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The final Saturday Night Live of 2020 once again went political with its cold open, but it more importantly set the trajectory of the show heading into the new year by introducing a new comic spoofing president-elect Joe Biden. Alex Moffat took over on Saturday, introducing the role that Jim Carey had declared he was done playing hours before the new episode aired on NBC.

Saturday’s sketch covered current president Mike Pence getting the COVID-19 vaccine on live TV, but the biggest news was that the show officially introduced a new Biden to its audience in the final episode of 2020. Biden has been played by several guest hosts in 2019 and 2020 before Carey famously signed on to play the eventual president-elect this season. But Saturday morning brought word that Carey was done playing his version of Biden, which admittedly drew mixed reviews of the Delaware politician through its unprecedented run of six straight episodes before and after the 2020 election.

Maya Rudolph, who also quite famously returned to SNL to play vice president-elect Kamala Harris, did return on Saturday to slap Mike Pence for denying the election results and, later, to sing during the show’s opening monologue. It’s clear that Rudolph is here to stay as Harris in future episodes in 2021, but we’ll see if Moffat is supplanted if Harrelson or Suedekis decides to return to the show anytime soon.

Dua Lipa has been having an epic year with the release of her sophomore album, Future Nostalgia, and the remixed, club-ready version Club Future Nostalgia. After displaying her range as a pop star, Dua is the guest on Saturday Night Live tonight to remind everyone that her live show is great, too. Already performing “Don’t Start Now,” she returned to perform “Levitating,” a hit that she also performed at the AMAs last. After kicking things off with a cute leopard print outfit for “Don’t Start Now,” she had to turn things up a few notches for “Levitating,” and she did that by wearing an outfit that brought only one word to mind: jellyfish.

The all-white, deep cut dress was stunning, but a headpiece with feathery strings that moved while she danced was a dead ringer for the luminous sea creature, and this fashion moment did indeed steal the show. While everyone else has firmly settled into sweatpants and indoor clothes, here’s Dua reminding us what an outfit can be like. She never sounded better and this is the song fans want to hear from her, but add the unexpected clothing item and this is a real pop culture moment. Watch above.

When the end of the pandemic finally comes, one of the first things I want to do after getting my vaccine is go to a Dua Lipa concert. Until then, her live renditions of songs on SNL will just have to do. The rising pop star has outdone herself this year with Future Nostalgia and Club Future Nostalgia releases, and tonight she’s appearing as the musical guest on Saturday Night Live to show fans that her live show is just as spectacular as her records.

Kicking off her first appearance on the show with “Don’t Start Now,” one of the first singles to introduce her Future Nostalgia era, she performed the track in an all-over leopard and black tights, complete with backup dancers and a huge diamond on a gold chain. Dua and her crew turned the stage into a light-up box that mimics a club dancefloor to illustrate the song’s lyrics about running into an ex. Basically, the song’s message say don’t go out if you don’t want to see me happy and moved on, and even if quarantine made it impossible for anyone to really party on a Friday night this year, the message still resonates. Watch the performance above.

News dropped earlier this week that the Golden State Warriors and Jeremy Lin had plans to reunite. While Lin, who spent last season in China as a member of the Beijing Ducks, was best known in the NBA for his run with the New York Knicks, he actually began his NBA career with the Dubs back in 2010-11, and reports indicated that he was close to joining the team’s G League affiliate.

Lin quickly took to Twitter after these reports began to surface to pour cold water on them, indicating that any report that this was almost a done deal was premature.

On Saturday, Lin’s tweet came to fruition, as reports indicated that the two sides were not able to get the requisite clearance needed for Lin to come to the NBA from FIBA in time. Shams Charania of The Athletic and Marc Stein of the New York Times explained that because the Warriors could not receive a letter of clearance in time, and as a result, there would have been luxury tax ramifications to signing Lin.

It is unclear if Lin will still look to make a return to the NBA or if he’ll decide to return to China for another season — his contract with the Ducks expired at the conclusion of the year.

Sega is no longer in the console making business, but many people still have fond memories about its last entry: the Sega Dreamcast. Digging through

Kotaku reported Saturday that Sega Dreamcast forum users discovered a Dreamcast dev kit that had images for a game called The Simpsons Bug Squad!, which apparently is an unreleased game that was developed for the console.

Yesterday, Sreak posted that they wanted to upload some files from an old Dreamcast dev kit and was curious if folks would want them to do that. People seem interested so they uploaded the contents of the dev kit and others began digging through the files. User Megavolt85 found files and images for The Simpsons Bug Squad! Megavolt85 was also able to get it running, allowing another user, pcwzrd13, to play the game and create a video of it in action.

Shortly after, a video of some gameplay from the dev kit made its way to YouTube and was shared by the Dreamcastic channel.

The video itself is a tech demo from Red Lemon Studios, and is more about the aforementioned bug jumping around the Simpsons house than it is an actual Simpsons video game, really. But it does feature Homer walking around the house while you try not to get stomped on. According to Kotaku, the unpublished game is more than two decades old, with development dating back to October of 2000.

It’s no Lee Carvallo’s Putting Challenge, but it’s certainly an interesting bit of Simpsons and Sega history.

[via Kotaku]

The last Verzuz battle of the year has been a doozy. E-40 and Too Short have been representing for the Bay Area, a region that tends to dictate countless trends in hip-hop, and, if you ask locals, never gets quite enough credit for just how influential it is. Celebrating two of the Bay’s greatest legends tonight has been a ball for everyone involved, but none more than the hip-hop community that hails from the Bay. Although some of them might not be as commercially successful, the Bay is very influential right now too, as artists like Saweetie, Kamaiyah, Guapdad and Iamsu — who have all been reacting tonight — illustrate.

Though she’s not a Bay Area rapper, Queen Latifah got an interesting shoutout earlier tonight too, with Too Short discussing his favorite adlib ever “b*tch,” but noting that certain people should never get that label. Latifah being one of them. It’ll be interesting to see if she weighs in when the comment is inevitably brought to her attention. All in all, the reactions from rappers, singers, and other celebrities (hi Dame) from the Bay (and the West Coast as a whole) who are having a ball watching this battle tonight are pretty priceless, though check out a few of them below.

Tonight’s celebration of the Bay Area featuring E-40 and Too Short is one of the best entries into the Verzuz catalogue so far, and it will also be the showdown of the year. The show is in full swing, and hearing these two legendary producers share stories and play the classics is more than enjoyable — it feels historic. Both of these icons know that despite their own talents, the hip-hop community at large has been instrumental in their success, and Too Short in particular has been mentioning the female rappers who he worked with on hit songs, name-checking Lil Kim and Kelis while playing collaborations.

But he also took a moment to mention Queen Latifah for another reason. Using what might be his favorite adlib, the B-word, very frequently throughout the night, Short mentioned that there’s certain women he will never use the word on… like Queen Latifah. Fans and listeners reacted to this hilarious statement with question marks and plenty of their own thoughts, immediately bringing up her song “U.N.I.T.Y.” and the famous line “Who you calling b*tch?” Now, fans are waiting for word of the mention to get back to Queen and see if she responds. Technically, it’s a compliment, even if it’s a roundabout way of delivering it. Check out more reactions below and tune in to watch E-40 and Too Short play the hits for the rest of the night.

Disney is expanding the Star Wars universe at a massive clip in the coming years, with new Disney+ shows and some big movie plans in place even if the Skywalker Saga is apparently wrapped up. And though much of the extended Star Wars canon was largely dismissed when The Mouse bought the franchise’s rights from George Lucas, some of its biggest beats have been readdressed in shows like The Mandalorian.

Which is why it’s particularly of interest that a new report says some authors of Star Wars books say they haven’t been receiving royalty checks from Disney since they bought control of the franchise. The Wall Street Journal laid out their claims on Saturday, detailing how several authors of Star Wars and other novelizations say the checks stopped coming when Disney took control of the franchise and its many, many works.

The story largely focuses on Alan Dean Foster, who famously wrote the novelization of the original Star Wars movie in 1977. Foster had received royalties for decades for it and several other projects, and he’s certainly a notable figure in the extended Star Wars universe. But in 2012, when Disney bought the franchise, the checks stopped coming.

Now, Mr. Foster and other authors from Disney purchased franchises are in a heated dispute with Hollywood’s biggest empire, which they say refuses to pay royalties on book contracts it absorbed in the $4 billion Lucasfilm deal and other acquisitions. The amount of money at stake is minuscule to a company of Disney’s size but important to the writers seeking it. While Disney has mined Lucasfilm for new movies that have collectively grossed nearly $6 billion at the world-wide box office, these writers say the company has delayed dealing with their complaints and stiffed them on checks that rarely total a few thousand bucks apiece.

Since Mr. Foster’s dispute was taken public by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America association, other authors of books tied to projects from Indiana Jones to “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” have come forward with similar stories of royalty checks that stopped after Disney acquired the properties. In each case, Disney threatens to alienate an obscure but vital tentacle of the franchises, as these novelizations helped build and maintain fan loyalty. Complicating matters: The exact amount of money at stake is unknown, since sales and royalties for the books involved have fluctuated wildly over time.

Disney responded to the report with a statement, saying “We are carefully reviewing whether any royalty payments may have been missed as a result of acquisition integration and will take appropriate remedial steps if that is the case.” But that’s apparently not what the company had said in the past when it came to other books Hansen wrote that Disney now controls.

In response to queries about the “Alien” checks, a Disney attorney told Mr. Foster that the company had acquired the rights to these books, but not the obligations to pay out royalties. But in the case of “Alien,” Ms. Hansen said, the rights to Mr. Foster’s novels had been reassigned several times, with no interruption of royalty checks, before Disney bought Fox.

“Disney has acquired a house with a mortgage on it. They want to keep living in the house. They don’t want to pay the mortgage,” Mr. Foster said.

As is pointed out in the piece, many of the authors who write these books are not the big-name writers and directors that make the box office hits or big-budget TV shows that power the Star Wars universe, but the more modest artists whose income largely relies on royalty checks, however small they may be. Hopefully things get sorted out soon, but it’s certainly a clerical issue that’s far more pressing for those cashing the checks than the company that should be cutting them.

[via The Wall Street Journal]

The Atlanta Hawks are entering the 2020-21 season with remarkably high expectations levied onto them. The team brought in a ton of talent to put around its existing young core, with All-Star guard Trae Young expected to be at the center of things. The message is clear: Atlanta is expected, by those who make decision in the organization, to compete for a playoff berth.

Before that happens, though, the team has to go through the preseason, which included a testy moment on Saturday night. With the Hawks down by six in the third quarter against the Memphis Grizzlies, Young was tasked with checking Grayson Allen, who came off a Jonas Valanciunas screen and began dribbling towards the rim.

Young tried to slow Allen down by fouling him, which was probably the right decision in that situation, but opted to engage in some extracurriculars by shoving Allen to the ground, which led to a minor fracas involving players on both teams.

As the announcers posited, it does seem like this is just Young taking out some frustration on Allen, as he’s struggled in each of the last two preseason games that Atlanta has played. Things continued for a minute after the shove, and at one point, it appears that Young jawed with Grizzlies coach Taylor Jenkins. When the dust settled, Young and Jenkins picked up technical fouls

Let’s be clear: Things could be going much better for the folks behind Cyberpunk 2077. The game, which had remarkably high expectations, fell flat on its face when it was rushed into being released. Instead of it being a potential game of the year, Cyberpunk is such a buggy mess on last-gen consoles that a power struggle between its developers and Sony led to it getting pulled from the PlayStation Store altogether.

There are some silver linings on this cloud, though. Thanks to things like patches, there may be new life breathed into the game that help it reach its potential down the road. And in the meantime, those of us who love glitches in video games get the occasional outstanding clip, like this one that made the rounds on Twitter on Saturday.

This one is art. The first time I saw it, I thought the glitch was going to be just a blackout that led to a loading screen or something, not “you will slowly ascend through the air, ostensibly to go meet the Lord.” While it’s hard to say this without seeing every single glitch that comes from this game, this one is going to go down as my favorite one barring something completely unforeseen.