GoneTrending

Michael B. Jordan is making his directorial debut with Creed III, the third installment of his starring vehicle, but it’s not all about him. We’re willing to forgive the 35-year-old actor for enabling Drake and 21 Savage’s fake promotional cycle around Her Loss because of what he let slip about the Creed III soundtrack during his panel at ComplexCon yesterday (November 20).

“I’m probably gonna get in trouble: Dreamville is executive producing this album,” Jordan said, as first reported by Complex.

It’s difficult to name a more dominant hip-hop label than Dreamville right now. The J. Cole– and Ibrahim Hamad-founded powerhouse’s roster boasts the likes of Cole, Ari Lennox, Bas, Cozz, EarthGang, JID, Lute, and Omen. Their star-studded compilation D-Day: A Gangsta Grillz Mixtape coincided with this year’s Dreamville Fest in April, while Lennox’s Age/Sex/Location and JID’s The Forever Story established them as individual forces.

In the Sylvester Stallone-less Creed III, MBJ’s Adonis Creed individual greatness is threatened by an unsuspecting opponent. He runs into his childhood friend Damian (Jonathan Majors), whose boxing potential was extinguished by prison. They reconnect in the ring, setting up a delicious dichotomy between loyalty and betrayal. Damian is coming for it all. “There’s no enemy like the past,” the official trailer description reads.

Creed III hits theaters 3/3/2023. Watch the trailer above.

Donald Trump had his Twitter account reactivated by Elon Musk over the weekend after the social media platform’s desperately unfunny CEO conducted a poll. “Reinstate former President Trump,” Musk tweeted, along with two options: Yes or No. 51.8 percent of people and/or bots voted yes, and now he’s back on Twitter for the first time since being suspended following MAGA riot at the Capitol building in January 2021. Trump hasn’t tweeted any new thoughts on Diet Coke yet, though, and he might not for awhile.

Truth Social is currently the exclusive home of Trump’s sh*tposts, and if he leaves, he’s worried the right-wing Twitter will financially collapse. There are also some potential legal complications, as reported by Semafor’s Shelby Talcott:

Trump has been working on a merger deal between the platform, which is privately owned by Trump Media & Technology Group, and Digital World Acquisition Corp., a special purpose acquisition company that would take Trump’s business public, making it accountable to investors… If Trump repeatedly signals in public before a merger that he’s never joining Twitter, then closes a SPAC deal and reneges, some shareholders could decide they were misled.

“If it’s going to look, later on, that he never had that intention [of remaining off Twitter], but he just wanted to convince people that they should go ahead and close [the SPAC deal], that’s kind of a textbook securities fraud lawsuit,” Columbia Law School Eric Talley explained. There’s also the matter of Trump agreeing to “make his posts exclusively available on Truth Social for eight hours before he could share them elsewhere,” according to the Washington Post. There are exceptions for “political messaging, political fundraising, or get-out-the-vote efforts,” however, so it sounds like he’s welcome to tweet about 2024. But relationship advice for Robert Pattinson? That might be legally off limits.

Meanwhile, here’s a 51-year-old’s very normal reaction to Trump being on Twitter again.

Cool.

(Via Mediaite, Semafor, and the Washington Post)

As the situation at Twitter continued to rapidly deteriorate following an reported “mass exodus” of employees and Elon Musk‘s controversial decision to unban Donald Trump, John Oliver weighed in on the chaos at the social media platform. During the opening segment of Sunday’s Last Week Tonight, the late night host tore into Musk for his weak jokes and signaling to “many of the worst people on Twitter” that the site is now a free-for-all. Oliver also dropped a scathing new nickname for the flailing media baron.

“A man who answers the question “What if Willy Wonka benefited from apartheid?’” Oliver quipped before dragging Musk over the coals for scaring away advertisers with his $8 a month blue checkmark plan that led to a “predictable” rise in impersonating brand accounts. The late night host also went to town on the platform’s apparent increase in hate speech as well as the removal of safeguards to stop misinformation.

Via The Hollywood Reporter:

Oliver concluded his intro segment by saying that Musk clearly doesn’t know what’s going to happen next on the social media platform, now that he’s fired half his staff and is facing several labor lawsuits.

“He’s decimated his staff and degraded his product, and sure, he could try and sell what’s left of Twitter, or it can continue functioning worse than before, as his free-for-all digital clown town,” the host said.

Despite ripping Musk apart for destroying Twitter, Oliver is not immune to the schadenfreude of it all.

“There is undeniably something a little satisfying about a guy who was so desperate to be perceived as cool and funny on the internet that he paid $44 billion to make it happen, only to discover that he still somehow couldn’t afford it.”

(Via The Hollywood Reporter)

How did Adele tackle anticipatory nerves around the start of the Weekends With Adele Las Vegas residency and a history of bummer New Year’s Eves? Schedule a Weekends With Adele show for New Year’s Eve.

“New Year’s Eve has always been a let down for me,” the 15-time Grammy winner wrote on Instagram, captioning a photo of her wearing “2023” glasses and popping champagne. “I seem to always end up spending it in a car on my way to or from somewhere! But not this year!! I’ll be ringing 2023 in on stage!! I dress up to the nines on NYE and I would love it if those of you that come would too! Let’s go all out black tie vibes.”

Adele deserves to let loose in Vegas. She finished 2021 with 30, her first release in six years, registering a fifth straight/total week atop the Billboard 200 albums chart. But the “Easy On Me” songstress hasn’t had an easy 2022. She tearfully announced the postponement of Weekends With Adele due to COVID complications in January, clarifying the residency “would have been a really half-assed show” if she didn’t make the difficult decision to postpone. The rescheduled dates were confirmed in July, and Adele finally brought The Colosseum at Caesars Palace to life this weekend. The residency will stretch to March 25, 2023.

See scenes from Adele’s opening weekend below.

It’s been nearly a month since Elon Musk bought Twitter and grabbed the reigns of the social media platform. Things have not gone well. Heck, at one point recently, many thought the site, at any second, was going to shut down for good. Whether that actually happens, it doesn’t look like Nine Inch Nails’ Trent Reznor will be part of Twitter’s future, as he’s gearing up to leave.

Speaking with The Hollywood Reporter, Reznor called Musk’s takeover an “embarrassment” and continued, “I’m about to depart. We don’t need the arrogance of the billionaire class to feel like they can just come in and solve everything. Even without him involved, I just find that it has become such a toxic environment. For my mental health, I need to tune out. I don’t feel good being there anymore.”

He also said of making the music for Luca Guadagnino’s Bones And All, “It couldn’t have been better. We went from not knowing him going into this to meeting a genuine, authentic, respectful collaborator who has become a friend. We were able to work on material that, in every iteration, we were amazed by how it blossomed into something beyond our expectation. I know that sounds ridiculous, you can say, but it really was a magical experience.”

Over the weekend, Elon Musk went ahead and decided to let Donald Trump back on Twitter. This was something that many people did not care for, including Jack White, who had many thoughts on the matter.

On an Instagram post about the reinstatement from the weekend, White wrote, “So you gave trump his twitter platform back. Absolutely disgusting, Elon. That is officially an asshole move.”

He continued, “trump was removed from twitter because he incited violence multiple times, people died and were injured as a result of his lies and his ego, (let alone what his coup did to attempt to destroy democracy and our Capitol). And how about the division and the families broken apart from his rhetoric and what it did to this country? That’s not ‘free speech’ or ‘what the poll decided’ or whatever nonsense you’re claiming it to be; this is straight up you trying to help a fascist have a platform so you can eventually get your tax breaks.I mean, how many more billions do you need that you have to risk democracy itself to obtain it?”

White concluded with some thoughts on free speech, writing, “I am a believer in free speech, but for example i’m not about to let the KKK hold a rally at our record label’s performance stage. That’s one of the platforms we control and have a say in, it’s not town square operated by the government. And if i owned a gas station, i wouldn’t be selling the KKK gasoline to burn crosses either and then wash my hands as if i didn’t help facilitate hatred. You took on a big responsibility with your purchase, and ‘free speech’ isn’t some umbrella that protects you from that.”

Brandi Carlile chimed in with a comment on the post: “PREACH Jack. What you’re saying and doing is super potent. He will on some level want your approval because you’re brilliant and culturally important. This reproach is both just and effective. He will see this and it may even help.”

Read White’s full post below.

“‘So you gave trump his twitter platform back. Absolutely disgusting, Elon. That is officially an asshole move.

Why dont you be truthful? Tell it like it is; people like you and Joe Rogan (who gives platforms to liars like alex jones etc.); you come into a ton of money, see the tax bill, despise paying your fair share, and then think moving to Texas and supporting whatever republican you can is going to help you keep more of your money. (How else could trump possibly interest you?) You intend to give platforms to known liars and wash your hands like pontius pilate and claim no responsibility? trump was removed from twitter because he incited violence multiple times, people died and were injured as a result of his lies and his ego, (let alone what his coup did to attempt to destroy democracy and our Capitol). And how about the division and the families broken apart from his rhetoric and what it did to this country? That’s not ‘free speech’ or ‘what the poll decided’ or whatever nonsense you’re claiming it to be; this is straight up you trying to help a fascist have a platform so you can eventually get your tax breaks.I mean, how many more billions do you need that you have to risk democracy itself to obtain it?

You did a lot of amazing things with Tesla, Elon, and you deserve a lot of compliments in that department (i personally supported the hell out of that venture), but you’ve gone too far and are now using your power to promote horrible, violence inducing liars, who are taking the country and the world backwards and endangering the democracy that made you rich and successful in the first place. I am a believer in free speech, but for example i’m not about to let the KKK hold a rally at our record label’s performance stage. That’s one of the platforms we control and have a say in, it’s not town square operated by the government. And if i owned a gas station, i wouldn’t be selling the KKK gasoline to burn crosses either and then wash my hands as if i didn’t help facilitate hatred.

You took on a big responsibility with your purchase, and ‘free speech’ isn’t some umbrella that protects you from that.”

(Spoilers for The Walking Dead series finale will be found below.)

After 11 seasons and nearly 200 episodes, The Walking Dead came to an end on Sunday. It was a remarkable run for the zombie series, one of the highest-rated shows on cable ever; at its peak, over 20 million people watched Rick, Daryl, & Co. escape a group of cannibals. The Walking Dead isn’t nearly as popular these days, but AMC hopes there’s enough interest for multiple spinoffs, including the existing Fear the Walking Dead and Tales of the Walking Dead, as well as Dead City (which is focused on the unlikely pair of Maggie and Negan), Daryl Dixon (in Paris), and Rick & Michonne.

The Rick in “Rick & Michonne” is, of course, Rick Grimes, who left The Walking Dead in season nine. He hasn’t been seen since — until the series finale, “Rest in Peace.”

Rick appears in the final moments of the episode after Daryl rides off into the sunset (and a bunch of zombies got blown up real good in an impressive-looking explosion). “I think of the dead all the time,” he said in a voice over, while writing a letter. “And about the living. Who I lost. I think about them all every day. Their faces. What I learned from them. How they made me who I am. So much more than all of this made me who I am.”

The other half of Rick & Michonne (last seen in season 10) is also writing a letter at the same time as Rick, or so it seems. They’re actually in two different timelines: Rick in the past; Michonne in the present. Rick is trying to get back to his family, including daughter Judith, but he’s interrupted by a Civic Republic Military helicopter; he’s told that there’s “no escape for the living,” but he has enough time to place his letter into a bottle and toss it into the water, and chuck his bag into a boat, which eventually finds it way to Michonne. The last time we see Rick, at least until the spinoff, he has a curious smile on his face as the helicopter approaches and the screen fades to white.

The episode then cuts to Hilltop, where Judith and her brother R.J. (Rick and Michonne’s son) are admiring the peaceful scenery surrounding them. The final lines of the show: “We get to start over. We’re the ones who live.” And it’s largely thanks to Rick.

Rick & Michonne premieres in 2023.

At the American Music Awards last night (November 21), controversial singer Chris Brown found himself nominated for Favorite Male R&B Artist, against Brent Faiyaz, Givēon, Lucky Daye, and The Weeknd. The AMAs are fan-voted, and the fans decided that Brown should come away with the win, so he did.

The in-person audience at the ceremony didn’t take this well. Kelly Rowland presented the award and was showered in boos when she revealed Brown was the winner. She accepted the honor on the absent Brown’s behalf and addressed the crowd as the booing continued, saying, “Now Chris Brown is not here tonight so I’m accepting this award on his behalf — excuse me: chill out — but I wanted to tell Chris, ‘Thank you so much for making great R&B music,’ and I want to tell him, ‘Thank you for being an incredible performer.’ I’ll take this award, bring it to you. I love you, congratulations, and congratulations to all the nominees in this category.”

This comes shortly after Brown accused AMAs organizers of canceling his planned Michael Jackson tribute performance at the show. Sharing a rehearsal video on Instagram a few days ago, Brown wrote, “U SERIOUS?” He later added in a comment, “WOULDVE been the ama performance but they cancelled me for reasons unknown.”

Tulsa King brings Sylvester Stallone to the small screen as a gangster who’s relegated to Oklahoma, where he’ll have the run of the state’s second-biggest city. In the process, he busts up a dispensary and starts to carve out some mafia-like extortion income and discovers the Internet and takes a tour of a honky tonk bar. It’s an amusing show, and Sly is clearly having a blast, but there’s also some emotional layers for his character, Dwight “The General” Manfredi, to sort through as he returns to civilization after 25 years in prison.

We received a hint of this deeper stuff at the end of Episode 2 (actually titled as “Center of the Universe”), which followed Dwight hearing about a real-life Tulsa landmark, known as the Center of the Universe. It’s a weird little anomaly located downtown atop a pedestrian bridge. There, the sound bounces off the surrounding buildings and concrete barriers in a way that echoes can be heard by the person speaking within the circle.

What’s more important and relevant to this episode: no one who is outside the circle can hear what that person is saying (no matter how loud they speak) while standing within it. Here’s a short video from local NBC affiliate KJRH, which demonstrates this phenomenon in action.

Dwight visits this landmark as a place to shout his anguish over being estranged from his daughter, but obviously, no one else would be able to hear him. It’s a pointed choice to have him do so atop this bridge, and the moment says a lot about how he’s suffering inside but would never dare to show it to the world. We don’t yet know what significance the white horse (seen near the bridge in an earlier moment) will hold, if any, but this is a nice nod to the Tulsa as a character of this show, since the Center of the Universe tends to attract tourists and locals who take to Instagram with the results.

In 2016, a pair of local artists replaced some of the bridge’s bricks with a lighted display, and it appears as though the series paid tribute on that note (blinking bricks are seen from above as Sly departs the structure), although the landmark itself is currently in disrepair with the City of Tulsa soliciting suggestions on how to overhaul and improve the area. Perhaps Tulsa King will give the area enough of a boost to get it going.

So, the show has conquered one landmark, and hopefully, we’ll see Sylvester Stallone threaten the Golden Driller at some point in the future. Hey, a girl can hope.

Paramount+’s Tulsa King streams on Sunday evenings.

Tulsa King brings Sylvester Stallone to the small screen as a gangster who’s relegated to Oklahoma, where he’ll have the run of the state’s second-biggest city. In the process, he busts up a dispensary and starts to carve out some mafia-like extortion income and discovers the Internet and takes a tour of a honky tonk bar. It’s an amusing show, and Sly is clearly having a blast, but there’s also some emotional layers for his character, Dwight “The General” Manfredi, to sort through as he returns to civilization after 25 years in prison.

We received a hint of this deeper stuff at the end of Episode 2 (actually titled as “Center of the Universe”), which followed Dwight hearing about a real-life Tulsa landmark, known as the Center of the Universe. It’s a weird little anomaly located downtown atop a pedestrian bridge. There, the sound bounces off the surrounding buildings and concrete barriers in a way that echoes can be heard by the person speaking within the circle.

What’s more important and relevant to this episode: no one who is outside the circle can hear what that person is saying (no matter how loud they speak) while standing within it. Here’s a short video from local NBC affiliate KJRH, which demonstrates this phenomenon in action.

Dwight visits this landmark as a place to shout his anguish over being estranged from his daughter, but obviously, no one else would be able to hear him. It’s a pointed choice to have him do so atop this bridge, and the moment says a lot about how he’s suffering inside but would never dare to show it to the world. We don’t yet know what significance the white horse (seen near the bridge in an earlier moment) will hold, if any, but this is a nice nod to the Tulsa as a character of this show, since the Center of the Universe tends to attract tourists and locals who take to Instagram with the results.

In 2016, a pair of local artists replaced some of the bridge’s bricks with a lighted display, and it appears as though the series paid tribute on that note (blinking bricks are seen from above as Sly departs the structure), although the landmark itself is currently in disrepair with the City of Tulsa soliciting suggestions on how to overhaul and improve the area. Perhaps Tulsa King will give the area enough of a boost to get it going.

So, the show has conquered one landmark, and hopefully, we’ll see Sylvester Stallone threaten the Golden Driller at some point in the future. Hey, a girl can hope.

Paramount+’s Tulsa King streams on Sunday evenings.