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On Tuesday evening, the Las Vegas Aces punched a ticket to the 2022 WNBA Finals with a Game 4 victory over the Seattle Storm. Earlier that night, the Connecticut Sun evened a semifinal series against the Chicago Sky with a Game 4 win of their own, setting up a winner-take-all scenario on Thursday in Chicago. With both teams winning road games already in the series, anything could seemingly happen in Game 5, and it was a back-and-forth contest. In the end, it was the Sun using a massive fourth-quarter run to emerge with the 72-63 victory and a berth in the finals.

Near the outset, the Sun used a 12-4 run to take control. That push featured an explosion from Natisha Hiedeman, who scored eight of the first 16 points, and Connecticut appeared comfortable.

Connecticut led by a 24-16 margin after the first quarter, and the Sun shot 53 percent from the floor with eight assists. On the other side, the Sky scuffled to 5-of-14 shooting with four turnovers, allowing the visitors to operate with the lead.

In the second quarter, Chicago found its stride with an extended push. The Sky outscored the Sun by a 16-6 margin over approximately six minutes, taking the lead at 38-36 and imposing their will on defense.

By the halftime break, it was a new game with a 40-40 score, but the Sky seemingly had more juice. Connecticut shot 50 percent and assisted on 15 of 16 field goals in the first half, but the Sun committed ten turnovers, including six in the second quarter alone. Chicago’s offense picked up a bit with the help of transition, and Kahleah Copper scored 14 points before halftime.

The start of the second half was more of the same for Chicago, with the Sky using an 8-2 run to open the third period. Connecticut didn’t score for almost three minutes, and Chicago continued to create effective havoc.

The Sky led by a ten-point margin as the fourth quarter arrived, and Chicago held Connecticut to only eight points in the third quarter. Chicago shot only 7-of-21 from the floor in the period, but the Sky took care of the ball and made a trio of three-pointers, while the Sun committed eight turnovers in the ten-minute period and shot just 3-of-12 from the floor.

Connecticut began to chip away in the closing period, and the team’s biggest push was coming. The Sun scored a whopping 18 consecutive points, turning a nine-point deficit into a nine-point win at the final buzzer. All told, Chicago failed to score for more than four minutes of clock time, and that scoring drought cost the Sky in a season-ending way.

After the way the middle of the game went, the fourth quarter swing was wild in favor of the Sun, and that was reflected on the stat sheet. Broadly, Connecticut outscored Chicago by a 24-5 margin in the ten-minute period, which speaks for itself. Taking things a step further, the Sky shot just 2-of-15 from the floor with four turnovers in the fourth quarter, and Connecticut’s balanced offense (all five starters in double figures) and timely defense keyed the victory. The 18-0 closing run also set a new record for the WNBA Playoffs.

With the Game 5 win, the Sun clinched their fourth all-time berth in the WNBA Finals, though Connecticut will be looking for its first title. The Sun will visit the Las Vegas Aces for Game 1 on Sunday afternoon at Michelob Ultra Arena in Las Vegas, with the eyes of the basketball world on what should be a fun series.

Queen Elizabeth II’s death was announced early on Thursday (September 8) and social media responded to it in a multitude of ways. Many laughed, celebrated, and trolled the 96-year-old. In one of the most humorous acts, the queen’s Wikipedia page was given a unique edit.

In a tweet shared on Thursday afternoon, a user said “Someone already griefed the Queen Elizabeth II Wikipedia page lmaooo.” The tweet is accompanied by a screenshot of Queen Elizabeth II’s Wikipedia page with the “Article” tab highlighted. What is found on the page is the cover art for Chief Keef’s 2012 album Finally Rich and “RIP Bozo” in all caps, in reference to the infamous Instagram post where a man attended his enemy’s funeral just to ensure he was dead.

A unique detail found on the Finally Rich cover art is Chief Keef blowing smoke out of his mouth, a reference to the popular colloquial phrase where someone’s “pack is in the air.” The phrase is used when someone that many people dislike either passes away or takes a bad loss publicly. While many native to Queen Elizabeth II’s home country may be mourning, those within the United States are clearly amused by her demise.

Check out a screenshot of Queen Elizabeth II’s edited Wikipedia page above.

Football season is kicking off with a bang. At tonight’s NFL season opener, where the Buffalo Bills are taking on the Los Angeles Rams, Halle Bailey and Tinashe graced the stage to open with powerful musical performances.

Up first was Bailey, who performed a breathtaking rendition of “Lift Every Voice And Sing.”

Shortly after, Tinashe followed, singing “The Star-Spangled Banner.”

Both Tinashe and Bailey have been making moves in music for about 10 years, though with their new endeavors, they both feel like they’re just getting started.

“Now that I’m independent and I’ve been in the game for a decade, I’m really big on saying yes to a lot, and not overthinking things,” Tinashe said in a recent interview with W. “I’m just trying to get back to that original mindset of, we make art for fun. This is a privilege to be able to make any type of art. In my 30s, I want to have fun being a creative and a mogul. But I’m far from done with my music era. I feel like that’s still on the come up.”

Next year, Bailey is set to star in a live-action version of Disney’s The Little Mermaid, as well as a remake of The Color Purple. She is also in the studio working on music with her sister, Chloe. In an interview with Essence, Bailey revealed that while she’s looking forward to her upcoming feature films, music will always take priority in her heart.

Check out Halle Bailey and Tinashe’s performances above.

It goes without saying that being Black in the 1960s was not easy, and often led to fatal results for those who were outspoken. In a recently declassified FBI file on the late Aretha Franklin, it was revealed that she was extensively tracked by the bureau for her civil rights activism and close relationships with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Angela Davis.

The document, including over 270 pages of information, details that there were death threats against the late singer in addition to negative characterizations of her Southern Christian Leadership Conference performances in the 1960s. They were labeled “communist infiltration” events, and the memorial concert at the Atlanta Braves stadium was specifically cited as it “would provide emotional spark which could ignite racial disturbance.”

With regards to Angela Davis, she was noted as “facing murder-kidnapping charges in California” and a concert sponsored by the National United Committee with the goal of freeing Angela Davis was being held by “an organization founded by The Communist Party, United States of America.” Aretha Franklin had offered to post bail on Davis’s behalf, which was not reflected in the FBI file.

Franklin was deemed a potential performer at alleged threatening events, though the characterizations far exceed the number of events that she actually appeared at.

Check out the full declassified FBI file on Aretha Franklin here.

Queen Elizabeth II’s passing has shocked the world but no one is taking it harder than Piers Morgan.

The lifelong royalist has always sung the late monarch’s praises and today, he’s mourning the 96-year-old head of state with a tribute on his talk show.

“This is one of the saddest and most momentous turning points in the history of the United Kingdom,” Morgan began. “There’s nobody in this country or the world, who hasn’t lived the majority of their lives under the reign of Queen Elizabeth II. For 70 years she served this country with astoundingly dedicated duty. I struggle to even imagine a Britain without this Queen. But … the moment we’ve all been dreading has finally come.”

Morgan went on to explain how her death was a blow to the country’s “psyche,” before explaining that people around the world who aren’t British subjects likely don’t understand the love the English have for the Queen. He described the monarchy as the “very essence” of being British, likening it to the relationship between American culture and Abraham Lincoln, or apple pie, and the Constitution.

“Nothing and nobody has symbolized being British like Queen Elizabeth,” Morgan continued. “She’s always been there. She had an aura of invincibility that sadly today has been shattered and now we have to learn as a country to live without her.”

He ended the three-minute monologue by saying his own personal goodbye to this “remarkable little lady.”

“She was our greatest export, our greatest leader. The greatest of Britains. When Her Majesty the Queen died this afternoon in Balmoral, a little piece of us all died with her.”

Watch the full video below:

The last time we saw a real live NFL football game that counted, the Los Angeles Rams won the Super Bowl, defeating the Cincinnati Bengals in a game that started with Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson hyping up the crowd and introducing both teams on the field before kickoff.

Seven months later, the NFL is back and the Rams got the honor of kicking off the season in L.A. with their ring night festivities against this year’s Super Bowl favorites, the Buffalo Bills. Given how well it worked the last time, the Rams decided to see if The Rock could bring them good luck once again, as they paid him what was surely an upsetting amount of money to do a 19-second intro to get the crowd on their feet before kickoff.

The Rock’s cash per word rate here must be extraordinary, and it wasn’t lost on many fans that it was a bit funny seeing the owner of a different football league doing an intro for an NFL game — Johnson, of course, is the new owner of the XFL for when it launches for a third time in 2023.

Unfortunately for the Rams, this time around they were not able to get off to the same positive start after The Rock’s intro as they did in the Super Bowl, with the Bills marching to an impressive first drive touchdown from Josh Allen to Gabriel Davis to put the first points on the board of the 2022 NFL season.

As The Handmaid’s Tale heads into its fifth season on September 14th, shifting its gaze toward revenge instead of Canadian safety, fans can watch knowing that they’ll get one more season of the dystopian show. Hulu announced today that the Elisabeth Moss-starring nightmare will close out after a 6th season while showrunner Bruce Miller develops a future-set spin-off series called The Testaments.

“It has been a true honor to tell the story of Margaret Atwood’s groundbreaking novel and chillingly relevant world, and we are thrilled to bring viewers a sixth and final season of The Handmaid’s Tale,” Miller said in a statement. “We are grateful to Hulu and MGM for allowing us to tell this story, which unfortunately has remained as relevant as ever throughout its run, and are in awe of our incredible fans for their unwavering support, and without whom we never would have gotten to this point.”

Even though it’s hard to say goodbye, this is great news. It allows the series, which has already evolved past its source material and past its original conceits, to close out purposefully. June has come an excruciatingly long way in her quest for freedom from subjugation, and it’s difficult to see just how much longer that quest could or should continue. The big question will be whether she topples Gilead for good. Maybe they can replace it with some kind of functioning democracy!

Serving more early aughts realness, Blackstarkids is back with another dreamy hit. On their latest cut, “Cyberkiss 2 U,” the members of the trio embrace a flame, despite the fact that they’re far apart.

Joined by Beabadoobee, Blackstarkids maintain their connection with a lover online while rapping and singing over a techno-inspired beat.

On the song’s chorus, Beabadoobee sings, “I just wanna send you a kiss,” recalling the magical, millennial feeling of connecting with a crush via the internet.

Back in January, Blackstarkids chatted with Alternative Press, detailing the creative process behind their upcoming mixtape, Cyberkiss 2 U.

“It was a fun time with each other,” said member Deiondre. “We hadn’t really lived with each other yet at that point, so it was our first time being in that setting. It’s hard to fake being in a good mood around each other; we see right through that bullsh*t. If trying to make a song feels weird, it’s a bit like, ‘Ah, there’s clearly one person in this room that doesn’t want to.’ So we try to hang out with each other as much as possible and not take ourselves too seriously. We wanted to get into this thing to have it feel as least like a job as possible. That was the ultimate goal. We always want music to feel like our go-to for having fun because the one thing that connects us all when we want to hang out is music.”

Check out “Cyberkiss 2 U” above.

Cyberkiss is out 9/23 via Dirty Hit. Pre-save it here.

This is Hollywood’s new rule: if you win the Squid Game, you get to star in a Star Wars show. This precedent comes courtesy of ol’ #456 himself, Lee Jung-jae, who is set to play one of the leads in The Acolyte, which “takes viewers into a galaxy of shadowy secrets and emerging dark-side powers in the final days of the High Republic era.” Details about his character also fall in the realm of “shadowy secrets.”

Written and directed by Leslye Headland (Russian Doll), the Disney+ show will also star Amandla Stenberg, Jodie Turner-Smith, and, per Star Wars tradition, one adorable CGI-enhanced puppet that’s a Sith this time.

That last part is a joke. Unless they actually have a Sith puppet. It’s a cool idea.

Fortunately, we won’t have to wait too long to see, because The Acolyte already has its release date set for August 11, 2023. At the very least, we already know that the casting is off the charts.

Plus, the only way they could really go wrong here is to make Lee’s character enter some perverse murder contest among emerging Sith trainees who all have to compete in fatal children’s games (like podracing) in order to secure the love of wealthy Sith lords. After digging deep into the sands of Tattooine for Westerns and adventure, a mystery thriller set in the Star Wars universe sounds fantastic.

(via Deadline)

No one ever envisioned Black Adam arriving at a dicey time for the DC/Warner Bros. camp, which is distributing The Rock’s (New Line Cinema) entry into the (live-action) superpowers realm. Let’s just say that things are strange over at Warner Bros. Discovery these days, and very few of their comic book adaptations (Harley Quinn and the Joker sequel, which is still two years away, among them) are receiving good news these days. And Black Adam is now destined to be a proving ground, which is, again, unanticipated because it’s been over six years since Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson broke the news that he’d be portraying the DCEU’s Black Adam.

According to the above trailer, Black Adam (who was once Egypt’s greatest champion) has woken up from a 5,000-year nap after being “born from rage.” And as you can see, The Rock is pissed off as Black Adam, who never claimed to be a hero. Viola Davis returns as Amanda Waller from those Suicide Squad movies. And Pierce Brosnan appears as Doctor Fate, all while Black Adam wants nothing to do with any of this. Can this save the DCEU? We’ll find out this fall.

This movie’s under a lot of pressure for what was essentially a big-budgeted passion project for the star who’s a self-admitted “fan boy” of the character, who’s been (at least in the comics) both a supervillain and an antihero. This surely looks like a far cry from Shazam!, that lighthearted predecessor starring Zachary Levi, so it’s not too surprising that The Rock wanted Black Adam to be totally left out of the movie about a kid in a superhero’s bod. And thus far, we’ve seen a grim teaser and a trailer where The Rock catches a rocket like it ain’t no thing. From the movie’s synopsis:

From New Line Cinema, Dwayne Johnson stars in the action adventure “Black Adam.” The first-ever feature film to explore the story of the DC Super Hero comes to the big screen under the direction of Jaume Collet-Serra (“Jungle Cruise”). Nearly 5,000 years after he was bestowed with the almighty powers of the ancient gods—and imprisoned just as quickly—Black Adam (Johnson) is freed from his earthly tomb, ready to unleash his unique form of justice on the modern world.

Black Adam will try hard to save DC Comics movies on October 21, 2022. Enjoy this very serious poster, too.