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FYI, this isn’t just a list, it’s an argument laid out in multiple parts that are trying to prove the point that Conan O’Brien is the greatest late-night host of all time. Someone who directly or indirectly influenced more than two generations of comedy writers, comics, actors, and nerds. To be sure, there are originators and other trailblazers worthy of serious consideration — the Carsons, Lettermans, Stewarts — but Conan and his merry gang have gone further, bigger, and bolder, setting a tone that shows it’s okay to stray from classic formats and the idea of what late-night comedy is supposed to be (both on-screen and as a business).

I may be way off base with this theory. I may be biased since I grew up watching Late Night, following from day one. Before you decide if there’s validity to this claim, I’d love for you to weigh the evidence while also basking in the amazing moments and genius characters that have defined these shows.

Some caveats: These moments and characters (and elements) are pulled from Late Night, The Tonight Show, and Conan. I’m trying not to double up on characters, which is why there’s only one Triumph sketch. Also, I brought in ringers. While they are not explicitly co-signing my claim about Conan’s number 1 all-time status (I didn’t ask), we have compiled a few anecdotes and quotes from former Conan guests, comics, and writers that will be sprinkled in here and there.

Now, let’s begin with the 25 best characters, moments, and elements from Conan’s 28-year run. Please know the pain it is causing me to know I’m surely forgetting things and the angst I have over leaving off things like the Year 2000, Conan’s trips to Ireland and South Korea, Clueless Gamer, The World’s Fastest Menorah, and the American Girls Doll Museum, as well as characters like Preparation H. Raymond, and Pimp Bot 5000. I am so sorry, Pimp Bot 5000.

25. The Extensive Cast

Conan’s writers were perpetually in the mix for on-screen time and many of them are going to get more specific call-outs below. More also needs to be said about the brief merge of the Upright Citizen’s Brigade into Late Night, and actors like Abe Vigoda, Nipsey Russell, and Mr. T. But we’d be remiss if we didn’t point out the other behind-the-scenes players that helped build the franchise without any on-camera experience or aspiration. People like announcer Joel Goddard, bandleader Max Weinberg, graphic designer Pierre Bernard, Conan’s assistant Sona, associate producer Jordan Schlansky, and prop master Bill Tull.

I interviewed Tull once and when I asked him about a specific sketch where they put ET in a wood chipper, he said, “we put a lot of things in the wood chipper in those days.” It remains the greatest sentence anyone has ever said to me.

24. Conan Gives His Staff Their Reviews

As stated before, Conan has a long history of pulling his staff into the show, and this bit, which follows other peeks into the office culture behind the show, is demonstrates the funny that can be found when Conan lovingly antagonizes the people he works with.

From Mo Mandel, comic and past guest:

“It just showcases how effortlessly likable Conan is because he’s just berating these poor people and being so mean but you totally love him and are on his side the whole time and know he’s in on the joke even though he’s playing it straight. That only comes from a person who is super nice in real life, so much so that even when they play angry you can tell they’re a sweetheart. People always talk about the self-deprecating Conan but he plays an equally good villain.”

23. The Impact On Stand-Up And Comedy

Johnny Carson’s Tonight Show stood out as the place where comedians met America in his era, and Conan took the mantle, focusing on the burgeoning alt-comedy scene of the ’90s doling out time to the likes of Marc Maron, Sarah Silverman, and others. As time went on, that continued with a new batch of comics in the 2000s and 2010s (Mike Birbiglia, Taylor Tomlinson, Mo Mandel), further establishing Conan as a sort of Godfather for comics. Which is to say nothing of the influence he has had on comedy culture, in general. Here’s Mike Birbiglia — comic, former guest, and former Late Night intern — had to say something about that.

“The first time I was on the show, I was so nervous because the people who make the show were sort of like my older brothers or sisters or something. My sensibility was raised watching hundreds of hours of the show. And then Conan, Andy, the writers, and the producers have been nothing but absurdly nice and generous. And I feel very lucky to have learned what I learned from watching that show and watching people work behind the scenes on the show and then to have been lucky enough to be a guest on the show. Conan and Andy are just two people who I admire most in this whole insane field of comedy. When Bill Hader came on my podcast, we talked about how influential that show has been to an entire generation of comedians.”

22. The Late Night Debut and The Tonight Show Finale

Both of these full episodes showcase the defiance that Conan brought to the mix at very different moments in his career when various “experts” were already counting him out. In the first episode — a wall-to-wall cavalcade of wild ideas and comic weirdness that we once dubbed “punk comedy art” — O’Brien leaned into the crushing expectations of his new post and the resulting anxiety, creating one of late-night comedy’s singular hours of television.

As for The Tonight Show, O’Brien stayed on the air through the slow-rolling PR nightmare that was NBC’s horrific handling of the show’s hand-off from the Jay Leno disingenuous in denim experience to Conan and company. And he did it with class, fire, and irreverence, supposedly making NBC pay for ultra-expensive comedy bits (the Bugatti Veyron mouse and its Rolling Stones theme song!) as a means of attaining some hilarious revenge. At the close of his final episode, O’Brien played “Free Bird” with an in-costume Will Ferrell (and his very pregnant wife, Viveca Paulin, who gave birth hours later) after delivering a farewell address that pushed back on the notion of cynicism and showed us all, one more time, what a gaggle of schmucks NBC was.

21. Artie Kendall

A ghost who used to croon in Conan’s Late Night studio back during the depression played by writer Brian Stack, Kendall warbles on about being in a Russian brothel getting high on Thanksgiving and bashing in the heads of the unemployed (“crackedy skull!”). Truly, Late Night was ahead of its time in reminding us that the things our grandparents watched and listened to were utterly terrifying and often super sexist and/or racist.

20. The Slipnuts Open For Slipknot

There were probably 18,000 fans at that arena utterly confused by what they were watching. Maybe even pissed when a weird comedy trio came out to open for heavy metal giants, Slipknot. But there were probably 100 people who found out who the Slipnuts were and the point of the bit, and to them, it probably became the greatest thing they’d ever seen. Gone in an instant for everyone else, imprinted for a lifetime on those select few. The power of aiming for the passionate niche over more casual and fickle broad acceptance. The power of not being afraid of confusing the masses to find the ones who get it. Another Conanverse staple.

19. Conan Plays In The Snow

Similar to the Andy Blitz goes to Toronto moment, this “fishing expedition,” as show writer Michael Koman calls it, demonstrates the recipe for success for so many key bits. Go someplace (maybe a snowy street or to Cuba) with a microphone and the flexibility to go with whatever and whoever you find with Conan leaning on his amazing improv skills to create something genius, random, and real. In this case, the Blizzard of 2003 provides the setting, with Conan goofing off in the snow, climbing massive mounds, and discovering pure gold in the form of a very shouty old man (who would pop back up on the show a few more times).

18. Andy Blitz Takes A Taxi To Toronto

Conan going apartment hunting with Andy Blitz should be on this list, but I can’t not put this utterly genius concept where Blitz (a longtime writer on the show) takes a cab to Toronto. Ever take a really long Uber ride? Like really long? Imagine going 12 hours with an overnight stop.

“You wanna pull over and do trust falls?” It’s amazing the awkwardness and resulting comedy that comes from two strangers put into close proximity with each other. Nothing is forced, it’s just gentle weirdness and a flash field trip.

17. Late Night Goes Claymation

The show had dabbled with claymation before (a Christmas special, a Passover special — both as shortish bits), but in 2003 they repurposed a whole episode, spending untold amounts of money and months of production to create a truly imaginative and fun visual experience. The ambition of the show and the “why not?” attitude of the people making it is truly startling when you compare what they’ve done to, really, any other show. That’s no disrespect to Letterman (the only real competition in my opinion) and, in particular, his own version of Late Night which, of course, preceded Conan’s and plowed the field where all these experiments got their start (I’ll note Letterman also used to add neat touches to freshen up reruns). But it has to be said that the scale and commitment to big ideas outpaced even Letterman’s in his show’s prime (in a very different time with different technical capabilities and budgets).

16. The Rockefeller Center Fire Special

The Rockefeller Center Fire episode makes it on this list not just for the show’s willingness to change things up and record outside (with Sam Jackson in a Brookstone massage chair), but for its ability to do that so completely and in an instant when their studio was damaged by a fire. Sure, desperation plays a part, but there’s a supernatural level of confidence at play as well. As close as they got to being canceled in the early going while, at the same time, pursuing a kind of budget bin avant-gardism, the show survived. Maybe it’s a thing where, after a bunch of near-death experiences, they began to believe they were immortal and, thus, could do anything.

14. Christmas Shopping Desk Drive

There’s an innocence to the general concept of Conan and friends being able to go anywhere they can imagine thanks to a magical desk (and green screen tech). Like it feels fit for a kids show and you can’t help but grin and embrace the silliness of it. Vehicular manslaughter and Tickle Me Elmo theft be damned. But besides that, this is also the best example (alongside the Clutch Cargo sketches from the ’90s) of the inventive lo-fi ways the show used to make their budget work while still standing out and leaning on, in particular, the talents of Conan, Andy,and Smigel.

13. Interviews

There are far too many that should be on this list but Jennifer Garner and Conan warring over the word “snuck,” Mel Brooks paying tribute to Sid Caesar, and all the raucous and familiar chats with friends like Timothy Olyphant, Will Ferrell, Lisa Kudrow, Aubrey Plaza, Martin Short, and the always-in costume Adam Pally all come to mind as standouts.

Conan didn’t jump into the show as a natural interviewer, but he evolved quickly to find comfort and gain master status. His previous digital series Serious Jibber-Jabber and his podcast, Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend, all free him to have longer, more multifaceted conversations now, joining with the late era of Conan with its longer interviews to prove that he’s now become pop culture’s ultimate defender for the value of a good conversation. Here’s hoping that remains either with the podcast, HBO Max series, or otherwise.

From Joel McHale, a frequent guest:

“He would be just as thoughtful talking to Obama as he would a kid on the street. The first few times I went on, I had to really control myself because I’m such a big fan. I get giddy when I’m on his show. And the last time I was on, they just aired the whole 25 minutes. That’s really how we talk to each other. It’s a heightened version because we’re on camera and we’re slinging jokes, but our wives just roll their eyes at each other when we’re talking. I don’t know how to describe it other than he’s a lovely genius.”

13. DInner With Conan And Jordan

Conan and Jordan Schlansky are like the Odd Couple re-born, with Conan flummoxed and Jordan barely tolerating the incessant picking at his very specific way of being. And it’s never better than when they take their act on the road, specifically when Conan went with Jordan to the restaurant in Italy where he was a supposed big deal and when Conan took Jordan to an Olive Garden to more or less mock him, burning his nipples with a hot breadstick in the process. I don’t think they’re taking suggestions, but I’ll go ahead and say that at least part of the new show needs to be Conan and Jordan recreating Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon’s The Trip franchise.

12. Andy In The Wild

For a time in the early days of the show’s run, Andy Richter was a primary force with remotes for the show, going out to Woodstock, the NBA Finals, the Tonys and other places. And it’s all great. Richter has an approachability to him that masks his killer comedy instincts. He’s like a cherub with a pistol taped to his back. I’m using a couple of examples here. One is a trip working the press line at the VMA’s where he sells a sad-sack routine trying to sell his music videos. And then the bomb drops and we’re seeing an amazing recreation of Eddie Murphy’s “Party All The Time” video. Then there’s this one in a dive bar where he mines laughs in what could only be described as a depressive rendition of Billy Joel’s “Piano Man.”

11. Conan Visits A Sick Writer

Writer Michael Koman felt bad about calling out of work so he sent in some material for the show, not realizing it would apparently read so weakly that Conan would feel the need to pop in at his apartment to make sure he was really sick. The result is an awkward and real exchange between a boss and a writer who told me he didn’t quite know how hard he could push back.

From Michael Koman, writer:

“Our general dynamic was that he would sort of lovingly anatomize me, and I would bumblingly try to do the same thing to him, but I would usually just say something way too blunt and mean. But I think that basic relationship is why it made some kind of sense for him to go to my apartment to see how I could possibly have been sick enough to justify the horrible page of ideas I had sent in that morning.”

Here’s an interesting detail: in the original episode, Koman makes a remark about his doorman letting Conan up which caused consternation with his Super resulting in him editing out the remark for reruns (at the Super’s suggestion).

10. Sattelite TV

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n4LoZz-r1pE

If you love Interdimensional Cable on Rick And Morty, allow me to introduce you to Sattelite TV from Late Night, a recurring platform for bite-size bits too weird to live as full sketches. This includes a guy who starts every conversation singing a modified version of Men Without Hats’ “Safety Dance,” a court show where a potato judge presides, a golden retriever doing ventriloquism with a dog puppet, Amy Poehler and Matt Walsh as a dysfunctional married couple trying to deliver the news, and Mike Sweeney as Abraham Lincoln in “The Lincoln Money Shot Channel.” Every one of these could be an Adult Swim show. These are just the scraps, proving how next-level talented the show’s writing staff has been.

9. Jack McBrayer and Triumph Go To Weiner’s Circle In Chicago

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33zPlnhymCU

As Mike Ryan alluded to in his talk with Smigel about Let’s Be Real, the velocity of Smigel’s mind is off the charts. That’s why Triumph is as good and as legit iconic as it is. But in this instance, it’s a whole other type of amazing watching Smigel’s mind work while getting back as good as he gives from the crew of the Weiner’s Circle in Chicago, a spot renowned for talking smack to their customers. It’s not people distracted by the puppet and the situation they’re in at a dog show or on line for a movie (each examples that would place high on any top sketch list if that was all this was). Here, sparks fly and the whole time you are physically frightened for gentle Jack McBrayer’s dear sweet disposition.

8. The Masturbating Bear

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zf-EPhNRBi8

Of all the show’s brilliant one-note characters, the Masturbating Bear was the onanist. You knew what he was going to do, and yet, you laughed every single time because it’s the wildest god damn thing that it popped up on NBC just a few short hours after an episode of Wings. Here, the setup is everything. The Masturbating Bear’s mom is sick and he needs to enter a Million Dollar Money Box to save her life. You know what happens… magic.

7. The Walker Texas Ranger Lever

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2_SvX4PEbU

A few inside tidbits from longtime Conan writer Mike Sweeney, Koman, his writing partner Andrew Weinberg, and propmaster Bill Tull. First, the Walker Lever exists somewhere in storage. Second, this all started because of the notion that the NBC/Universal merger meant the show had free reign to show clips from Walker Texas Ranger at will. They did not. Which is why they stopped eventually. But in its time, god damn was it magnificent. Such a simple premise: pull a lever, get a prize. And the prize was a seemingly random (though painstakingly discovered by Koman and Weinberg through hours and hours of research) clip of Chuck Norris getting dragged across a field or of a pre-Sixth Sense Haley Joel Osment matter of factly telling a group that he has AIDS. “We waited a year before we showed that clip,” Sweeney told me, reflecting on concerns about the censors. It’s not even technically a “lever” clip in the above video, but still a part of the legend. And while the bit eventually came to a close, they tried to walk away multiple times before it was finally shut down. Including after they had Chuck Norris on the show to add a meta send-off.

From Mike Sweeney, writer:

“We thought that would be the end of it. We’re like, okay, we’ve don’t it. I don’t know, 15 times? Doing something that many times, we felt like, okay, it’s run its course. Let’s end it and bring on Chuck Norris and we’ll never do Walker Texas Ranger Lever again. That’s it. It was a nice ride. […] I think nine months went by and we had two weeks off and Conan came back from break and he said, ‘All anyone’s saying to me everywhere I go is you’ve got to keep doing more. We need more Walker clips.’ I was like, ‘Okay.’ I had to go to Michael and Andrew and I was like, ‘Guys, sorry to tell you, but you’ve got to screen more.’ They’re like, ‘There can’t be any more clips.’

But it was an endless supply. They went down and found more great clips and we ended up doing it again for another two months. Then we stopped again. The same thing happened again nine months later. Fans on the street were like, ‘Come on, show more clips.’ I think there was a third round of it.”

6. Conan Without Borders: Haiti

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-f_wQjRflc

Save for some of the Clutch Cargo stuff from back in the day and monologue jokes across multiple decades, Conan has largely avoided being overtly political on the show. When I spoke with Andy Richter last year, he had a great line about why not: “Conan actually said to me once, ‘There are all kinds of people doing topical stuff and making political points,’ and he said, ‘It’s so much more interesting to me to just be silly and be absurd and explore the absurd, and ultimately I think it’s doing a greater service to humanity.’”

But with reports that President Trump called Haiti a “sh*thole” country, Conan seemingly took it as a challenge, prompting a herculean effort to quickly do a Without Borders from the country. The whole thing is funny, as per usual with the long, long history of Conan visiting other countries, but there’s an empathy that’s so palpable and paired with a want to cut through the mountains of nonsense. Conan isn’t the first person you think of when it comes to getting heavy and making a statement piece, but that doesn’t mean he hasn’t done it or that it isn’t powerful. Reference remarks following school shootings, the aftermath of Robin Williams’ death, and the first episode following 9/11 where he plainly talked about not knowing how to do the job of being an ass and making people laugh in that exact moment. But with Haiti, he made more than a statement, he made an impact, taking a camera right to the spot and countering an idiot’s verbal diarrhea with a window into the vibrancy, resiliency, and nuance of a whole country.

5. Conan Visits Hunter S. Thompson

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKq5wmCz0wM

You can’t be great at interviews if you aren’t open to going where the guest wants to go. Even if that means not so much an interview as a trip into the woods to “shoot guns and drink hard liquor” in the name of creating art with literary literal madman Hunter S. Thompson. What more needs to be said about this moment?

“F*ck you, bear!”

Well, there it is.

4. The Paul Rudd Mac And Me Surprise

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9rcqGBrHDtw

Much like the Masturbating Bear (which is an. aces way to start a sentence), we always knew what was going to happen when Paul Rudd popped up on any of the three iterations of Conan’s shows. He’d do the usual talk show stuff, everyone would laugh and then the time would come for a clip and you’d kinda forget. It was like setting a trap. It’s the perfect bit, made richer by the fact that it might be late night’s most enduring tradition.

3. Old Time Baseball

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GS39vMhag-A

There are times when Conan approaches a situation as something of a blank canvas to see what can be made. Those fishing expeditions. But then there are other times when it feels like he’s trying to either solve a puzzle or flip over the table that it’s on before laughing and pointing. That’s the takeaway from Old TIme Baseball, which might be universally regarded as among the top things he’s ever done. He walks onto the field like an Alien crash-landed and accumulating data: is there an accomplice? What can he learn about these people from their uniforms and how everyone is speaking and engaging like it’s really the 1860s? And then he tries to infiltrate, taking an at-bat, threatening to throw hands, and being scared of technology. It’s playful enough to be a little pointed and pointed enough to be hilarious. And wow, how many times has the show walked that line successfully?

2. Conan Goes To Houston To Find Viewers

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQs_oRJtcno

Speaking of, Conan is calling upon many of the same superpowers here but he’s also got no clue what he’s going to find of comic value in Houston late in the night. Enter Buffalo, a big dude who seemed like he might be persuaded to chose violence and who didn’t seem like he’d be down to absorb Conan’s brand of playfulness or pointed remarks. It’s great when things work, it can be even better when they don’t workout and Conan wasn’t afraid to show those moments.

Additionally, going someplace in search of people who recognize you is such a great send-up of Hollywood phoneyness, affiliate relations torture, and a manifestation of the self-deprecating nature of the show and its host.

1. Conan Discovers Late Night Is An Undercover Sting Operation

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fQEs3Irurgw

There was a distinct vibe that the show was always running from the reaper in its early days. Perhaps that’s why this sketch lands so perfectly. Or perhaps it’s in the commitment level and the performances — particularly Richter, who carries the bulk of the story. I could have picked any number of moments or characters to top this list, but while so many favorites come together while they’re filming, there is something to be said for a truly great produced bit and something that is super well-coordinated and choreographed. Like a ballet, really.

The Conan team has, for the longest time (and I’m refusing to use the past tense here since the HBO Max show is coming and will still be late night to me), shown an ability to create comedy from nothing and to find a way to get laughs out of the most esoteric, 2 AM in the morning on a napkin bits of weirdness. All in their pursuit of a challenge, or expressing a wholly new idea, and in that pursuit of the cross-section of silly and stupid and magical that Conan talked about in the TBS series finale. It’s a huge part of their charm, but they are also master tacticians and craftspeople.

From the costumes to the props to the performances and the material, we’re getting an idea fully realized in moments like the above sketch where they refuse to settle for the passing grade. They want to take it to the end of the line and they do here, with an empty studio, Conan robbed of his life’s work, and being made fun of for still believing in his life.

Whether their commitment is for you or for them isn’t quite clear, maybe both? But it’s definitely for the sake of doing the thing right and making sure it sticks with you. And that thing, as well as all the other things expressed here, make Conan a multi-generational talent and, I feel, late night’s greatest host.

James Corden’s late-night talk show has a number of segments and bits that keep it in the mainstream pop culture landscape, but one is apparently looking at changes after complaints about cultural insensitivity. Corden was interviewed by Howard Stern earlier in the month and announced that his show’s “Spill Your Guts” segment would undergo an overhaul after users on social media pointed out issues with the nature of the segment’s use of ethnic foods.

The AV Club spotted the interview where Corden admitted the segment would be changing its perspective. The “Spill Your Guts” segment featured Corden asking celebrities pointed questions that would require tricky answers, with the alternative option of eating an unfamiliar food item instead of answering. But the segment struck many as troublesome, as highlighted by a viral TikTok video posted by Kim Saira, which pointed out that many of the foods described as “disgusting” were actually traditional Asian delicacies. The video featured a reaction to Corden’s segment with fellow late-night host Jimmy Kimmel, who said “wow, it all looks so terrible.” That video sparked a Change.org petition that netted more than 45,000 signatures in the days that followed.

“In the wake of the constant Asian hate crimes that have continuously been occurring, not only is this segment incredibly culturally offensive and insensitive, but it also encourages anti-Asian racism,” Saira said in the petition. “So many Asian Americans are consistently bullied and mocked for their native foods, and this segment amplifies and encourages it.”

Corden heard about the petition and responded, telling Stern, “We heard that story, and the next time we do that bit we absolutely won’t involve or use any of those foods. As you said at the start, our show is a show about joy and light and love, we don’t want to make a show to upset anybody.”

Corden said the segment will instead now focus on “fattening, diet-destroying” foods rather than foods from other cultures and parts of the world.

[via AV Club]

Through the whole #FreeBritney movement, one figure close to Britney Spears who has been publicly silent about the situation is her sister, Jamie Lynn Spears. Now, finally, Jamie Lynn has taken a moment to show support for sister and explain why it has taken so long for her to do so.

Jamie Lynn shared a video on her Instagram Story today in which she speaks to the camera and starts, “Hey everybody, I just want to take a second to address a few things. The only reason I haven’t before is because I felt like until my sister was able speak for herself and say what she felt she needed to say publicly, that it wasn’t my place and it wasn’t the right thing to do. But now that she’s very clearly spoken and said what she needed to say, I feel like I can follow her lead and say what I feel I need to say.”

From there, she goes on to note that she doesn’t have a financial interest in what Britney does with her career, saying, “I don’t care if she wants to run away to the rain forest and have a zillion babies in the middle of nowhere, or if she wants to come back and dominate the world the way she has so many times before, because I have nothing to gain or lose either way.”

She also explained that her support for Britney has been in private, noting, “Maybe I didn’t support her the way the public would like me to, with a hashtag on a public platform. But I can assure that I have supported my sister long before there was a hashtag, and I’ll support her long after.”

Watch the video above and read a full transcript of it below.

“Hey everybody, I just want to take a second to address a few things. The only reason I haven’t before is because I felt like until my sister was able speak for herself and say what she felt she needed to say publicly, that it wasn’t my place and it wasn’t the right thing to do. But now that she’s very clearly spoken and said what she needed to say, I feel like I can follow her lead and say what I feel I need to say.

I think it’s extremely clear that since the day I was born that I’ve only loved, adored, and supported my sister. This is my freakin’ big sister before any of this bullsh*t. I don’t care if she wants to run away to the rain forest and have a zillion babies in the middle of nowhere, or if she wants to come back and dominate the world the way she has so many times before, because I have nothing to gain or lose either way. This situation does not affect me either way because I am only her sister who is only concerned about her happiness.

I’ve made a very conscious choice in my life to only participate in her life as her sister. […] Maybe I didn’t support her the way the public would like me to, with a hashtag on a public platform. But I can assure that I have supported my sister long before there was a hashtag, and I’ll support her long after. Note that. I mean, I’ve worked since I was 9 years old, I’ve paid my own frickin’ bills since I was 10 years old. Not that I owe the public anything because my sister knows I love and support her. That’s the only person I owe anything to. I’m not my family — I am my own person and I am speaking for myself.

I’m so proud of her for using her voice. I am so proud of her for requesting new counsel, like I told her to do many years ago. Oh, not on a big public platform, but just in a personal conversation between two sisters. So I’m very proud she’s taking that step.

If any of the conservatorship is flying to Mars or whatever the hell else she wants to do to be happy, I support that, 100 percent. Because I support my sister. I love my sister, always have, always will, as long as she’s happy. So, let’s keep praying, that’s all.”

Space Jam: A New Legacy has a stated mission of trying to create a movie that is able to stand on its own, while also paying homage to the original — not as a sequel but a reboot with LeBron James in the Michael Jordan role. That is a tricky needle to thread, and it’ll be interesting to see what the response to the movie is when it releases on July 16 in theaters and on HBO Max.

The premise is generally the same, with LeBron leading the Tune Squad against an evil alien/cyber squad of players with the skills of some of the NBA and WNBA’s best (this time called the Goon Squad rather than the Monstars). How they get to that game is different, though, and seems to have a bit more of a plot beyond “Michael Jordan gets sucked down a golf hole to help save the Looney Tunes.” Still, part of the reason to make a second Space Jam is to play into the nostalgia aspect, as it’s the 25th anniversary of the original that was for many of a certain age a childhood favorite.

They’re banking on the 30-something crowd to come watch along with kids being introduced to the franchise for the first time, and the merchandise around the movie is likewise straddling the line of leaning into nostalgia while trying to make something new. On the new side, there’s the LeBron 19, which Nike unveiled recently and James will debut in the film. On the nostalgia side, McDonald’s partnered with Diamond Supply Co. for a line of retro-inspired merch for the new movie, in honor of the original Space Jam Happy Meals with a shirt and sweatshirt as well as a jersey and shorts combo.

They are very clearly 90’s inspired from the style but updated with the look from the new movie. The collection will release on July 3 at 9 a.m. PT on Diamond Supply Co.’s website and store in L.A.

There are only so many ways to introduce a post about BTS’s “Butter” being the No. 1 song in the US. That’s been happening a lot lately, so let’s just get right to it: On the Billboard Hot 100 chart dated July 3, “Butter” is the top song for the fifth week.

Of the 54 songs that have ever debuted in the top spot on the Hot 100, “Butter” is just the 11th to spend at least its first five weeks at No. 1. The last song to do that is another recent hit, Olivia Rodrigo’s “Drivers License.”

On a related note, the song has also sold at least 100,000 downloads in each of its first five weeks. The last song that pull that off was Luis Fonsi, Daddy Yankee, and Justin Bieber’s “Despacito,” which did it for 12 consecutive weeks from May to August 2017.

Elsewhere in the top 10 are a bunch of familiar songs, including some former No. 1 singles: Rodrigo’s “Good 4 U” (now at No. 1); Justin Bieber, Daniel Caesar, and Giveon’s “Peaches” (No. 5); Silk Sonic (Bruno Mars and Anderson .Paak)’s “Leave The Door Open” (No. 6), The Weeknd and Ariana Grande’s “Save Your Tears” (No. 7), and Lil Nas X’s “Montero (Call Me By Your Name)” (No. 8).”

Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

On Monday morning’s The View, Meghan McCain launched into a passionate rant praising Mumford & Son banjo player Winston Marshall’s decision to leave the band because he no longer wants to “self-censor” himself. Marshall had been on a leave of absence from the band after he tweeted support for controversial right-wing journalist Andy Ngo’s book, Unmasked, which accused Antifa of having a “radical plan to destroy democracy.”

Naturally, Meghan opened her remarks by criticizing The View for describing Ngo as a far right journalist and trotting out the usual conservative talking points about Antifa burning cities like Portland and Seattle. She painted Ngo as an intrepid reporter worthy of being labeled “brave” by Marshall, who she admired for “self-canceling” himself to protect the band. According to McCain, the 33-year-old Marshall represents a new line of thinking amongst millennial that independent thought and free speech are more important than money or careers. McCain also says she feels this way herself, which isn’t that bold of a statement coming from a millionaire daytime talk show host whose mother is a heiress to one of the largest beer fortunes in America.

You can see McCain’s defense of Marshall at the 2:00 mark:

In a Medium post written by Marshall, he explained that his decision to leave the band was to protect his bandmates from having to deal with any ensuing controversy from him speaking openly. “I could remain and continue to self-censor but it will erode my sense of integrity. Gnaw my conscience. I’ve already felt that beginning,” Marshall wrote. “The only way forward for me is to leave the band. I hope in distancing myself from them I am able to speak my mind without them suffering the consequences.”

(Via The View on Twitter)

Even a casual follower of the news over the last few years is likely to have encountered stories about research showing that digital technologies like social media and smartphones are harming young people’s mental health. Rates of depression and suicide among young people have risen steadily since the mid-2000s, around the time that the first smartphones and social media platforms were being released. These technologies have become ubiquitous, and young people’s distress has continued to increase since then.

Many articles in the popular and academic press assert that digital technology is to blame. Some experts, including those recently featured in stories by major news outlets, state that excessive use of digital technology is clearly linked to psychological distress in young people. To deny this connection, according to a prominent proponent of the link, is akin to denying the link between human activity and climate change.

In an effort to protect young people from the harms of digital tech, some politicians have introduced legislation that would, among other things, automatically limit users’ time spent on a social media platform to 30 minutes a day. If the evidence is so definitive that digital technology is harming America’s youth in such substantial ways, then reducing young people’s use of these devices could be one of the most important public health interventions in American history.

There’s just one problem: The evidence for a link between time spent using technology and mental health is fatally flawed.

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Know thyself – easier said than done

Absent from the discussion about the putative harms of digital tech is the fact that practically all academic studies in this area have used highly flawed self-report measures. These measures typically ask people to give their best guesses about how often they used digital technologies over the past week or month or even year. The problem is that people are terrible at estimating their digital technology use, and there’s evidence that people who are psychologically distressed are even worse at it. This is understandable because it’s very hard to pay attention to and accurately recall something that you do frequently and habitually.

Researchers have recently begun to expose the discrepancy between self-reported and actual technology use, including for Facebook, smartphones and the internet. My colleagues and I carried out a systematic review and meta-analysis of discrepancies between actual and self-reported digital media use and found that self-reported use is rarely an accurate reflection of actual use.

This has enormous implications. Although measurement isn’t a sexy topic, it forms the foundation of scientific research. Simply put, to make conclusions – and subsequent recommendations – about something you’re studying, you must ensure you’re measuring the thing you’re intending to measure. If your measures are defective, then your data is untrustworthy. And if the measures are more inaccurate for certain people – like young people or those with depression – then the data is even more untrustworthy. This is the case for the majority of research into the effects of technology use over the past 15 years.

Imagine that everything known about the COVID-19 pandemic was based on people giving their best guesses about whether they have the virus, instead of highly reliable medical tests. Now imagine that people who actually have the virus are more likely to misdiagnose themselves. The consequences of relying on this unreliable measure would be far-reaching. The health effects of the virus, how it’s spreading, how to combat it – practically every bit of information gathered about the virus would be tainted. And the resources expended based on this flawed information would be largely wasted.

The uncomfortable truth is that shoddy measurement, as well as other methodological issues including inconsistent ways of conceiving of different types of digital tech use and research design that falls short of establishing a causal connection, is widespread. This means that the putative link between digital technology and psychological distress remains inconclusive.

Social media has a lot to answer for, but in terms of time spent on them, the mental health of young people might not belong on the list.
images.theconversation.com

In my own research as a doctoral student in social work, I found that the link between digital technology use and mental health was stronger when self-report measures were used than when objective measures were used. An example of an objective measure is Apple’s “Screen Time” application, which automatically tracks device use. And when I used these objective measures to track digital technology use among young adults over time, I found that increased use was not associated with increased depression, anxiety or suicidal thoughts. In fact, those who used their smartphones more frequently reported lower levels of depression and anxiety.

From believer to skeptic

That the link between digital tech use and psychological distress is inconclusive would have come as a big surprise to me five years ago. I was shocked by the levels of depression and thoughts of suicide among the students I treated when I worked as a mental health therapist at a college counseling center. I, like most people, accepted the conventional narrative that all these smartphones and social media were harming young people.

Wanting to investigate this further, I left clinical practice for a Ph.D. program so I could research why these technologies were harmful and what could be done to prevent these harms. As I dove into the scientific literature and conducted studies of my own, I came to realize that the link between digital technology and well-being was much more convoluted than the typical narrative portrayed by popular media. The scientific literature was a mess of contradiction: Some studies found harmful effects, others found beneficial effects and still others found no effects. The reasons for this inconsistency are many, but flawed measurement is at the top of the list.

This is unfortunate, not just because it represents a huge waste of time and resources, or because the narrative that these technologies are harmful to young people has been widely popularized and it’s hard to get the cat back in the bag, but also because it forces me to agree with Mark Zuckerberg.

Getting at the truth

Now, this doesn’t mean that any amount or kind of digital technology use is fine. It’s fairly clear that certain aspects, such as cyber-victimization and exposure to harmful online content, can be damaging to young people. But simply taking tech away from them may not fix the problem, and some researchers suggest it may actually do more harm than good.

Whether, how and for whom digital tech use is harmful is likely much more complicated than the picture often presented in popular media. However, the reality is likely to remain unclear until more reliable evidence comes in.

Craig J.R. Sewall is a Postdoctoral Scholar of Child and Adolescent Mental Health at the University of Pittsburgh.

This article first appeared on The Conversation. You can read it here.

Dexter had some good seasons, but only one unquestionably great season. That would be season four, where Dexter Morgan, played by Michael C. Hall, learns how to have a healthy work (forensic technician for the Miami Metro Police Department) / life (murdering people) balance from Arthur Miller, better known as the Trinity Killer. John Lithgow won an Emmy for playing the canny serial killer, and although — spoiler alert — he died in the season finale (although not before murdering Dexter’s wife, Rita), the actor will somehow reprise his role in the upcoming Showtime revival.

Deadline reports that Lithgow “is set to make a short but decisive appearance in the Michael C. Hall-led revival coming from Showtime this fall… Which begs the question: How will Lithgow’s Arthur Mitchell will return? Details are scant, but scribes on the Clyde Phillips-showrun 10-episode limited series have concocted a pathway for the Trinity Killer to come back that works within the larger Dexter narrative.” Lithgow’s cameo is only expected to take a day of filming, so he can quickly go back to screaming about gremlins, or whatever he does in his free time.

It’s unclear who else will return from the original run, outside of Hall and Lithgow. Julie Benz (Rita) won’t be back, but Jennifer Carpenter (Debra) was reportedly spotted on set. There’s also been speculation that lil’ Harrison, the “cereal spiller” himself, will show up. We’ll find out later this year when the Dexter limited series debuts on Showtime.

(Via Deadline)

The easiest way to discuss the Fast & Furious franchise, to the extent an easy way exists, is to break the nine films into three separate but connected trilogies.

FILMS I-III: Let’s race some cars and take down local bad guys

Stealing DVD players and doing battle with Southern California crime families. Jetting off to Miami and stumbling into an undercover operation run by Eva Mendes. Introducing all-new cast members and sending them to Tokyo to drift with Bow Wow and a mysterious figure named Han who dies before the end of the movie. It feels a little crazy to say even though it makes sense in context, but these movies are damn-near straightforward and simple. Most of the action is tethered to reality. A reasonable argument can be made that the wildest thing that happens in any of them is Tyrese wearing cut-off button-up dress shirts throughout an entire feature film. But the returns start to diminish quickly this way. Things can get watered down and repetitive. Changes need to be made. And so…

FILMS IV-VI: Let’s do some heists and cheat death a little

Han is back despite dying in the third movie. The entire timeline has folded itself into a bright orange origami Honda. There are fuel heists in the Dominican Republic and vault heists in Rio and The Rock and Gal Gadot are here now, at least temporarily. Michelle Rodriguez dies in a car explosion in the fourth movie and then turns up alive with amnesia in the sixth movie, which ends with Vin Diesel driving a car through the nose of an exploding airplane after Gal Gadot falls to her death on the runway. A mid-credits scene reveals that Han’s death in the third movie was actually revenge for the events of the sixth movie and was caused by Jason Statham, who is also in these movies now as a villain. It becomes clear that the secret to success is the size. Things must press forward and grow at all times, regardless of reason or the laws of gravity. This is the way. And so…

FILM VII-IX: Let’s… screw it, let’s just do everything

Cars are flying through the air, both between Abu Dhabi skyscrapers and out of cargo planes, sometimes with parachutes. The Rock and Jason Statham are good guys now, kind of, but are also spun-off into their own franchise due to plot congestion and/or on-set beef. There’s a submarine. Academy Award winners Helen Mirren and Charlize Theron are in the franchise now, both as crime bosses. There is barely any street racing anymore, with brief exceptions made when someone needs to gain entrance to some new underground culture that will assist in the theft of a device that will thwart evildoers and/or save the world. Kurt Russell is introduced as a mysterious government official named, I swear to God, Mr. Nobody. Ludacris, who started the franchise as a Miami mechanic and jet ski race officiant, is now one of the world’s premier computer hackers and physicists. It’s a whole thing.

And this paragraph barely even touches on the events of F9, the latest and largest of these increasingly massive movies. Let’s switch from paragraph to a list to hit the highlights here:

— Han is alive as a result of some Mr. Nobody-related shenanigans, making him the second major character to “die” in a car explosion only to turn up alive a few movies later

— Ludacris and Tyrese go to space in a rocket-powered Pontiac built in part by Bow Wow

— Helen Mirren shows up for about five minutes to pull off a diamond heist in London, evade police in a neon sports car, and drop off Vin Diesel at a massive mansion party attended exclusively by whiskey-sipping international criminals and supermodels in tiny white dresses who dance on or near expensive cars

— Everyone is shockingly proficient at the use of high-powered magnets in high-speed chases through many cities they are visiting for the first time

— Vin Diesel’s character has a younger brother played by John Cena who is a bigtime spy who went rogue and started working with a weasel financier with daddy issues

— Multiple characters watch a parent (or parents, plural) blow up in a car explosion during one of the literal half-dozen flashbacks that take place

— Vin Diesel, as he is nearly drowning, has a vision that reveals his father’s death was not actually the sole fault of his brother

— Charlize Theron spends about 80 percent of the movie imprisoned inside a toilet-less clear box while sporting a stylish bowl cut and red leather pants, which, while certainly not the biggest logical leap the movie asks us to make, can’t be comfortable

It’s all, to understate things to a ridiculous degree, a lot. It is so much, honestly, all the time, in so many different and occasionally hilarious ways. It would be really fun to take someone who has never seen these movies and then show them only the first and the ninth and have them try to guess how any of the things happened that got us all from one place to another. Secret siblings, faked deaths, amnesia, associates getting murdered and their murderers getting invited to the barbecue anyway. It’s all kind of like what I think would happen if some sort of accounting error funneled $500 million into the budget of a daytime soap opera. Which I would also support. Let Susan Lucci fly a stealth bomber. See what I care.

And, to be extremely clear about all of this, I think it’s great. It’s delightful. Right around the time the franchise kicked off the third trilogy, everyone involved seemed to realize that its many plot holes and questionable developments were more like features instead of bugs. They presented opportunities. They gave everyone involved a chance to go back and make everything bigger and wilder and more ridiculous. Han’s death went from a Tokyo street racing casualty to an elaborate revenge plot carried out by a dirty spy to a ruse concocted by a secretive government official with an unlimited budget. The legend of Dominic Toretto beating a guy with a wrench now involves both his father’s death while throwing a race and his younger brother’s abandonment issues that led to that younger brother also going to work for the secretive government official. Tyrese is now the voice of reason who expresses disbelief at it all on behalf of the audience. It’s the equivalent of digging yourself into a hole with a shovel and trying to blast yourself out of it by strapping dynamite to your back, and, yes, I’m a little shocked no character in these movies has attempted this. Yet.

All of which makes for a wonderful way to spend two or three hours in a theater on a hot Saturday in June. These are not movies you are meant to think about much, at least not beyond the extent we are doing here, just admiring the open audacity of them as a whole. I don’t even think most of them are meant to be rewatched on cable or a streaming service more than once or twice, with the possible exception of Fast Five, the midpoint of the franchise where it found the sweet spot and delivered a legitimately classic action movie. This isn’t a Mission: Impossible situation, or even a John Wick one, where the movies have artistic merit and performances and a somewhat linear story that at least tries to adhere to its own mythology. This whole thing is like an order of cheese fries: a delicious treat when fresh that contains zero nutritional value whatsoever and becomes a soggy gross mess when reheated in a microwave at a later point in time.

Which, again, is fine. It’s a blast. (Cheese fries are great!) Because while you could, I suppose, exit the theater and harumph your way through a “so you’re telling me that Paul Walker’s character, Brian O’Conner, an actual trained law enforcement officer, who is still alive in the franchise’s universe, would just stay home with the kid while his wife and best friends risk their lives to battle cyberterrorists who want to destabilize the entire world as we know it” rant if you want and just get all dismissive and disdainful about it all, if I really can’t talk you out of it. But it’s a lot more fun to picture him at that barbecue at the end, Corona in one hand and a child in the other, big bemused smile on his face, as Ludacris and Tyrese explain to him that they just got back from outer space. That’s the vibe you should be looking for here. Just have a seat and enjoy the cheese fries, people. You can start eating healthy again tomorrow.

The story on Cyberpunk 2077 is well told by this point. It was a highly anticipated game that was teased as early as 2012, but a chaotic development process led to a game that was nowhere close to ready at launch. After multiple delays, and a worldwide pandemic, the game was allowed to launch in a state that was very clearly not ready to be played. The glitches were legendary with most of them ranging from funny to extremely frustrating.

However, one ridiculous glitch in a playthrough is a memory forever. Multiple game-breaking bugs throughout the experience are a problem and created massive player frustration. That frustration eventually led to players demanding refunds. When CD Projekt obliged, the game was pulled from PlayStation stores indefinitely. So yeah to say the game was an absolute disaster at launch would be an understatement. It was a colossal failure.

It’s been six months since then and multiple patches have been pushed through. The game is back in the PlayStation store, which has a lot of people asking a simple question. Is the game actually playable now? If you trust the word of CD Projekt CEO Adam Kiciński, then yes. During a WSE Innovation Day conference, Kiciński stated that the game is playable and at a “satisfying level” for players.

Via VideoGamesChronicle:

“We have reached a satisfying level in this regard,” the CEO said regarding the current stability and performance of the game.

“We have also been working on improving the overall quality, which we are also quite happy about. Of course, we also removed bugs and visual glitches and we will continue to do that,” he said. “Over time, we will also be introducing improvements to the general game systems that players have highlighted.”

With the game finally back on the PlayStation Store, and Microsoft recently announcing that no questions asked refunds will be ending soon, it definitely seems like Sony and Microsoft agree that the game is at a satisfactory level. Of course, what does satisfactory in this context mean? It means that the game is actually playable and probably won’t crash a PlayStation 4 or Xbox One. This doesn’t mean that the games are bug-free. What this also means is that, had the developer of the game had time to fix Cyberpunk instead of letting it launch the way it did, the current state of the game is probably what it would have looked like at launch. Use your best judgment when deciding if you want to get back on the Cyberpunk 2077 train.