Amazon may be one of the biggest companies in the world, but their streamer has always been jankier than the others. Where Netflix, Hulu, and even the Criterion Channel offer smooth interfaces with well-organized curation, Prime Video is more like one of those chaotic vintage stores where staffers still haven’t gotten around to separating used DVDs from copies of Dan Brown pageturners. But now the streamer that Jeff Bezos built is belatedly getting a facelift.
As per The New York Times, Amazon has started slowly rolling out a new interface some 18 months in the making. Not all subscribers have access to it yet, but those that do can see a more simplified main navigation page, as well as more direct routes to some of the newer parts of their library, including live TV and the new library of films and TV acquired from their $8.5 billion acquisition of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, which includes all the Bond films (minus, of course, the non-canon Never Say Never Again).
What’s more, the new interface is more cinematic, with pop-up videos that one tends to find on Netflix.
The overhaul comes as some of Amazon’s bigger shows and deals are about to debut. That super pricey Lord of the Rings show bows later this month, while the company also forked out a fortune for the exclusive broadcast rights to Thursday Night Football. When those begin, subscribers won’t have to attempt to navigate an interface with a strong shrug emoji vibe. (It also comes at a time when one of their biggest competitors, Netflix, is still reeling from losing untold subscribers.) Something to think about the next time you want to watch Roger Moore in Octopussy.
Another day, another cringe-worthy embarrassing moment by the Dr. Oz senate campaign. In a new fundraising text sent on Monday, the Republican candidate (who just barely won the nomination) oddly declared that Donald Trump‘s “MAGA movement is dying.” At first glance, one might assume that Oz is attempting to further distance himself from Trump after noticeably scrubbing the former president from his campaign website. Instead, Oz appears to be running back to the MAGA well by urging Republicans to financially support his campaign and stick it to those pesky liberals for ol’ Trumpy boy.
Liberals are winning the fundraising race, and the America First ProTrump movement feels defeated. If just 7 MAGA supporters step up right here, right now, we will be able to turn things around. Our nation cannot afford for the MAGA movement to die.
Friend, be a fighter for TRUMP.
Again, it’s a weird and seemingly desperate move by a guy whose campaign immediately got to work scrubbing Trump’s image from Oz’s campaign site after using the former president’s endorsement to win the primary. The fundraising text also arrives on the heels of Oz getting trolled by Snooki — yup, from the TV show — for pretending to be a PA resident.
On top of the Snooki burn, Pat’s King of Steaks in Philly got in the action by roasting Oz for not knowing how to spell the PA town he supposedly lives in after the TV doctor pretended to be a local resident. When beloved cheesesteak haunts are telling you to stay on your side of the Delaware River, it’s time to pack it in.
Meanwhile, Fetterman continued to dunk on Oz with no end in sight. The lieutenant governor mocked the TV doctor for pretending to be a lifelong avid hunter in a blatant effort to endear himself to the state’s vast sportsmen population.
“I’ve been shooting and hunting my whole life” – Dr. Oz in one of his TV ads
After a move from the Indiana Fever waiving Bria Hartley and signing Rennia Davis on July 15th, speculation immediately arose about where Hartley would sign. We have that answer now, as Rachel Galligan of Winsidr reported earlier today that Hartley has signed with the Connecticut Sun, with the team confirming shortly after.
The Connecticut Sun have signed Bria Hartley, sources confirm to @Winsidr
Hartley was a breakout player for the Phoenix Mercury during the WNBA bubble in 2020 prior to suffering an ACL tear late in the season, and has only played 26 games over the last two seasons. Returning late during a Finals team’s run, Hartley played a fairly minor role last season understandably, and that carried over this season in a showing of competitive polarity. Hartley came over late into the season for the Fever after a playoff run with her Turkish league club, Fenerbahce. Hartley played less than 100 minutes in Indiana this season, and it’s difficult to parse through who she is as a player at this time based off of her W season thus far.
My assumption is that Indiana already felt pretty set in their rotation, was comfortable leaning into their youth movement, and Hartley was primarily resting, rehabbing, and practicing. We’ve seen it happen a multitude of times in both the NBA and WNBA, so that’s my guess here. I’m more confident in that speculation considering her play in Turkey, which has me fairly bullish on her ability to impact a contending team as a bench guard.
Hartley played on a remarkably talented team in Fenerbahce, playing alongside Satou Sabally, Elizabeth Williams, Kayla McBride, and Amanda Zahui B. She’s at her best operating as more of a combo guard than a true lead guard, and she embodied that with her play on that roster. This is the quintessential Bria Hartley experience to me.
While Hartley isn’t the quickest guard (part of what makes her a combo) she pushes the break, generates a paint touch, and then relocates after moving the ball, culminating in a three point make. She doesn’t put a massive dent in the defense, but with her quick decisions and quality movement without the ball, she’s capable of starting sets and playing as a vital cog in an offense built around four players were ideally set up by a complimentary ball-handler.
That immediately ties back to the Sun and her fit with them. Alyssa Thomas has essentially performed as a quasi-creator for the Sun since Jasmine Thomas’ injury, but in the halfcourt, she’s at her best as a roller and screener. Jonquel Jones, DeWanna Bonner, and Brionna Jones are all fantastic offensive players in their own unique ways, but again, are ideally set up by a complimentary guard. Courtney Williams is more of a true two or scoring guard than a combo in my opinion, which is not a bad thing, but is much more of a pick and roll scorer than creator.
Natisha Hiedeman has factored in well as a starter for the Sun and I view Hartley in that same fashion: not truly a lead creator, but a player more than capable of stirring the drink, getting the ball to the right people in the right places, and being a threat off of the ball.
Much of the coverages Hartley receives are due to her shooting ability, so her playmaking reads are typically built off of her shooting gravity. She’s not routinely going to manipulate a defender with her eyes or a wild combo into a jump pass, but combined with sets involving multiple dynamic rollers, she can help generate quality looks. One thing that will be interesting to note: if defenses are willing to switch on Hartley ball-screens, how will Connecticut attack? Hartley is a decent pull-up shooter inside the arc and was a quality pull-up shooter from deep during her 2020 season, but if that shot isn’t there and switches are fairly airtight, what then? I’d counter and say that switching against the Sun is pretty haphazard, as switching a guard onto any of their bigs would be a sizable mismatch, but we’ve seen some routine issues of establishing halfcourt offense from the Sun.
Her defense is decent, particularly on the ball, but her screen navigation and off-ball defense can be a bit spotty at times, likely a residual effect of recovering from that knee injury still. The Sun’s overwhelming length and quality defenders makes this an ideal team to mitigate most concerns that can be sparked by a perimeter defender. If you can keep the ball in front to some degree, there are a bevy of All-Defense level players rotating and crowding the lane behind you.
For a team that has truly missed a stable eighth player since Thomas was injured earlier this season, this is a really good signing by the Sun and a great opportunity for Hartley to find her game in the W again on a team that lacks what she brings at her best.
There are a lot of topics one could ask Rick Ross about in an interview. The man is one of the most successful rappers and record execs in hip-hop, who also happens to have a taste for outlandish things like amateur lumberjacking and gifting his son a Wingstop franchise. There’s a lot to unpack when it comes to the polarizing hip-hop star, so why not ask him if he enjoys eating ass? Wait, hold up…full stop. That’s right folks, that’s where the hosts of the Beyond The Chair podcast went and Ross (who is starting his own podcast himself) didn’t hold back on his answer.
“Nah, I don’t really have no taste for ass,” Ross said. “I know what I like and I usually avoid the ass… I’m just letting you know, that ain’t a Rozay thing right there.” But it didn’t stop there.
When one of the hosts tries to get Ross to acquiesce by suggesting that, “I don’t like it but I’m gonna respect it?” Ross took the opportunity to talk about another kink that he might have an… errr, taste for. “That’s cool too but I want you to respect getting peed on from the neck down,” he replied. “And if I splash your face?” This could’ve taken an even wilder turn, but then Ross revealed how he’s not really into bondage and S&M, but prefers to go a different route in the sack:
“Chicks done asked me, ‘You ever watched 50 Shades of Grey?’ Nah baby, I ain’t watching 50 Shades. Nah, nah, nah… We ain’t gonna watch that,” he said. “I’mma have the weed lit, that goddamn Anita Baker gonna be playing and I may tug on that ponytail a little bit. And if your eyelashes end up on the marble floors, that’s cool too.”
Watch the full episode of the Beyond the Chair podcast with Rick Ross below, with the referenced portion of the conversation beginning at the 25 minute mark.
Earlier this month, Chris Brown expressed frustration with his recent media coverage after releasing his tenth studio album, Breezy. Exasperated by the album’s mixed critical reception and a general lack of press despite it reaching No. 4 on the Billboard 200, Chris complained that it “seems like yall only invest in the negative stories” about him. Unfortunately for him, he’s made those the safer bet himself, as even when he tries to do good it seems that he can’t keep from tripping himself up.
Case in point: Today, NBC’s Click2Houston reported that Brown was recently sued for failing to perform at a charity concert to benefit victims of 2021’s hurricane season which saw four major storms cause $64.5 billion in damages. The organizer of the March One Night Only Benefit Concert, LeJuan Bailey, says Brown accepted $1.1 million to perform, then canceled at the last minute — literally, just after the show’s sound check.
Bailey, owner and vice president of DML Real Estate Investors and Construction, further says Brown has refused to return the money, calling his actions “parallel to pure theft.”
Speaking of bad investments, Digital Music News has also reported that Brown’s Breezyverse NFT collection, which was launched on the first of the month, has only sold 299 of the 10,000 tokens that were minted to start (only 297 sold in the first week). Part of this is probably just due to the (inevitable) crash of the crypto market, while at least some had to just have been poor planning on Brown’s team’s part. After all, there doesn’t seem to be much overlap between Chris Brown fans, who likely would have enjoyed VIP concert tickets and meet and greets with Brown, and NFT investors, from whom the primary draw is flipping them for profit.
Also, from what I’ve seen of the NFT community, they don’t look much like R&B fans, if you catch my drift. And while other pop artists have huge, rabid fanbases already built-in who buy into just about everything their fave does, Brown’s had… shall we say, a rougher go of it. But look, it’s not all bad for Breezy; his One Of Them Ones Tour with Lil Baby is apparently off to a solid start.
[This post contains spoilers for the Ms. Marvel finale]
Ms. Marvel was one of the most enjoyable Marvel Cinematic Universe projects in years. The lively Disney+ series was fun and refreshingly free of self-seriousness (Eternals), and it didn’t sag under the weight of having to connect to the rest of the MCU (Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness). In fact, it took until the post-credits scene of the finale for the only major MCU cameo: Captain Marvel.
Ms. Marvel directors Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah discussed how the scene came together with Collider. When asked if they shot it, El Arbi replied, “So, that was actually… Nia DaCosta shot that while she was shooting The Marvels. She was on set with Brie Larson and [star Iman Vellani], and she didn’t know that scene was going to be used for the post-credit scene. Marvel is very good in separating all the things.”
He continued:
So, we would always ask Kevin, “Yo, when’s Captain Marvel going to show up?” And he would always tell us, “Don’t worry about it. You’ll see.” Meanwhile, he has said to Nia DaCcosta, “Just shoot that scene. We need that. And you’ll see.” All of a sudden, when we were calibrating the final episodes after the credits, we said, “Oh. There’s Captain Marvel.” So that was a big surprise for us, as well. But it was pretty cool. It was pretty cool.
DaCosta, who also directed Little Woods and the record-setting Candyman, was tasked with helming The Marvels. The 33rd film in the MCU — but first with a possible cameo from bara Hulk and choti Hulk — comes out on July 28, 2023, after Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (November 11, 2022), Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (February 17, 2023), and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (May 5, 2023).
There are some things that people who aren’t online all the time will just simply not understand, like why Dr. Oz keeps getting dragged for eating at various tourist traps in Philadelphia or anything that Elon Musk tweets. Another thing is adding “-ussy” at the end of any word to turn it into a “thing.” Enter: the wonderful Jamie Campbell Bower who somehow got roped into learning what Vecnussy is.
In a video shared by Netflix earlier today, Bower, who plays the tentacle-y villain Vecna, was reading a series of tweets and memes about his character when he learned of the term “Vecnussy.” This, of course, stems from “bussy,” which is synonymous with a bunch of other stuff that you can probably assume for yourself.
“My vecnussy, what is it? I don’t even know where it is. I don’t know what it is,” Bower remarked after reading several memes about it. After a while, he seems to get the gist of the phrase “putting his whole vecnussy” into the character–basically meaning he gave it his all.
“I mean, I did. I put as much as I had of my vecnussy into Stranger Things,” he said. “If you could help me find my vecnussy so that I can then put it into something else, that would be fantastic.” Please don’t!!
Bower is right though, he did offer a fantastic performance of the gross demon who infiltrated the friend group. After all, the role required almost eight hours of makeup application every day, and he handled it like a champ. After playing various villains in both the Harry Potter and Twilight universes, maybe he can get a basic rom-com gig soon?
While the world’s sociopolitical balance seems to be crumbling before our very eyes, calling out injustice is nothing new at a Rage Against The Machine concert. Zack De La Rocha, Tom Morello, and company have always used their on-stage platform to spread awareness to a range of causes, corruption, etc. in well-articulated but incredibly pissed-off ways. And while the band hadn’t played a concert in 11 years before reuniting to perform again last week, they’re picking up right where they left off.
This past weekend at Ottawa’s Bluesfest, the band used their Friday night headlining set to bring awareness to the disproportionate violence against Canada’s Indigenous peoples population.
“In Canada, Indigenous women and girls are 16 times more likely to be murdered or to disappear than white women are,” one message read on the screen behind the stage. Another said, “An Indigenous person in Canada is over 10 times more likely to be shot and killed by a police officer than a white person is.”
Rage Against the Machine in Ottawa last night
In Canada, Indigenous women and girls are 16 times more likely to be murdered or to disappear than white women are. pic.twitter.com/U1vu54JMY2
— With All Due Respect Your Holiness (@JakeBuffin) July 16, 2022
The briefer messages they posted read “LAND BACK” and “Settler-colonialism is murder,” which spoke to long-standing mainstream issues surrounding Canada’s indigenous population and their rights to the land that is historically theirs. While Rage has stood up against the overturning of Roe v. Wade, they’re not one to loosen the grip on societal ills in other parts of the world as well.
With Rage Against The Machine, the purpose of these displays is not for shock value, but rather to educate and bring sheer awareness to pressing instances of injustice towards marginalized populations. And the responses on social media, show how much more widespread the band’s messages can be in the digital age than they were in the pre-internet era of the band’s early-’90s beginnings.
While Keanu Reeves is as synonymous with John Wick as he is with Neo from The Matrix, the role of the vengeful assassin almost went in an entirely different direction. According to a new (and excellently titled) behind-the-scenes book, They Shouldn’t Have Killed His Dog, Derek Kolstad’s script for the first film was originally written with a much older actor in mind. In fact, there were two names that were specifically being kicked around: Clint Eastwood and Harrison Ford.
Here’s John Wick producer Basil Iwanyk described the original script in an excerpt provided to Entertainment Weekly:
“The lead was a seventy-five-year-old man, twenty-five years after being retired. It was the fun of watching Clint Eastwood kick ass. I thought, Okay, there’s probably one or two names you could do this with: Clint Eastwood, Harrison Ford. Other than that, I’m not sure how I put this movie together. But the tone of the script for John Wick was subversive and really fun. It has a very clear emotional through line and a great premise for an action movie.”
Considering Eastwood is in his 90s now, it would have been interesting to see him pull off the gun-fu movies required for the film and its multiple sequels. Granted, Ford is knocking out a fifth Indiana Jones movie, so he probably would’ve fared only slightly better at John Wick’s almost ballet-like choreographed battles. (Would we still have paid to see both? You bet!)
As for how Reeves became involved, the actor’s agent was aggressively looking for projects to get him out of a career slump. When Reeves read the script, he immediately wanted in. And if you know anything about Reeves, the guy is an aggressive reader, so when something sparks his interest, you really know you got something.
“I see he has three hundred screenplays stacked on his desk, because he reads everything that UTA, WME, William Morris sends out. He reads them all,” Kolstad said while recalling his first time meeting Reeves at his house. “And so think that he read something on a Friday, in ninety minutes, and was like, ‘I want to do it.’ In that moment, before I met and really clicked with him, I was like, ‘Yeah, I really want to do it, too.’”
The Bear (now streaming on Hulu) stars Jeremy Allen White as Carmy, a former fine dining chef who’s gone back to run his family’s frenetic, working-class Chicago beef joint. It’s a show that allows White to flex more muscles than Shameless did (even though White did a lot more heavy emotional lifting than he ever received credit for as Lip). It’s a damn good show with a delightful soundtrack and a first season that you can binge in one afternoon. And it’s also very, terribly funny how The Bear has launched a lust-inspired social media phenomenon that has very little to do with the show itself.
People have been looking at promotional images of the unmistakably intense Carmy and admitting (as comedian Sarah York did in a thread that you must read) that they hadn’t even watched the show but still branded Carmy as the quintessential “sexually competent dirtbag that only exists in a restaurant kitchen.” One Twitter user remarked upon how his roommate declared Carmy to be “[w]orth the yeast infection.” And that chatter continues, despite, how White stressed this fact GQ: “Carmy does not f*ck.”
During the course of this blunt (yet true for those people who’ve watched The Bear) proclamation, White added, “[T]here is zero romance, let alone sex, onscreen. Zilch.” Here’s more: “Carmy’s, like, the least sexual person. In playing him, I was aware that he had no room for love.” So, there you have it. Carmy didn’t have sex (at least onscreen) during the eight warp-speed episodes on the first season of The Bear. But… will Carmy have sex in Season 2, when it arrives? More importantly, should Carmy do the deed?
This is a real issue that the show’s writers must consider, either in a serious or darkly comedic way, so let’s talk about the Should first:
FX
– YES: Carmy’s got some frustrations to work out: Dude has a lot of pent-up energy. He’s tightly wound and subsisting on cigarettes and angst, all while classically trained and desperately wanting to express his creativity through food. That didn’t (satisfyingly) happen at his family’s beef joint, where the beefs are not simply confined to meat. The tension — between Chefs, between Carmy and his cousin, between Carmy and himself during a rich inner life — boiled over at several points, and hell, Carmy couldn’t even count on suppliers to drop off the correct meat. “Just the delivery guy!” had to be the most annoying phrase to hear while plagued with an unwanted shipment of flesh, so maybe Carmy deserves to take a carnal vacation, if only for a brief interlude. He’d be a more relieved, happier Carmy, perhaps even with a spring in his step while striding through the streets of Chicago on the way to work.
– NO: A googly-eyed Carmy would be no good: I don’t think this would work out at all with the vibe of The Bear. All of the pounding should only go down in the kitchen for Carmy. He truly doesn’t have time to pause for sex, not even to swipe on Tinder. He’s got to mind the grind, deal with a cousin and his megaphone, respond to exploding toilets, and all the messes. If he’s distracted by his personal life, Carmy might lose some of his drive in the kitchen. Maybe sex could be his Kryptonite and the destroyer of tasty food. We can’t have that. Also, those sounds of water boiling to a steam would lose all context if Carmy’s not completely immersed and overwhelmed by his professional pressures and family issues. Sexual tension could ruin everything. And then there’s the danger of Carmy starting to crank out food on autopilot. Maybe even rely upon pre-freezing food and microwaving it. No. The restaurant’s now called The Bear, not Olive Garden.
– YES: However, Carmy could make a lady very happy: This one’s a given, actually. I mean, the way that Carmy operates in the kitchen with all that detail paid to, say, browning an onion makes me want to believe that Carmy would be as patient and attentive in the sack. Is that something we really want to see happen, though? Well sure. I’m curious enough, but I hope that he showered after the aforementioned exploding toilet and showing off his somewhat perverse fascination with the floor, including the time that he couldn’t resist tasting some donut.
FX/Hulu
– NO: Bye bye, kitchen creativity: When Carmy spoke during an Al-Anon meeting, we learned a lot about why he is the way he is. He speaks through the food, and that’s where he also finds his purpose. If he got all infatuated with a woman, or even if he had some one-night stands, I really think he’d lose his drive to work out his dead-brother issues. I don’t believe that the spaghetti-sauce money could fix everything; there’s still gotta be some lingering angst. And Carmy is chronically stressed, so very stressed, so I think that the act of copulation would be counterproductive in a sense. There’s be no stress relief, only distraction from what he’s viewed as his ultimate purpose in life.
VERDICT: For the “Should he?” question, I think that Carmy would be better off not having sex on the show, at least, not yet. Keep a little mystery going and let Carmy focus on those kitchen mishaps. After all that energy buildup and conflict in the kitchen and people projecting their fantasies on social media, actually putting a Carnal Carmy scene into the show might be too hot (or too cold!) for the audience to handle.
However, do I think that Carmy Will have sex?
– YES: That’s it. I think that the writers will have him go there, but I can only hope that this gets postponed until, say, the third season. Since this development seems inevitable (as fan service), I can only hope that there will not be a tribute to — and I’m sorry, I cannot resist this — Ebon Moss-Bachrach’s comparable Girls scene. And hopefully, the show will refrain from having Carmy hook up with a coworker (though admittedly restaurants are historically fertile grounds for inter-office relationships). We don’t need any lovers’ squabbles in the kitchen, although I admit that having Carmy accidentally referring to his partner as “Chef” wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world. Or have Joel McHale return in Carmy’s head, criticizing his every move. Yep, gotta make it weird, Chefs.
The Bear is streaming on Hulu.
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(@calicoestrella) 
Fighting RoevsWade in the USA, but they don’t let Canada off the hook either. 
(@jollenelevid) 
