing that they might be disappointed — if the show even makes it to air.

The piece, which details a number of reportedly disturbing claims about showrunners Sam Levinson and The Weeknd from the cast and crew, notes that Jennie and other prominent stars were brought on without much of a significant part.

“It was like three or four lines per episode for her,” a production source told the publication about Jennie’s alleged role in the show, even though she was featured in the trailer and promotional materials. “They didn’t let her talk that much. Her job was to sit there [and] look pretty, basically.”

Levinson, in a previous interview with Elle Magazine (via Hypebae), described Jennie as “so professional and hardworking.”

“Watching her learn a full dance routine in about an hour and then perform it flawlessly 10 times in a row was amazing, and of course that’s just a tiny piece of her talent and ability,” he added.

Jennie also shared that she was working with both Levinson and The Weeknd (Abel Tesfaye) — who gave her advice on set to calm her down.

“What he said was to just be me,” Jennie said. “I didn’t try to prepare it perfectly, which I really would do. I had many conversations with Sam and Abel, and I think that helped me. And they just made sure that I didn’t have to be so nervous about things.”

Until then, time will tell on how much Jennie will appear in The Idol.

When it was reported that the buzzy upcoming HBO show The Idol was undergoing massive production changes last April, all anyone could do was speculate on the supposed “new creative direction” it would take. Interest in the show was high, given its all-star cast consisting of co-creator Abel Tesfaye (better known as The Weeknd) and Lily-Rose Depp and the involvement of high-profile producer Sam Levinson of Euphoria fame.

However, a new report from Rolling Stone suggests that the changes have mostly been for the worst, with the show going from “a dark satire of fame and the fame model in the 21st century,” according to one production member, “to the thing it was satirizing.”

The show, which was to follow Depp’s character as she became involved in a cult led by Tesfaye’s character, was overhauled as The Weeknd apparently felt it was focusing too much on the “female perspective” and wanted to highlight his character more. This reportedly led to director Amy Seimetz (She Dies Tomorrow, The Girlfriend Experience) dropping out and Levinson replacing her as director, then promptly throwing out everything she’d already shot — 80 percent of the six-episode series.

The new material has been described as “any rape fantasy that any toxic man would have in the show,” with lurid depictions of sexual encounters between Tesfaye and Depp’s characters in scripts, ramped-up explicit nudity, and even a violent scene in which Tesfaye’s character beats Depp. While some of these scenes were never shot, one source described the scripts as “sexual torture porn.”

Many of the sources say they don’t even know what will make it into the final show because so many scenes were reshot, scripts were changed daily, and the shoot went wildly over budget and time. High-profile castings such as Blackpink’s Jennie amounted to inconsequential storylines, with a crew member saying, “Her job was to sit there [and] look pretty, basically.” Meanwhile, other actors were “wiped from the show” entirely after thinking they’d gotten their big breaks.

With so many issues, there’s no telling how the show itself will actually turn out, but HBO continues to promote it with multiple trailers, even though a release date has yet to be determined (it’s still aiming for sometime in 2023).

We’ll see if Levinson, The Weeknd, or any of the cast have anything to say, but for now, things aren’t looking great. Still the show is already shaping up to be another hit for HBO — the real question is, will it be worth it?

The RX is Uproxx Music’s stamp of approval for the best albums, songs, and music stories throughout the year. Inclusion in this category is the highest distinction we can bestow and signals the most important music being released throughout the year. The RX is the music you need, right now.

In the leadup to the release of his third album, Love Sick, Houston rapper-singer Don Toliver said enough of the right things to make me believe that this would be the project of his that would finally tell us who he is.

“On this particular album, I really locked in on the actual story and the theme of the album and basically the tracklist is going in sequence, in motion of the actual story, of what it will be,” he said in one interview.

“I want people to listen to my music and think it’s timeless,” he echoed in another. “To think about Marvin Gaye, Sade, Jay-Z, and just listen again. All I strive for is to be in the conversation with some of the greatest of all time.”

The one thing all of those greats did, though, is put themselves into their music. When you push play on “Song Cry,” you get the impression that Jay is letting us in on a moment in his life. When Marvin Gaye made “What’s Goin’ On?” it was considered a massive creative risk, but it was a sentiment he cared about deeply enough to take that risk.

With Don Toliver, I’ve never gotten the impression that I’m learning anything about him or what he truly cares about in his music. I tend to believe that he’s the consummate aesthete – his presentation is everything, and he’s going for a look rather than a feel.

The feeling that pervaded his prior releases Heaven Or Hell and Life Of A Don is that his primary preoccupation in making them was imitating and improving upon the aesthetics of stylistic forebears like his mentor Travis Scott, Future (both of whom appear here), and Young Thug – i.e. the wounded melodic howling, eerie vocal effects, and clipped, erratic rap deliveries that made them stand out from the pack when they first broke out in the middle of the last decade.

Love Sick, on the other hand, seemed like it would be a step forward when we’d begin to see more of the artist in his work. Love, after all, is the most personal and primal of human emotions, even as it remains the most universal. If any subject could crack the facade and reveal the interiority missing from Toliver’s past projects, this would be it.

After a few listens to Love Sick, though, I still haven’t figured out who Don Toliver is.

Don’t get me wrong; it’s a polished, pleasant body of work. If nothing else, he’s upped his game with regard to developing his own artistic flourishes. Perhaps credit belongs to his expanded roster of production partners. After all, it’s hard not to notice that the Kaytranada-produced “Honeymoon” is a standout, nor is the dreamy quality of “Let Her Go,” which features James Blake.

The hyperfocus on subject matter allows Toliver much more room to play around sonically. So while there are still cavernous club 808s and bellowing synthetic bass lines aplenty – “Leave The Club” is a prime example – “Leather Club” finds a smooth, almost ‘80s adult contemporary vibe well suited to his Drake-lite lamentations of one-directional affections.

“Slow Motion” with Wizkid is a surprising dance floor banger that goes in a completely different direction than you’d expect with the Afropop star involved, “If I Had” recruits quiet storm favorite Charlie Wilson for a classic example of the genre, and Chicago heads will almost certainly figure out a few new juke steps to “Bus Stop.”

Throughout Love Sick, I get the feeling that Don Toliver is a nice guy who is really kind of a music nerd, someone collaborators really enjoy testing out new sounds with. But there’s still no sense of identity, that undefinable something that instantly lets you know when you’re hearing a song from Future, Travis Scott, or Young Thug.

The good news is that Toliver is really good at executing an idea, and that’s a step in the right direction for where he wants to be. Coming up with a concept and making music that effectively conveys those ideas is really hard – that’s why we hold such respect for artists. If Love Sick has more style than substance, that style is really charming and enjoyable.

And if Toliver hadn’t managed to at least do that much, we wouldn’t be talking about him at all. If he wants us to talk about him in the same breath as Sade Adu, he’s laid a decent foundation for that conversation to take place. But he still needs to give us something to talk about. He’s almost there.

Love Sick is out now via Cactus Jack and Atlantic Records.

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