GoneTrending

There were fewer gulfs in impact during last season’s playoff run than Jrue Holiday’s menacing, versatile, overwhelming defense and his erratic, unpredictable, confusing scoring. When the Milwaukee Bucks opted to stop switching screens and keep Holiday tethered to Chris Paul in the NBA Finals, the Hall of Fame point guard struggled mightily to catalyze the offense the same way.

Holiday was an All-Defensive First Team honoree and looked the part as the Bucks pulverized teams defensively en route to a title. He was also a tremendous third scorer during the regular season, averaging 17.7 points on 59.2 percent true shooting (.503/.392/.787). Had he not missed 10 consecutive games in February due to COVID, there’s a chance he’d have received his second All-Star berth. That’s how good he was on both ends all regular season.

While the defensive chops translated to the playoffs and he remained a valuable distributor, the individual scoring became unreliable, when he averaged 17.3 points on 48.2 percent true shooting. His finishing and rim frequency deteriorated, he settled for more hurried midrange jumpers, and seemed to gravitate toward early clock pull-up threes on the break too often. As Milwaukee looks to defend its title, an improved scoring Holiday could loom large.

The Bucks should be a better team than last year. Donte DiVincenzo will return, who they missed mightily during the final three rounds of the playoff rounds. Acquiring Grayson Allen was a savvy move to add some shooting and playmaking. Post-title bumps for their stars, Giannis Antetokounmpo and Khris Middleton, could be a legit phenomenon and both were better players by the end of the postseason than at the start. Maybe, they figured some stuff out.

Other contenders should be better as well, though. The Phoenix Suns bolstered their bench and can expect growth from the quartet of Devin Booker, Deandre Ayton, Mikal Bridges and Cam Johnson. The Los Angeles Lakers and Brooklyn Nets were constantly bitten by the injury bug last season. Both enter the year seemingly much healthier, though Kyrie Irving’s vaccination status threatens to complicate the situation in Brooklyn.

That’s why a guy like Holiday being better equipped to handle the mantle of third scorer is crucial. Much of the talk surrounding Milwaukee last season centered on its diversified offense that was seemingly more playoff-ready. Yet when late May rolled around, the Bucks made most of their money defensively. They had the top-ranked defense of the postseason, while their offense finished 11th among 16 teams.

Some of that is because they played a handful of very good teams, especially the Nets, whose defense was stifling at times. But it’s also because Giannis, Middleton, and Holiday struggled earlier before the former two turned it on eventually. Holiday had some impressive scoring outings, including Games 5 and 6 against the Atlanta Hawks and Game 5 against Phoenix. Yet by and large, the Bucks would have benefitted from consistency. That hasn’t changed as their title defense begins this month.

Going into the weekend, news broke that Netflix fired the organizer of a planned employee walkout that was sparked in response to the streaming company’s continued defense of Dave Chappelle‘s latest comedy special, The Closer. However, that setback has not stopped the walkout of trans employees and their allies who have been internally voicing their frustration with Netflix’s refusal to grapple with the potential harm caused by the transphobic and homophobic portions of Chappelle’s special.

Scheduled for October 20, the event’s new organizers and participants — now formally known as the Trans* Employee Resource Group (ERG) — have shared a list of demands that includes internal changes they want to see the streaming giant adapt. Notably, removing Chappelle’s special is not one of the demands. However, the employees would like to see content warnings going forward as well as more concentrated efforts to promote trans talent across the company.

Here are just some of the demands via The Verge:

– Increase investment in trans and non-binary content on Netflix comparable to our total investment in transphobic content, including marketing and promotion.

– Revise internal processes on commissioning and releasing potential harmful (“sensitive”) content, including but not limited to involving parties who are a part of the subject community and can speak to potential harm, or consulting with 3rd party experts/vendors.

– Hire trans and non-binary content executives, especially BIPOC, in leading positions.

– Acknowledge the harm and Netflix’s responsibility for this harm from transphobic content, and in particular harm to the Black trans community.

– Add a disclaimer before transphobic titles that specifically flag transphobic language, misogyny, homophobia, hate speech, etc. as required.

You can read the full ERG letter here.

(Via The Verge)

If you thought Marvel’s M.O.D.O.K. was out there, wait until you see what the team over at Hulu is working on next. Following M.O.D.O.K. (but unfortunately no longer leading up to the debut of the tentatively planned The Offenders series over on Hulu), the streaming service has revealed the first trailer for Marvel’s Hit-Monkey and forgive us for making the pun but… it’s pretty ape sh*t.

Based on the 2010 comic series of the same name, Hit-Monkey follows a Japanese snow monkey (voiced by legendary voice actor Fred Tatasciore) who ultimately dedicates his life to killing fellow assassins. However, based on the trailer, it seems there might be some deviations between the comic series and the upcoming television adaptation.

In the Hit-Monkey comics, the monkey who goes on to become the legendary killer gains his skills through disdainfully watching an unnamed assassin (Jason Sudeikis’ Bryce, in the trailer) train following his troop of fellow snow monkeys essentially adopting and caring for him following an assignment gone wrong. Eventually, the observant monkey attacks the rest of his tribe after they attempt to save the hitman from death, which he vehemently objects to, and he is ultimately banished from the tribe for his violent nature. During his banishment however, he finds a group of assassins on the way to finish their job and kill the unnamed man staying with the monkeys. When Hit-Monkey returns, the unnamed assassin and his entire, former tribe have been murdered, causing Hit-Monkey to take on a vow of revenge. In addition to appearing in his own series, the furry lil’ killer has also been featured in the Deadpool comics, which makes complete sense given literally everything about his character.

While it could be the trailer doesn’t paint the whole, bloody picture, it seems like the show will deviate somewhat from that premise, and the unnamed assassin will play a much larger part as Bryce, Hit-Monkey’s ghost companion who helps train the little guy. The trailer also introduces us to Shinji Yokohama (George Takei), a “kind politician with too much on his shoulders,” Akiki (Olivia Munn), “the smart and ambitious niece of Shinji,” and Haruka (Ally Maki), ” a good honest cop who wants to fight the injustice in Tokyo.”

Directed by Will Speck and Josh Gordon (Blades of Glory, Office Christmas Party, The Switch), the crude comedy might remind you a bit of another adult animated series: Archer. This is because Floyd County Productions, the production studio behind hit FX series Archer, is the same one working on Hit-Monkey. The series is set to hit Hulu on November 17, 2021, and is the last planned Marvel series coming to the service after its planned Howard the Duck, Tigra & Dazzler, and The Offenders series were all canned.

Might we never really pass on into nothingness? Has the world ended many times before? Are we in fact doomed to spend eternity unknowingly jumping from one dimension to the next? According to one TikTok theory, the answer is yes. And it’s blowing millions of minds worldwide.

---

Joli Moli (@joli.artist) is quite used to spooking and perplexing viewers with conspiracy theories and alternative hot takes. In her video titled “Apocalypse…again,” Joli introduced the concept of Hugh Everett’s quantum immortality.

Fans of the Marvel “multiverse,” are quite familiar with this concept, where instead of experiencing death, “your consciousness just gets transferred to a parallel universe where you survived,” the TikTokker explained.

Joli admits that this might burst the bubbles of those seeking the “sweet relief” of a widespread apocalypse. “If the quantum immortality theory is correct,” she deduced, “you’re just going to wake up in a parallel universe with no memory of the fact that you just survived an apocalyptic event.”

According to Joli, the only sort of clue or hint you’d get that you might have woken up in a parallel world would be “new Mandela effects.” You know, the strange phenomenon where all of a sudden there are two completely opposing memories of historical events? Yeah, quantum theory says that if you remember Curious George having a tail, you probably died in another universe.

Driving her point home, Joli added: “What I’m basically implying here is that in our reality, apocalypses happen every day … after the inevitable apocalypse occurs, you’re going to wake up the next day in a new reality, and the next thing you know, you’re going to find yourself on Reddit talking about ‘since when did Pizza Hut have two Ts?!’ Arguing with people who are native of this new reality, talking about ‘it’s always had two Ts’.”

I for one would never want to live in a Pizza Hutt universe. Blech.

Still not sold on the theory? Joli has further arguments: “You don’t believe me? Okay, it’s been about 65 million years since the asteroids allegedly took out the dinosaurs. … So you mean to tell me that in the last 65 million years, no other asteroids have come through the neighborhood, taken us out? You think we’re just that lucky, huh? No other super volcanic events in 65 million years? We’re just out there in space just dodging asteroids by luck, right? Earth doesn’t have a steering wheel.”

Hmmm. That’s a good point.

Joli concluded with the upbeat sentiment that “Earth is probably always being taken out, and our consciousness just keeps getting transferred to another parallel universe, and another one, and another one. For all you know, the apocalypse maybe already happened last night…”

So far, in this reality anyway, the video has 4.9 million views. And—as to be expected—the video left many feeling uneasy.

One user commented, “Ok, I’m actually kind of freaking out right now coz I’m not the conspiracy typa guy, but you’re like eerily making sense.”

A few resorted to sarcasm as a defense mechanism (understandably), like this Twitterer: “Thanks I was overdue for another existential crisis.”

The discourse got so intense, people were reporting physical side effects from the stress. One person wrote: “The thought of never being able to actually die is extremely depressing, and it’s giving me a headache.”

Another added, “Bruh, I’m just done with this anxiety. My body [is] emotionally [and] physically TIREDDD.”

One commenter, who clearly had their priorities straight, wrote: “You’re over here talking about extinction level events and I’m having to check on the two Ts in Pizza Hut.”

It wasn’t all gloom and doom though. According to indy100, some saw the potential of eternal life as a comfort against the loss of loved ones, while others finally got to make sense of their “world-ending” dreams.

If you have watched the original TikTok and are filled with burning questions, Joli posted a follow up Q&A video. A small disclaimer: You might be left with even more questions.

Though we may never really know what awaits us on the other side, it is interesting to think that we might live in a multiverse with infinite second chances. And whether or not this theory floats your metaphysical boat, it’s fun to contemplate on one of life’s biggest mysteries.

We love emojis. These modern-day hieroglyphics are the statement jewelry of punctuation in the digital age. Nothing quite drives a message home better than the clapping hands going between words in ALL CAPS, am I right? And who doesn’t appreciate receiving a quick skull to indicate that your joke was so funny, the other person is, in fact, dead.

Well, there’s a new emoji sheriff in town, folks. Odds are you’ve probably seen a little “red flag emoji” popping up all across social media posts. While these markers are indeed a warning, I wouldn’t be too concerned. They don’t indicate any real danger. Unless of course the one posting them was your date from last night…

---

Just like in real life, the now viral internet meme signals potentially, um, I think the nice way of saying it is “problematic” behavior in a newly met person. Though red flags are commonly discussed in the dating world, they can pop up in any encounter. Whatever statement, strong opinion or otherwise awkward interaction that makes you think “uh-oh, this is not a person I actually want to associate with,” that is a red flag. And though red flags can take a serious spin, this trend is definitely taking on a lighter tone.

The trend originally began on Black Twitter, where users shared humorous dating warning signs, like “TEXT SLOW BUT ALWAYS ON SOCIAL MEDIA,” and “I’m cool wit all my exes.”

But like all social media phenomena, this has morphed into something bigger.

The formula is a simple: quote or brief description + anywhere between seven and a million red triangle flags (seriously, some people put a lot of them). Other than that, your red flag warning can be about literally anything. From controversial culinary choices…

… to misaligned movie choices.

And again, it doesn’t always have to be about dating. Like with this Twitter user who shared a less-than-desirable salon experience.

From fan accounts to celebrities and major companies, everyone seems to be joining in on the fun. Including Wonder Woman herself, standing up against the patriarchy.

Dolly Parton sent her “Jolene”-inspired red flag tweet that warranted its very own article in HuffPost.

Others, like Trevor Noah, were a bit more on the savage side.

Netflix used the trend to advocate against superficiality. Although truth be told I’m 99% sure they have at least 200 movies with this exact plot.

Brands like Pepsi and Twitter kept the messaging simple. Don’t like their product? Red flag.

You know it’s cool if the Teletubbies are doing it:

The trend has begun to morph again, as some people have used it to make fun of themselves, and all the red flags they ignore.

One Twitter user attempted to inject a little positivity by incorporating green flags to indicate general acts or words of kindness, like “what can I do to make you feel better.”

Though these tweets are generally fun to read, it turns out they are an audible hell for those who use screen readers. Imagine having to hear Siri say “triangular post on flag” (the emoji’s proper name) 40 times. Yikes.

Despite the reported nuisance, the trend continues to grow. And it doesn’t seem to be letting up any time soon. Look on the bright side: It might just be a lighthearted way of getting us all to mind our Ps and Qs, lest we find ourselves marked with the scarlet emoji.

When I saw that Vincent Price was trending, I assumed that it was for something Halloween oriented. After all, the man is pretty much the king of the holiday, is he not?

Much to my ignorant surprise, that was not the case. As it turns out, one Twitterer was giving the world a crash course on all things VP, and her informative thread received so much positive attention, #VincentPrice began breaking the internet. Many, like myself, were thrilled to learn a bit more about the Halloween King, who was actually a real-life hero.

---

For those who would like a quick education on the man, or simply seek to fill themselves with renewed appreciation, keep reading! You just might find some fun icebreakers to test out at your next Halloween party.

He was the Robin Hood of the art world

OK, he didn’t steal anything, but Vincent Price would collect the original masterpieces of legends like Picasso, Rembrandt and Pollock and place them into a Sears department store for discounted purchase.

The exhibit, called The Vincent Price Collection, offered buyers a chance to purchase a work for as little as $5/month. Imagine putting an original Dali surrealist piece on layaway!

In his video promoting the collection for Sears, Price said, “Art belongs to everyone … [it] is the visual experience of man … done by extremely disciplined human beings who are trying to allow you … to see through their eyes the visual beauty of this world.”

He also advocated for Indigenous art

Price’s love of art transcended beyond Western cultures. He was also passionate about helping Indigenous artists prosper from their creativity. In addition to serving for 14 years on the Indian Arts and Crafts Board, he also developed a creative writing award for Native students and read their poems aloud during his interview with Johnny Carson. And to top it all off, Price integrated their work into that Sears fine art collection.

And was an activist before it was cool

We’re quite used to seeing celebrities use their platforms to speak out about social justice issues.Sometimes as a genuine effort to create change, and other times, sadly, as a performative strategy to appear “on brand.” There was a time, however, when this was not normalized, and even had a certain level of risk. That didn’t stop Price. While starring in a popular radio show “The Saint,” he delivered speeches about racism and religious intolerance. Though delivered more than half a century ago, what he had to say feels relevant even now.

Especially this part:

“Poison doesn’t always come in bottles … marked with the skull and crossbones of danger. … Poison can take the form of words and phrases and acts. The venom of racial and religious hatred.”

Special shoutout to Sarah McGonagall on Twitter, who is clearly a Vincent Price trivia connoisseur and wholehearted fan.

Schooling everyone, she even had super exclusive, lesser-known facts about the Hollywood icon. Like the one about Price’s grandfather inventing cream of tartar.

Or the one about Vincent Price originally being the voice of Santa in “The Nightmare Before Christmas,” before being overcome with sadness over the loss of his wife:

As to how she found all these interesting facts, her answer is good old-fashioned memoir reading. She wrote “For all those asking, I got most of this information from the beautiful memoir written by Vincent’s daughter, Victoria. I highly recommend it in both physical and audiobook form!”

That book can be found here.

McGonagall ends her Price thread by noting her “favorite Price moment,” where he presented the “most devastatingly savage explanation of why humans are the most terrifying monsters of all” in his movie “The Monster Club.”

It wasn’t long before others started contributing their own Vincent Price tidbits.

One person tweeted about Price’s legendary memorization prowess, saying “The Hilarious House of Frightenstein” hired Price for two days to record dozens of little poems to introduce the segments. But Price was so fast at learning his lines—and never messing up—that they were done in half a day.

Another shared how Price, according to his daughter, was openly bisexual (along with his 3rd wife).

One person even posted Price’s cookbook, “A Treasury of Great Recipes.” For those who didn’t know, myself included, Price’s two passions were art and cooking.

Who knew that so much could be learned from one Twitter trend? One thing is clear, Vincent Price most assuredly deserves every bit of internet love he’s receiving today. The man not only gives Halloween a distinctly fun and spooky voice, he also continues to be an inspiration by standing up for what he believed in and expressing himself fully.

As this Twitterer astutely stated, “Vincent Price is just the Goth Mr. Rogers.”

Marcella Lopez didn’t always want to be a teacher — but once she became one, she found her passion. That’s why she’s stayed in the profession for 23 years, spending the past 16 at her current school in Los Angeles, where she mostly teaches children of color.

“I wanted purpose, to give back, to live a life of public service, to light the spark in others to think critically and to be kind human beings,” she says. “More importantly, I wanted my students to see themselves when they saw me, to believe they could do it too.”

Ms. Lopez didn’t encounter a teacher of color until college. “That moment was life-changing for me,” she recalls. “It was the first time I felt comfortable in my own skin as a student. Always remembering how I felt in that college class many years ago has kept me grounded year after year.”

It’s also guided her teaching. Ms. Lopez says she always selects authors and characters that represent her students and celebrate other ethnicities so students can relate to what they read while also learning about other cultures.

“I want them to see themselves in the books they read, respect those that may not look like them and realize they may have lots in common with [other cultures] they read about,” she says.

She also wants her students to have a different experience in school than she did.

When Ms. Lopez was in first grade, she “was speaking in Spanish to a new student, showing her where the restroom was when a staff member overheard our conversation and directed me to not speak in Spanish,” she recalls. “In ‘this school,’ we only speak English,” she remembers them saying. “From that day forward, I was made to feel less-than and embarrassed to speak the language of my family, my ancestors; the language I learned to speak first.”

Part of her job, she says, is to find new ways to promote acceptance and inclusion in her classroom.

“The worldwide movement around social justice following the death of George Floyd amplified my duty as a teacher to learn how to discuss racial equity in a way that made sense to my little learners,” she says. “It ignited me to help them see themselves in a positive light, to make our classroom family feel more inclusive, and make our classroom a safe place to have authentic conversations.”

One way she did that was by raising money through DonorsChoose to purchase books and other materials for her classroom that feature diverse perspectives.

Courtesy of Ms. Lopez

The Allstate Foundation recently partnered with DonorsChoose to create a Racial Justice and Representation category to encourage teachers like Ms. Lopez to create projects that address racial equity in the classroom. To launch the category, The Allstate Foundation matched all donations to these projects for a total of $1.5 million. Together, they hope to drive awareness and funding to projects that bring diversity, inclusion, and identity-affirming learning materials into classrooms across the country. You can see current projects seeking funding here.

When Ms. Lopez wanted to incorporate inclusive coloring books into her lesson plans, The Allstate Foundation fully funded her project so she was able to purchase them.

“I’m a lifelong learner, striving to be my best version of myself and always working to inspire my little learners to do the same,” she says. Each week, Ms. Lopez and the students would focus on a page in the book and discuss its message. And she plans to do the same again this school year.

“DonorsChoose has been a gamechanger for my students. Without the support of all the donors that come together on this platform, we wouldn’t have a sliver of what I’ve been able to provide for my students, especially during the pandemic,” she says.

“My passion is to continue striving to be excellent, and to continue to find ways to use literature as an anchor, depicting images that reflect my students,” she says.

To help teachers like Ms. Lopez drive this important mission forward, donate on DonorsChoose.

Courtesy of Ms. Lopez

It’s almost time for everyone’s favorite spooky holiday, Halloween! For some, it’s all about costume parties, candy, and pumpkins, but it’s also the time of year when horror fans get treated to the best in scary movies, haunted houses, and games. While horror novels can feel too detached, and horror movies are more about witnessing the terror, a horror game puts everyone directly into the experience. Playing a horror game is an experience like no other because it forces us to directly deal with those fears. Dealing with ghosts? That’s your problem to solve. Running away from a demon? Well ya better get moving, because the only person that can escape that demon is you.

The great thing about horror games though is that they give us a very personal experience as well. By forcing us to go through the entirety of the horror on our own, we become far more attached to everything that is happening to the characters we’re playing as. Maybe that’s because the game is forcing us to become those characters through personal choice, or the tale is just so gripping that we can’t look away. Horror is able to enter territory that other genres can’t and it’s led to some of the most influential video games ever.

Silent Hill 2 – PlayStation 2

Silent Hill 2 is a contender for the best horror game ever made. When the original Silent Hill was released on PlayStation, it was in many ways an unexpected success. The series was supposed to be Konami’s answer to the Hollywood movie style of Capcom’s Resident Evil, but what it ended up becoming was a truly terrifying psychological horror series, with Silent Hill 2 standing above the rest as the pinnacle of the series.

Silent Hill 2 has all the benefits of a good sequel in terms of gameplay and design, but the story starring James Sunderland is where it really fills the player with terror. Called to the town of Silent Hill by a letter from his supposedly dead wife, James is forced to reconcile with past traumas he would rather forget. Along the way, he meets others dealing with their own demons as well as literal monsters of his worst psychological fears. The most terrifying of them being Pyramid Head, a monster he created to punish him for his previous sin. What makes Silent Hill 2 so important though is the impact it had on the survival horror genre. Horror games had rarely tackled such mature subjects before and the way Silent Hill 2 handles its characters, plot, and setting makes it a classic that should be played by any fan of the genre. It is the benchmark that so many games are still attempting to meet to this very day.

Resident Evil – PlayStation

The first Resident Evil game is really not that scary. With hokie (hilarious) voice acting, a B-movie plot, and often frustrating gameplay, someone playing it today might not understand how the series would go on to become such a worldwide phenomenon. For starters the game really was horrifying back on the PlayStation, but the gameplay was also very fresh and new for console horror games. The camera angles, tank controls, and limited inventory created an experience that immediately grabbed players.

By the end of the game, the player becomes so overpowered Resident Evil switches from horror to an action title, but that gave it a Hollywood thriller feel. Capcom’s goal with Resident Evil was to create a game that felt like a movie and it largely succeeded. The series would go on to make far scarier games in the future, and then ridiculously cheesy ones — only to re-correct back to horror — but none of those future games would exist without that first game. Age may have not treated the original Resident Evil the best, but its influences are all over the series and horror game market today.

Alone in the Dark – PC

Everything that Resident Evil made popular when it released in 1996? All of that was inspired by Alone in the Dark back in 1992. The pre-determined camera angles, mansion, and emphasis on not trying to fight through every scenario was done by Alone in the Dark first. It basically defined the entirety of the Survival Horror genre that Resident Evil would go on to perfect.

What made Alone in the Dark so influential at the time was how it approached gameplay. The main character, Edward Carnby or Emily Hartwood, is a private investigator that can handle themself in a fight. The problem is their enemies are typically supernatural and far more powerful than them. With limited supplies, it isn’t smart to tackle every combat scenario head-on. Most combat can be avoided altogether by using logic, solving puzzles, and thinking quickly. This can be frustrating sometimes with some scenarios being easier to solve in repeat playthroughs, but that’s to be expected of games from the early 90s. The important thing here is that Alone in the Dark became the inspiration for one of the most popular genres in games today and it should be praised for it.

Castlevania: Symphony of the Night – PlayStation

Is Castlevania scary? Absolutely not. Is it also one of the best examples of taking horror and gothic themes in a side-scrolling platformer and making a series that would go on to define an entire genre? Yes. Castlevania is a really simple game. You are Simon Belmont, you have a whip, and travel to the end of every level to defeat classic horror bosses like Frankenstein’s monster, Medusa, the Grim Reaper, and then, finally, Dracula. The series is more challenging than scary, but the themes around it all fit perfectly into the horror genre.

Where the series would go on to influence games as a whole was Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. Keeping with the themes of the original games, it was still a story about defeating Dracula at the end but what made this one special was the non-linear and explorative aspects of the game. The player would collect new powers throughout their playthrough that allowed previously unexplored areas to open up. This encouraged backtracking because the player could go back and find new secrets. This style of gameplay would go on to be so popular that a new genre was born out of anything that copied it. Metroidvanias. A combination of Metroid and Castlevania, the two series that popularized the concept, are one of the most popular game genres today.

Dead Space – PlayStation 3, Xbox 360

Want to feel fear? Dead Space will fill you with it. Starring silent protagonist, Isaac Clarke, the player is tasked with helping Clarke discover what happened to his girlfriend Nicole on the USG Ishimura when it suddenly went silent. Unfortunately for Clarke, a Necromorph (zombie) infestation has taken over the ship and he has to put a stop to it. All of this takes place in the silent confines of space and Dead Space makes use of that detail in really unique, interesting, and horrifying ways.

There might not be a more terrifying game on this entire list than Dead Space. The way it manages to hit every nerve of a player and put them into an uncomfortable state is very impressive. Yet, it’s also a really fun action game as well. The concept of cutting off the limbs of the Necromorphs to conserve ammo was unique at the time. Back in 2008, most enemies in games had just a handful of hitboxes. Having a game where each individual body part can be isolated and attacked was very cool for the time. Throw in some cool modules, like kinesis stasis, and you have a vulnerable but also powerful protagonist. The player will feel like they can hold their own in Dead Space, but they’re going to be terrified the entire way. Another must-play for any fan of horror.

Nic Cage seems to average four or five roles in offbeat indie films per year, most of which you probably haven’t heard of. It’s news when one actually manages to cut through the noise. In 2021, that indie was Pig, starring Cage as a famous chef-turned-hermit who lives in the wilds of the Pacific Northwest foraging for mushrooms with his pet pig. When his pig gets pignapped one day, you think you know the rest of the story.

The beauty of Pig is that it mostly eschews kitsch and that kind of easy predictability in favor of something far stranger. And in the end, much more satisfying, even if its logic doesn’t always track. Where most Nic Cage vehicles default to loud and broad, Pig is impressionistic. Some of the best parts of the film are watching him lovingly prepare a rustic mushroom tart or butter baste a pan-roasted squab.

Movies almost always need a professional to teach the actor (and often, the director) that kind of specialized knowledge. In the case of Nic Cage and that squab (which is a fancy word for domesticated pigeon), that professional was Gabriel Rucker. Rucker is the chef-proprietor of the aptly-named Le Pigeon in Portland, Oregon, working in the same genre as Cage’s character in Pig, and thus a logical choice as creative consultant. His path to becoming a Hollywood food consultant came via unsolicited email.

Did he want to teach Nic Cage to cook? Duh seemed like the operative word.

“No brainer, let’s have fun, right?” Rucker says of his reaction to the initial feeler. “I just said ‘yes’ because it seemed like a cool experience. I love Nicholas Cage. He’s his own cultural icon.”

While Rucker wasn’t the guy who taught Cage to make the mushroom tart (that was a different food consultant, Chris Czarnecki of the Joel Palmer House) Rucker took to his task with aplomb. Not only did he teach Cage all the movements, how to break down a pigeon, how to slice potatoes on a mandoline, etc, he also improvised like a showbiz veteran. He now takes credit for one of the more memorable moments of the film and the opening image of the trailer: Nic Cage smelling a mushroom.

“We talked about tearing a chanterelle and smelling it, even though it doesn’t really smell like all that much,” Rucker says of his discussion with Nic Cage. “Tearing it open and smelling it, and kind of having a pause where you have this moment of, ‘I pulled this off the forest floor,’ like a connective moment. I was completely bullshitting. I was trying to give him some stuff that he could do on camera, but he definitely did that in the movie.”

It’s most impressive to me that it didn’t take Rucker years of experience in the entertainment business to understand intuitively that bullshitting was a key part of his job. And if he did work full-time in showbiz, I doubt he would’ve admitted that to me (that, friends, is why I like interviewing chefs more than actors). Check out our full conversation below.

—

So tell me how you got involved with being a food consultant?

I just got an email from, I think it was the production manager, he sent an email to the restaurant website, and the manager of Le Pigeon brought it to me, and she was like, “I think this might be a joke, but it doesn’t seem like a joke.” The email said something like, “We want you to be a consultant of this movie with Nicholas Cage where he plays an avant-garde French chef from Portland…” And I mean, the whole premise sounds like it could be a joke or not a joke.

Right. Yeah, I think that’s kind of like the whole movie’s appeal, right?

Yeah. I think so. It’s kind of a polarizing movie that people either love or hate. No one’s like, “Oh, it was fine.” People that aren’t in the restaurant business seem to like it. People that are seem to dislike it, but that’s typical of any sort of movie that handles something of a very specific interest of yours. It’s Hollywood, it’s movies. Anyway, I got the email and I was like, “Well, if it’s not a joke, of course, I’m going to be willing to teach Nicholas Cage how to cook for a movie.” And duh, no brainer, let’s have fun, right? I just kind of said yes because it seemed like a cool experience. I mean, I love Nicholas Cage. He’s his own cultural icon.

Can you tell me a little bit about your background in the food industry?

I started cooking when I was 18 and then moved up to Portland in two years, at the age of 21, and I’ve been the chef/owner of Le Pigeon for 15 years now. So I haven’t traveled around and done a lot, I’ve just been at my spot. I continue figuring out how to make the most out of it every day. But not that exciting of a journey. I guess it’s exciting in the sense that I found something that works and I’m making it work, and I don’t have a lot of extra chaos in my life which is really nice.

Running a restaurant is chaotic enough.

Do they tell you what your duties as that kind of consultant are going to be, or do you kind of show up and–

They said, “We want you to create a dish for him to cook. Here’s the screenplay, we want you to make a dish for him to cook for this scene.” It was very easy for me, because the dish they wanted me to cook was very similar to what we were doing at my restaurant, Le Pigeon, back in 2006, 2007. I just gave them some ideas. They said, “We love that idea.” And then, Nick landed in Portland and came right to the restaurant. Spent about half a day with me in the morning, just talking about being in the little old kitchen at Le Pigeon, talking about the restaurant and the movements of a chef, and what I would do physically, butter basting with food, and tearing mushrooms apart, and how to chop through and break down the pigeons and cut them up. All the stuff he did in the movie.

He was super — you know when you meet somebody that’s a famous person, like a singer or someone that you’re a fan of, it can go a couple ways. They can be super uncool or they can be very cool, very respectful. That’s the thing that I take away from it the most, that he really cared about what he does and he treated me with the utmost respect. It didn’t feel like he thought it was a waste of his time, he was there because he really wanted to learn how to do the stuff and do it right. He was polite, said, “Thank you,” and he was a professional.

What was that dish that you taught him? Like what is that called on the menu?

It was pan-roasted pigeon with chanterelle mushrooms, pommes Anna, and huckleberry sauce.

Did they say any qualities that they wanted it to have visually before you decided on that one?

I don’t remember, I just picked a dish that seemed very Northwest-inspired and something that would have some good visual appeal. And not be this crazy avant-garde… this guy, he cooks food with a soul and meaning, but not for show. And so, I think pigeon or squab is one of those dishes that chefs cook to have that feel. And then, pommes Anna is a traditional old-school way of making a crispy potato pancake in France. Chanterelle mushrooms, because he’s a forager. So, of course, there’s some foraging aspect to it. Same with the huckleberries, they are a foraged Pacific Northwest ingredient. I think they just wanted it to feel like the Pacific Northwest.

So when Nick Cage came, did he bring any food knowledge to the table with him, or was he–

No. He was blank slate. So what’s cool is we did that the day where I showed him the cooking, we talked about the dish, and the movements, and everything. And then about three weeks, maybe a month, I can’t remember the amount of time, went by, and then, I showed back up on set for one of the last days of filming for this quintessential scene where he cooks. And I got to kind of jump in there and almost give a lot of direction about, “Let’s put this here, this there. Let’s do this. No, don’t do that.” It was really fun. When I showed back up, he was, once again, very respectful. Made sure all of the cast members, “Hey, this guy knows what he’s talking about, listen to him.” Just thanked me very much for my work on the way out. It was great.

Do you remember anything specific that you corrected him on or showed him the more proper way of doing the thing?

Well, there was the butter basting the pigeons with the foaming hot butter. How to break through the bones on butchering the pigeon, and then using the mandoline for the potatoes. Those are the three things that I remember like really going in-depth with him on.

Right, so what’s the mandoline tip we need in order to look like a real chef and not cut our own fingers off?

Well, yeah. Hold the potato with the heel of your palm versus with your fingertips and just use smooth movements.

So you’ve talked about people in the food industry maybe not liking it because it was… do you think people were expecting a grounded, reality-based movie about the contemporary restaurant industry when they saw Pig?

I’m not sure. I don’t even know what I was expecting, but it’s hard for me to be a good judge because I went into it wanting to like it. I got to see how the sausage was made a little bit, and I enjoyed it because I got to be part of it. I thought it was a really well-shot, beautiful movie. But it was an art film, right? It didn’t have a super clear arc of good guy/bad guy, problem, action, and resolution. It left you thinking about things and it wasn’t… it was more about the humanity of people than just the Portland restaurant beat.

Right. I mean, I assume there’s not a real evil truffle magnate that you have to deal with in the Portland food scene.

No, and I think people look at that, and kind of think, “Well, that’s not how it is.” And it’s like, “Well yeah, because it’s a movie.” That’s such a bullshit thing to say, “Well, that’s not how it is.” Nobody wants to go see a movie of how it is. That’s called a documentary, okay? Ken Burns makes movies of things how they are. Like, I want there to be a little bit of a wild, “What the fuck?” element. In the movie theater, we were laughing. It was like, “What? This is ridiculous. No way. There’s a fight club with a little person?” It’s like, “What is this? This is ridiculous.” But also like, “All right, sure.”

Why not? It’s a movie.

Was there anything you saw Nick Cage do in the final cut of the film where you’re like, “Oh, yeah. I definitely showed him how to do that?”

Oh, we talked about tearing a chanterelle and smelling it, even though it doesn’t really smell like all that much. Tearing it open and smelling it, and kind of having a pause where you have this moment of, “I pulled this off the forest floor,” and like a connective moment. And, I mean, I was completely bullshitting. I was trying to give him some stuff that he could do on camera, but he definitely did that in the movie.

Did you have other favorite food movies?

Well, my daughter is named after the movie, Babette’s Feast, so I guess the answer is yes. Big Night‘s a great food movie. We haven’t really gotten a real good semi-realistic, believable restaurant movie. That movie, Burnt, was a fucking joke. It was just so bad.

What about Chef?

Yeah, that was a cute movie. That’s good.

I know what you mean though. It seems like they’re all either really bad or disappointingly close to great but not quite.

I feel like rather than a movie, like a really good HBO series about a restaurant and all of the function and dysfunction and everything could really work out well. I think people have tried and they have not succeeded, but there’s definitely something there.

Now you got connections, now you can reach out and find out if Nicholas Cage wants to bankroll that.

If he’s available, yeah. Something tells me he’s not rich enough to be bankrolling stuff these days.

---

Pig is available for rent now on most platforms, and it hits DVD and Blu-Ray on November 2nd.

‘Pig’ Vince Mancini is on Twitter. You can access his archive of reviews here.

Adele’s return has been long awaited, and so far, it’s been a massive success. It’s too early to know how her comeback single “Easy On Me” will fare on the charts, there are other less quantitative measures we can look at to see how well Adele is doing, like the fact she’s getting her own two-hour primetime TV special. There were false reports that the song broke a major iTunes record, but now we have some confirmed data: “Easy On Me” officially had the biggest streaming day in Spotify history.

Spotify themselves reported that the song set the record on its release day, October 15. The Spotify Charts website shows that on the 15th, the song was streamed over 19.7 million times worldwide. For reference, the second-biggest song of the day, The Kid Laroi and Justin Bieber’s “Stay,” racked up 7.2 million plays. However, Rolling Stone reports that Spotify confirmed with them that the song had 24 million streams in its first 24 hours. That breaks the record that BTS set earlier this year on May 23, when “Butter” was streamed nearly 21 million times.

Meanwhile, Adele found herself involved in a spat with Peppa Pig recently, but thankfully, that situation has come to a positive resolution.