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In what might be the shortest wait yet for reality-warping animated series Rick and Morty, Season 5 is heading to Adult Swim just a little over a year after the conclusion of Season 4. Despite the pandemic, Rick and Morty Season 5 will start airing new episodes on June 20, and it’s already dropped a trailer for the upcoming batch of episodes that’s loaded with mad-cap sci-fi references to Voltron, Blade, and we’re pretty sure there’s a whole Hellraiser thing going on.

As for how Season 5 managed to arrive so quickly despite the show having infamously long waits before seasons, co-creator Dan Harmon revealed back in October that COVID restrictions somehow put Rick and Morty so on schedule, that the creators are actually ahead. Via SyFy:

“We’re more on schedule than we’ve ever been,” he said, admitting that the unprecedented digital workflow caused by the COVID-19 pandemic has actually been extremely beneficial to the show’s creation, while live-action projects have stopped and started. “It kind of makes you have to focus on the whole process when you don’t have this office environment anymore. Everyone has to run this bee colony remotely, so the honey just gets made more consistently. It’s working for us.”

Voice actor Chris Parnell also confirmed that Rick and Morty will have much shorter wait times thanks to creators Harmon and Justin Roiland locking down a 70-episode order from Adult Swim. “We’ll see less lengthy breaks between seasons going forward because of that,” Parnell told TVLine.

Rick and Morty Season 5 premieres June 20 at 11 PM ET/PT on Adult Swim.

(Via Adult Swim)

“Coconut Oil,” Lizzo’s 2016 self-love anthem, is the subject of a lawsuit recently filed by a church elder who claims his voice was sampled on the song without his permission, causing him “anguish, embarrassment, and outrage,” according to The Detroit News (Lizzo was born in the Motor City). Detroit resident Orlandus Dunning demands $750,000, saying that Lizzo sampled him singing a hymn at a mutual relative’s private funeral.

The lawsuit reads, “(Dunning) had a reasonable expectation of privacy and that his voice would not be heard publicly, as the funeral where he sang was held privately and open only to family and close friends… When Plaintiff sang the devotional, it was at a private funeral and done for the specific purpose of uplifting his family and friends during their time of bereavement.” Dunning says that he wouldn’t have consented to the use of his voice because of his beliefs; he’s an ordained elder in the Church of God In Christ and feels that the song’s messaging runs counter to his position — although he doesn’t say exactly how. The song’s mostly about Lizzo learning self-care, although she does say “sh*t” once on the record.

You can hear the song for yourself below.

Lizzo is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

The Mandalorian is currently the only original scripted Star Wars series on Disney+, but over the next couple of years, at least 10 more titles will debut on the streaming service, including The Bad Batch. A spin-off of The Clone Wars (which ended last year), the animated series follows an “elite and experimental” group of clones known as Clone Force 99, or the Bad Batch. There’s Hunter, Echo, Tech, Wrecker, and Crosshair, who “use their unique talents and specialized physiology to execute extraordinary solutions on the battlefield.” Other familiar Star Wars characters in the action-heavy series include Fennec Shand (played by Ming-Na Wen on The Mandalorian), Saw Gerrera (Forest Whitaker in Rogue One), and Admiral Tarkin, hopefully complete with CGI stink lines.

Here’s the official plot synopsis:

Star Wars: The Bad Batch follows the elite and experimental clones of the Bad Batch (first introduced in The Clone Wars) as they find their way in a rapidly changing galaxy in the immediate aftermath of the Clone War. Members of Bad Batch — a unique squad of clones who vary genetically from their brothers in the Clone Army — each possess a singular exceptional skill that makes them extraordinarily effective soldiers and a formidable crew.

Star Wars: The Bad Batch premieres on Tuesday, May 4 (a.k.a. Star Wars Day), with a special 70-minute episode, followed by new episodes every Friday starting on May 7.

Demi Lovato has been open about her sexuality for years now. In her 2017 documentary Simply Complicated, she said, “I am on a dating app with both guys and girls. I am open to human connection, so whether that’s through a male or a female, it doesn’t matter to me.” Now she has offered another update about that part of her life, as she told Joe Rogan on a recent episode of his Joe Rogan Experience podcast that she is pansexual.

Lovato told Rogan she was considering adopting a child and continued, “I also don’t know if I’m going to end up with a guy, so I can’t really see myself maybe getting pregnant. I don’t know. […] I’m so fluid now and a part of the reason why I am so fluid is because I was super closeted off.”

Rogen then interjected to ask if Lovato meant she meant she was sexually fluid and Lovato responded, “Yeah, anything really.” Rogen replied, “What do they call that, like ‘pansexual’ or something like that?” Lovato affirmed, “Yeah. Yeah, pansexual.” She then continued, “I heard someone call the LGBTQIA+ community the ‘alphabet mafia’ and I was like, ‘That’s it, that’s what I’m going with. I’m going with that.’ So I’m a part of the alphabet mafia and proud.”

Check out a clip from the episode below.

Yes, Alexander Skarsgard is under no false impressions that you are looking forward to Godzilla vs. Kong to see the adventures of his character, a geologist named Dr. Nathan Lind. You see, Godzilla has been causing some problems for humans for unknown reasons and, just maybe, Kong can take care of business and let Godzilla know that his antics aren’t appreciated by means of a knuckle sandwich. And Dr. Nathan Lind has been studying Kong for years and has a good idea of what Kong’s motivations might be and what Kong actually wants.

So, yes … there are times where there is not a lot to talk about when even one of the lead actors in a movie admits people aren’t coming to see him or his character. Though from past interviews, I know Skarsgard has a pretty good sense of humor, so the real questions soon devolved into kind of outlandish fake questions and, luckily, Skarsgard ran with them.

Also, Skarsgard’s next film is The Northman, which is interesting for a couple of reasons. First, he teams with Robert Eggers, which will be the director’s followup to the acclaimed The Lighthouse. Second, it will completely screw up Google searches for True Blood fans searching for Skarsgard’s character, Eric Northman. And, yes, he’s thought about that and wonders how many people will show up expecting to see vampires. (There will be no vampires.)

It’s funny, because just the title of this movie, that isn’t false advertising.

Oh yeah.

Multiple fights.

It’s almost a two-hour-long movie, and it’s like an hour and 55 minutes of fighting.

So what’s this like for you? When you sign onto something like this? Because it’s Godzilla and Kong and they’re going to wind up getting a lot of the attention.

It’s humbling for a narcissistic actor like myself, to be put in my place, to show up on set and know that no one will go to see this movie because I’m in it.

Well, that’s not true. I have noticed over the years you do have a fan base that goes nuts for you.

That’s flattering to hear. But I’m under no illusion that I’m the star of the show and that anyone will go see the movie because they want to see Nathan Lind, the geologist.

The geologist.

Yeah, well, in a way, to be a vessel and a way for the audience to get to know, in my character’s case, Kong, more so than Godzilla, because I’m with Kong throughout the movie. But in a way to not necessarily humanize Kong, but to show a different side of Kong, to show that he has empathy. He’s lived a very solitary, lonely life on Skull Island without social connections, without family. And the thought of him to be reconnected, or to find his family in Hollow Earth is, is kind of the driving force, to reconnect. So I felt like my job was kind of set that up in a way and to kind of show the audience that side of Kong.

Well, you said people aren’t coming to see Dr. Nathan Lind, the geologist. But once here, where you tell me, how you’ve spent the last five years, studying with geologists and following them around and becoming a trained geologist yourself, people will look at this in a different way.

Right? Well, that’s how seriously I take my job.

You threw yourself into it. The last, maybe, ten years, you’ve been studying with geologists, just to know exactly what you were doing in this movie.

It’s just the kind of actor I am, Mike. Even though I play a very peripheral character and no one cares, I still take my craft seriously. And that means a decade of studying geology and living, breathing the character. Just to give the audience that sublime performance that I give in the movie.

When you’re giving the technical jargon during the movie, viewers can rest assured that you know exactly what you’re talking about, because you studied for so long with trained geologists.

Exactly. And they can see that in my eyes, that I’m not lying. I’m not pretending. I’m not acting. I’m not playing a geologist. I am a geologist.

You are a geologist.

Yes.

So when you filmed at Hollow Earth, in the center of Earth, was that on location?

Obviously, it was.

Yeah, I could tell.

And being there was trippy. I felt like you can’t … the audience can tell whether you’re there or when you’re actually there, or if it’s the soundstage with green screen. So the only way to do it, when you make a character driven drama, like Godzilla vs. Kong, is to actually go there and actually spend time down there and be there with Kong. So it was six very intense months, deep down in the center of the earth with a gigantic ape.

That’s why we haven’t seen you in a while — because you’ve been down there.

I’ve been down there, with a gigantic ape.

Being serious, doing the “there they are” reaction seems especially difficult in this movie, with these being such central characters. And I know that’s part of the deal with a lot of movies, but this seems even more that.

Absolutely. Watching the movie, I could tell that I’m reacting to the wrong thing, like I’m reacting to something else. And they play my reaction to something that I think I’m reacting to, but many things have changed. Or they use that reaction to something else. So they kind of make it work. So it’s like, I look at something, and I think I’m reacting to something completely different, but I’m not. They completely changed that. So it’s quite a ride and exciting to watch the movie, because I’m as surprised as the audience. When I watch it, like, “Oh really? That happened.” And, “Oh, look at my reaction here.”

The scene that we all saw in the trailer, which surprisingly happens pretty early in the movie, where Kong just punches Godzilla in the face. So do you watch the movie and go, “If that really would have happened in front of me, I might’ve reacted quite differently than I did even in the movie”?

Well, that specific sequence, they actually had in the pre-visualization, so that actually looks quite very, very, very close to what the previs two years ago looked. So Adam [Wingard] played us that. So pretty much the whole fight scene was choreographed before we shot our reactions to it. So I knew that that punch was going to land, and that’s what I’m reacting to.

We’ve given Dr. Nathan Lind a lot of time, and we’ve given King Kong a lot of time. We haven’t really talked about Godzilla. He gets annoyed when people bother him. I relate to that.

Me too. Going into the movie, I was very much team Godzilla. I love the old Godzilla movies, like the ’60s and ’70s, that era, when it’s zero special effects.

Just a guy in a suit and it’s awesome.

It’s a middle-aged dude in a suit, kicking a miniature version of Tokyo on a set.

In your next movie, you’re working with Robert Eggers, The Northman. You’re done filming that, right?

We’re done. Yeah, we shot for six months during the pandemic. We started last summer and finished just before Christmas.

Did you look at his prior movies and just go, “I have to be part of this.”

Well, I courted him. I loved both The Witch and The Lighthouse. And was developing The Northman and was trying to find a director for it. It was a very different iteration of the script, and the story was very different from what we ended up shooting. But I had a version of a viking movie that I wanted to make and basically went after Rob. He was my dream director and I thought that he would be perfect for this. And that, when I mentioned it to him, it turned out that he was a huge viking fan and knew everything about the mythology.

That doesn’t surprise me for some reason.

Yeah, he knew so much about that world and that era and got really excited about the idea of potentially making this movie. And then he found Sjón, this Icelandic author and poet and screenwriter. And Sjón and Rob together wrote the screenplay to what ultimately became The Northman, the movie that we shot. So it’s something on that was slowly percolating and growing over the course of eight years. So, to finally be on set last year, with the greatest filmmaker of our time and some of the greatest actors of our time, was the highlight of my career, for sure.

Have you thought about how this will screw up Google searches for your True Blood fans?

[Laughs] Yes, I am very much aware of how problematic the title is.

Well, not problematic. True Blood fans are going to have to put in a few other keywords now.

Yeah, that’s true. That’s true. I do apologize for that. And I’m sure some people will be pretty disappointed if they go to see a stand-alone movie about Eric Northman, and then they sit down and it’s a goddamn Viking movie and not a vampire in sight.

I think they’re in for a treat, to tell you the truth.

Well, I hope so. I hope so. I’m very excited about the movie, but I have to admit that, unfortunately, there are no vampires in the movie.

‘Godzilla Vs. Kong’ hits theaters and HBO Max on March 31st. You can contact Mike Ryan directly on Twitter.

Just when you thought “Whoopty” mania had reached its peak, Staten Island rapper CJ comes out of nowhere with a surprising new remix to extend the shelf life of his breakout hit. This time around, he offers a “Latin Mix” of his runaway drill smash featuring two of Latin music’s hottest stars in Anuel AA and Ozuna.

Rather than write a new verse for this version, CJ talks a little smack in Spanish then steps back to let his guest stars hold the limelight. Both Anuel and Ozuna go on extended, rapid-fire, bruising lyrical runs, with Anuel name-dropping Kobe Bryant and claiming he’s a real son of a gun while Ozuna flexes his watch collection and delivers a fatalistic outlook on life. The video, meanwhile, takes place at an underground fight club, which apparently has both male and female divisions for its brutal, bare-knuckle brawls.

The Latin mix is the second remix of CJ’s popular hit after the New Yorker shared a Big Apple-centric remix earlier this month featuring French Montana and Rowdy Rebel. The infectious beat for “Whoopty” has also provided the backdrop for a wide-spanning array of colorful freestyles from the likes of Compton’s Westside Boogie, Chicago’s Polo G, and Philadelphia’s Tierra Whack.

Watch the video for CJ’s “Whoopty Latin Mix” featuring Anuel AA and Ozuna above.

(SPOILERS from The Falcon and the Winter Soldier will be found below.)

The Falcon and the Winter Soldier ended its debut episode with a big surprise: Sam Wilson is not the new Captain America. Instead, he’s handed over the vibranium shield (as bestowed by Steve Rogers at the conclusion of Avengers: Endgame) to the government, who seemingly tossed it over to a rando. That rando would be John Walker, a.k.a. U.S. Agent, and (obviously) Marvel fans don’t dig the guy. Lots of “store-brand Captain America” jokes out there on Twitter. Although Walker’s got the super serum in his bod, he’s kind-of a lazy Cap, but the show’s really hammering that home to illustrate how eager the government was to get the shield out of a Black man’s hands, and Sam Wilson damn well knew it. Walker symbolizes white supremacy, even if he himself might also be a pawn of the government.

Well, new Captain America actor Wyatt Russell (son to Kurt Russell and Goldie Hawn) visited with Jimmy Kimmel and is aware of his character’s apparently random acquisition of his role. He’s also rather self-deprecating and freely admits that he’s got something in common with his character: being unprepared for the role. That is to say, one of the only MCU movies that he’s watched is Guardians of the Galaxy 2 (because Kurt’s in it). So, he knows who Star-Lord is, but that Thanos guy and his snapping? Get outta here. At least Sebastian Stan had some advice for Wyatt.

“I didn’t grow up knowing much about comics,” Wyatt admitted. “My heroes were athletes. So when I came on set, I was asking, ‘What does that mean?’ Or, ‘Who’s that person?’… and finally, Sebastian was like, ‘Dude, stop asking questions. You’re gonna get even more confused than you are… when you get answers, it’s gonna be worse.’”

Wyatta related how he tried to fake some knowledge for about 15 minutes while auditioning and then owned up to his lack of nerdiness. He then reasoned (after Kimmel asked if this was actually something that appealed to Disney+), “It kind of works for the character because he’s new, and he’s not part of the old universe, but it was semi-embarrassing.” Sounds like it, but yeah, it’s working to help get the John Walker vibe going.

Disney+’s The Falcon and the Winter Soldier streams new episodes on Fridays.

With Bad Trip now available on Netflix, star Eric Andre is opening up about the Borat-esque filming of his latest comedy and how one scene in particular got a little too real for his co-star Lil Rel Howery. According to Andre, the duo’s first prank went wrong almost right from the jump as the two entered an Atlanta barbershop while attached at the crotch by a Chinese finger trap. When they asked for help from the barber (who had no idea what was going on thanks to the film’s hidden camera approach), he pulled a knife and chased them out of the store. Via USA Today:

“Part of my brain was like, ‘Wow, I could die right now.’ Another part of my brain goes, ‘This is going to be great footage,” says André, 37, speaking by Zoom from his Los Angeles home. “I felt the movie needed a couple of death-defying scenes to give it real stakes. To make it feel raw and intense.”

While Andre was thrilled with the visceral reaction and how it would look in the final product, Howery was not. The actor quit the production right then and there. “He walked from the movie, we had to seduce him back,” Andre told USA Today. After the beefing up of security, Howery not only returned to the film, but he somehow roped his The Carmichael Show co-star, Tiffany Haddish, into joining the film. Her escapee character ended up being one of the highlights of Bad Trip, according to Uproxx‘s Vince Mancini.

“It helps that Haddish herself is also genius, with a Sacha Cohen-esque facility for improvising and an uncanny ability to insert perfectly-timed, perfectly-crafted one-liners into high-risk situations,” Mancini writes. “She’s either raising the stakes of a situation by adding a new complication or adding in an element of the absurd, sometimes both.”

(Via USA Today)

Ice-T remains an institution throughout the various realms of pop culture, going strong for over 30 years now. From his earliest 1980s solo rapper days to his heavy-metal stylings with Body Count (the group recently won a Grammy), his influence cannot be underestimated. Nor has his career remained predictable, although once Ice-T makes a move, he does not waver, which is precisely why Law and Order: SVU fans have dug him as Fin Tutuola since the year 2000. He’s done reality TV and tells it to everyone straight on Twitter, and the man has never been anything but consistently entertaining.

Such a reliable nature might work to Ice-T’s advantage with his new ad campaign for Tide alongside Stone Cold Steve Austin. You’d probably never expect to see him associated with a laundry detergent brand, but he’s on board to educate people (through the #TurnToCold campaign) about the environmental (and money-saving) benefits of washing clothes in cold water. Not that Ice-T actually does the laundry at home, which is something that he had no problem admitting while he was cool enough to chat with us. We touched upon plenty of topics during our discussion, including when he’ll tour again, how he feels about working with Chris Meloni on the Law and Order: SVU crossover with Organized Crime, his approach to Twitter, and other assorted odds and ends.

Is this really the O.G. Original Gangster on the line here?

Hey! How you doin,’ Kim?

I should tell you that Law and Order: SVU was once a go-to syndicated show while I did cardio at the gym. Now we don’t go to the gym, and it’s a little bit sad!

Can I tell you a funny story?

Please do.

I was in Miami one time, and this lady walked up to me, and she goes, “I was on the treadmill, and I said I would go off when Law and Order went off, and it was a marathon, so I ran 26 miles.” I was like, she did a TV marathon and a marathon at the same time, okay yeah, be careful with that.

It’s strangely motivational to watch you guys take down the indisputably bad guys, and you’ve been on the show for over 20 years at this point.

Yeah, 22 years. I technically came in during the first episodes of the second season, but they shot it during the first season, so I try to claim the first season, but there’ll be arguments. [Laughs] But I’ve been on it a long time.

You’re a pretty fit guy. With gyms being closed and all that and touring not happening, are you still getting your workouts?

I stay in shape. I have a little mini-gym in my house, so I do my dips and my calisthenics, so I’ve always pretty much been in shape. You can get out of shape very easily as you get older, so I gotta stay on top of it. Since I’m on television all the time, I don’t wanna look at myself and say, “Look at yo’ fat ass!” I’m forced to be vain in that respect, but when you marry a swimsuit model, it’s not smart to get fat, so I’ve got a lot of motivation around to stay slim and trim, but I’m doing okay.

You’re SVU-ing it on an April 1 crossover episode, which is the premiere of Chris Meloni’s Organized Crime spinoff. What’s it like to have him back in the saddle?

Well, it’s fun for me. The thing of it is, the difference between me and the fans is that I’ve been in touch with Chris over the last ten years while he’s done his movies and while he had his show, Happy. Me and Chris kinda became friends because we worked together twelve years, so when we got back and we did our scenes together, it’s just like old times. We’re glad to have him back, but Chris wanted to do other things. A lot of actors, well, you don’t become an actor to just play one role for twenty years. It’s about being able to be different characters, and that’s what actors love to do. So, now he’s back, he’s happy, and he’s got his own show, so when you see this reunion, it’s gonna blow everybody away because it’s written well, and it’s good.

Speaking of blown minds… dare I ask how you got involved with your new Tide commercial?

I got cold-called. When people want you to do commercials, the first thing you do is ask, “Does the shoe fit?” “How am I gonna be connected to Tide?” Although I use Tide already, so they told me that cold washing helps the environment, it saves money, and also, it doesn’t ruin your clothes, which is smarter. And Tide does not require hot water to activate. It cleans just as well in cold water, so I thought that was cool. I was like, “Okay, okay, got that!” And then I figured out, “Oh, it’s because my name is Ice.” And they said, “The campaign will be you and Stone Cold Steve Austin,” so I was like, “I’m in.” I’m a fan of Stone Cold Steve Austin, so we went and did the campaign, and it’s a really cool campaign. We’re cold-calling people and telling them about the benefits of using Tide in cold water. We cold-called Mr. T, and it’s kind-of a cool commercial.

And does Ice-T do the laundry at home?

No, I don’t do it. Coco does the laundry. We’ve got a very old-school family situation, so she loves doing laundry, and she’s like, “I’ve got this.” Because she knows that if I do the laundry, I’m gonna half-ass do it.

You know what people say: you can’t be good at everything.

But I told her, and she got the memo that we no longer have to use this hot water, from what I understand, to clean it. And I don’t have to shrink my clothes up and have the colors running and all that stuff, so it’s great.

Can we talk about your wonderful Twitter account? It is consistently entertaining.

Let’s talk!

You’re out there lobbying for an “edit” button while saying that you’ve heard all of the comments for and against one, but dammit, you want one.

I think it’s stupid that they don’t have one! I mean, Instagram has one. People are so concerned: “Oh, you could say something, and then you could take it back!” You can screenshot, and all the reasons they don’t want an edit button are negative. It’s just based around catching someone saying something and then trying to deny it. It’s based in negativity, it’s not based to help people. There’s a million different ways they could do an edit button. They can make it so that if you edit it, it says it’s been edited — it could have a little symbol. What they don’t understand is that I’ll put up a tweet, and it might get 2000 likes, and then I’ll realize that something’s spelled wrong, and then you don’t wanna take that one down. Because I’ve had times when I’ve had a bunch of people like something, and I took it down, and they got offended. But you know, it’s Twitter, and maybe Twitter’s just not wanting to be like IG, but you know, whatever. Then don’t comment on my spelling! All the spelling Nazis, stop.

Twitter is for bursts of 240 characters. Typos happen that way.

And also, Twitter’s something you’re doing on your phone! Your thumbs are moving, and they won’t have an edit button, but they’ve got autocorrect. So why do you have autocorrect if I’m talking slang? So whatever, it’s nothing… I just had a moment when I felt like saying it because I just tweeted something where I didn’t put an -ing on a word, and I felt like, “Man, why can’t I just edit this stuff?” Whatever, who cares.

You once tweeted about blowing through a toll booth on accident and briefly getting arrested.

Yeahhhh. [Laughs]

There was quite a reaction to that saga on Twitter and on the news.

It was stupid. You’ve got real crimes and all that going on, and as far as arresting me? Yeah, I think they overreacted. They could’ve given me a ticket. A lot of times when a cop arrests a celebrity, it gives them the chance to be famous. They never arrested anyone, but they arrested JLo. So now, they get to say, “Ahhhh, I put JLo in handcuffs.” It’s something that they do for themselves. You know, as many crimes as I’ve committed in my life, and you’re gonna bust me for running a toll? It’s funny to me. If there’s nobody in the trunk, I’m not sweating, so I’m not really worried about it. The thing is, I was on my way to go play a cop! on TV! And you guys are busting me.

Speaking of your SVU character again, there was a Cameo you did for some John Mulaney fans, and they got you to poke fun at Fin Tutuola — that time that he took a long time to grasp the concept of sex addiction — and you played along, and that Cameo clip went viral. People ask you to say some really odd stuff.

I don’t even remember that one! On Cameo, most of the people just want you to say “hi” and “happy birthday” and anniversaries. There were some people who had a sixty-second wedding anniversary. When I first started Cameo, I didn’t think that was as cool as it was until I saw the reaction. When I saw the way that people reacted to cameos, I thought, “Oh, this is cool.” So there’s “tell my brother to stay in school,” or “congratulate my teen” for this or that, it’s a cool platform, and I enjoy doing ’em.

We are almost out of time here, but I’m a Body Count fan, and you guys won a Grammy this year. You once talked about your heavy metal influences, like Black Sabbath. Do you dig any particular contemporary metal bands?

We based our band off of Slayer and Suicidal Tendencies, and of course, Black Sabbath. I like Lamb of God and Fit for an Autopsy, which is the band of my producer (Will Putney). We’ve been out with so many bands. Of course, I like Power Trip, but it kind of sucks because this past year, we couldn’t tour. We put out Carnivore, and then the pandemic hit, so we dropped an album, and we haven’t been able to do a single show.

Do you know when touring will likely resume for you?

Everybody’s saying 2022, so we’re gonna come up with some other ways to get the music out to the fans. Right now we’re doing an EP to connect to Carnivore because we don’t wanna just step over that album like a dead body. We got a Grammy for it, so we’re trying to keep our fans entertained, so we’re thinking of different options. We just did a fan video for “The Hate Is Real.” Have you seen that, the one with the puppets?

Oh, I saw it on Twitter and did not click on it yet, so I’m doing fantastic here.

You’re gonna bug out on that one. I had a concept where I said, “The fans are gonna make the video,” and this one was the winner. It’s outrageous.

I’ll go watch it now, and it’s been real talking to you.

Well, keep following me and stay on Twitter. You never know what’s gonna happen, day by day. Someone might pop off, and I might need to let ’em have it.

‘Law and Order: Organized Crime’ debuts on April 1, and find out more about how to #TurnToCold via Tide’s website.

In the early days of the pandemic, I swore that I would read more. I did not read more. But I am ready to crack open a book… the book of Saw.

Spiral: From the Book of Saw — the ninth installment in the Saw franchise (which has an impressively convoluted mythology) — is written by Josh Stolberg and Peter Goldfinger, but it’s Chris Rock who came to Lionsgate “and described in chilling detail his fantastic vision that reimagines and spins off the world of the notorious Jigsaw Killer.”

The new trailer for Spiral: From the Book of Saw begins with detective Ezekiel “Zeke” Banks, played by Rock, opening a mysterious package. Inside is a flash drive with “PLAY ME” written in blood on it. “Hello, Detective Banks, do you know where your officers are?” a voice from the file says. Banks has “hours, not days” to solve the case of the Jigsaw Killer (“He can be anywhere, he can be anyone”) with help from his police veteran father, Marcus Banks (Samuel L. Jackson), and rookie partner (Max Minghella).

Here’s the official plot synopsis:

A criminal mastermind unleashes a twisted form of justice in Spiral, the terrifying new chapter from the book of Saw. Working in the shadow of his father, an esteemed police veteran (Samuel L. Jackson), brash Detective Ezekiel “Zeke” Banks (Chris Rock) and his rookie partner (Max Minghella) take charge of a grisly investigation into murders that are eerily reminiscent of the city’s gruesome past. Unwittingly entrapped in a deepening mystery, Zeke finds himself at the center of the killer’s morbid game.

Spiral: From the Book of Saw opens on May 14.