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There are two main factors in any successful vaccination program: 1) To have a safe and effective vaccine , and 2) To make sure enough people get the vaccine to achieve herd immunity.

Unfortunately, a combination of factors has led many Americans to be wary of vaccines. Some reticence is based in legitimate historical trauma, such as the Tuskegee experiments that left some Black Americans distrustful of government and medicine mixing. Some of it is people falling down rabbit holes of partial information or misinformation from anti-vaccine activists, as well as conspiracy theories about the pandemic in general. And some of it is people simply not knowing enough about the vaccine, how it was developed, and what the trial process entailed to make them enthusiastic about getting it.

So will there be enough people getting the vaccine to put an end to the pandemic? Time will tell, but a new Gallup poll offers some hopeful news on that front. In November, the number of Americans who say they are willing to get the coronavirus vaccine jumped to 63%, continuing the increase from 50% in September and 58% in October.

With the FDA moving forward in the approval process with the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, and with people already starting to be immunized in the U.K., that’s encouraging news. A return to normalcy will depend on a majority of the population being immune, and widespread vaccination is a far better way to get there than through mass sickness and death.

For those who are still hesitant about getting the vaccine, check out what Dr. Samara Friedman shared about how they were developed and why she won’t hesitate to get it as soon as it’s available:

“The FDA is likely going to approve the Pfizer Covid vaccine when they meet on December 10th. The Moderna vaccine will probably be approved shortly thereafter. This is an incredible feat of modern medicine, and our best chance to hopefully get our lives back to near normal relatively soon. However, it is new and it was done quickly, so understandably, people may be hesitant to get it; even people who vaccinate against all other diseases.

Will I be getting the vaccine? ABSOLUTELY. As a physician, I will probably have the opportunity to be immunized prior to New Year’s and yes, I will be taking it as soon as possible.

But, it is a new vaccine technology and done in record time, so aren’t I worried about its safety? Nope, not any more so than any other vaccine or other medical intervention.

Why? Let’s start with how this vaccine works. This is an mRNA vaccine. Past vaccines typically use a live but weakened “attenuated” virus, or dead viral material “inactivated” virus, or a piece of the virus’s protein or even a toxin produced by the virus. The Covid vaccine is very different. It contains mRNA (messenger genetic material) that encodes for the Covid spike protein. This causes your cells to then produce the Covid spike protein. In contrast, when you are sick with Covid, the virus hijacks your cell to produce many copies of the entire virus. Then it destroys the cell, busting it open to release its newly formed viral particles. When your cells release just the spike protein, it will stimulate your immune system to form antibodies to the Covid spike protein without you getting sick. There is no possibility of getting Covid from the vaccine. When your body is subsequently exposed to Covid, it will quickly recognize the spike protein and destroy it before it can make you sick. This was 95% effective in preventing Covid, which is an even better percentage than most other vaccines. However, you must take both doses (about 3-4 weeks apart).

Am I concerned about it being new? And previously untested? No, I’m not. This type of technology is not entirely new. It has been studied and used in cancer research. They have been making mRNA vaccines and studying them to specifically target proteins on tumor cells and train your immune system to then destroy the tumor. In this case, it is not a vaccine in the preventive sense, as it is targeted to a tumor that you already have. It is not currently widespread because it has to be custom made for each tumor. But, it has been “around the block” for a while now. The technology was also being studied for other Coronaviruses. It never came to fruition, because the diseases never reached pandemic proportions, and then the funding dried up. The mRNA does not enter the nucleus of the cell, and it does not affect your DNA, and therefore has no lasting impact on your cell.

Am I concerned about the speed with which it was developed? Weren’t significant corners cut in order to get this out so quickly? No and no. What was cut out of the equation was mostly red tape, and what was added was technology and funding. We were given the genetic code by scientists in China to start vaccine production in January; before Covid was even documented to have reached our shores. From there, the vaccine was developed from the technology we had from the prior Coronavirus and cancer research, and was completed in March. Normally, there would be months of waiting for the FDA to even look at the work done prior to approving Phase 1 trials. Because of the urgent nature of this, it was essentially put on the top of the wait pile, which cut out months of waiting, but did not cut any corners. Between the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines (both mRNA, with a slightly different delivery system), they were tested in 37,000 people in Phase 3 (and an additional 37,000 received a placebo). That is on par with, if not better than the vaccines currently available.

Aren’t I concerned that the FDA is about to approve it, and there may be side effects that haven’t been seen yet? Nope on this one too. We know from decades of vaccine research, since you typically just get 1, 2 or 3 doses and then you are done with it, that nearly all side effects from vaccines occur in the first 6 weeks. Like other vaccines, minor side effects may occur(soreness at injection site, muscle aches, fever). Severe adverse reactions are extremely rare, and again, occur quickly if they are going to occur at all. As a healthy 40-something year old woman, my risk of dying from Covid is about 1 in 250 to 1 in a 1,000. That is not a rare event! And even if I don’t die from it, I could have long term lung damage and other issues that affect my quality of life. Because vaccines are given to healthy people (unlike medications for treating a disease that is already present) they are held to a much higher standard for approval. My risk of having a significant adverse reaction from the Covid vaccine is minuscule in comparison to my risk with Covid. In fact, there have been no severe reactions to the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine to date.

For the rest of the population (outside of healthcare workers or those in nursing homes), who will likely be able to get the vaccine in February or March, there will be even more time passed and more people who have received the vaccine to be the “guinea pigs” here.

Anyone who is pregnant – it has not yet been tested in your group (although I do know that many pregnant front line health care workers are planning to take it). For those under 18 years old – it is also not yet tested. Moderna will be starting a trial shortly. Hopefully it will be approved by summer. But for everyone else, I highly recommend getting it as soon as you can; for you, for your loved ones, for those who cannot (perhaps because they are immunocompromised), for the many businesses that are on the verge of permanent shut down, and for kids to safely return to schools. I will be rolling up my sleeve for it as soon as it is offered.

If you’d like, please do feel free to cut and paste on your own social media sites. Sharing of information is so important to combating this pandemic. We have now surpassed 15 million documented Covid cases in our country (5 million of which were in the last 30 days) and over 2,000 people are dying per day. I do not plan on making the post shareable, as I don’t need militant anti-vaxers tracking me down.

Samara Friedman, M.D.
Orthopaedic Surgery

(While, I am not an expert in vaccines, as a physician, I do have the necessary skills to interpret medical studies and evaluate data. Additionally, I have been listening to the experts in virology, infectious disease, and epidemiology.)”

You don’t have to be an expert in vaccines to listen to those who have dedicated their lives to their development. When it comes to risk, we know that there are very real risks from COVID-19, and since the incidences of adverse vaccine events are far, far lower, the risk-benefit ratio comes out greatly in favor of getting the vaccine.

Modern medicine truly has come so far, and the incredible feat of this newvaccine development should be celebrated whole-heartedly.

When most people think of the “Home Alone” franchise, they remember the original 1990 blockbuster starring Macaulay Culkin that plays on TV throughout the holiday season. Most people will also have a vague recollection of its 1992 sequel, “Home Alone 2: Lost in New York,” that’s best known these days for having a Donald Trump cameo.

However, there are actually five films in the “Home Alone” franchise. Nineteen-ninety-seven’s Culkin-free “Home Alone 3” was a flop about an eight-year-old prodigy who defends his home from a band of criminals who work for a North Korean terrorist organization.

The next two films, “Home Alone 4: Taking Back the House,” (2002) and “Home Alone: The Holiday Heist” (2012) were made-for-TV movies.

Now, the franchise is being rebooted for a movie that will air on Disney+. The untitled “Home Alone” film will star “Jojo Rabbit” actor Archie Yates as a precocious child protecting his house against a couple looking to retrieve a family heirloom.

Rumor has it that Culkin got paid $3 million to play Kevin McCallister for a cameo in the film.

Culkin recently reprised the role for a Google Assistant commercial that went viral in 2018.

Home Alone: Macaulay Culkin Google Assistant Parody

www.youtube.com

If actor Kevin Zak has his way, the next “Home Alone” film won’t be a reboot starring a new Kevin McCallister imposter, but Culkin himself playing the role, this time as a married man.

(Note: Zak pitches this as “Home Alone 3” which is further evidence that few people have any idea that there were more than two films in the franchise.)

In Zak’s film, the tables are turned and Kevin has to navigate a church filled with homemade booby traps designed by the original Wet Bandits played by Joe Pesci and Daniel Stern. Pesci and Stern are a little long in the tooth to be getting beat up by McCallister, but Zak has figured out an entertaining way to make it work.

Take it away Kevin.

For those who aren’t in the know, Dan Levy is the son of character actor Eugene Levy and best known for playing David Rose on “Schitt’s Creek.”

Zak’s idea for the third Culkin-led “Home Alone” is pretty brilliant because it overcomes the fact that seeing the bandits get beat up again in a booby-trapped house would be terribly boring a sixth time around.

It’s also smart because it turns the tables, making McCallister the one that has to make his way through the traps. Adding his husband into the mix is great because the audience can laugh at him being cartoonishly injured by the traps set by the bandits.

Plus, given the age of the bandits, it’d be pretty cruel to watch them get whacked in the face or fall down a staircase.

Most people on Twitter are on board with the movie, but more than a few thought the big orgy reveal was a little gratuitous.

The only problem with the pitch is that if Culkin received $3 million for a cameo in the Disney reboot, how much would he charge to play the lead?

The acclaimed reboot of One Day at a Time, which reworked one of Norman Lear’s many classic TV shows as a look at a Cuban-American family, is officially dead. There was hope that it wouldn’t be. After it lost its second home at Pop, the makers and the cast were cautiously optimistic that they could find it a third one. But according to The Hollywood Reporter, showrunners Gloria Calderon Kellett and Mike Royce announced they were throwin in the towel.

Their version of One Day at a Time, which updated the version that ran from 1975 to 1984, was born at Netflix, and starred Justina Machado as a single mother of two who also lives with her sparkplug of a mother, played by the legendary Rita Moreno. After three seasons, Netflix unceremoniously pulled the plug, but it eventually wound up at Pop. That fourth season wound up shorter than planned, only seven seasons, thanks to complications that arose during the pandemic. The final episode, its 46th, aired over the summer.

The original show was groundbreaking at the time for being a positive (if not always sunny) portrait of single motherhood, at a time when divorce was becoming both more commonplace. It normalized something that had been long seen as scandalous, and it did so with the patented wit Lear brought to other enjoyable socially conscious shows as All in the Family, Maude, The Jeffersons, Sanford and Son, and many more. (Let’s not forget the surreal soap parody Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman! Nor its late night talk show send-up Fernwood 2 Night.) The revival kept that balance of tackling real issues with humor. And if you’d like to keep it in your lives going forward, you now have to track it down over two platforms. Rest in peace to a real one.

(Via THR)

It’s been almost a week since America fell in love with Melissa Carone, aka “Rudy Giuliani’s Wine Lady.” She was supposed to be his star witness at a Michigan hearing on alleged voter fraud. But her testimony was such a trainwreck that it and she went viral, costing Giuliani and company whatever credibility they had left. (Which admittedly wasn’t much.) Inside Edition landed her for her first public interview, in which she told television audiences that she wasn’t drunk — the kind of everyday situation many of us find ourselves in regularly.

Looking quite different from what she did during her notorious testimony, Carone strongly denied accusations (or at least jokes) that she was tanked. “I wasn’t drunk,” a far, far more calm Carone told Inside Edition. “I would swear under oath that I wasn’t drunk.”

The widespread belief that she had tied one off was exacerbated by the parody of her on last weekend’s SNL. She was played by Cecily Strong, who at one point appeared next to Kate McKinnon’s Giuliani brandishing a martini glass. But the portrayal left Carone the opposite of offended.

“I loved it,” Carone said of the spoof. “I think she did a great job. I thought it was very funny. She looked just like me.” She also doesn’t take offense to others mocking her aggressive personality. “I’m not hurt. That’s my personality.”

Carone wasn’t even upset by Giuliani, who appeared mere inches away from her without a mask, mere days before testing positive for COVID-19 and wound up being hospitalized. (Another member of the bumbling Trump legal team, Jenna Ellis, tested positive the same day the Carone interview dropped.)

“I’m not concerned at all,” Carone said of what turned into a super-spreader event. (She also didn’t wear a mask.) She also has no intention of going into quarantine, despite a local mandate saying that anyone present during the hearing should immediately do so.

And Carone addressed her bizarre criminal past, namely her allegedly sending sexually explicit videos to her fiancé’s ex-wife, resulting in an obscenity charge. She pled guilty to a lesser charge, which was later dismissed. She didn’t deny those charges, but she did say Giuliani never inquired about her sketchy past before making her his star witness in a hearing meant to sow doubts in an election otherwise considered historically safe.

You can watch the full interview on Inside Edition’s site.

Richard Nixon kept his most devious schemes private. Donald Trump, meanwhile, has always been very vocal about his underhanded plans, telling supporters at rallies and even reporters about all the crooked things he wants to do. For instance, he outright spoke on record about how he wanted to rush Amy Coney Barrett onto the Supreme Court, so she and the other two justices he appointed would help him in case the 2020 election didn’t go his way. Well, it didn’t, and yet none of them wound up being the savior he wanted.

According to CNN, on Tuesday the Supreme Court rejected the Trump team’s latest attempt to overturn the election away from winner Joe Biden. The Pennsylvania GOP had sent in a request to block the certification of their state’s results, which tipped greatly in Biden’s favor once the plethora of absentee ballots were belatedly counted. The case was presented to the Court on Tuesday afternoon, and they wasted no time in shooting it down.

It’s yet another humiliating loss for Trump, who had managed to name three justices to the court, the others being Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh. He’d been bragging about how they’d help him out of this jam, rejecting the will of the people if no other court across the land would. But not only did the court reject the Pennsylvania Republicans’ request outright, none of them (not even Barrett) offered a single dissent.

A Trump meltdown, in which he singles out each justice for apocalyptic scorn, is almost certainly en route. In the meantime, many on Twitter celebrated what may be the most epic Trump loss yet.

It was a pretty spectacularly anticlimactic ending, too, with Samuel Alito (a George W. Bush appointee) signing his name to the terse letter that shut down the Republicans’ request right out of the gate.

Some jokes took a “life comes at you pretty fast” approach.

Others noted that curious photoshop of Barrett that Trump retweeted.

Some noted that this was in fact Barrett’s first involvement in an election case, which does bode well for any that may follow.

Surely Trump will not be pleased with his most recent Supreme Court justice.

Some welcomed Republican Justices to the resistance.

Even former Trump administration employees joined in the revelry.

Perhaps now that the Supreme Court has slapped him down, Trump’s only remaining ally could be his alien friends.

The bumbling Trump legal team is probably none-too-happy right now.

Then again, it’s ridiculous that an appeal filled with baseless accusations and outright contempt for the will of the people made it all the way to the top of the legal ladder.

Of course, this involved the Supreme Court case from Pennsylvania. Don’t worry, Ted Cruz, defending the one from Texas: You may still get his chance to defend the man who talked smack about both his father and his wife.

(Via CNN)

Let’s get this out of the way: it’s Pokémon, but with a highly competitive massively-multiplayer twist where every battle is 2v2 and RNG has no influence over damage or accuracy. It’s Pokémon, but with a solo story campaign, ranked PVP, co-op, and extensive character customization. It’s Pokémon, in the style that I feel like we’ve all been waiting for… but it’s actually called TemTem and I keep calling it Pokémon by accident. This is the truth and you will likely have the same problem.

TemTem was released on Steam Early Access back in January and hit PlayStation 5 Early Access on Tuesday. The TemTem community is expecting a flood of new players who love(d) Pokémon, like me, over the course of the next month with the same question on all their minds: “Is TemTem worth getting into?” Because once you start learning the ropes of TemTem, you quickly realize that this isn’t your father’s creature-capture game.

The stats, the types, the “synergy,” the stamina, the priority, the “must refrain from naming him Metapod” — combined with so much Pokémon muscle memory — means you’re simultaneously un-learning everything you know as the game continues to introduce increasingly complicated concepts to your 1999-stuck brain. It’s hard not to avoid Pokémon comparisons and the inevitable fact that it remains front of mind as you play TemTem.

But after only playing a short while, I think it’s will be. A MMO is only as good as its community. I might still be playing World of Warcraft today if my guild wasn’t filled with greedy drama queens, but that’s a story for another time. Thankfully, TemTem seems to have an exceptionally kind one. I decided to stream my first hours in the game on Twitch, and after an hour, about half a dozen TemTem Tamers from the PC community had joined me in the chat; some with literally thousands of those aforementioned hours.

And instead of bullying me for forgetting which type my TemTem is every five minutes (which I deserved), they gently reminded me. They offered me tips and tricks, warned me about my early choices, and helped me name my TemTems. When I was lost, they helped me find my way… which usually was some version of “look at the mini-map, you have a mini-map”. For the rest of the stream, folks were encouraging, patient, and incredibly generous with their time and TemTems, some even going out of their way to find me in-game just to gift a TemTem to help me on my journey. It was a genuinely refreshing experience for my first hours in a new MMO and I’d be lying if I didn’t say I was touched by it all.

When I asked the more experienced players why they were willing to hang around with a noob for so long, they said it was because they wanted to make sure my first experience with the game was a positive one. They knew how complicated TemTem could be for new players and they really wanted to make sure the game didn’t scare me off. They even told me that it was no big deal because they were already preparing a bunch of welcome gifts for new players on release day. How nice is that?

They wanted me to like TemTem and continue to play it because when I do, I’m contributing to the community, which in turn affects the longevity of the game. They don’t want to see TemTem fail like so many other online games do. Not every MMO can be World of Warcraft. They want to make sure they have the opportunity to invest thousands of hours more. That tells me it’s at least worthwhile to start.

A great community can only get you so far, but TemTem appears to be a rock-solid game at its core. It doesn’t ignore decades of foundational games in the genre and have built upon that bedrock to give people what they’ve been asking for. TemTem is the epitome of “as advertised” in the nicest way possible. It promises a creature-capture game with a lot more depth, and it delivers. It promises to remove all the “randomness” we’ve seen in Pokemon games, and it delivers. It promises interaction with other players around the world in a meaningful way, and it delivers.

TemTem mechanically reveals its hand pretty quickly and either you’re into or not. But honestly, if you’re reading this, you’re probably into it. Other than a few bugs here and there that are easily remedied — and commonplace in an early access title — there are few complaints to be found. Some might say that TemTem is really “grindy” and all I can say in response is “duh”. Like, what did you expect? These Tems ain’t gonna level themselves.

The artistic design in TemTem is well done, albeit a little safe, and the world is vast and populated. There are currently 86 known TemTem that mostly trend toward cute so far, but they each seem to be uniquely purposed and generally feel balanced. The music exceeded my expectations a bit, which I’m glad wasn’t as glossed over as it could have been. It’s nowhere near as melodic as something you’d find in Pokémon, but it managed to stick out in a good way a handful of times.

Most everything is as you would expect it to be, especially in the “superfluous” areas of the game that don’t affect the gameplay. The jury is still out about TemTem’s potential to catch on from a merchandising perspective. Then again, I’m probably not their intended audience for TemTem: The First Movie anyway. One of the NPC’s actually said “hell yeah,” however, so perhaps that’s one area where I did misread things.

The biggest surprise here really was the immediate welcome of the TemTem community. TemTem is good, it’s fun, and I think it’s going to be worth investing your time because to get the full picture of any MMO, you really have to give it a while and grind it out. Hour 1 and hour 1000 are very different things, but in the early hours it does seem like TemTem has delivered on all of its initial promises, and then some. It’s an ambitious title, but it has a fantastic framework for long-term competitive players and introducing new content. And lastly, it has a great community with players who have invested their time and spirit because they want the game to thrive. That community is counting on you, a community that now includes me imploring you to give us Tamers an enthusiastic “hell yeah” and try it for yourself.

Outside of perhaps Tiger King, no other documentary series captured our attention this year like The Last Dance. ESPN’s 10-part miniseries about Michael Jordan the Chicago Bulls of the 1990s let us relive one of basketball’s golden eras and offered us a closer look at the mythical figure at its center.

And the closer we looked, the more complicated it all became. Jordan’s reputation as a tyrant among his teammates was confirmed, and it also provided another opportunity to engage in one of his favorite pastimes — settling old scores, with both friends and enemies alike.

Scottie Pippen was just one of many teammates who wasn’t happy about his portrayal in the docu-series, and he’s made no secret about since the show aired earlier this year. Pippen didn’t appreciate the way it emphasized a couple of his less flattering moments during their time together in Chicago, and he apparently didn’t hesitate to tell Jordan about it directly.

Via Andrew Anthony of The Guardian:

“I thought it was more about Michael trying to uplift himself and to be glorified [the series was co-produced by Jordan’s Jump 23 company]. I think it also backfired to some degree in that people got a chance to see what kind of personality Michael had.”

***

“Yeah. I told him I wasn’t too pleased with it. He accepted it. He said, ‘hey, you’re right.’ That was pretty much it.

The interesting part — if his interpretation of their exchange is accurate — is that Jordan appears to accept Pippen’s criticism. In the past, His Airness has been notoriously prickly anytime his peers deigned to utter anything negative about him, something that led to his falling out with Charles Barkley. But then again, Pippen has always carried much more cache than anyone else in his inner sphere.

If we learned anything from The Last Dance, it’s that these guys have long memories, and it seems that as long as we keep asking about it, they’ll be happy to accommodate us.

(The Guardian)

Barack Obama has been making the rounds doing numerous interviews on late night television and beyond as he promotes his new book, and on Sunday, he’ll be joining the number one show in late night, sitting down with Showtime’s Desus & Mero as their latest (and arguably most) illustrious guest.

On Monday, Showtime offered a teaser of the interview showing the two hosts meeting Obama for the first time for their sit down and the former president came well equipped to riff with them. Obama, a lifelong Bulls fan, opened things by roasting the pair’s skills on the basketball court from their previous efforts in hooping with Corey Booker, and put the dagger in them by proceeding to drag their beloved Knicks into it by saying they are probably still good enough to play for the team in Madison Square Garden.

It’s a pretty tremendous opening that certainly sets the tone for what should be one of Obama’s most light-hearted and fun interviews he does on his book tour, as Desus and Mero react as you’d expect with a bit of shock at Obama coming that hard at them out of the gate and enjoying every moment of it. Desus’ “good luck with your little book” was spectacular and one would expect the rest of the interview will be highly entertaining as well. Just don’t expect the hosts to willingly steer the conversation towards the Knicks too much more after this opening shot fired.

40 Years A Prisoner (HBO, 9:00pm EST) — This documentary follows an enduring battle for justice by Mike Africa Jr, who moved to exonerate his parents after they were imprisoned as part of the revolutionary, back-to-nature group MOVE following a law enforcement 1978 raid on their Philadelphia commune. Eyewitness accounts and archival footage trace the steps of the controversial raid four decades later.

Mr. Iglesias: Season 3 (Netflix series) — Stand-up comic Gabriel Iglesias returns as the good-natured high school teacher who’s no longer the student at his alma mater. Unfortunately, he’s antagonized by a bullyish assistant principal, who seems dead set against helping the children reach their full potential.

Swamp Thing (CW, 8:00pm EST) — The creature saves Avery when he attempts to confront it while trekking through the swamp. As it turns out the tuber-guy makes a pretty good nurse.

Tell Me A Story (CW, 9:00pm EST) –Simone’s got mixed feelings about her step-family as Olivia interrogates Tucker, and Simone’s relationship with Jackson gets tested..

Big Sky (CW, 10:00pm EST) — The Ryan Phillippe-starring series continues with a criticism of how the girls’ disappearance was investigated, while team members regroup to showcase individual strengths.

The Late Show With Stephen Colbert — John Dickerson, Emily Bazelon, David Plotz, Greta Van Fleet

Jimmy Kimmel Live — Tim Allen, Stacey Abrams, Ari Lennox

The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon — Taraji P. Henson, Chloe Fineman, Finneas

The Late Late Show With James Corden — Meryl Streep, Billy Eichner

In case you missed these weekend highlights:

Your Honor (Sunday, Showtime 10:00 p.m.) — Bryan Cranston’s intense (although uneven) limited series faces inevitable comparisons to Breaking Bad, and for sure, Cranston’s character executes his most Walter White-like maneuvers since Heisenberg left the building with AMC’s 2013 “Felina” finale. Some The Wire vibes and Defending Jacob vibes resonate throughout as well, and here he’s playing a sort-of everyman (albeit one with more power than Walt), who tangos with the criminal underworld after making an incredibly bad decision that quickly sets off a series of even worse decisions, eventually leading to a sh*tload of collateral damage. And a lot of Panic Faces.

Big Mouth: Season 4 (Netflix) — One of TV’s funniest shows is back to drum up anxiety, courtesy of Tito the Mosquito (who will be voiced by Maria Bamford), in addition to all the hormone monsters that you dearly love. Newcomer voices on the series include Ayo Edebiri replacing Jenny Slate as Missy, along with Zach Galifianakis, Seth Rogen, Josie Totah, Lena Waithe, Quinta Brunson, John Oliver, Sterling K. Brown, Paul Giamatti, Maya Erskine, and Anna Konkle.

The Los Angeles Clippers were supposed to be the prohibitive favorites to win the title last season. And they were, right up until they blew a 3-1 lead to the Denver Nuggets in the Western Conference semifinals and cleared a path for their in-arena rivals to raise yet another championship banner inside their shared arena.

Doc Rivers, who spent seven seasons with the Clippers but had never made it to the conference finals, was the obvious fall guy. His ongoing inability to get them over the hump made his departure inevitable. But his absence doesn’t mean that everyone has quite moved on. Just this week on the All The Smoke podcast, Paul George complained that Rivers had misused last season.

He also criticized Rivers’ coaching and decision-making, particularly during the Denver series. Rivers has apparently heard that criticism, and in response, has reminded George that the person who’s currently filling his seat, new head coach Tyronn Lue, was right there on the sidelines with them and that George can likely expect more of the same next season.

Via Keith Pompey of The Philadelphia Inquirer:

“Hey, listen, I enjoyed coaching him,” Rivers said of George. “So not a lot to say there. Ty Lue was sitting right next to me. So he better hope it’s not adjustments. It ain’t going to be much different.”

Rivers chuckled while lightheartedly mentioning Lue, his close friend, before continuing by saying: “Listen, we lost the game, and I think everybody needs to take ownership. [Me] obviously. We can always do better. Players can play better. So as far as I’m concerned, I’ll leave it there.”

Rivers’ response also comes in the wake of a new report claiming that George’s own teammates were resentful of the preferential treatment he enjoyed last season despite the fact that, in their estimation, he’d done little to deserve it.

Lue, George, and the Clippers have plenty of work ahead to get on the same page if they want to contend this season, while Rivers faces a similar set of challenges in Philadelphia as he tries to get the Sixers to live up to their full potential.

(The Philadelphia Inquirer)