Researchers at the University of Houston have developed a filtration system that can instantly neutralize and kill 99.8% of the coronavirus after a single pass through.
“It’s basically a high-performance COVID-19 killer,” Dr. Garrett Peel of Medistar, who helped craft the design, said according to Fox News.
The filter looks to be an important tool in fighting a virus that can remain in the air for hours and, in turn, spread more readily than viruses like the common flu. Harvard Health says that aerosolized coronavirus can remain in the air for up to three hours.
People who are asymptomatic can easily spread it to multiple people when they talk, breathe, cough, or sneeze.
In a world that has yet to develop a COVID-19 vaccine, an air filtration system is one of the best ways to combat the airborne disease at a time when businesses and schools are set to re-open across the country.
The filter was primarily designed by Zhifeng Ren, director of the Texas Center for Superconductivity at UH, in collaboration with Monzer Hourani, CEO of Medistar, a Houston-based medical real estate development firm.
via PixaBay
“This filter could be useful in airports and in airplanes, in office buildings, schools, and cruise ships to stop the spread of COVID-19,” Ren, a co-author of the research paper said in a press release.
“Its ability to help control the spread of the virus could be very useful for society,” Ren added.
Researchers describe the device as a “catch and kill” filter, made of commercially-available nickel foam that is heated to 392° F. Viruses like COVID-19 are unable to survive in temperatures above 158° F.
“It is porous, allowing the flow of air, and electrically conductive, which allowed it to be heated,” Ren said in a statement. “It is also flexible.”
When heated, the filter is able to kill 99.8% of COVID-19 that passed through it during laboratory tests, along with 99.9% of anthrax spores.
The developers of the filter would like it to be rolled out to organizations in order of importance.
Peel says it should be deployed “beginning with high-priority venues, where essential workers are at elevated risk of exposure — particularly schools, hospitals and health care facilities, as well as public transit environs such as airplanes.”
“We want to roll this out of Texas first and start deploying them in schools, nursing homes,” Peel added. “This unit could be deployed in 60 days.”
Researchers also hope to develop a smaller, desktop version that people can put on their desks at work to protect them from airborne COVID-19.
There are plenty of good TV series on Netflix. Arguably, too many, in fact. If you’re trying to figure out what to watch next, here’s a great place to start with a look at 65 of the best shows on Netflix right now (including some of the best Netflix original series). You can also find recent changes, including new seasons and removed shows, at the bottom of this list, while some of the most recently added entries listed first.
Netflix is giving this true-crime series a reboot which is good news for all the murder mystery junkies out there. UFOs, missing husbands, and a murderous French count still on the run are the highlights of the show’s first six episodes. Get your sleuth hats ready.
Bryan Fuller’s Hannibal is a perfect series to binge-watch, given that the ability to watch back-to-back episodes evens out some of the slow pacing. Hannibal is dark, macabre, and brilliantly creative, and while it has many of the same characters viewers know and appreciate from the movie/book series, it also has an entirely different and unique tone (some would even say better). The murder scenes are equally gruesome and gorgeous, the series’ long arc is as disturbing as it is engrossing, and the acting from Hugh Dancy, Mads Mikkelson, and Laurence Fishburne is superb. It’s a slow, morbidly addictive burn, and viewers must stick around for Michael Pitt’s Mason Verger in season two, if only for one of the most beautifully unsettling sequences ever seen on network television.
Has there ever been a sitcom as downright clever as Community? Aside from the gas leak year, Community was quicker than nearly every other comedy out there, with jokes flying fast but also taking seasons to reach a punchline. After getting caught with a phony degree, former lawyer Jeff Winger (Joel McHale) heads to Greendale Community College to get a legitimate degree. There he gets into increasingly hilarious hijinks with his Spanish study group. Between paintball wars, zombie outbreaks, and the increasingly ridiculous presence of Senor Chang (Ken Jeong), Community is never, ever boring. Quit living in the darkest timeline and get to watching.
Comedian Mae Martin stars in this feel-good dramedy series about a stand-up performer (named Mae), who falls for a young woman named George. Mae’s a recovering addict; George has just emerged from the closet. Sparks fly between the two, but Mae’s past drug use and George’s reluctance to come out to her friends and family threatens to break them up.
There are stories too bizarre, too mind-boggling to be true… and then there’s this seven-part docuseries. Cults, queer romance, exotic cats — this true-crime binge has it all. Is Joe Exotic, a gay, gun-loving conman running an exotic zoo out of his home in Oklahoma, a criminal or an American hero? Did animal rights activist Carole Baskin murder her husband and feed him to her tigers? Why are so many zoo employees missing limbs? These are just a few of the questions you’ll ask while watching this train wreck. Have fun, kids.
Good news: Narcos is back. Even better news: Mexico is basically an entirely revamped show, which means you don’t need to be familiar with past installments to enjoy the wild ride. Diego Luna plays the new big bad, a drug lord looking to expand his reach, while Michael Pena plays the fed tasked with busting his operation. Luna looks to be thoroughly enjoying playing the sleazeball gangster-type, and since this installment is set in the 1980s, expect plenty of decadence, a killer soundtrack, and a ton of cocaine.
Henry Cavill leads this fantasy epic based on a best-selling series of books and a popular video game franchise. The expectations are high, but they’re more than exceeded by Cavill, who plays a mutated monster hunter named Geralt. Showrunner Lauren Schmidt Hissrich laid out for us the changes she made from page to screen, introducing key characters like the sorceress Yennefer and the destined princess Ciri early on, changes that take this show to the next level. It’s a cross between a police procedural and a Lord Of The Rings-style adventure. You’ll love it.
The only thing better than a series starring Paul Rudd is a show starring two Paul Rudds. The funnyman leads this new original series while playing a man named Miles, who seems pretty dissatisfied with his life so far. After agreeing to participate in a mysterious spa treatment that promises a better, more successful life, Miles is left with a practically perfect doppelganger intent on taking his life from him. It’s dark and weird, and did we mention the two Paul Rudds?
Director Ava DuVernay’s limited series about the wrongfully accused men in the Central Park Five case is an emotionally heavy reimagining of a truly tragic event in our history. The series sheds light on racial profiling and corruption in the NYPD as a group of young Black men are targeted for a heinous crime and put on trial with little evidence. It’s a gripping, heartbreaking retelling, but one that feels sadly relevant.
Saturday Night Live and Detroiters alum Tim Robinson creates and stars in this 15-minute sketch comedy series that is perfectly happy to offer up a few irreverent laughs without all of the post-comedy commentary that weighs down other funny shows in 2019. It’s a mixed bag of unconnected stories about toddler pageants and old men out for revenge and how Instagram has warped our social interactions in hilariously bizarre ways. What each of these skits has in common is Robinson’s particular brand of comedy and his unrivaled ability to make you laugh.
Ali Wong and Tiffany Haddish voice the stars of this animated comedy from BoJack Horseman artist Lisa Hanawalt. Wong plays Bertie, a 30-something songbird thrush with debilitating anxiety, a knack for baking, and a truly toxic work environment. Haddish plays her best friend Tuca, a loud-mouthed toucan who loves to party and hates the thought of settling down. The friends try to hold on to their single days, even as Bertie takes the next step in her long-term relationship and Tuca struggles to find her place in the world. It’s a more colorful, comforting world than BoJack, but it’s got the same great humor and surprisingly-thoughtful musings.
Christina Applegate returns to TV with this grief-com about a woman trying to pick up the pieces after her husband is murdered in a horrible hit-and-run accident. Applegate plays the angry, grieving widow with equal parts humor and empathy while Linda Cardellini plays her sunny, optimistic best friend. The two meet in a grief group and navigate the challenges of moving on after loss while also solving a murder mystery. There’s no way you’ll know what to expect here, which is half the fun of watching.
Natasha Lyonne stars in this Groundhog Day-from-hell remake about a woman who’s forced to relive the last day of her life over and over again. It’s been done before, but this series stands out thanks to its mix of dark humor and a tinge of the supernatural. Lyonne is one of the often overlooked OITNB stars, but it looks like this series is giving her a chance to show off her comedic chops as her character, Nadia, endures a constant loop of partying, dying, then waking up to do it all over again. As bleak as the premise is, Lyonne manages to find a silver lining, a universal message that basically read, “The world is sh*t, let’s help each other out if we can.”
Superhero team-ups are a dime a dozen, but the TV adaptation of this award-winning comic series created by Gerard Way — yes, the lead singer of My Chemical Romance — feels wholly unique and thus, totally refreshing. The show follows the story of seven kids, all born on the same day to mothers who didn’t even know they were pregnant. They’re adopted by a mysterious billionaire and trained to use their supernatural abilities to fight evil in the world, but when they grow up, their dysfunctional upbringing catches up with them, and they’re left struggling to live normal lives. It’s all kinds of weird, which is exactly what the genre needs right now.
Kiernan Shipka stars in this witchy revival of a sitcom classic. This Sabrina Spellman is darker than what millennials are used to. As a half-mortal, half-witch, Spellman is an outcast with the magical community and the first season explores the cult-like fervor of magic users, their worship of Satan, and why Sabrina is being pressured to sign her name over to the Dark Lord. The show also tackles issues of romance, friendship, and sexism in clever, crafty ways and with season two newly released, expect things to get even more nightmarish for the Spellman clan.
The UK’s most popular new drama has made its way across the pond. The procedural thriller stars Game of Thrones’ Richard Madden as David Budd, a military vet turned police officer tasked with protecting a high-profile politician during a, particularly dicey time. There’s plenty of suspense and action to string you along, coupled with a vulnerable performance by Madden, who ditches his King of the North swagger to play a man conflicted by his past and his present duty to his country.
Mike Flanagan knows how to do horror, and his latest series for Netflix, The Haunting of Hill House, is proof of that. The show, like the book off which it’s based, follows the fractured Crain family as they try to make peace with their dark and twisted path. Of course, through some carefully-timed flashbacks, we see why the Crain siblings are so messed up: They lived in a haunted house as children, a house that eventually caused the death of their mother. There are plenty of frights to keep horror fans interested in this thriller, but the real point of this show is investigating trauma and its lingering effects. Makes sense that horror is the best way to do that.
Not enough people on the Internet have explained that BoJack Horseman is not what it might seem like. Not enough people raved that it was an often very funny, often very heartbreaking meditation on depression. It’s an animated sitcom about a washed-up horse, and somehow, it’s also an incredibly profound look at deeper themes. It’s amazing, but it may also leave you in a depressive funk for days afterward. Its fourth season even placed it among our best TV shows of 2017, and, thankfully, Season 5 is just as funny and sad as ever.
A throwback and love letter to the early 1980s movies of Steven Spielberg and John Carpenter, the Duffer Brothers’ Stranger Things feels both familiar and new. It’s about a boy named Will (think E.T.‘s Elliot) who is captured by a The Thing-like creature and trapped in a Poltergeist-like world. His mother (Winona Ryder) recruits the local sheriff to investigate Will’s disappearance. Meanwhile, Will’s dorky, Goonies-like best friends take to their bikes to do some sleuthing of their own and eventually befriend an alien-like girl with telepathic powers (the E.T. of the series). Season two continues that vibe as the show dives deeper into government conspiracies and alien monsters intent on wreaking havoc on small-town Indiana. It’s great PG horror/sci-fi, like the blockbusters of the early ’80s, and even if you didn’t come of age in the era, there’s something for everyone to enjoy.
The original UK The Office mainstreamed Ricky Gervais’ awkward, uncomfortable humor, while The Office diluted it (some), layered in one of sitcom’s greatest romances (for four seasons, anyway), and surrounded Steve Carell with a remarkable, quirky supporting cast. The first four seasons still stand as the best workplace comedy in American sitcom history, even if the final four seasons were increasingly mediocre — though the series did redeem itself in the end.
Witty, heartfelt, and funny, you’re not likely to find a more likable sitcom than Parks and Recreation. The first six episodes aren’t very good, but once they figured out what to do with Amy Poehler’s Leslie Knope, the sitcom began to thrive, thanks in huge part to its endearing supporting cast. Parks and Rec is blissful television, and a must watch for any fan of great sitcoms.
The series lost some of the mystique it had gained after its cancellation because Netflix’s season four wasn’t to everyone’s satisfaction — though it flowers with repeat viewings, especially with the recut version of it. Arrested Development still stands as one of the funniest, most inventive, and most influential sitcoms of the generation.
One of the best original shows on Netflix, this prison dramedy is a deeply human, funny, moving, realistic, progressive show about life and the bad decisions we’re all destined to make. OITNB humanizes the dehumanized, transforms labels — felons, thieves, murderers, embezzlers — into real human beings and reminds us that, even in prison, life isn’t put on hold. Life is being led. It’s a remarkably excellent series, and addictive as hell.
In its first season, Better Call Saul quickly put to rest any fears anyone might have had about a spin-off from arguably the greatest drama of all time, Breaking Bad (which sits atop this list). Vince Gilligan and Peter Gould return as showrunners, and they continue to bring the same level of complexity, intensity, and character development to Saul as they did for Breaking Bad. What’s most remarkable about the series, however, is that they managed to transform the Saul character into someone humane and sympathetic while staying true to the same character in the original series. Indeed, Saul is the most detail oriented and perhaps the smartest show on television, and one hell of an intense, suspenseful drama, which is all the more impressive because we know roughly where it will end up.
Ryan Murphy’s horror anthology on FX is an unpredictable tour-de-force that, when it sticks its landing, is one of the best shows on TV. The series chronicles truly terrifying, mind-warping plots across multiple seasons, connecting some, ignoring others. What grounds these outrageous storylines involving haunted hotels, murder houses, insane asylums, cults, and covens is the cast, most notably Jessica Lange, Sarah Paulson, and Evan Peters. Murphy relies on their visceral portrayals of individuals unhinged to sell this whacky, nightmare-inducing rollercoaster and sell they do.
At first glance, this bodice-ripper from Starz reads like the television adaptation of a dime-store paperback romance novel. It’s got time travel, sexy Scottish men in kilts, an arranged marriage, even a bit of witchcraft. But the show, starring Caitriona Balfe and Sam Heughan, elevates itself beyond those tropes, touching on everything from love and loss to the politics behind some of history’s most infamous conflicts. From the highlands to the French court, the series delivers awe-inducing visuals, career-making performances, and the kind of drama to keep you hooked.
Fred Armisen, Bill Hader, and Seth Meyers have created something truly unique with their riff on our culture’s obsession with docu-style TV series. The SNL alums mock the stylistic choices and subjects of other shows of its ilk, with episodes dedicated to everything from Grey Gardens to The Thin Blue Line. And the guest list for this thing is unbelievable.
In Mindhunter, Jonathan Groff plays Holden Ford, a character based on the real-life John E. Douglas (the inspiration for Jack Crawford in the Hannibal series). The series itself is based on the origins of an actual behavioral science unit in the FBI used to study serial killers in the 1970s and 80s. Ford is a young FBI Agent who takes a keen interest in psychology which, in turn, grows into an interest in the psychology of sequential killers. It’s a fascinating exploration into the origins of what now seems commonplace, a science that has inspired dozens of police procedurals. What’s more interesting here, however, is that while Ford is studying serial killers (all of whom are based on actual serial killers from that era), Ford develops his own obsession with serial-killers that mirrors the obsession serial killers have with their victims. It’s engrossing and fascinating. The series comes from Joe Penhall and executive producer David Fincher (who also directs several episodes), and fans of Fincher’s Zodiac will appreciate Mindhunter for its same attention to detail, and the same dedication to character and research over surprising twists and reveals.
If small-town murder mysteries full of camp and supernatural phenomenon are your thing, well then why wouldn’t you watch (or re-watch) Twin Peaks? The series, crafted all the way back in the ’90s by David Lynch, is a cult-favorite and for good reason. With Kyle MacLachlan playing Special Agent Dale Cooper, a poor schmoe who’s called in to investigate the murder of homecoming queen Laura Palmer, he’s met with more than he bargained for. Conspiracies theories and otherworldly beings, time travel, and dwarves in red business suits soon follow. The original series may have ended with cliffhangers and unexplained plot-holes, but with the more recent Showtime revival, now’s as good a time as any to catch up on all the strange events that seem to plague this sleepy town.
This Tina Fey-produced sitcom — which was originally supposed to air on NBC before the network agreed to give it to Netflix — is as dense and irreverent as 30 Rock, but it’s also immensely life-affirming. It’s funny, fast-paced, chock-full of pop-culture references and maybe the easiest Netflix original series to binge-watch. And, like 30 Rock, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt also includes a lot of fun — and unexpected — celebrity cameos and pop culture references throughout its four seasons.
Currently, the highest-rated scripted series on cable television, The Walking Dead is an up-and-down show. When it’s good, it’s phenomenal; when it’s not, it can be a slog (especially in the earlier half of the series, when Frank Darabont was showrunner). Greg Nicotero does fantastic FX work, and the series is particularly compelling because no one — no matter how high they are listed in the credits — is safe from the zombie apocalypse, and the showrunners seem to relish in killing off cast members (other than the almighty Rick Grimes). Some of the binge-watching value, however, is lost because it’s so difficult to avoid being spoiled to plot points of one of the most talked about series on TV. Nevertheless, unlike almost any television drama, up until the sixth season, The Walking Dead improved with age, Beware of the cliffhangers, however, in season six, and a precipitous fall off in quality thereafter.
Although the original trial took place 20 years ago, and despite the fact that anyone watching the series already knows the outcome, The People vs. O.J. Simpson somehow remains a tense, suspenseful watch. Buoyed by incredible performances (the season was nominated for over 20 Emmy Awards, winning 8), The People vs. O.J. Simpson recreates the events following the murder of Ronald Goldman and Nicole Brown Simpson and recasts them in the light of what we know now. In its second season, the shows moves focus on the assassination of design legend Gianni Versace by Andrew Cunanan. While not as strong as the amazing ensemble in Season 1, Season 2 boasts memorable portrayals of conflicted, complex figures by Darren Criss, Penelope Cruz, Édgar Ramírez, and (surprisingly) Ricky Martin.
Sherlock is the best iteration of the Sherlock Holmes ever to air on television. The British series from Steven Moffat stars Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman, and despite the fact that it has been updated, it brilliantly captures the same spirit of Arthur Conan Doyle’s classic stories. It’s fast-paced, engrossing, brilliantly acted, often very funny, and frequently tragic.
Intimate, funny, warm and kind, Master of None confidently tackles issues of sex and race from a perspective original to mainstream television. Creator, writer, and star Aziz Ansari loads the sitcom with smart observations and wry humor, and when it comes to dating as a thirty-something, Ansari just gets it. Sweet, sentimental, but never sappy, the mold-breaking Master of None may be the most thoughtful and well-considered dating sitcom on television.
Packed full of hairspray, ’80s nostalgia, leotards, and neon eyeshadow, 2017’s GLOW surprised us all with a comedy about a group of unconventional women wrestling with stereotypes in and out of the ring. Led by Alison Brie and Marc Maron, the show is both a subversive commentary on issues of gender equality and sexism, and a raucous imagining of what goes on behind the scenes of an adult women’s wrestling league. In other words, it’s a damn good time. Brie carries the series, playing a struggling actress forced to take a “role” in this televised nonsense, but she’s by no means a heroine. In fact, it’s her battle to find her character and herself (while making amends for her bad behavior along the way) that’s so entertaining. Well, that and some good ol’ fashioned body slamming. Season two focuses the spotlight on the supporting cast as the women ready for their television debuts and contend with sexual harassment and misogyny in the workplace.
Riverdale is a dark teen comedy based on characters from the Archie comics. It mixes in elements of a conventional teen drama — romance, small-town life, and the high-school ecosystem — with a compelling, adult murder mystery. The series takes place in a small-town with a 1950s vibe (despite being firmly set in the present) where a high-school teenager is found dead under mysterious circumstances that implicate much of the community as suspects. Riverdale is powered not just by the mystery, but by characters who are instantly likable (Betty, Veronica, and Jughead are all standouts) and easy to invest in. The mystery is so incredibly intriguing that it’s almost impossible not to get wrapped up in it as the storyline guides us through numerous red herrings. It’s a madly addictive series, occasionally campy, and just self-aware enough not to take itself too seriously.
5 seasons, 22 episodes + interactive film | IMDb: 8.8/10
It cannot be stressed enough how amazing Britain’s Black Mirror is. It’s severely biting social commentary about the current and future technological age in the form of twisted, dark Twilight Zone episodes. It’s an incredible (and incredibly short) four seasons of television, and episode for episode, perhaps the best series on this list. Watch one episode, and you’ll be hooked.
Netflix’s original series Dear White People builds on the foundations laid by Spike Lee’s drama of the same name. The show kicks off during the aftermath of an event that happened in the film – a blackface party held by a white fraternity on a fictional college campus. Sam, a radio personality and student at the school, covers the fallout for her listeners and serves as a pseudo-narrator to all the goings-on at school. There are brief moments of humor and plenty of satire, but watching these kids deal with racist learning institutions and police brutality and ignorance from the privileged peers feels uncomfortable real and relevant. It’s a must-watch, not only because the acting is superb, and the storylines are rich, but because you’ll probably learn something you didn’t know but should.
Rectify is maybe the best series on television that no one watched. Aden Young, in a soulful performance, plays Daniel Holden, a man locked up and put on death row nearly 20 years ago for raping and murdering his girlfriend. However, DNA evidence has come to light that casts doubt on his guilt, so the court system has no choice but to release him. Is he actually guilty? Or is he innocent and misunderstood? That’s the question at the heart of the series, and the question the people in his small town, including his family, have to ask themselves. Is this man we’re letting back into our family a murderer and a rapist, or is he the kind, thoughtful man he appears to be? Rectify is a beautiful show about appreciating life that manages to perfectly straddle the line between bleak and hopeful, and quietly features some of the best performances on television.
Exec produced by Steven Soderbergh and written, directed, and created by Scott Frank, who wrote Logan and Out of Sight, Godless, is equal parts a feminist Western and s a show about fathers and sons. The series is set in the 1880s in the small mining town of La Belle, where nearly all of the town’s men have died in a mining accident. Enter Roy Goode (Jack O’Connell), a charming gunslinger on the run from the mentor he double-crossed, Frank Griffin (Jeff Daniels), who — along with his crew out desperadoes — had already murdered everyone in another small town for harboring Goode. The series ultimately pits a town of mostly women against a brutal, merciless outlaw gang. Scoot McNairy, Thomas Brodie-Sangster and Sam Waterston play lawmen, but the standouts in Godless are Downton Abby‘s nearly unrecognizable shotgun wielding pioneer woman Michelle Dockery and Merritt Wever, a bisexual woman all out of f–ks to give. It’s a tremendously good series buoyed by beautiful cinematography, poetic language, a few great shoot-outs, and fine performances from the entire cast. It’s one of the best Netflix series of 2017.
Daredevil is unquestionably the best superhero series of all time. It has the addictive qualities of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but it’s darker and more intense than any of those films. It’s harsh, with brutal eye-popping fight sequences. It has an excellent cast (led by Charlie Cox as the title character) with tons of chemistry, and nails the tone of the source material.
Television’s all-time best political drama The West Wing is Aaron Sorkin at his absolute best, working with one of the finest ensemble casts in television history. The show wavers after the fourth season (when Sorkin left), but it picks back up in its final season (with Jimmy Smits and Alan Alda). Here’s a celebration of the greatest fictional President of all time to get you warmed up for it.
The animated, coming-of-age comedy from Nick Kroll is full of familiar voices and even more familiar life problems. Centered on a group of pre-pubescent friends, Kroll voices a younger version of himself, a kid named Andrew who’s going through some embarrassing life changes like inconvenient erections and strange wet dreams and bat-mitzvah meltdowns. All these traumatizing and hilarious happenings are usually caused by Maurice, Andrew’s own Hormone Monster (also voiced by Kroll) who takes pleasure (literally) in abusing the poor kid. As painfully accurate as the show is, if you’re lucky enough to be removed from that angst-ridden era of life, you’ll probably appreciate the humor in all of it.
As an episodic series, Jessica Jones occasionally falters in its first season. Jones is a private detective with certain special powers, but the series doesn’t put her P.I. talents to much use, instead focusing on one storyline surrounding the big bad, Kilgrave (David Tennant) for the entire 13 episodes. Tennant’s character, however, is the best reason to watch the series — he’s captivating yet repugnant, alluring yet vile — and the themes of rape and domestic abuse resonate loudly. Unfortunately, when Kilgrave is not onscreen, the series drifts, and that’s especially apparent in Season 2. Krysten Ritter’s title character is too often dour and sarcastic, robbing the series of some much-needed levity. Still, it’s a captivating, thematically-rich series that covers ground no other superhero series would dare to explore, and while that doesn’t make it the most entertaining Marvel series, it is the bravest and most unique among the Netflix originals.
In theory, American Vandal sounds silly and sophomoric, and it is, but it’s also a genuinely brilliant, incredibly clever, smartly written satire of true-crime documentaries. It plays just like any other true crime docuseries — interviews, investigations, multiple suspects, and numerous conspiracy theories — only the crime here is not a murder. In its first season, it’s a high-school student who has been accused by the school board of spray painting dicks on 27 cars, a crime that threatens his ability to graduate. It’s a brilliant whodunnit that just happens to also be the best parody of 2017, and it even took home a Peabody Award. The show’s follow-up season trades dick picks for explosive diarhhea which is just as fun, if not ten times as gross.
Maybe the wittiest, pop-culture rich drama ever, Gilmore Girls has nevertheless managed to hold up incredibly well over the years. It’s a great show to watch with a new generation of television viewers, it’s a great show to watch while bingeing on food, and it’s a great show to re-watch many times. The relationship between single mother Lorelai and her daughter, Rory, never gets old.
A young boy is found dead in a seemingly idyllic small town, and the detectives charged with solving the case turn up twist after twist in tracking down the murderer. Despite its familiar premise (see also: Twin Peaks, The Killing), Broadchurch relies on its ensemble cast — specifically the impeccable David Tennant and Olivia Colman — to keep viewers caring after each red herring is tossed back into the ocean. The first series centers on the hunt for the killer while the second is on both the suspect’s trial and a reopened case from the past, but they both don’t let up in intrigue. A word of warning, though: This isn’t one of those TV dramas you should binge even if you want to. It gets heavy and emotionally exhausting, and unrestrained streaming kinda negates the effect of the show’s mysteries.
Set in the afterlife, The Good Place sees a lazy, entitled selfish, Arizona woman Eleanor Shellstrop (Kristen Bell) enter into “Heaven” only to discover that — due to a mixup — she was incorrectly assigned. With the help of her new friends and, Shellstrop endeavors to be a better person and earn her place in Heaven. In the early goings, the high-concept premise feels like it’s going to run out of runway, but Mike Schur (Parks and Recreation) continually finds new directions to take the show and the characters, as the show humorously and sweetly tackles an array of moral dilemmas before arriving at a surprising twist ending. It’s a charming, clever and delightful series with a freshly-imagined approached that only improves as the season progresses and new wrinkles are explored, while Ted Danson is his usual remarkable self. It’s a fantastic comedy, one of the best TV shows on network television in recent years.
The long-running Showtime series understands better than any other drama on television what it’s like to be poor in America. Set in Chicago, Shameless follows the lives of the Gallagher family as they struggle beneath the poverty line to make ends meet. The family is afflicted with alcoholism, drug addiction, mental illness, poor decision-making skills, and the kind of terrible luck that so often follows poor families, but they’ve also got each other, their resilience, and a determination to break the cycle, but in Shameless, impoverishment is the boogeyman that always comes back, hilariously and heartbreakingly.
Another British import, Peaky Blinders is roughly the Netflix UK equivalent of HBO’s Boardwalk Empire, taking place in the same time period and covering similar terrain. Peaky has one thing that Boardwalk does not, however, and that’s the piercing, intense Cillian Murphy. The show also features Tom Hardy as a phenomenal recurring character debuting in season two (along with Noah Taylor).
At once intimate and sweeping, The Crown presents an inside view of the ascension of Queen Elizabeth II, played by Claire Foy, and the first few years of her reign. John Lithgow is featured as the indomitable Winston Churchill, struggling with the ignominy of age at the end of his career. Churchill’s support and mentorship of Elizabeth, despite his limitations, creates an important emotional center around which various historical events turn. Elizabeth’s relationship with her husband, Prince Phillip (Matt Smith) is also wonderfully explored; his role as consort is one that he by turns delights in and rebels against. The production spared no expense in painstakingly recreating the physical environments and rigid protocols that constrained and defined the royal family. The challenges posed by modernity and the post-colonial period are filtered through the Palace’s political structure, in which despite her role, Elizabeth’s personal needs and wishes are continually subsumed to protocol and appearance. This series will appeal to anyone who enjoys costume drama, but it is also a fascinating exploration of the post-WWII period and the development of a monarch who managed to maintain and even expand the popularity and stability of the British Monarchy against significant odds.
Bloodline is engrossing, so much so that somewhere along the way, you may find yourself wondering if you skipped an episode. You’ll start in on episode 7, fall into a trance, and wake up somewhere around episode 10, wondering what happened to the last four hours of your life. Ben Mendelsohn will hook you immediately, but after four or five episodes into season one — once the pieces begin to fall into place — the story will sweep you along toward the dark and sickly satisfying end, capping the season off with four of the best episodes in the short but stellar history of Netflix’s original programming. Unfortunately, the following seasons — while still a fine TV — don’t live up to the first.
Based on a Spanish telenovela, Jane the Virgin plays more like a brilliant but genial satire of conventional telenovelas. Gina Rodriguez plays the virgin here, who is impregnated through an accidental artificial insemination. Matters are complicated, however, because she has to break the news of her pregnancy to her deeply religious family, as well as her fiancé, with whom she has never had sex. Jane also develops feelings for another man who just so happens to be the baby’s father. It sounds like a premise that could not sustain itself beyond 5 episodes, but the writing is so good and the characters so delightful that Jane never gets bogged down by its premise. It’s a genuinely delightful, heartwarming show, and Gina Rodriguez lights up the screen every second she is on it.
Fox’s comedy about a quirky girl who moves in with three male roommates quickly evolved from a pretty straightforward premise to become one of the best shows on TV. Zooey Deschanel plays Jess, a teacher who’s forced to room with three other guys, Nick (Jake Johnson), Schmidt (Max Greenfield), and Winston (Lamorne Morris) after she discovers her boyfriend’s been cheating on her. For the next seven seasons, the gang grows to become close friends — getting married, having babies, experiencing sympathy PMS, and getting stuck in Mexico, among other disasters. Still, it’s the chemistry between the four mains that makes every outlandish episode work.
House Of Cards, Netflix’s first major foray into original programming, is worth every cent of its $100 million production budget, featuring searing performances, a droll sense of humor, slick writing, engrossing plot-lines, and Kevin Spacey chewing the face off the scenery. The first season is phenomenal, but the show rapidly goes downhill through its six seasons with some sparks of life in scattered seasons, with the final season focused on Robin Wright’s Claire Underwood being cluttered at best.
Michael C. Hall is absolutely terrific as a blood spatter analyst for the Miami police department who moonlights as a serial killer and tries to keep his two lives separate. There’s a great opening season, a fantastic fourth season, and in between the two, a couple of decent ones. Do yourself a favor, however, and don’t bother with Dexter‘s final four seasons. It’s a testament to how good the first and fourth seasons were that it still gains a place upon this list, despite a deeply disappointing final season.
A musical series about a woman who leaves her prestigious job in Manhattan to follow an ex-boyfriend to a small town in California, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is like no other show on a show on television. The premise is not unlike that of Felicity, but the tone is unique: Quirky and hilarious on the surface, but dark and subversive underneath. As co-creator (along with Aline Brosh McKenna) and star, Golden Globe winner Rachel Bloom provides catchy songs with irreverent lyrics that offer dark meditations on depression, insecurity, and the challenges of balancing careers and love lives. Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is funny, feminist and infectious.
Once the Wachowskis’ underappreciated sci-fi series establishes its characters, there’s at least one profoundly moving moment in every episode. Sense8 is rich with brilliant ideas, and, though they’re not always executed with perfect logic, the chemistry between the characters is undeniable. It’s impossible not to root for them, to feel and experience their ups and downs, their confusion and heartbreak, and, most of all, their love. The Wachowskis first foray into television is at once romantic, life-affirming, and thought-provoking.
It’s rare that older women get a chance to shine on a half-hour comedy series, but if your stars happen to be Lily Tomlin and Jane Fonda, you’d be insane not to have all the action center on them. Grace and Frankie follows the pair as they discover that their husbands have been carrying on an affair with each other. The news throws life into chaos, forcing Grace and Frankie to room together and pick up the pieces. Along the way, there are family squabbles, online dating drama, and a battle over the ladies’ organic lube company but at the heart of the show are these two women who bond after a devastating ordeal and support one another during a time of change and growth. Did we mention organic lube? There’s that, too.
Travelers is a sci-fi series co-produced by Netflix and a Canadian television network Showcase starring Eric McCormick (Will & Grace). It’s a light sci-fi drama about people from hundreds of years in the future whose consciences are sent back to the present day to take the place of others who are already about to die. They’re sent back, a la Terminator, to prevent a bleak future from taking place. In the present day, this group of people is tasked with missions to prevent the future dystopia from happening, but they also have to acclimate into the lives of their host bodies. It is a quintessential Netflix show: Easy-to-binge, madly addictive, fun as hell, and immediately engrossing. While it certainly borrows heavily from other sci-fi shows and movies, it does an excellent job of shaking it up and bringing fresh life to the genre.
A remake of a 1970s sitcom produced by 94-year-old iconic television producer Norman Lear, One Day at a Time manages to not only match its predecessor but miraculously improve upon it. This new version centers on a Cuban America family headed by a single mom (Justina Machado) raising three kids with the help of her mom (Rita Moreno). It’s broad jokes and laugh track feels somewhat out of place on the streaming service, but the jokes still land and more importantly, the characters connect in an honest way as they attempt to live on a modest nurse’s salary and maintain their Cuban heritage while adapting to modern progressivism (much like Fresh Off the Boat). It’s more poignant sitcom than it is funny, but it’s a warm, loving look at difficulties of single parenting that resonates as much today as it did in the ’70s.
Eugene Levy and Catherine O’Hara star in this Canadian sitcom about a wealthy family forced to scale down their extravagant lifestyle with hilarious results. Levy plays Johnny Rose, a rich video-store magnate who loses his fortune when his business manager fails to pay his taxes. O’Hara plays his wife, Moira, a former soap opera star who, along with her husband and their two pampered children, must move to a town called Schitt’s Creek. Johnny bought the town as a joke when the family had more money than they could spend, but now, the town and its residents serve as a comedic wake-up call for a guy who has problems rooting himself in reality. Levy is brilliant in this thing and it’s a damn shame the show is so overlooked by American audiences. Let’s change that.
Ryan Murphy’s fashionable ’80s drama imagines the rise of the world of ball culture. Murphy focuses on warring houses in the scene, painting a myriad of queer portraits about gays, lesbians, and trans warriors, forging their own path amidst bigotry and hatred in New York City. There’s couture, there are catfights, and there’s plenty of vogueing, but there’s also nuanced, heartfelt portrayals of figures who paved the way for the acceptance of this fringe community.
On paper, Happy! feels more like an Adult Swim-inspired fever dream than a Syfy series. Disgraced detective-turned-hitman Nick Sax (Christopher Meloni) meets his new best friend and partner, a lovable blue unicorn that only Sax can see named Happy (voiced by Patton Oswalt), who tasks him with rescuing a young girl who’s been abducted by a maniac Santa Claus. It’s a ridiculously violent and dark, with Sax getting hurt more than Harry and Marv in both Home Alone movies combined, with enough comedy and twists to keep you bingeing episode after episode. It’s a fun, over-the-top show, and it relishes in its unique elements.
Survivor was one of the many shows that saw its production shut down in the middle of things due to the coronavirus pandemic. But as COVID-19 cases continue to rise in various places around the world and production still hasn’t resumed, it’s now the first major show to get pulled from a network’s fall lineup because of the pandemic.
Variety reported on Tuesday that the long-running CBS reality show won’t be in its traditional CBS timeslot this fall. The show, which was shut down two weeks into filming back in March, is far from finished and will not be done in time for the schedule.
Variety has learned that CBS has pulled the long-running reality competition series from its fall 2020-2021 lineup. Production on the season, which will take place in Fiji, was delayed back in March due to the coronavirus pandemic.
According to an individual with knowledge of the production, CBS and officials in Fiji are still evaluating the best time to start production due to the heightened health and safety concerns involved.
Survivor has had some challenges to overcome in the past, including evacuating the entire cast. In its place, Season 32 of The Amazing Race will air on Wednesdays at 8 p.m. in the fall, as it was originally scheduled to run in the spring before the pandemic hit.
While the NBA continues to ramp up in its Orlando bubble, The Basketball Tournament has provided a respite for hoops enthusiasts over the last ten days. The $1 million, winner-take-all tournament began on July 4 and, because of COVID-19 considerations, the entire field entered a fully quarantined bubble in Columbus, Ohio for the duration of the proceedings. On Tuesday evening, the always-entertaining TBT came to its conclusion in competitive fashion, with the Golden Eagles ultimately securing both the competitive glory and the seven-figure team prize.
The Golden Eagles, a squad comprised of former Marquette standouts, made an impressive run to the finals in 2019 before falling just short, while Sideline Cancer pulled off a Cinderella run to make the finals as the No. 22 seed in the tournament, including a walk-off three-pointer to down four-time champion Overseas Elite in the semifinal. In appropriate fashion, the two teams put on quite a show in the finals, even if the early going was a bit ominous for the underdog.
The eventual champs took an 8-0 lead out of the gate, threatening to put some significant space between them and the challengers.
Withstanding the early haymaker from the Golden Eagles, Sideline Cancer actually took a one-point lead after the first quarter and, in short, the entire game was closely contested. Mo Creek made one of the highlights of the night with a sneaky, heads-up play to beat the halftime buzzer and give Sideline Cancer a one-point lead at the break.
It was more of the same in the second half, with neither team able to pull away. In fact, the Elam Ending was set with the two teams tied at 70-70, meaning the first team to score eight points (and reach the 78-point mark) would claim the million-dollar payday.
Once the target score was set, the two teams continued to trade blows, with impressive shotmaking as the conclusion approached.
Finally, 38-year-old former Marquette guard Travis Diener knocked down the game-winner on a corner three-pointer to give the team its first TBT title ever.
Diener was the hero of the night, with Darius Johnson-Odom later named the MVP of the tournament after scoring 15 points in the final and averaging more than 17 points per game in the event. Overall, though, it was a full team effort for the Golden Eagles and, after coming tantalizingly close in 2019, the collection of (mostly) former Marquette standouts pulled off quite a run in cutting down the nets in Columbus.
At long last, The Sandman is getting its due beyond the pages of Neil Gaiman’s genre-stretching, sprawling comic book series. Not as a film, of course, since the dark-fantasy saga’s widely accepted by fans to be unadaptable as a movie. Gaiman even once declared that “I’d rather see no Sandman movie made than a bad Sandman movie.”
Yet the project will leap to life soon in a few ways. The DC Vertigo title will be adapted as a Netflix series with a premiere date to be determined, but fans don’t have to wait that long for a fix. An Audible reading of the whole saga — beginning with a first installment that encapsulates the first three graphic novels (Preludes and Nocturnes, The Doll’s House, and Dream Country) — will debut on July 15. The cast is sheer madness to behold: James McAvoy headlines as Morpheus, the God of Dreams, with Kat Dennings as his older sister (and adorable goth), Death. Also on board? Michael Sheen (as Lucifer!), Riz Ahmed, Samantha Morton, Andy Serkis, Taron Egerton, and more.
Gaiman was gracious enough to nerd out with us about Audible’s The Sandman reading. We also discussed the enduring legacy and impact of the comic book series, and we dove into why he prioritized the telling of women’s narratives, which was something of a nerd-centered rarity before the 1989 series debut. The fantasy maestro also revisited a question that only he could have conjured up: “What happens if a werewolf bites a goldfish?” In doing so, he dreamed up a definitive answer for us.
People often tell you that The Sandman changed their lives. Are there any stories in particular that stick out for you?
I think the stories that impacted me the most over the years, they tended to be from people who told me how the character of Death got through things that felt impossible to get through. And whether it was getting through the death of a baby, getting through the death of a sibling, or getting through the death of a loved one. In a couple of cases, it was people who came close themselves and come away from it. With all of those things, I wound up feeling honored that something that I created helped people to get through dark times.
You mentioned Death, and Kat Dennings is voicing that role. What does she bring to Death, and how’s her dynamic with James McAvoy as Dream/Morpheus?
Kat is such a remarkable performer, and as an actress, I always used to be very fascinated because I knew Kat as an actress, and I loved her work, and with something like 2 Broke Girls, there was a quote [that said, paraphrased], “She’s good, but they’re only asking her to do one of the hundred things that she can do.” She gets to do that one thing, over and over again, and people are going to forget all the things that she can do.
One of the things that I love about her performance as Death is that, with Kat, we get her cheerful side, her funny side, to land a gag. But we also get her deep, we get her angry, we get her very, very real… it’s funny but absolutely heartbreaking. I think in “The Sound Of Her Wings,” where it’s her and James McAvoy as Death and Dream, you get to really feel that you have a relationship between siblings. It’s kind-of magical.
The Sandman has comforted readers for decades. How do you think this Audible reading might resonate during a time when life feels nightmarish?
I don’t know. Your guess is as genuinely as good as mine on this. The least that I would be happy with is if it gives people eleven hours of entertainment and distraction that they might not otherwise have. Because we need all the distraction and entertainment that we can get. If it makes people think, even better. If it makes people ponder, again, even better.
I vividly remember reading the “Calliope” story (from Dream Country). That was the first time I learned the word “bezoar,” and that’s when it dawned on me exactly how much effort that you put into women’s narratives. Yet it also feels like that was a story about your own writer’s block?
It was! I was going to write, well, that story wasn’t what was meant to be written there. It was meant to be a story called “Sex And The Violets.” And it was going to be about an old [person] living in London, and it was going to be about — gosh, it’s been so long — the spiritual cost of making [things up in fiction]. And it didn’t really work, I remember, I think I have several versions on my hard disk somewhere. And I thought, really, what is this story about? It’s about desperation, it’s about the need for ideas, and suddenly, it became something about somebody, and with a focus, incredibly fast.
You of course wrote Black Orchid initially, but The Sandman was still one of the first female-forward comic book series in the U.S. You actually increased the number of women who’d visit comic book stores.
It was a slow process as well. I mean, the first year of writing The Sandman, I don’t think women would have been saying that. And I say that, and now somebody’s going to be like, “No, I was there!” At the time, they were incredibly few and far between, mostly the people who were in those stores were young males in between the ages of 15 and 21. And then it changed, and as those young men between the ages of 15 and 21 would give, I think, their girlfriends and would-be girlfriends The Sandman to read. And then the girlfriends would say, “Do you have any more of these?” And then the girlfriends would go and get their own copies of The Sandman, and it wasn’t long before it was a 50-50 thing, half males and half females.
Do you feel that, these days in comics, that there’s been progress toward more female-forward narratives? People have pushed back on problematic tropes, but overall, how are things going?
I come from a world in which there were two mainstream female comic artists … and I would have used others, but those were the two main female comic artists at the time. We had lots of women in editorial roles and marketing and business roles, but we did not have enough women writers, and we definitely did not have enough women readers at the time. And my goal was that there would be comics for everybody. It was a medium that I loved, and it should be a medium that everybody loved. It seemed to be really weird that the comic stores were very often where women and girls were not welcome, and it seemed just as weird and wrong that a lot of the comics were essentially, you know, pre-adolescent male power fantasies. And that seemed particularly weird to me because I, as a kid, had loved “girl comics.” In the U.K., you have fabulous comics for girls, and they had better stories than the ones here. Comparing what we have now to what we had then, we’ve come worlds. Comparing where we are now to an ideal world, I think we still have a long way to go, but for me, I just look at how far we’ve come.
One well-known quote of yours is about the absurdity of being asked for writing advice. At the time, you posited, “What happens if a werewolf bites a goldfish?” And you never really answered that question, so will you do so now?
[Laughs] Oh yeah. You’d definitely get a goldfish who would turn into a wolf at the full of the moon and shiver oafishly around the house looking for victims, and possibly head out into lakes. Then in the morning, he’d turn back into a goldfish. The dangerous thing is how you get the goldfish back into the bowl. It’d probably break the bowl. So, you’d have to hope. I think you’d have a werefish, or a fishwolf, who’s smart enough to hop out of the goldfish bowl, transform into a wolf, go on a ravenous trail of destruction and then, just before the moon would move behind the clouds, get back into the goldfish bowl.
You have truly made my week by finishing that story. Thank you.
Saturday Night Live co-head writer and Weekend Update host Michel Che will have another writing project to work on: an still-untitled HBO Max project that was announced on Tuesday. Che, who appeared on People’s Party last month, will helm a project for the streaming service that debuted in June.
According to an announcement the service made on Tuesday, Che will develop the sketch comedy show with a six-episode arc that will each address a different topic such as police brutality or unemployment. As the announcement puts it, the show will use sketches and vignettes to “illustrate what it feels like to experience this from a black vantage point.
“Michael brings a distinct comedic perspective as he illustrates the uncomfortable truths across multiple topics” Suzanna Makkos, executive vice president of original comedy and animation at HBO Max said in a statement. “We look forward to sharing his unique vision and necessary point of view with our audiences.”
Che, who has used Weekend Update to address similar issues in the past as a running bit, expressed his enthusiasm for the project in the statement. He also joked about hopefully getting to work on the show amid the COVID-19 pandemic still raging across the world.
“I’m really excited to be working on this show with HBO Max” Che said. “It’s a project I’ve been thinking about for a while and we have a lot of sketches we want to shoot so please wear your masks so that we can go into production.”
30 Rock is the latest NBC comedy to get a reunion show during the age of coronavirus, with a one-off special slated for Thursday on NBC. But according to a report, the episode won’t be as easy to find on traditional TV in some markets as the mothership would like. According to Vulture, some NBC affiliates are essentially boycotting the episode because of concerns that it’s essentially an ad for Peacock, the network’s upcoming streaming service.
Vulture reported on Tuesday that about half of the televisions in America won’t be able to watch the special on NBC on Thursday thanks to a large number of TV station groups deciding to pre-empt the show with other programming.
Vulture has learned that Gray Television, Hearst, Nexstar, Tegna, and Sinclair Broadcast Group — huge TV-station groups whose NBC affiliates reach about half the country’s TV homes — have told NBC that they are planning to preempt Thursday’s remotely filmed hour.
If it seems strange that NBC affiliates would not want the eyeballs that will likely come with Liz Lemon and Co’s return to television, there’s a lot more at play behind the scenes with the 30 Rock reunion than you may anticipate. As Vulture notes, the show is something NBC’s sales department pitched in place of a more traditional up-front, and they’re worried the service will essentially take eyeballs from traditional network TV.
The apparent reason for the decision, per sources familiar with the matter: The station owners think the 30 Rock reunion, which was produced by the NBCUniversal ad-sales division as a replacement for the usual upfront presentation, is too much of a promotion for the company’s new Peacock streaming platform. Station owners are understandably worried about Peacock siphoning viewers from linear TV, particularly since the new platform will offer next-day reruns of NBC shows on its premium tier (and week-late access to reruns on its free level). Reps for station groups contacted by Vulture, including Gray and Sinclair, did not respond to requests for comment. An NBC rep confirmed the preemptions but declined further comment.
NBC, however, owns its own stations in big markets like New York and Los Angeles, so viewers there will have plenty of options to see 30 Rock this week. Despite it missing on some main NBC channels elsewhere, it won’t be hard to find. According to the network, the pre-recorded special will rebroadcast on USA, Bravo, E!, Oxygen, Syfy, and CNBC. It will also, of course, be available on Peacock the next day.
Michael Beasley was signed by the Nets last week as a substitute player after they had three players test positive for COVID-19 that either opted out or were ruled out of the NBA restart in Orlando. With Wilson Chandler opting out for family health reasons, the Nets were left with four open roster spots.
Beasley, along with Jamal Crawford and Tyler Johnson, were brought in to give the Nets a much-needed offensive boost with Kyrie Irving and Spencer Dinwiddie out of the restart. However, on Tuesday, reports emerged that Beasley had become the eighth Nets player since March to test positive for the novel coronavirus from Tim Bontemps and Malika Andrews of ESPN and The Athletic’s Shams Charania.
Nets forward Michael Beasley tested positive for coronavirus, returned home and his roster status is up in the air, sources tell @TheAthleticNBA@Stadium.
According to Bontemps and Andrews, Beasley needed to test negative for six consecutive days after signing before he was allowed to join the team since he had not been part of testing prior to entering the bubble, and it appears that system caught this case before he interacted with his teammates.
It’s unfortunate for the Nets, who have recently also added Lance Thomas and Donta Hall to their roster, and will be restarting the season with a roster that is almost unrecognizable from the one they had in March. As both reports note, it’s unclear whether Beasley will attempt to rejoin the Nets in the bubble at some point in the future if he is cleared and can make it through another quarantine period in Orlando without a positive test.
Depending on who you ask, Solo: A Star Wars Story is either an unmitigated disaster of a movie or an underrated gem that people judged a little too harshly when it arrived just a few months after the highly contentious Star Wars: The Last Jedi. But one thing is for certain: the film’s disappointing box office sent Disney and Lucasfilm scrambling, as standalone films for Obi-Wan Kenobi, Boba Fett, and Yoda were reportedly shelved along with plans for a sequel to Solo, which was originally envisioned as a new trilogy of films.
Since then, there’s been very little movement on the Solo front save for ever-present rumors — emphasis on rumors — about maybe finishing the film’s story on Disney+. Of course, any plans for bringing back the young Han Solo would probably require the participation of Alden Ehrenreich. In a new profile in Esquire, the actor reveals that he took a few years off after the whirlwind production of being in a Star Wars film, and he hasn’t even kept up on the franchise. During the interview, he knew nothing of The Mandalorian or The Rise of Skywalker. However, Ehrenreich admitted that despite everything that went on with the first movie, he wouldn’t rule out coming back as the classic smuggler.
“It depends on what it is. It depends on how it’s done. It depends if it feels innate to the story,” he told Esquire. This naturally led to a follow-up about whether he’s heard anything specific regarding the ongoing tale of Han’s early days:
“No, I don’t know anything about that. I mean, you know, I think our movie was kind of the last of the conventional-era Star Wars movie release time.”
Just… any news through the Star Wars grapevine? “I’ve heard soooome stuff, but nothing concrete.”
It’s not much, but there are fans of Ehrenreich’s turn as Han Solo who will probably appreciate this tiny glimmer of hope. As tiny as it may be.
In 1945, Lily Ebert, now 90, was liberated from a German munitions factory where she worked as slave labor after being transferred from the Auschwitz death camp.
A few weeks after being liberated, an American soldier shared some words of positivity with her, “The start to a new life. Good luck and happiness,” he wrote on a German banknote.
The simple gesture was life-changing for Ebert and the banknote became one of her most treasured keepsakes.
“This soldier was the first human being who was kind to us,” she told NBC News. “It was the first time after this terrible life that somebody was kind and I knew that somebody wants to help.”
Lily Ebert is the woman with the soldier’s arm around her.via Dov Forman / Twitter
Ebert’s mother, brother, and sister were all killed at Auschwitz. Her two younger sisters were liberated with her at the munitions factory. She believes that she survived the ordeal due to her responsibility to take care of her sisters.
“I promised myself that if I survived by some miracle, I would tell the world what happened there,” Ebert said. “The next generation and next generations should know the story so that something like that should not be repeated to any human being ever.”
Ebert kept the banknote in a photo album at her home in London where it was discovered by her great-grandson, 16-year-old Dov Forman. Forman had taken it upon himself to start documenting his great-grandmother’s stories as a survivor so they would never be forgotten.
“My great-grandma obviously isn’t going to be around forever and her story will eventually become my whole family’s responsibility to carry on,” Forman said.
Intrigued by the transcription on the banknote, Foreman tweeted out a photo of the bill along with photographs of the unknown soldier and Ebert taken a few days after liberation.
The only clue to the man’s identity was an inscription on the banknote that reads: “Assistant to Chaplain Schacter.”
Yesterday my great Grandma (Lily Ebert – an Auschwitz survivor) showed me this bank note- given to her as a gift by… https://t.co/rDuPbpFFaT
The “Chaplain Schacter” eluded to on the bill was Chaplain Herschel Schacter, an American Orthodox rabbi who served as a chaplain in the Third Army’s VIII Corps. Schacter participated in the liberation of the Buchenwald concentration camp and helped relocate survivors, including Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel.
The tweet went viral and Forman received responses from all over the world. Eventually, he learned the identity of the solider, Private Hyman Shulman from New Jersey.
In late 1944, Shulman was removed from the front lines after being injured in the Battle of the Bulge and assigned to to serve as Assistant to the Jewish Chaplain to the US Army, Rabbi Herschel Schachter.
@DovForman @thekjohnston @HolocaustUK @AuschwitzMuseum @yadvashemUK @yadvashem The assistant to Rabbi Schacter https://t.co/KNrYtPwPtp
Unfortunately, Shulman died seven years ago at the age of 91.
However, Forman was able to locate and contact Schulman’s children in New York and bring the families together digitally through Zoom. “It was really special. It felt like we were family, we just clicked,” Forman said.
Image: Lilly Ebert and Dov Forman (right) hold a Zoom call with Arlene and Jason Schulman, descendants of the American GI that liberated Lilly during the war, along with Lilly’s daughter and husband Bilha and Julian Weider.via Dov Foreman
“I know that this soldier told his family, he wrote to his family every day the stories that he saw,” Ebert said. “With that, I feel some connection to them.”
The families re planning another Zoom call soon and have discussed meeting in person when coronavirus travel restrictions are lifted.
“I hope one day that I will meet them personally, I would very much like to have that,” Ebert said.
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University of Houstonvia Steven Saing / Flickr 
Lily Ebert is the woman with the soldier’s arm around her.via Dov Forman / Twitter
Image: Lilly Ebert and Dov Forman (right) hold a Zoom call with Arlene and Jason Schulman, descendants of the American GI that liberated Lilly during the war, along with Lilly’s daughter and husband Bilha and Julian Weider.via Dov Foreman