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As if Megan Thee Stallion didn’t have enough going on with her booming music career, she has the added pressure of worrying about grades as well. Before becoming one of hip-hop’s favorite hitmakers, Meg was a full-time student in health administration at Texas Southern University and continued her studies as her career took off. However, she’ll soon be able to return her focus to music as she recently revealed that she’s on track to graduate in the fall.

However, that doesn’t mean she won’t have pursuits outside of rap. As she told People last year, “I’m gonna open an assisted-living facility and use the money that I make from rapping to open it. Then I’m gonna let my classmates run it.” In her tweet giving the update on her upcoming graduation — which was addressed to a now-deleted tweet demeaning her for explaining why she’s putting the kibosh on a sequel to her breakout “hot girl summer” — she said that the plans are still in the works for the assisted-living facility.

Meanwhile, Megan celebrated her 26th birthday over the weekend, receiving well-wishes from her mentor/”Savage” rap partner Beyonce and once again showing off the freestyle skills that made her such a star in the first place.

Megan Thee Stallion is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

This week in the best new pop music saw some captivating remixes and exciting releases. Dua Lipa returned to share her first new track of the year, Rebecca Black celebrate ten years of her meme-worthy song “Friday,” and Claud released their anticipated debut album.

Each week, Uproxx rounds up the best new pop music. Listen up.

Dua Lipa — “We’re Good”

Dua Lipa may have pulled influences from ’80s disco for her 2020 Future Nostalgia. But with her new single “We’re Good,” she’s dipping her toes into early aughts pop. Over a rolling beat, Lipa gets real with her past partner about deciding it’s time to move on.

Rebecca Black — “Friday (Remix)” Feat Dorian Electra, Big Freedia, 3Oh!3

Feel old yet? It’s been ten years since Rebecca Black released her internet-breaking song “Friday.” While the song didn’t receive positive feedback at the time, the now 23-year-old is reclaiming the single with the help of Dorian Electra, Big Freedia, and 3Oh!3. “I’d had the idea to do this remix of ‘Friday’ for years leading up to now but honestly it was also mildly insane for me to think anyone else would want to be a part of it,” Black said in a statement. “As I started talking about it with other artists and producers I couldn’t believe how stoked people were about it.”

Claud — “Guard Down”

Claud released their highly-anticipated debut album Super Monster this week, which included the shuffling single “Guard Down.” Describing the album in an interview with Uproxx, Claud says it’s “a reminder that to myself and to other people that you’re capable of being loved. If you open yourself up enough and remind yourself that you’re worthy of it, it’s possible and that you deserve it.”

Gabriel Garzón-Montano — “Someone” (Armando Young Remix) Feat. Jamila Woods

Gabriel Garzón-Montano is expanding on his 2020 album Agüita by enlisting a handful of artists to remix his songs. This week, the musician shared an Armando Young remix to his touching track “Someone” with Jamila Woods. Speaking to her decision to hop on the remix, Woods said she’s been a longtime fan of Garzón-Montano’s music: “I’ve been a big fan of Gabriel for a while and it was so fun to re-make this song with him! The lyrics are so visual and vulnerable and the story of the song really resonated with me.”

Sia — “1+1”

Sia made her directorial debut with the controversial and headline-making film Music. The movie just hit theaters this week, which means its accompanying soundtrack, also written by Sia, has been released. While critics may be puzzled over the film itself, songs like “1+1” proves Sia’s talent for songwriting.

Rita Ora — “Big” Feat. Gunna

Rita Ora returned to share her first new music in a year with her collaborative EP Bang. “It was like finding pen pals,” she said about the project. “You had me in London, Imanbek in Kazakhstan, Gunna in Los Angeles, KHEA in Argentina and David Guetta, well, who knows where David is at any one time. It’s a global project that went beyond language and geographical boundaries but somehow stayed lovely and intimate.”

Alaina Castillo — “STFU (I Got U)”

Many were celebrating love on Valentine’s Day this week, but Alaina Castillo was instead busy showcasing the pitfalls of romantic obsession. Armed with a downtempo beat, Castillo sings of playing games with her love interest and feeling insecure as a result.

Biig Piig — “Cuenta Lo”

With a handful of singles and EPs under her belt, Biig Piig continues turning heads with her thumping new track “Cuenta Lo.” About the single, the singer said: “‘Cuenta Lo’ is an alter-ego-driven song about money, sex and power. The video is based around when I used to be a poker dealer, and it’s about the coldness and greediness that money can bring in all industries…including music.”

Gallant — “Relapse”

Gallant brought his ethereal vocals into the new year. This week, the singer dropped the single “Relapse,” which followed his acclaimed 2019 album Sweet Insomnia. The emotionally-charged track offers another preview of his forthcoming project Neptune, which is expected to be released later this year.

Charlotte Cardin — “Meaningless”

With her affecting new single “Meaningless,” Charlotte Cardin officially announces her anticipated debut album Phoenix. “Making this album took two years, because I started the writing process trying to keep control over what I wanted to show,” Cardin said about the album writing process. “It eventually became obvious, though, that I needed to embrace accessing those true impulses for my music (and my life) to make any sense whatsoever. The more I realized certain things about myself in the process, the angrier I got for not understanding them earlier. This conflicting loop of shame versus growth gave birth to ‘Phoenix.’”

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

Unlike his superhero buddies Iron Man and Black Widow, Captain America lived happily ever after in Avengers: Endgame. He returned the Infinity Stones, as well as Thor’s hammer Mjölnir, to their respective points in the timeline, and instead of immediately returning to the present, he lived a “beautiful” life with Peggy Carter. But how did Cap pull it off? Did he create his own “branch reality,” or did he remain in our timeline? The only thing we know for sure is that Chris Evans is still ridiculously handsome even as an old man. It’s a question that has plagued Marvel fans since the highest-grossing movie ever was released, but directors Joe and Anthony Russo have set the record straight.

“One thing that’s clear that Anthony and I have discussed, I don’t know that we’ve discussed this publicly at all, but Cap would have had to have traveled back to the main timeline,” Joe told the Lights Camera Barstool podcast. “That’s something that, yes, he would have been in a branch reality and have had to have traveled back to the main timeline to give that shield to Sam Wilson.” In other words, Cap and Peggy finally danced to “It’s Been a Long, Long Time” in a branch reality, but he returned to the main timeline to hand his shield (not S.H.I.E.L.D.) to Falcon. Joe added:

“In our internal logic that we defined in the room, that was the choice that we made. Based on everything that happened, he would have been in a branch reality and then had to have shifted over to this, so jumped from one to the other and handed the shield off.”

Phew, I’m glad that’s finally solved… at least until Chris Evans returns to the MCU.

(Via the Huffington Post)

Elon Musk is becoming quite the Clubhouse power user, and he might have just scored his biggest “interview” yet. The Tesla CEO reached out to Vladimir Putin to invite the Russian president to chat on the burgeoning video chat app, and Musk surprisingly got an official response from the Kremlin. Even more surprising, the answer wasn’t “no.” According to Reuters, the Kremlin is intrigued by Musk’s offer, but they have to look into it first because, unlike his close friend Donald Trump, Putin doesn’t do social media.

“In general, this is of course a very interesting proposal, but we need to understand what is meant, what is being proposed… first we need to check, then we will react,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Monday. “We want to figure it out first. President Putin does not personally use social networks directly, he doesn’t have them.”

Musk got the ball rolling on Saturday when he tweeted to whoever controls Putin’s Twitter account, “Would you like [to] join me for a conversation on Clubhouse?” He then added in Russian. “It would be a great honor to speak with you.”

If Musk scores a chat with Putin, it will be his most high profile conversation on Clubhouse yet. In the meantime, Musk claims he’s locked down a chat with Kanye West, which should prove interesting given the two men’s eccentric personalities and growing rumors of West’s pending divorce from Kim Kardashian.

In a way, it almost feels like Musk is positioning himself to be the Joe Rogan of Clubhouse. The Tesla CEO is a noted fan of Rogan and was just on his podcast last week where he revealed his ambitious plans to make his next batch of cars hover. “Maybe it can hover like a meter above the ground, or something like that,” Musk told Rogan. “If you plummet it’ll blow out the suspension but you’re not gonna die.”

(Via Reuters)

Rifle-toting Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert (representing Colorado) has been stirring up a ruckus on Capitol Hill, first by vowing to carry her Glock in the halls of Congress before throwing a hissy fit following the beefing up of metal detector presence after the failed MAGA coup. She was already a controversial figure in her home state, in which she owns a diner called Shooters Grill (actually located in Rifle, Colorado) and has been accused of providing a firearm to a minor staff member. And she’s got a handful of arrests under her belt, according to the Denver Post. And now, Sarah Palin 2.0 believes that she knows who to blame for the rolling blackouts affecting much of the U.S. during this historic ice and snow storm.

The freshman Congresswoman is pointing her trigger pullers at the Green New Deal, a general set of goals that hope to move the globe to net-zero emissions within decades. The “deal” also calls for affordable housing and universal health care, and so much more, like building out smarter power grids, improving transportation emissions in the U.S., and obviously, a whole ton of the deal has yet to be put into effect. Still, Boebert (along with Tucker Carlson, who ranted about the deal) is making it her mission to blame the Left for what’s happening in Texas and beyond.

Boebert isn’t here for the deal and is taking aim at Biden, who hasn’t wholly embraced the New Green Deal and has presented his own plan instead. “Rolling blackouts from ND to TX have turned into lengthy power outages in freezing conditions,” she tweeted. “Biden needs to lift his oil & gas ban as we need reliable energy sources. The Green New Deal was just proven unsustainable as renewables are clearly unreliable.”

She wasn’t done yet. “You know how you unfreeze frozen windmills?” she sarcastically inquired. “By sending up a helicopter that shoots out chemicals onto the blades. You need fuel for the helicopter. Keep that in mind when thinking how ‘green’ windmills are.”

Well, people are throwing this right back at Boebert, especially since Biden’s Interior Secretary hasn’t even been confirmed yet, so perhaps she should be asking what happened during the Trump administration. Also, there’s the issue of how nothing (not even all the fossil fuels in the world, since many power stations are down and/or frozen, despite the presence of oil and gas leases) can stop ice from forming on power lines.

Well, this debate isn’t going to be settled anytime soon, but one user posted an apparent list of Boebert’s arrests and called that the real “rolling blackout.” Yikes.

One year ago today, myself and a number of other folks gathered (remember doing this?) in an arena (this too?) to watch the 2020 NBA All-Star Game. It was a fun weekend! Derrick Jones Jr. controversially beat Aaron Gordon in the dunk contest, there were really moving tributes to the recently-departed Kobe Bryant and David Stern, the game itself was fantastic thanks to a new format centered around the Elam Ending, I ate these nachos, it was real good.

The weekend took place at the United Center in Chicago, and the league decided to use the event as a chance to celebrate the Windy City. All the stuff you’d expect was involved — tributes to Michael Jordan and his Bulls, a video honoring the city that included a cameo from Barack Obama, etc. One of the many Chicago institutions that was part of the entire ceremony was Common, who as part of his role as pregame master of ceremonies became a meme for his myriad of rhymes about those participating in the game.

With it being the one-year anniversary of that night in Chicago, I have taken it upon myself to look back on these rhymes and rank them. The ranking is based on nothing more than how I felt as they re-entered my brain after one year of not hearing them. Now I’ll do you all a favor, and quell your suspenses, but before we do that, some honorable mentions:

HONORABLE MENTIONS: THE COACHES

HM1: The head coach for Team Giannis, in the All-Stars this is his first, from the defending champion Toronto Raptors, Nick Nurse

HM2: Making his second All-Star appearance, he runs the team like a mogul, from the Los Angeles Lakers, the coach, Frank Vogel

Hard to get too riled up about either of these. Both are fine. The Vogel one is way better. Onward.

COMMON JUST DID THESE TO MOVE ONTO OTHER THINGS

25. A big man with big skills, yes indeed, from the Philadelphia 76ers, Joel Embiid

24. We knew he’d be an All-Star from everything he’s shown us, from the Indiana Pacers, Domantas Sabonis

Common is an icon but how are you going with “yes indeed” for the Embiid one? Read, feed, need, plenty of things rhyme with “-iid.” Also, I have faith Common has watched Sabonis because he is a well-documented basketball fan, but if I were making a poem about Domantas Sabonis and I never watched him play basketball, I would vaguely mention how he’s shown us a lot of stuff.

FINE

23. He’s a two-time All-Star, so you know he’ll get it done, from the Milwaukee Bucks, give it up for Khris Middleton

22. From the land down under, he’s always all about winnin’, from the Philadelphia 76ers, y’all give it up for Ben Simmons

21. A 10-time All-Star, he’s a general with the ball, from the Oklahoma City Thunder, the great Chris Paul

20. Here from the champion Toronto Raptors, and you know they did it proudly, six-time All-Star and floor commander, Kyle Lowry

19. This All-Star’s the truth, keeping the defense honest, the reigning Rookie of the Year from the Dallas Mavericks, Luka Doncic

18. 2019 All-Rookie first-team, and he’s only just begun, from the Atlanta Hawks, they call him Ice, we also know him as Trae Young

Some poetic license are taken with some of these, some are merely just fine. I do like to imagine that somewhere, Paul Pierce heard Common call Luka Doncic “the truth” and he filed a complaint with someone. And while the Trae Young one is a bit cumbersome, I like the idea. Generally, again, these are fine.

LEGITIMATELY PRETTY GOOD!

17. A seven-time All-Star, one of the generation’s greatest, from the south side of Chicago and the Los Angeles Lakers, Anthony Davis

16. He got crazy skills, that you can’t overstate ‘em, from the Boston Celtics, first-time All-Star, Jayson Tatum

15. He’s Kia’s Most Improved Player, and tonight he’s ready to rock ‘em, here from the world champion Toronto Raptors, give it up for Pascal Siakam

14. Known for his passin’, but his triple-doubles are his best look, from the Houston Rockets, give it up for Russell Westbrook

13. When he heats up from outside, it’s like a pressure cooker, first-time All-Star from the Phoenix Suns, Devin Booker

12. Like a protest on the court, he’s an all-time disruptor, from the Miami Heat, y’all give it up for Jimmy Butler

11. A league MVP who breaks ankles with no pardon, from the Houston Rockets, the league’s leading scorer, James Harden

10. In his breakout season, representin’ the Bayou Kingdom, first-time All-Star from the New Orleans Pelicans, Brandon Ingram

9. Sixteen-time All-Star, three-time NBA champion, we continue to witness his reign, one of the greatest to play the game, from the Los Angeles Lakers, LeBron James

I love that we have an internal rhyme in the LeBron one (reign/game/James), which puts it atop this list. “Bayou Kingdom” and “Brandon Ingram” is terrific, as are pardon/Harden and disruptor/Butler, particularly that last one, because [gestures at Jimmy Butler’s time with the Minnesota Timberwolves, which he joined from the Chicago Bulls, whose fans cheered him when he was introduced]. Rest of them are all pretty solid, shout out to Kia for getting a mention in there. I hope Common was given a very nice Sorento for that.

COMMON REALLY DID A JOB MAKING THESE RHYMES WORK AND I APPRECIATE THAT

8. Unable to play due to the injury, but anywhere on the court he can kill it, from the Portland Trail Blazers, give it up for my man Damian Lillard

7. Representin’ the three-point range from the lane, he’ll give you a dosage, from the Denver Nuggets, two-time All-Star, the Joker, Nikola Jokic

6. The reigning MVP, can drive the lane with no refusal, from the Milwaukee Bucks, the captain of the team, Giannis Antetokounmpo

5. From inside or outside, either way he’ll get you, first-time All-Star, from the Utah Jazz, Donovan “Spida” Mitchell

4. He may not talk a lot, but on the court, he gives a clinic, a four-time All-Star from the LA Clippers, Kawhi Leonard

3. Makin’ his All-Star debut, goin’ hard in the paint is his sty-o, from the Miami Heat, Bam Adebayo

Looking back, I was surprised by how much joy I got out of the various ones in which Common took major poetic license to make the rhyme work. These range from “alright I get it, he had to be a little flexible, although he could have done ‘killer’ instead of ‘kill it,’ ya know?” to “Common took the word ‘style’ and change it to ‘sty-o’ because he had to make something rhyme with Adebayo.”

AFTER I DIE, I WILL BE AT THE GATES OF HEAVEN, AND ST. PETER WILL ASK WHY I DESERVE ENTRY, AND I WILL NOT BE ABLE TO GIVE AN ANSWER, BECAUSE I WILL STILL BE THINKING OF THESE TWO RHYMES COMMON MADE AT THE 2020 NBA ALL-STAR GAME

2. A four-time All-Star, he handles the rock like Gibraltar, from the Boston Celtics, give it up for Kemba Walker

1. Think you can shake this first-time All-Star? Au contrarie, mon frère, from the Utah Jazz, the Stifle Tower, Rudy Gobert

Rhyming “Walker” and “Gibraltar” is inspired work. I am legitimately in awe of the fact that Common did this, one year later. Yes, there is a quibble with the fact that “handles the rock like Gibraltar” doesn’t quite work, factually, because no one really handles the Rock of Gibraltar and it’s, you know, kind of just there, surrounded by the Mediterranean Sea. Unless Common’s implication is that Kemba Walker is the Mediterranean Sea of basketball players, which I will need to marinade on some more before making a ruling.

And then, there is his masterpiece. Ok, well, Be has a much better case for being his masterpiece, but this sits right at the intersection of “really good,” “really clever,” “really funny,” and “really applicable for the player.” Also, it called upon Common to speak French, which makes sense considering, uh, Rudy Gobert is French, but is also just terrific. Just fantastic stuff.

Nirvana was one of the defining bands of its era, and that came off the strength of only about a half-decade of mainstream success before Kurt Cobain’s tragic death. While the band left fans with legendary music, there was still loads of unfilled potential with the group, a thought that still saddens Dave Grohl.

On a recent episode of Apple Music’s Medicine At Midnight Radio, Grohl spoke about the success of the band towards the end of its run and how he wishes Cobain was still making music today. He said:

“The shows were getting bigger. The crowds were getting bigger. The crowds outside of the shows were bigger than the crowds inside the shows. We could see that something was happening, but we really never expected that it would turn out to be as big as it was. I don’t think any of us expected that. […]

Of course, [Cobain’s death] was an incredibly challenging experience, and ultimately one of the greatest heartbreaks of my life that Nirvana isn’t still here today making music, whether it would be called Nirvana or something else. It is one of my life’s greatest heartbreaks that Kurt isn’t still here to write more amazing songs because it’s pretty clear that he was blessed with a gift. I think it’s safe to say that he was the greatest songwriter of our generation. I’m very proud to say that I got to be his drummer and play those songs every night.”

Meanwhile, Pat Smear, Grohl’s Foo Fighters bandmate and a former touring member of Nirvana, recently revealed that surviving Nirvana members still jam together sometimes.

There was a moment, for four or five days of my life, when my only goal was to see Die Hard 2. (Which, then, most people I knew referred to the movie as Die Harder, but that version of the title has seemed to have dissipated over the years.) A month before the release of Die Hard 2 I had gotten my driver’s license. But to see Die Hard 2 I had to be 17, which I was not. It’s a weird no man’s land of an age, where a human being is old enough to operate a moving vehicle on an interstate highway, but not old enough to hear the word “fuck” more than once during the course of a motion picture. Seeing Die Hard 2 in a movie theater was proving to be a challenge.

(I do find myself getting irrationally annoyed when people tell stories about how they saw all these “hard R” horror films in theaters with their buddies when they were 12, or whatever. How did everyone live near theaters with such lax rules except for me? I had a terrible time seeing rated R movies before I was 17. My first date ever, we were supposed to see Pretty Woman. Wouldn’t that have been a nice story? Well, they wouldn’t let us in to see Pretty Woman because it was rated R, so we saw Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles instead. To this day I have misplaced hatred towards Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles for this very reason.)

At the time, just outside of Kansas City, somewhat near Arrowhead Stadium, there was a somewhat decrepit movie theater at a somewhat decrepit shopping center called the Blue Ridge Mall. (This mall was finally demolished a few years ago.) Now, my parents didn’t live particularly close to the Blue Ridge Mall, but, after a few failed attempts at other theaters, this was the first theater where, by chance, whoever was working that night, didn’t seem to care I wasn’t old enough to see Die Hard 2. (This theater would become my “rated R” theater until I turned 17. I had, probably, around a 50 percent success rate. But this was much better than my rate at other theaters, which was “zero.” But I remember I did, eventually, also get in to see Total Recall and Darkman. I was denied entry to The Two Jakes, a movie I didn’t wind up seeing until 2020.) And, let me tell you, when I finally got to see these movies, it was exhilarating. But not because I was watching something even close to “dirty” or “sinister.” I was watching movies where people kind of acted and talked like they did in real life.

I’ve been thinking about this past incarnation of rated R movies a lot lately. Mostly due to having not much to do socially these days, I’ve been rewatching a lot of rated R movies from that era. And, frankly, they are awesome. A friend of mine, before the pandemic, had a huge blindspot when it came to action movies of the ‘80s and ‘90s. He had just assumed he wouldn’t like them because he doesn’t really like today’s versions of action movies. Well, he’s all caught up. And not only does he like these older rated R action movies starring the likes of Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone, he loves them. And the reason being is they literally don’t make these movies anymore. Because, while watching, they kind of, sort of feel like PG-13 action movies of today, in that they are intended for a younger audience. Then, out of the blue, there’s a bunch of profanity, or someone gets killed and there’s a lot of blood and a funny punchline. This kind of movie is so rare today, these moments all feel like real shocks to the system.

Today, if an action movie is rated R, that’s basically the selling point. And the movie has to be “dark” and “earn its R.” Back then none of these movies were trying to earn an R. They were just barely R, but that’s what makes them unique now, because no studio is going to let a “barely R” movie see the light of day. Today, it either has to be PG-13 or full-on, all the way, R. There’s no Die Hard 2, middle-of-the-road R-rated action movies anymore. And I didn’t realize how much I missed them until now.

I asked ‘80s and ‘90s film historian Kumail Nanjiani (oh, and an Academy Award-nominated screenwriter) – who has also been re-watching a lot of action movies from that era over the last few months – if he’s also noticed this.

“Yes,” agrees Nanjiani. “I think R- rated movies then were more fun and more varied. I think the difference in R-rated movies in the past compared to R-rated movies now seems to be that R-rated could be ‘casually’ R. They could be fun movies. Whereas, now, every R feels like a decision.”

Nanjiani’s use of the word “casually” is interesting here, because that’s a pretty good way to sum it up. Here’s an example: Deadpool and Logan are two famously R-rated superhero movies. And there’s nothing “casual” about either of their R ratings. It almost felt like a studio note was, “If we are going to let you make this rated R, you’d better use the word “fuck” in literally every sentence.” (For the record, I like Logan quite a bit.) We can even see this with The Snyder Cut of Justice League. One of its promotional tools is that its “rated R.” That never used to be a thing: “Come see Commando, it’s rated R!”

Now, compare all this to a movie like Planes, Trains and Automobiles. There is absolutely no way possible this movie would be rated R today. It’s barely even rated R then, save for one scene in which Steve Martin unloads the word “fuck” 18 times. Which is a classic scene we’d, again, never get today. Could you even imagine the conversation in the corporate offices, “So, wait, you’re telling me we are going to make this nice family holiday movie rated R because of one 90-second scene? Forget it! You’re fired! Now find me Spider-Man!” (For some reason I picture J. Jonah Jameson as the head of Paramount Pictures in 1987.)

Honestly, I think what makes these “casual” rated R movies so appealing is our normal lives are “causally R.” No, most of us aren’t dealing with explosions on a regular basis, but we do hear some casual expletives often during our day. But not “let’s make this a rated R movie in 2021” often. There’s something strangely realistic in the way people talk in these action movies of the ‘80s and ‘90s that we don’t get today.

And they are shockingly fun. As I mentioned before, when they do use an expletive, it’s usually at an opportune time that really hits. Nanjiani adds, “Movies for adults are generally R now, or hyper-violent thrillers.” Looking back at a few of the movies that fit in this category I’ve re-watched over the last few months (and that I had a great time re-watching. Like, an actual good time): Die Hard 2, Die Hard with a Vengeance, Passenger 57, Beverly Hills Cop 2, Young Guns, Total Recall, Predator, Commando, The Running Man, Under Siege, Eraser, Tango & Cash, Con Air – or even comedies like Major League and, yes, Planes Trains and Automobiles … all of these movies are rated R and I’d have a difficult time believing any of them would be released with an R rating today. And none of them are really aimed at adults or are hyper-violent thrillers. And even when they do release them as R today, like say 2018’s The Predator, the somewhat fun spirit of the original is long gone and it leans into the fact it’s an “R movie.” These movies all work because they are “casually R.”

People often lament that studios don’t make mid-range budget movies anymore. And that’s true. And some of the movies above would fit into that category. And, boy, this past year sure would have been a good time for some new “casually R” movies. But the “casually R” movie is now extinct as that theater at the Blue Ridge Mall where I got to see them in the first place.

You can contact Mike Ryan directly on Twitter.

Fox News blowhard Tucker Carlson was a contestant on a 2004 episode of Jeopardy! He narrowly finished in first place over columnist Peggy Noonan (the Final Jeopardy prompt: “If a president is impeached, this official presides over the trial in the Senate,” which is almost too perfect), but it would have been a blowout if the game had been focused on Carlson’s specialty: “vile and vicious” attacks. Monday’s episode of The Daily Show with Trevor Noah had Carlson responding to his oft-racist, sexist, and white nationalist comments over the years with Jeopardy!-style buzz ins. For instance:

“We have a moral obligation to admit the world’s poor they tell us, even if it makes our own country poorer and dirtier” “What is hate speech?”

“All cultures are equal, except they are not all equal” “What is a white supremacist?”

“Iraq is a crappy place filled with a bunch of, you know, semiliterate primitive monkeys” “Who’s the racist here?”

“Well, I’m, like, extraordinarily loaded just from, like, money I, you know, inherited… I’ve never needed to work” “What is precisely is privilege?”

And most recently: “There was no physical evidence that George Floyd was murdered by a cop” “What exactly is this disinformation?”

Watch the clip above.

Katee Sackhoff has been working steadily in the industry for well over twenty years, from Battlestar Gallactica to 24 to her Netflix series, Another Life, to Longmire, where getting chewed out by a co-star changed her career. She’s also been featured in a few movies — most notably Riddick — but Sackhoff has never broken out in a huge way.

However, since she was a little kid, Sackhoff has always wanted to be part of the Star Wars universe. “I always joked,” she told Michael Rosenbaum on his Inside of You podcast, “that there’s one thing I will always do. If they call me to be a rock in a Star Wars movie, just say yes. I’ll be a rock just to be in this world.”

That’s exactly what Sackhoff did more than ten years ago when director Dave Filioni asked her to voice the role of Bo-Katan in the animated Star Wars series, The Clone Wars. “I didn’t even have to think twice. A female Mandalorian warrior? Hello! Of course!”

Though it was just an animated character, Sackhoff still often joked with Filoni about being cast as a live-action version of Bo-Katan. “You know, one day, if this happens, you know she could exist in these worlds!” Sackhoff said that she “kept saying tongue in cheek things like that because I was honestly just taking the piss.” She never expected it would actually happen.

“I have had such a beautiful career,” Sackhoff continued, “but I have seen people around me get that huge, massive thing… but it’s never happened to me. This huge thing had never happened, so I always joked with [Filoni] just thinking, ‘Of course, they’ll probably recast her. They’ll probably cast Scarlett Johansson.”

“But when The Mandalorian came out,” Sackhoff said, “I made a joke again to [Filoni]. ‘I’ve been playing characters like this for 15 years, buddy!’ And I never thought it would happen. I was just sort of joking.”

In the end, however, Sackhoff didn’t even have to audition. Jon Favreau — the showrunner on The Mandalorian — thought “outside the box” by hiring the actual person who was voicing the animated character, which “never happens.” In fact, when she sat down for a meeting with Favreau, “it wasn’t until halfway through the meeting before I realized he was talking about me. It was a total out of body experience. I kept thinking while he was walking, ‘Those are pictures of me on the wall. What is happening?!’”

“I’m still pinching myself. My mind is blown that not only did they have the thought to do [hire the person who voiced the character], they believed that I could play the role, and that they ultimately let me.”

Source: Inside of You with Michael Rosenbaum