Previously on the Best and Worst of Backlash: There were five championship matches where all five champions retained, most of the finishes were really bad, and the show went 30 minutes too long but still had time for a long comedy sketch in the middle. No really, that was the Backlash before this one.

If you haven’t watched Backlash yet, you can do that here. Remember that With Spandex is on Twitter, so follow it. Follow us on Twitter and like us on Facebook. You can also follow me on Twitter. BUY THE SHIRT.

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Here’s the Best and Worst of WWE Backlash for June 14, 2020.

The Greatest Wrestling Match Ever: Foreword

Before I talk about anything else, I want to note the handful of matches WWE themselves consider the “greatest wrestling matches ever.”

• Hulk Hogan vs. Andre the Giant at WrestleMania 3
• Ricky Steamboat vs. Macho Man Randy Savage, also at WrestleMania 3
• Stone Cold Steve Austin vs. Shawn Michaels at WrestleMania 14
• John Cena vs. The Rock at WrestleMania 28
• Triple H vs. The Undertaker, also at WrestleMania 28

It’s mostly what you’d expect, with the one match everyone considers one of the greatest ever — Savage vs. Steamboat, which still cooks and makes 14 minutes feel like five — and a handful of others that weren’t necessarily “the best wrestling matches ever,” but are important to WWE history. Hogan vs. Andre is one of the worst matches ever performed but is eternally iconic, Austin vs. Michaels was the christening of Austin as the new top guy and the unofficial beginning of the Attitude Era, and Rock vs. Cena featured the biggest movie star in the world returning to wrestling long enough to participate in three straight WrestleMania main events. The funny one is Triple H vs. The Undertaker, though. They just had to get a Triple H match on there, didn’t they? My going theory is that the intern in charge of choosing the “greatest wrestling matches ever” watched WrestleMania 3 and WrestleMania 28, and then someone barged in screaming WE NEED THE VIDEO PACKAGE NOW and there was only time to randomly draw a Triple H match out of the hat so he didn’t get left out and feel bad.

You probably aren’t interested in this, but if I was that intern and had to pick the five WWE matches I’d consider “the greatest wrestling matches of all time,” I’d definitely have Savage vs. Steamboat on there, and Austin vs. Bret Hart from WrestleMania 13 was a CRIMINAL snub. John Cena vs. CM Punk from Money in the Bank 2011 should be on there if you want Cena represented, and if you need Shawn Michaels and the Undertaker repped I’d include the first Hell in a Cell. It’s not a great “wrestling match,” but it’s bordering on as good as sports-entertainment gets. Michaels and Taker had more famous and probably better matches at WrestleMania 25 and 26, but you should probably include some stuff that isn’t from WrestleMania, especially since the match you’re currently promoting as the greatest ever is a rematch from WrestleMania. For the fifth spot I’d go with a wildcard. There are a few I’d consider that probably wouldn’t make a pay-per-view opening video package — the Eddie Guerrero vs. JBL bloodbath from Judgment Day 2004 that’s still my favorite WWE Championship match ever, or Bret vs. Bulldog from SummerSlam ’92, or Tyler Bate vs. WALTER if you’re nasty — but if you’re promoting Edge, why not go with TLC from Mania X-7? That shit changed the mainstream wrestling business, full stop. If you absolutely HAVE to put Precious Paul on the list, go with Triple H vs. Cactus Jack from Royal Rumble 2000. Put the goddamn Boneyard Match on there before The End of an Era that didn’t actually end anybody’s era.

The Greatest Wrestling Match Ever: Prelude

So, here we are.

WWE is WWE’s worst enemy sometimes. They don’t ever seem to trust that wrestling fans might like to watch wrestling, so even some basic stuff that’s an automatic sell to audiences gets bells and whistles glue-gunned to it to make it clumsier and less effective. Edge vs. Orton from this show might’ve been the best-ever example of this.

Consider the scenario. Edge and Randy Orton are both 10+-time World Champions with dense WWE histories, a myriad of connections to almost all of WWE’s top stars from the past 30 years, and are former best friends and tag team champions. Edge is the “ultimate opportunist” who will do anything necessary to put himself over. Orton is a “viper” with a documented mental disorder who thinks he’s a snake and makes his butter sneaking up on people from impossible shadows to move all crazy and hit them with cutters. Edge was forced to retire due to a neck injury, and spent nine years on the sidelines watching Orton mail it in and still manage to be one of the top stars in the promotion’s history. He managed to return to the ring at the Royal Rumble, had a tense interaction with Orton, and was then consistently injured and/or humiliated by Orton over the next couple of months. Orton attacked his wife. They had a 40-minute hardcore brawl at WrestleMania that ended with Edge smashing Orton’s head between two chairs on top of a production truck and then bursting into tears because of the cruel place he had to go to to get empty revenge on a man he once considered a brother. At Backlash, they’re set to have a rematch wherein Orton leverages Edge’s ego and asks him to prove himself (and his health) in a classic, one-on-one wrestling match knowing there’s a good chance Edge’s body won’t hold up and he’ll be able to fulfill his goal of brutally and permanently removing Edge from the business he lords over.

Instead of just, you know, doing the match with all of that in the tank, WWE decided to randomly promote the match as “The Greatest Wrestling Match Ever,” several weeks before it happened. Charly Caruso just said it in passing before an interview and suddenly there were graphics and THE GREATEST WRESTLING MATCH EVER was all over the posters. Out of context, it was a guy who hadn’t wrestled a normal singles match in nine years being asked to put on another 40 minute classic with Randy Orton, who has shit the bed in so many promoted matches that he’s literally had “doesn’t care and doesn’t try” weaved into his on-screen character’s persona. When it’s time for the match, they present it with “enhanced audio and unique camera angles,” meaning they snap your suspension of disbelief in half with some impossible Halftime Heat-ass cameras and a loud “laugh track” of imaginary fans loudly reacting to things actual wrestling crowds probably wouldn’t and starting ghostly, canned chants. There are few things more creatively disheartening than WWE promoting a match that hasn’t happened yet between a 46-year old man returning from injury and their consistently worst main-eventer on a June pay-per-view in a mostly empty Performance Center during a global pandemic as “the greatest wrestling match ever” and then smothering it in fake “this is awesome” chants until we believe it. Vince McMahon might as well be stomping around in the halls with a roque mallet telling wrestling fans to get out here and take their medicine.

It’s a manic, illogical recipe for disaster.

The Greatest Wrestling Match Ever

And that brings us to the shocking truth of the match: it was really good.

It’s certainly not the greatest wrestling match ever, but it’s one of the best matches of Randy Orton’s career and an impressive feat for Edge at this stage of his career, under these circumstances. It told a story. It was built on wrestling, like wrestling matches should be, with a build dedicated to both establishing and communicating the rules of professional wrestling to an audience and making sure the events of the bout are purposeful and constructive. It has callbacks to previous matches to solidify its place in the timeline, and I’m not just talking about Edge vs. Orton matches. They even did a callback to the cool leapfrog RKO counter Orton pulled on Christian back in the day and Edge countering it, only for Edge to make another of Christian’s famous mistakes and springboard off the second rope into the move. There are layers upon layers upon layers here, which isn’t a unique invention or some kind of WWE masterstroke; it’s what professional wrestling’s supposed to be. Because professional wrestling is the BEST THING.

But, as I said before, WWE is often WWE’s greatest enemy.

The only real problem I can find with the match (aside from the fact that it was still probably too long … Steamboat vs. Savage only went 14:35, long =/= good) is the presentation. The presentation is awful. There are a lot of little insults. You’re promoting this as the “greatest match ever” on a show with several other matches, including five title matches. You’re using the ghost of Howard Finkel to ring announce, which has the same vibes as when they’d bring out Jim Ross at WrestleMania to do “good” commentary for matches instead of the commentary they use for everything else. It’s like a series of little admissions of either disrespect or purposeful mediocrity. got a lump in my throat hearing Fink’s voice again too, but it felt a lot like when companies CGI Audrey Hepburn into their candy commercials. The poor PC recruits having to act their way through a HOW TO CHEER FOR WWE order was hard to properly reconcile already before WWE had them out there standing up for 45 minutes only to dub a different fake crowd over them.

To put it simply, they took a ready-made, possibly great wrestling match with two established stars, promoted it as a legendary thing we all remember fondly before it happened, used “wrestling” as a gimmick like they were in a fucking catch-as-catch-can Punjabi Prison, gave it a Big Bang Theory studio audience, had it go almost an hour because long equals good, had the announce team incessantly insist how unfathomably great every aspect of it was until we had 45 minutes of emotional motion sickness, and still had it end with a low blow with the ref standing there staring at it. That doesn’t even begin to touch the awkwardness of obvious re-tapes, wacky camera angles like looking up at Edge’s face while he’s in Orton’s draping DDT, and so on. They more or less declared they’d created the best wrestling match in history before they actually did anything, had Edge and Orton use their decades of experience and know-how to actually craft something approaching the possibility of “best ever,” and then colored all over it.

The Greatest Wrestling Match Ever: Postlude

In case you didn’t want to read all of that, it was a really good match that WWE worked really hard to make worse. It was better than we could’ve imagined, despite a seemingly impossible challenge. The wish that it was happening “in front of thousands of fans” and could have real crowd reactions sits at about the same level for me as wishing there was a version on the Network without the laugh track making it feel like I was watching somebody play a video game. It is what it is, nuance and context don’t matter to most of the audience, and I truly appreciate the hard work that went into putting something like this together.

I also want to say that I get the “greatest match ever” promotion. I do. I think it’s stupid dumb baby garbage, but I get it. Giving pay-per-view matches little hooks like that get people interested and involved, and I’d be lying if I said the novelty of watching them promote a match as THE GREATEST EVER for a month before doing it and seeing whether they succeeded or failed was one of my major interests in the show. It works. I guess we’re at the point in our popular culture now where we have to be annoyed and offended into being interested, and nobody does “annoying and offensive” quite like WWE.

I look forward to Triple H battling The Undertaker in The Actual Best Wrestling Match Ever at Extreme Rules.

The Worst Wrestling Match Ever

It turns out cinematic matches in WWE were a mistake. Sorry, everybody.

I loved the Firefly Fun House match at WrestleMania. I liked the dorky but sincere Boneyard Match. Tommaso Ciampa vs. Johnny Gargano and Velveteen Dream vs. Adam Cole were about 10% as good as they would’ve been as normal wrestling matches. Money in the Bank had characters getting framed photos smashed over their head and running around with it still on their shoulders and two (2) falling murders that were retconned by a “secondary roof.” Now the Raw Tag Team Championship is being decided in a months-long feud involving golf, bowling, axe throwing contests, decathlons featuring turkey leg eating competitions, and, now, an advertised Tag Team Championship pay-per-view match that turns out to be an episode of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers directed by “two of the six writers” of Scary Movie.

At the time, I described AEW’s Stadium Stampede match as, “Money in the Bank made by people who like wrestling and have a decent sense of humor.” I’d like to follow that train of thought by saying the Street Profits vs. Viking Raiders “match” at Backlash was like Vince McMahon (or Brother Love, or whomever) watched a YouTube clip of the fight from Anchorman for the first time on Saturday afternoon and scripted an entire WWE “spoof” of it from memory without bothering to watch it twice. This shit made me stop wanting to watch wrestling, and I’m the guy who obsessed over time-traveling-ass cannibal-cage-brother-ass pissed-off-ninja-skeleton-ass Lucha Underground and cheered for Bray Wyatt causing John Cena to get so depressed about his life that he literally disappeared. I’m not above it. This was just terrible.

In case you missed it, the thing that was supposed to be a match featured:

• Braun Strowman’s car windshield getting busted again without any callbacks or consequences, making me wonder if WWE randomly decided to support somebody’s Orlando metro area windshield glass replacement service
• lazy callbacks to the various skits from Raw, most notably a standoff between the Profits holding golf clubs and the Raiders holding shields and a bowling ball, as if the ring psychology of this pay-per-view blowoff is the reason we got 1,000 weeks of “anything you can do we can do better”
• people getting hit in the balls with balls, evoking the legendary comedic influence of Al Snow hardcore matches
• a spear through a window, which was the only thing that seemed cool or violent in the entire segment
• Akira Tozawa, of all people, randomly showing up in command of a Japanese biker gang of ninjas (?) that causes the Profits and Raiders to put aside their difference to team up as the “Viking Profits”
• all four men fleeing the scene when Tozawa introduces a very tall ninja with a sword played by (as far as I can tell) the very not ninja-like Jordan Omogbehin
• more top of a production truck shenanigans, as seen in Ciampa/Gargano and Orton/Edge at WrestleMania, which somebody in creative is SUPER INTO right now
• both teams literally falling into the garbage
• the teams being attacked by a mysterious monster that lives in the dumpster, which is obviously a Star Wars joke for some reason but plays more like it’s a rubber alligator that makes tiger noises

My only reasonable theory is that they needed Edge vs. Randy Orton to seem especially great to wrestling fans, so they prefaced it with the corniest, most half-assed bullshit they could imagine. Montez Ford needs to get the hell away from these people as soon as possible. Quick side note: how do you call them the “Viking Profits” when STREET RAIDERS is the other option? Come on. Even Profit Raiders or Street Vikings would’ve been better. You picked the worst possible combination of those words.

Additional side note: remember when Bianca Belair existed?

Best: The Opening Two Matches

These get their own section for being pretty good wrestling matches that didn’t spectacularly sink themselves with bad finishes. The first was the triple threat for the Women’s Tag Team Championship featuring Bliss Cross Applesauce and the IIconics, complete with Billie Kay’s good luck championship match Maleficent horns, challenging Sasha Banks and Bayley. If I haven’t said it enough, Bayley’s finally getting into her character again and developing it beyond people telling her she sucks and has a mom haircut, and it’s been great. She’s killing it. Combine that with Sasha Banks being Sasha Banks and the Women’s Tag Team Championship suddenly being a priority again — thanks again, Alexa Bliss — and you’ve got a stew going.

You won’t be surprised, but I really enjoyed the IIconics here. I think they’ve been done a great disservice by a lot of writers and opinion-havers on the Internet who (1) never watched SHIMMER and (2) don’t seem to remember that Billie and Peyton wrestle like that as the IIconics not because they suck, but because they’re supposed to suck. That sounds like an excuse, and honestly it probably is, but a lot of what they get shit for — the loudness, the obnoxiousness, the comedic exaggerated selling — is clearly on purpose. I don’t see them in there botching more moves or making things look worse than anyone else, and they’re like 15 solid steps up in the ring from Natalya, and at least as many steps up as characters and orators than Natalya.

I also liked the rare instance of a triple threat tag team match having three people wrestle at a time instead of two. It never made a ton of sense to have the third team just stand out on the apron, and at best gave us moments like when the New Age Outlaws subverted the rules by ending up in the ring together and having one pin the other. It informed the finish as well, as Bliss hit her finish on Peyton Royce and forgot Sasha Banks was also technically legal. It’s a totally reasonable mistake for the character, allows the IIconics to kind of stay in competition without looking too good or getting pinned, and makes Sasha look smart and skilled. Plus, Bayley Dos Straps can loudly brag about winning a match her partner straight-up won on her own. Good stuff.

That’s followed by Jeff Hardy vs. Sheamus, which plays out like a really good Smackdown match from like, three years ago. Before the darkness came. It’s a little over 15 minutes of solid work with clear alignments that followed the perfect structure of a heel vs. face wrestling match without doing what the main event did and having 15 people stand around the ring pointing and yelling LOOK AT HOW GOOD THIS WRESTLING MATCH WE PUT TOGETHER IS.

Scott Heisel filled in for me on this week’s Best and Worst of Smackdown so I didn’t get to write about it, so here are my thoughts on Jeff Hardy throwing a HUGE cup of prop piss in Sheamus’ face. First of all, god damn, Jeff, drink some water. Your pee looks like Mountain Dew. Second of all, I’d be more reactive to the segment if I didn’t remember Shawn Michaels and the McMahons doing the same exact segment with the same punchline 14 years ago. Don’t have any new ideas? Think about what you did over a decade ago and hope nobody remembers, or has YouTube, or subscribes to your network full of archived footage! You’re good at jokes, Bruce!

P.S. (or “pee-s,” since that’s the level of humor we’re working with here), Sheamus is way too decorated and way too experienced and in way too good of shape to be stuck having bottom-of-the-barrel DUI and urine feuds with Jeff Hardy in the year of our Lord 2020. You seriously can’t find something better to do for a tenured, multiple-time World Champion who can work and talk and looks like he’s chiseled out of quartz?

Worst: Ewtreme Rules

You forgot the WWE logo is also a letter, didn’t you?

Whatever, nobody cares about Extreme Rules. I want to skip ahead and see what happens at SummerSlaw.

The Rest Of The Show: Good Matches With Bad Endings

But what can you expect from the WWE quarantine era? Before I get too deep into dissecting the rest of the show, I wanted to reiterate that even though I’ve developed some incredibly low expectations for the company and honestly believe they operate in bad faith more often than not, I realize trying to run half a dozen weekly wrestling shows in the middle of a global disaster in a country currently going through a civil rights revolution and continuing to fumble into ignorant fascism is a no-win situation. Wrestling’s supposed to be a reflection of society. How can it be that right now? Wrestling’s supposed to entertain live crowds. It can’t right now. They can’t travel. They can’t do spectacle in a small gym in central Florida. A sizeable chunk of the roster is either fired for shitty reasons or in self-imposed and completely understandable quarantine. It’s tough. I couldn’t do any better. All Elite Wrestling‘s barely doing better. New Japan went away for months and JUST came back. Shit’s hard. I get it. Sorry for all the disclaimers, I’m just dedicated to making sure anybody who actually reads this knows I’m not complaining about wrestling because I “don’t like wrestling.” I do. I just want THIS wrestling to be better.

Nia Jax vs. Asuka was good while it lasted, but had a terrible finish. These two have surprisingly good chemistry with one another — I think Asuka might be the only woman on the roster who is impervious to Nia’s stumbly-bumbly hoss style and knows how to construct a match around her limitations to make her look strong and imposing — and this was another example of it. And then, boop, the match ends with a double count-out. Did they not have a finish in mind because they accidentally signed Nia as Asuka’s opponent in the middle of an Asuka vs. Charlotte Flair program? Did they just not know what to do? You have Asuka win, guys. That’s what you do. It’s Asuka.

The best compliment I can give the Universal title match is that Miz and Morrison weren’t immediately double powerslammed and pinned in a pile.

This was easily the worst thing on the show (that was actually a match) for me. I don’t know why you couldn’t have done this exact same set-up with Miz as a single challenger or Morrison as a single challenger with the other at ringside as their second. “Burying” is probably the wrong word, but it’s not doing a former WWE Champion who is one of the social faces of your company and his recently returned 5-time Intercontinental Champion tag team partner any favors to have them lose a 2-on-1 match, bumble through some goofy pranks, and have even the PRANKS backfire on them. They couldn’t even get and maintain PRANK HEAT. It’s not their fault Braun’s cold boogers on a paper plate right now and is building his first title reign on sheep masks, sassy haunted puppets, and Kayla Braxton getting slimed like she’s on fucking Double Dare.

It’s somehow better and worse than I expected at the same time. I’ve got low opinions about Braun right now, sure, but can his next opponent be someone promoted as Worth A Shit? Because that seems like a better use of your main event singles championship. I dunno. Maybe not, though. What’s signed for Ewtreme Rules, Strowman vs. Lucha House Party in a Lucha House Rules match?

Finally we have the WWE Championship match between Drew McIntyre and Bobby Lashley, aka WWE Backlashley, aka WWE MacLash. This was really damn good while it lasted, and is the kind of WWE Championship match I’ve been dying to see. I want to see two big or strong or skilled or something Superstars going HAM on each other in pursuit of their job’s top accolade. If Bobby Lashley looks like Bobby Lashley, I want him kicking ass like Bobby Lashley. If Drew McIntyre spends a month screaming I WANT YOU TO TRY REAL HARD TO KICK MY ASS and that’s the core plot point of the program, I want, for example, to see Lashley jump him before the bell and put the fear of God into him with a bad-ass full nelson with a leg scissors. McIntyre got SHOOK in this match, and that’s a thousand percent what I want to see.

And then — stop me if you’ve heard this one before — they aren’t confident enough to just end the match on the merits of competitive pro wrestling and go full Sports Entertainment with it. Lana shows up, gets up on the apron, and causes a completely unnecessary distraction that leaves Lashley open for a cheap Claymore Kick. It’s a finish that I’d expect on Raw or Smackdown, but feels extra disappointing when it’s at the tail end of what was building up to be one of my favorite title matches in a long-ass time. Again, I get it. I get that the focus is on the characters, and to WWE and most of the audience it’s probably more important to push the cornball soap opera stuff as the “point.” I’m sure a lot of people tuned in to see how the MVP vs. Lana drama would play out. I’m just one of the ones who tuned in to see one big guy try to beat the guts out of the other. At least I kinda still got that.

If this sets up a rematch and the rematch has to have a special stipulation because it’s on one of WWE’s dedicated gimmick pay-per-views, what do they do? A submission match? Is Drew gonna tap Bob to the Iron Maiden?

Best: Top 10 Comments Of The Night

PatsShredShack

This man framed me for drunken assault, throwing my career and my life into a tailspin i thought i may never recover from. I hate this man with every fiber of my being.

… Better start with a headlock.

LastTexansFan

Samoa Joe congratulating A.J. Styles on being able to celebrate with his family is a nice little dig.

SHough610

I’m still trying to figure out why FTR would have wanted to leave the WWE.

DarO

My mom walked in my room and i switched over to tentacle hentai because that’s significantly less embarrassing to explain

Westy

Cant wait for the directors cut of this, I hear there is 28 mins cut of Randy Orton rest holds. #ReleaseTheDunnCut

EvilDucky

I mean, this match is ok, but it’s no Melina v. Alicia Fox

AddMayne

Mr. Bliss

The Viking Profits? The 4 Norsemen was right there!

The Real Birdman

Braun Strowman will forgive them for messing up his car since Ivar is cute

Not A Crook

“feels like they’re doing too much here” – Johnny Gargano
“yeah it’s a bit excessive, what’s the finish, someone pulling out a shotgun?” – Tommaso Ciampa
“couldn’t agree more, guys” – Adam Cole

Samoa Joe deserves a raise for the work he put in last night. Full stop. ♫ Oh Wennnndyyyyy ♫

That about does it for another edition of the Best And Worst Of A Thing I Watched On The Network and Hope You Agree With, At Least Mostly. If you did, or you at least laughed at something or thought a point was interesting, consider giving the column a share on social media to spread the word and help us out. We’ve been doing this a while, but there’s always room to grow, both as writers and as critics. And, I guess, as people who run wrestling websites during the plague.

Make sure you’re here on Monday night for Raw and again on Friday for the backlash to Backlash, and we’ll see you here for the build to Ewtreme Rules. We hope you’ll stick around even longer, since Surwiwor Series is coming up in the fall. Thanks again for reading The Greatest Wrestling Column Ever.

The Oscars are shifting back by two months after the coronavirus shut down Hollywood film sets and emptied out movie theaters.

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In a landmark decision Monday, the Supreme Court has ruled 6-3 to protect members of the LBGTQ+ community against discrimination in the workplace. The ruling expands the definition of discrimination in Title VII of the pivotal 1964 Civil Rights Act to further prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. Lauded by musicians and allies everywhere, the ruling was praised by Taylor Swift, Kesha, Jonas Brothers, and many more.

Taylor Swift has been an outspoken ally to the LBGTQ community for years. Sharing news of the ruling, Swift wrote: “Thank you to the Supreme Court Justices who voted in favor and all the advocates who have fought so hard for this! We still have a long way to go to reach equality, but this is a beautiful step forward.”

Other musicians followed suit and celebrated the decision on social media. The Jonas Brothers praised the news as a “historic day for the LGBTQ+ community.” Kesha also offered a happy reaction.

Hayley Kiyoko, who is dubbed “Lesbian Jesus” by her fans, echoed cheers for the ruling.

Tegan And Sara supported the Supreme Court’s decision on Facebook, writing: “A terrific and unexpected victory. Some people have spent their entire lives fighting for this. Some died waiting to hear the ruling.”

The historic decision aptly arrives partway through pride month. As pointed out by Associated Press, the ruling could have a big impact on lawsuits that are pending over transgender athletes’ participation in school sports, as well as cases dealing with gender-segregated bathrooms and locker rooms.

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

Donald Trump and Howard Stern used to be friendly (it’s unclear if Trump is capable of having an actual “friend”), as the president appeared on The Howard Stern Show over 20 times. But their relationship has soured in recent years. Stern voted for Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential election, and while he stated that he doesn’t “hate” Trump, the Sirius XM host believes that Trump is secretly (and accurately) “disgusted” by his MAGA hat-wearing supporters. Now, the president’s son, Donald Trump, Jr. has gotten involved, too, after tweeting a link to a 27-year-old comedy sketch of Stern in blackface.

Deadline reports that the clip “was interspersed with Stern’s recent appearance on The View, where he claimed during the appearance that he’d never used the racial slur…. Stern was reportedly playing the part of Ted Danson, with Sherman Hemsley playing Whoopi Goldberg, Danson’s girlfriend at the time.” (Danson wore blackface to a Friars Club roast in 1993.) Stern acknowledged the footage during Monday’s recording of The Howard Stern Show, calling his former-self the “craziest motherf*cker” on radio.

“The sh*t I did was f*cking crazy. I’ll be the first to admit. I won’t go back and watch those old shows; it’s like, who is that guy?” he said. “But that was my shtick, that’s what I did and I own it. I don’t think I got embraced by Nazi groups and hate groups. They seemed to think I was against them, too. Everybody had a bone to pick with me.”

Stern has since, as he put it, been able to “change my approach, able to change my life, and change how I communicated,” unlike the Trumps. “It f*cking distresses me that Donald Trump, Jr. and Donald themselves won’t go into psychotherapy and change. Why not change the way you’re approaching things, because, wearing a mask is not a bad thing. Telling people the actual size of the crowd at your inauguration is OK. Attacking me during the coronavirus and Black Lives Matter is absolutely f*cking crazy.”

“I cringe when I look at myself 30 or 40 years ago, and that was 27 years ago… Am I a bad guy? I don’t think so. Donald Trump didn’t think so, he was on my show 27 times. Donnie Junior did the show. On TV he said, ‘I’m really disappointed in Howard, he’s changed,’ that I’ve gone Hollywood. Which is it? Do you want me to get in blackface and make fun of Ted Danson? … I remember how badly Donald, Jr. wanted to take a picture with me.”

It’s only a matter of time before, somehow, Ted Cruz gets involved in all this.

(Via Deadline)

Last Updated: June 16th

The Netflix name has meant many things, including the best shows not on TV. And while there are some glaring omissions in their selection of good movies, there’s still plenty to peruse. Narrowing them down to just 50 of the best Netflix films wasn’t easy. Nonetheless, here’s a ranked list of the best movies on Netflix streaming no film lover should miss, all of them just a simple click away.

Related: The Best Comedies On Netflix Right Now

1. Indiana Jones: Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)

Run Time: 115 min | IMDb: 8.5/10

The Indiana Jones franchise has been housed on Amazon Prime for a while now, but it’s finally making its way to Netflix with the streaming platform hosting all four feature films. Of course, nothing beats the original, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and as far as travel and adventure go, this movie has everything you could possibly want. A hero with a love for archeology and whips? Check. An adventure to recover a stolen artifact with destructive powers? Check check. Harrison Ford beating up Nazis while uttering sarcastic one-liners and with a twinkle in his eye? Did movies even exist before this?

Add To Netflix Queue

2. The Matrix (1999)

Run Time: 136 min | IMDb: 8.7/10

The Wachowski sisters created one of the greatest sci-fi films in cinematic history with their mind-bending Matrix trilogy, but the original is hard to top. Keanu Reeves plays Neo, a young man unplugged from the matrix — a kind of alternate reality that keeps humans docile, so machines can harvest their life energy. He teams up with a band of rebels fighting the machines (Laurence Fishburne as Morpheus and Carrie-Ann Moss as Trinity) and faces off against a henchman named Agent Smith (Hugo Weaving). The real draw of this trilogy, besides its inventive storyline, is the CGI effects. The movie also sports some of the most imaginative fight sequences you’ll ever see on the big screen.

Add To Netflix Queue

3. There Will Be Blood (2007)

Run Time: 158 min | IMDb: 8.2/10

Daniel Day-Lewis stars in this gritty, Oscar-winning drama from Paul Thomas Anderson playing a turn-of-the-century prospector, who risks his faith and his family for oil. Daniel Plainview is a shrewd, callous businessman who adopts the orphaned son of a dead employee to make himself look more appealing to investors. When he hits oil in California, he wages a war with a local preacher and his family who stand in the way of Daniel’s progress. Violence and yes, plenty of blood, follow.

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4. Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse (2018)

Run Time: 117 min | IMDb: 8.5/10

The Oscar-winning animated film follows a young kid named Miles, who becomes the web-slinging hero of his reality, only to cross paths with other iterations of Spider-Man across different dimensions who help him defeat a threat posed to all realities. Mahershala Ali, John Mulaney, and Jake Johnson make up the film’s talented voice cast, but it’s the striking visuals and daring story-telling technique that really serves the film well.

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5. The Irishman (2019)

Run Time: 209 min | IMDb: 8.7/10

Martin Scorsese delivers another cinematic triumph, this time for Netflix and with the help of some familiar faces. Robert De Niro and Al Pacino team up (again) for this crime drama based on actual events. De Niro plays Frank Sheeran a World War II vet who finds work as a hitman for the mob. Pacino plays notorious Teamster Jimmy Hoffa, a man who frequently found himself on the wrong side of the law and the criminals he worked with. The film charts the pair’s partnership over the years while injecting some historical milestones for context. It’s heavy and impressively cast and everything you’d expect a Scorsese passion-project to be.

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6. Inception (2010)

Run Time: 148 min | IMDb: 8.8/10

Christopher Nolan’s imaginative sci-fi adventure will most likely be remembered as one of the best genre films in cinematic history, and for good reason. The movie — which stars everyone from Leonardo DiCaprio and Tom Hardy to Ellen Page, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Cillian Murphy, and Michael Caine — is the ultimate heist flick, following a group of thieves who must repurpose dream-sharing technology to plant an idea into the mind of a young CEO. DiCaprio pulls focus as Cobb, a troubled architect with a tragic past who attempts to pull off the impossible so that he can return to his family.

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7. Roma (2018)

Run Time: 135 min | IMDb: 7.8/10

Oscar-winning writer/director Alfonso Cuaron delivers what may be his most personal film to date. The stunningly-shot black-and-white film is an ode to Cuaron’s childhood and a love letter to the women who raised him. Following the journey of a domestic worker in Mexico City named Cleo, the movie interweaves tales of personal tragedy and triumph amidst a backdrop of political upheaval and unrest.

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8. Taxi Driver (1982)

Run Time: 114 min | IMDb: 8.3/10

Robert De Niro, Jodie Foster, and Cybill Shepherd star in this Martin Scorsese crime thriller about a veteran with mental health issues who works a night job, driving a taxi around New York City. De Niro plays Travis Bickle, a Vietnam war vet who moonlights as a cap driver to cope with his insomnia. During a long shift, he contemplates assassinating a politician to help out the woman he’s fallen in love with (Shepherd) and killing a pimp after befriending an underage prostitute (Foster). It’s a wild ride, full of darkly comedic moments, and an even more harrowing looks at the consequences of war.

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9. Lady Bird (2017)

Run Time: 94 min | IMDb: 7.5/10

Greta Gerwig’s love letter to her hometown of Sacramento, California follows Saoirse Ronan and Laurie Metcalf as they navigate the often-frustrating relationship between mother and daughter. Ronan plays “Ladybird,” a young woman attending Catholic school who longs for the culture and change of scenery that New York City promises. Her mother, Metcalf, is overbearing and overprotective, and the family’s lack of money and social standing contributes to a rift between the two. Some hard truths are explored in this film, but watching Ronan manage teenage angst, first love, and everything in between will give you all kinds of nostalgia.

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10. Ex Machina (2014)

Run Time: 108 min | IMDb: 7.7/10

Alex Garland’s sci-fi thriller breathed new life into the tired A.I. trope when it landed in theaters a few years ago. The film focuses on a naïve young programmer (Domhnall Gleeson), who’s selected amongst a pool of applicants to evaluate a new A.I. life form. The poor kid is whisked away to a remote villa to spend time with the eerily-human-looking robot, Ava (Alicia Vikander), and her eccentric, often cruel creator Nathan (Oscar Isaac), a genius with an ego to match his talent. The film takes some twists you don’t expect, and Isaac gives cinema one of its greatest dance sequences, in case you needed more reason to watch.

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11. Pan’s Labryinth (2006)

Run Time: 118 min | IMDb: 8.2/10

Guillermo Del Toro’s fantasy war epic focuses on a young girl named Ofelia, who grows up during a time of political unrest in her native Spain after a brutal Civil War ravages the country. Ofelia escapes the horrors committed by her stepfather when she accepts a challenge from a magical fairy, who believes her to be the reincarnation of Moanna, the princess of the underworld. If she completes three tasks, she’ll achieve immortality. The film is a play on folklore and fables from Del Toro’s youth, but there’s an undercurrent based in reality — the real cost of war — that grounds this film and makes it even more compelling.

12. Django Unchained (2012)

Run Time: 164 min | IMDb: 8.4/10

Another Quentin Tarantino classic, this violent visit back in time to America’s era of slavery carries major Western vibes and gives Lenoard DiCaprio a refreshing turn as the film’s big bad, a plantation owner named Calvin Candie. Tarantino favorite Christoph Waltz plays a German bounty hunter who teams up with Jamie Foxx’s Django, a former slave looking to free his wife (Kerry Washington) from Candie’s clutches. There’s a lot of gore and uncomfortable dialogue and over-the-top action, really, everything you’d expect, but DiCaprio, Waltz, and Foxx make it all worth it.

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13. Room (2015)

Run Time: 118 min | IMDb: 8.2/10

Brie Larson and Jacob Tremblay star in this gripping drama about a mother and son held hostage for nearly a decade. The film, based off a work of fiction, pulls elements from real life trauma cases as it follows a woman named Joy (Larson) and her son Jack (Tremblay) who exists in a singular room, cut off from the outside world. The two plot an escape, are eventually rescued and must cope with the effects of their harrowing ordeal while adjusting to life outside of the room. Larson is deserving of every award she won for this thing, and her chemistry with Tremblay will have you grabbing for the tissues throughout the film.

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14. Inglorious Basterds (2009)

Run Time: 153 min | IMDb: 8.3/10

Brad Pitt, Diane Kruger, Christoph Waltz, and Eli Roth star in Quentin Tarantino’s imaginative World War II drama about a group of Jewish U.S. soldiers with a plan to assassinate Hitler. The film flip-flops between Pitt’s Southern-accented Lt. Aldo Raine’s mission to scalp Nazis and blow-up an exclusive event for SS officers in Paris and French actress Melanie Laurent, who plays a theater-owner with a devious plan of her own. It’s full of mesmerizing performances and Tarantino’s unique brand of humor — oh, and a lot of Nazi killing.

15. Minority Report (2002)

Run Time: 145 min | IMDb: 7.6/10

Steven Spielberg is the genius behind this mind-bending, futuristic crime drama starring Tom Cruise and Colin Farrell. Cruise plays John Anderton, a police chief in charge of a unit capable of arresting criminals before they commit their crimes thanks to a trio of psychics called “precogs.” When Anderton is identified as a future murderer, he goes on the run with one of the precogs and uncovers a deeper conspiracy that forces him (and us) to question the nature of free will.

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16. The Social Network (2010)

Run Time: 120 min | IMDb: 7.7/10

It’s hard not to watch this Aaron Sorkin-penned, David Fincher-directed masterpiece and have your viewing experience colored by Facebook, and founder Mark Zuckerberg’s, many political misdealings. Jesse Eisenberg plays the boy genius, an outcast whose brainchild is the product of a bad breakup and sexism. He partners with Andrew Garfield’s business-minded Eduardo Saverin and the two create the famous social networking site before Zuckerberg outs his friend and alienates himself. The story isn’t new, but watching it play out is still thrilling, mostly because Eisenberg is just so damn good at being a dick.

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17. Drive (2014)

Run Time: 100 min | IMDb: 7.8/10

A stone-faced Ryan Gosling steers us through the criminal underworld created by director Nicolas Winding Refn in this high-speed thriller. Gosling plays a near-silent stunt driver who moonlights as a getaway man. When he gets involved with his next-door neighbor and her young son, his carefully cultivated life is thrown into chaos, forcing him to align with criminals and take on risky jobs to protect the pair and keep a firm grip on the wheel.

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18. Kung Fu Hustle (2004)

Run Time: 99 min | IMDb: 7.8/10

The early aughts action-comedy borrows elements from famous Kung Fu films of the ’70s and pairs them with a completely ridiculous plot and some impressive cartoon-style fight sequences to produce a wholly original flick that we guarantee you’ll marvel at. The film follows the exploits of two friends, Sing and Bone, who impersonate gang members in the hopes of joining a gang themselves and inadvertently strike up a gang war that nearly destroys the slums of the city. Of course, the real draw here is the absurdist, over-the-top comedy that takes place during some of the film’s biggest action sequences. It’s laugh-out-loud funny, but only if you check your brain at the door.

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19. Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986)

Run Time: 103 min | IMDb: 7.8/10

You can’t think of classic ’80s teen comedies and not include Matthew Broderick’s rebellious school comedy in those musings. Broderick brought Ferris Bueller, a smart-mouthed kid with a flair for the dramatic, to life in this beloved movie that also stars Alan Ruck and Jennifer Grey. Bueller goes to extreme lengths to skip school with his best friend and girlfriend, leading them on an adventure that includes a musical parade in the city and a brush with the law. Being bad never looked so fun.

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20. The Lobster (2015)

Run Time: 119 min | IMDb: 7.1/10

Colin Farrell and Rachel Weisz star in this dark, absurdist comedy about a man searching for love under some very strange circumstances. Farrell plays David, a man whose wife recently left him. David is sent to a hotel where he’s told he must find a mate within 45 days or be turned into an animal. While there, David witnesses strange rituals and must follow strict rules in order to find love, but it’s not until he ventures into the woods, where the “loners” live, that he pairs up with a woman (Weisz) who may be his soulmate. It’s weird, eccentric, and the perfect Farrell-starring vehicle.

21. Her (2013)

Run Time: 126 min | IMDb: 8/10

Spike Jonze imagines a world in which Artificial Intelligence can become something more than just a personal assistant program. Joaquin Phoenix plays Theodore Twombly, a depressed introvert going through a divorce who starts up a relationship with an OS named Samantha. Things get serious before Theodore begins to realize that romance with an A.I. is more complicated than he thought. What follows is a thoughtful exploration of love, relationships, and the ways human beings find connection in a plugged-in world.

22. Avengers: Infinity War (2018)

Run Time: 149 min | IMDb: 8.5/10

We’re in the end game now. The Russo brothers return to direct the first of this two-part wrap-up. Josh Brolin plays the ultimate villain, a purple meat-head named Thanos, who’s insistent upon solving the Universe’s over-population problem. The film does a good job of giving fans some long-awaited pairings — Thor meets the Guardians of the Galaxy crew while Tony Stark and Doctor Strange square off — and it manages to fit its enormous, A-list cast into an over two-hour flick that never feels like it’s running too long.

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23. The Witch (2016)

Run Time: 92 min | IMDb: 6.8/10

Robert Eggers’ Sundance hit attracted some of the oddest complaints directed at any film in recent years when some disgruntled audience members suggested it wasn’t scary enough. Maybe they were watching a different movie? Set in colonial New England, the austere film follows a family outcast from their strict religious community and trying to make it on their own at the edge of some deep, dark woods. It essentially takes the witch-fearing folklore of the era at face value, watching the family disintegrate under the insidious influence of a nearby witch. It’s a slow-burn horror movie, light on shocks, heavy on unease, and thematically rich in ways that only become apparent later.

24. Moonlight (2016)

Run Time: 111 min | IMDb: 7.4/10

Barry Jenkins’ Moonlight will always be remembered for winning the Academy Award for Best Picture after a mix-up that initially named La La Land as the winner. But that’s just an asterisk attached to a momentous coming-of-age story set over three eras in a young man’s life as he grows up in Miami, grappling with the sexuality he feels will make him even more of an outcast while searching for guidance that his drug-addicted mother (Naomie Harris) can’t provide. The film is both lyrical and moving and won justifiable acclaim for its talented cast, including a Best Supporting Actor award for Mahershala Ali as a sympathetic drug dealer.

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25. Marriage Story (2019)

Run Time: 136 min | IMDb: 8.1/10

Noah Baumbach’s star-studded divorce drama is pure Oscar bait, but in the best way. The film takes a look at messy breakups with Scarlett Johansson playing an actress and mother named Nicole, who is intent on separating from her stage director husband Charlie (Adam Driver). Laura Dern and Ray Liotta play their hard-hitting lawyers, who don’t help in diffusing the tension and resentment building between the pair when Nicole moves herself and their son across the country. It’s an intimate look at the emotional wreckage of a divorce and the struggle to put a family back together again, and it’s carried by some brilliant performances by Driver and Johansson.

26. Uncut Gems (2019)

Run Time: 135 min | IMDb: 7.5/10

This adventurous mindf*ck starring Adam Sandler finally landed on Netflix, and our only advice before watching this criminally-good romp is this: prepare yourself for a wild, over-the-top ride. Sandler gives one of his best performances, and the Safdie Brothers prove they’ve got a knack for crafting thrillers textured with grit and a realness that just can’t be beaten.

27. Back To The Future (1985)

Run Time: 116 min | IMDb: 8.5/10

This iconic ’80s comedy franchise might have wrongly-assumed we’d have flying cars, hoverboards, and self-tying shoes by now, but it got a lot of other tech predictions right. Still, that’s not what makes this film a classic. Christopher Lloyd playing a brilliant-but-eccentric scientist, Michael J. Fox playing a smart-mouthed teenager who can time-travel, and a brilliantly-funny script from director Robert Zemeckis. That’s what makes this comedy a classic.

28. Catfish (2010)

Run Time: 87 min | IMDb: 7.1/10

Before he scored his own MTV show, filmmaker Nev Schulman was exposing cons on the internet in this documentary, that basically introduces the term “catfish” to the cultural lexicon. The film captures Nev’s growing online-only friendship with a young woman and her family, exposing the secrets and lies they’re keeping along the way and reminding us all: you really can’t trust people.

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29. I Lost My Body (2019)

Run Time: 81 min | IMDb: 7.6/10

This beautifully animated French fantasy film follows the story of a young man named Naoufel, or rather, his hand which has been severed from his body and spends most of the film escaping labs and trying to get back to its owner. The film flits between the past and present, watching Naoufel’s life unfold from a young orphan to an accidental carpenter’s apprentice — which is how he lost his appendage — all while exploring themes of love, loss, and destiny.

30. Da 5 Bloods (2020)

Run Time: 154 min | IMDb: 6.9/10

Any Spike Lee joint is worth a watch, but this genre-bending thriller about a group of Black Vietnam war vets returning to the battlefield decades later feels especially timely. That’s because Lee manages to shed light on a little-known part of our shared history: the way our country treated Black soldiers returning from the war, but he also raises the stakes with a subplot that includes a buried treasure hunt and a heartwrenching mission to retrieve the remains of a fallen comrade. The cast, which includes Black Panther’s Chadwick Boseman, is brilliant, the story is gripping, and you’ll probably be seeing more talk of it come awards season, so go ahead and watch it now.

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31. Y Tu Mama También (2002)

Run Time: 106 min | IMDb: 7.7/10

After a stint in Hollywood, Alfonso Cuarón returned to Mexico for this story of two privileged high school boys (Diego Luna and Gael Garcia Bernal) who road trip with an older woman (Maribel Verdú) in search of an unspoiled stretch of beach. In the process, they discover freedom like they’d never imagined — and maybe more freedom than they can handle. Cuarón’s stylish film plays out against the backdrop of Mexican political upheaval and plays with notions of upturning the established order on scales both large and small, all the while suggesting that no paradise lasts forever.

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32. Groundhog Day (1993)

Run Time: 101 min | IMDb: 8/10

Bill Murray has some great comedies living on his resumé, but few are as iconic, or at least, well-loved as Groundhog Day. That’s because watching Murray play a surly weather-man forced to relive the same day over and over again is basically a comedy goldmine of a plot. At first, Phil (Murray) enjoys the time loop, binge-drinking, filming some half-hearted news segments in a hick town in Pennsylvania, having one-night stands, etc, but eventually, he realizes that in order to escape his never-ending bed-and-breakfast hell, he’s got to better himself, not an easy task.

33. Mudbound (2017)

Run Time: 134 min | IMDb: 7.4/10

Netflix spent much of 2017 trying to establish itself as an alternative to movie theaters as a place to find quality new films. The results were mostly strong, and none stronger than Mudbound, Dee Rees’ story of two families — one white and one black — sharing the same Mississippi land in the years before and after World War II. Rees combines stunning images, compelling storytelling, and the work of a fine cast (that includes Jason Mitchell, Carey Mulligan, Garett Hedlund, Jason Clarke, and Mary J. Blige) to unspool a complex tale about the forces the connect black and white Americans and the slow-to-die injustices that keep them apart.

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34. Dallas Buyers Club (2013)

Run Time: 117 min | IMDb: 8.0/10

Matthew McConaughey’s Dallas Buyer Club is a searing look at how the world failed the LGBTQ community during the devastating AIDS crisis. McConaughey stars as Ron Woodruff, a man diagnosed with the disease in the 80s during a time when the illness was still misunderstood and highly stigmatized. Woodruff went against the FDA and the law to smuggle in drugs to help those suffering from the disease, establishing a “Dallas Buyers Club” and fighting in court to the right to aid those in need. The story is all the more powerful because it’s true and McConaughey delivers one of the best performances of his career as Woodruff, a man who changes his entire outlook on life after being dealt a tragic blow.

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35. Snowpiercer (2013)

Run Time: 126 min | IMDb: 7.1/10

Chris Evans stars in this sci-fi thriller from auteur Bong Joon-ho. The film, set years into the future following a devastating ice age caused by mankind, follows Evans’ Curtis who lives in poverty on a train that continuously circles the Earth and contains all that remains of human life. Curtis is part of the “scum” that the people relegated to the back of the train while the “elite” enjoy the privilege of wealth and status that comes with living in the front. Curtis sparks a rebellion that ends in bloodshed and a devastating reveal when he makes it to the train’s engine room and discovers just how the elite have been fueling their operation. It’s a dark, grimy action piece that should give fans a new appreciation for Evans’ talent.

36. Blue Is The Warmest Color (2013)

Run Time: 179 min | IMDb: 7.8/10

When this French coming-of-age drama premiere in 2013 it sparked plenty of controversies. The film centers on a blooming romance between a naïve teenager named Adele and her free-spirited lover, Emma. Praised for painting an honest portrait of a lesbian romance on screen while also scrutinized for its sometimes graphic sexual content, the film marked a turning point in how the LGBTQ community was represented on film and gave people a heartbreaking look at a young woman discovering herself and her sexual identity in an unforgiving world.

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37. Elizabeth (1998)

Run Time: 124 min | IMDb: 7.4/10

Cate Blanchett plays the famous monarch in this period piece that charts her earliest days on the throne. Blanchett’s Elizabeth is a young woman being held prisoner by her older sister, the current Queen, before wearing the crown when that woman dies. She must contend with the political machinations of older men in her court, a religious uprising, and the scandal of having a married lover and yet not taking a husband for her own. It’s really the best kind of British drama.

38. It Comes At Night (2017)

Run Time: 86 min | IMDb: 7.4/10

Writer/director Trey Edward Shults followed up his unnerving family portrait in 2015’s Krisha with a look at another family under the most desperate of circumstances. After an unknown illness has wiped out most of civilization, a number of threats — both seen and unseen — come for a family held up in their home out in the wilderness. It’s a subtle, dream-like tale that stars Joel Edgerton and Christopher Abbot as two patriarchs intent on keeping their families safe, no matter the cost.

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39. Frances Ha (2012)

Run Time: 86 min | IMDb: 7.4/10

Before Greta Gerwig was directed Oscar-nominated coming-of-age dramas, she was writing and starring in this black-and-white dramedy about a young woman also trying to find her way in the professional dance world of New York City. Gerwig is magnetic in the titular role of Frances, a dancer dissatisfied with her career prospects and forced to contemplate a move to Tribeca on the whim of her best friend and roommate. That trek across Manhattan serves as a jumping off point for Frances, who travels home, then to France, before settling in Washington Heights on her journey to self-discovery.

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40. Marvel Studios’ Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018)

Run Time: 118 min | IMDb: 7.1/10

Look, it’s hard to keep track of the Marvel Universe timeline so we’re not going to explain where Ant-Man and the Wasp fits into the grander scheme of this blockbuster monopoly. The only thing you really need to know about this action flick, which sees Paul Rudd returning to play the shrinking superhero and Evangeline Lily playing his partner in fighting crime, is that it’s a hell of a fun watch. Rudd returns to the character more seasoned in the superhero verse and thus, more comfortable with his leading man status, but he benefits greatly from a team-up with Lily and a well-written script.

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41. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (1966)

This classic Western starring Clint Eastwood follows the adventures of a stiff-lipped bounty hunter, a sociopathic mercenary, and a fast-talking Mexican bandit. The trio is connected by a grave full of gold, a few near executions, and a lot of bad blood. Highway robberies, assassination attempts, and a famous Mexican standoff make this a worthy entry on the action flicks list, plus it’s one of Eastwood’s most iconic roles.

42. Cloverfield (2008)

Run Time: 85 min | IMDb: 7/10

Disappointing sequels aside, the original installment in J.J. Abrams’ Cloverfield trilogy remains one of the greatest works of found-footage in the history of film. Most of that is because the narrative style lends itself to the tension, chaos, and horror of fleeing a monster destroying New York City. The film follows a group of friends caught in the bedlam after a Godzilla-like creature begins attacking the Big Apple. While trying to save each other and make it out of the city before the bombs drop, the friends document their journey. The directing by Matt Reeves is superb, almost too good, because you often feel a part fo the action, for better and worse.

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43. The Hateful Eight (2015)

Run Time: 167 min | IMDb: 7.8/10

It seems almost perverse to think about watching The Hateful Eight at home, given how big a deal Quentin Tarantino made of its 70mm format at the time of its release. And while it looks great on the big screen it’s not like that’s an option right now. And, in some ways, the film feels just at home on the small screen, since it’s at heart a chamber mystery that brings together a collection of unsavory characters (Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russell, and Jennifer Jason Leigh among them) as mystery and murder unfold in their ranks.

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44. Green Room (2015)

Run Time: 95 min | IMDb: 7/10

When a punk rock group accidentally witnesses the aftermath of a murder, they are forced to fight for their lives by the owner of a Nazi bar (Patrick Stewart) and his team. It’s an extremely brutal and violent story, much like the first two features from director Jeremy Saulnier (Blue Ruin and Murder Party), but this one is made even tenser by its claustrophobic cat-and-cornered-mouse nature. Once the impending danger kicks in, it doesn’t let up until the very end, driven heavily by Stewart playing against type as a harsh, unforgiving, calculating character.

45. The Two Popes (2019)

Run Time: 125 min | IMDb: 7.6/10

Anthony Hopkins and Jonathan Pryce play off each other in this fictionalized comedy about two of the most powerful men in the Catholic Church. Hopkins plays Pope Benedict XVI near the end of his tenure as he struggles with the disillusionment of his role and his faith. Pryce plays Cardinal Bergoglio (who would later become Pope Francis) who’s also going through a crisis of faith and wishes to leave his post. What follows is two hours of two of the greatest actors paling around with each other, delivering some laughs as they get deep about the philosophical leanings of these two great men.

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46. Silver Linings Playbook (2012)

Run Time: 122 min | IMDb: 7.7/10

Bradley Cooper and Jennifer Lawrence star in this drama that’s equal parts rom-com and a harrowing look at mental illness. Cooper plays Pat Solitano, a former high school teacher who recently completed a stint at a mental institution. Things aren’t going well for Pat. He’s moved back in with his overbearing parents (a wickedly-funny Robert De Niro and Jacki Weaver), his now ex-wife cheated on him, he doesn’t get along with his therapist, and he’s operating under the delusion that if he gets fit and gets his sh*t together, he can get his wife back. Lawrence plays Tiffany, a young woman with problems of her own. She’s depressed after the death of her husband and prefers sex with strangers to drown the pain. The two strike up a friendship that pushes both to their mental and emotional limits. It’s a messy, complicated love story, which makes for a nice change of pace if sappy-sweet rom-coms just aren’t doing it for you.

47. Clueless (1995)

Run Time: 97 min | IMDb: 6.8/10

Few teen comedies have found a permanent place in the cultural lexicon like this 90s flick from director Amy Heckerling. Inspired by a Jane Austen plot and modernized with a Beverly Hills setting, the story follows a shallow, rich Queen-bee named Cher Horowitz (Alicia Silverstone) who begins matchmaking fellow students and teachers at her school only to be confronted with her own shortcomings in the romance department. The fashion, the catchphrases, and Silverstone’s magnetic performance — they’re all standouts here.

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48. Burning (2018)

Run Time: 148 min | IMDb: 7.6/10

Walking Dead alum Steven Yeun stars this psychological thriller from South Korean filmmaker Lee Chang-dong. Yeun plays Ben, a rich millennial with a mysterious job who connects with a woman named Shin Hae-mi on a trip to Africa. The two journey back home together where Ben meets Shin’s friend/lover Lee Jong-su. The three hang-out regularly, with Lee growing more jealous of Ben’s wealth and privilege while he’s forced to manage his father’s farm when his dad goes to prison. But it’s when Shin disappears, and Lee suspects Ben’s involvement, that things really go off the rails.

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49. Hell or High Water (2016)

Run Time: 102 min | IMDb: 7.6/10

Chris Pine, Ben Foster, and Jeff Bridges star in this neo-Western crime thriller about a pair of brothers who go on a bank-robbing spree to save their family’s ranch. Pine plays Toby, a down-on-his-luck father struggling to live right under mountains of inherited debt while Foster plays Tanner, his ex-con brother who has a wild streak that often endangers the two men on their jobs. Bridges is the aging sheriff tasked with bringing them to justice but his job is made harder by the locals, who have no love for the bank chain the boys are stealing from. It’s a gritty, unapologetic tale of a forgotten America brought to life by some brilliant performances and an impressive script from Taylor Sheridan.

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50. The Perks Of Being A Wallflower (2012)

Run Time: 100 min | IMDb: 8/10

This coming-of-age indie is based on a beloved book, but if fans were worried that the story of a depressed teenager who finds friends and a sense of belonging in a group of lovable misfits wouldn’t translate on screen, they shouldn’t have been too concerned. Stephen Chbosky wrote the novel, but he also penned the screenplay and directed this flick, which sees Logan Lerman play Charlie, the social outcast, and Emma Watson play Sam, the alt-pixie-dream girl he falls for. Everyone’s good in this, but it’s Ezra Miller’s Patrick who really stands out.

Recent Changes Through June 2020:
Removed: Mystic River, Magnolia, The King’s Speech, Steve Jobs
Added: Lady Bird, Uncut Gems, Clueless, Da 5 Bloods

If you don’t live in a major American city, you might’ve convinced yourself that the country had gone back to “normal” since protests calling for an end to police violence against Black Americans erupted across every state after the May 26 killing of George Floyd. It hasn’t. Also, we’d like to argue there is nothing “normal” about a country where police are regularly accused of using force that reaches far beyond the scope of their duties.

To the former point: People are still out protesting and they’ve made it clear they’re not going home until serious progress is made. Dismantling/ defunding massive police departments was never a short-term project and, as we enter the third week of protests, it’s worth remembering that this type of nationwide movement takes time. The Montgomery Bus Boycott lasted 381 days, the Greensboro Sit-Ins five months, and the Selma marches stretched out over 18 days.

Protests in Atlanta were punctuated by the death on Friday morning of Rayshard Brooks, 27, who was shot in the back twice by a police officer after an attempted arrest. CNN reports that within 48 hours of protestors flooding the streets calling for justice for Rayshard, the officer who shot him has been terminated and the police chief has stepped down. In Palmdale California, protestors took to the streets over the weekend calling for a renewed investigation into the death of Robert Fuller, a black man whose body was found hanging from a tree outside of City Hall just days after another black man was found hanging from a tree outside of a Victorville library, 45 miles away. According to The Cut, both deaths were initially believed to be suicides by local authorities.

The protests from this past weekend, even in Atlanta and Palmdale, were been largely peaceful (though the Wendy’s in the parking lot where Brooks was arrested was burned down) as people showed up in the thousands at peaceful protests in Hollywood, Brooklyn (where protestors wore white in support of the Brooklyn Liberation), Chicago, New York, San Francisco, and Boston. In conjunction with pride month, this past weekend’s Black Lives Matters marches had a special emphasis on black trans lives. According to the Human Rights Campaign, 91% of the reported murders of trans and gender non-conforming people in 2019 were black women.

Here are some of the scenes from this weekend’s protests across the country.

https://mobile.twitter.com/ABC7Shack/status/1272326514403491840

The CMJ Music Marathon was a New York Institution between 1975 and 2015, but the event came crumbling down following some legal issues involving the then-CEO and some lawsuits from employees. In 2016, they asked fans to “bear with” them, and toward the end of last year, it looked like good news from CMJ was on the way. Under new ownership, CMJ was set to return in 2020. Like it has to everybody else, though, life happened, and live events aren’t really going on right now.

However, Amazing Radio, which announced in April that they are the new owners of the CMJ name, has a plan. Instead of a live in-person event, CMJ will be an online-only affair that will be “set up to emulate the iconic New York City festival and its spirit of new music discovery,” as noted in a press statement. For $30, artists can sign up to be eligible to play the virtual fest.

In April, Amazing Radio chairman Bill Hein said, “This is a revolution for American emerging artists; the opportunity to be played on the radio, increase their popularity through listener engagement, have the chance to play CMJ and grow their careers, all backed up by audience support and exert advice. We’re still planning to bring CMJ back to New York in October, come hell or coronavirus. But we’re here to help musicians, now, anyway.”

It was back in 1978 when Esquire published a story called “The Ballad of the Urban Cowboy: America’s Search for True Grit.” Most of the events of the piece take place at Gilley’s, a honky-tonk in Pasadena, Texas, just outside Houston. And, frankly, that article pissed off the owner of that bar, country singer Mickey Gilley, because he thought it was making fun of country music and the whole surrounding scene. He was about to let his ire be known when he got wind that there was interest in shooting a movie based on the article, which would film at Gilley’s bar – a movie which would eventually become Urban Cowboy, starring John Travolta. Suddenly that article didn’t seem so bad anymore.

Urban Cowboy would become a phenomenon, doing for country music what Saturday Night Fever would do for disco — perhaps more, considering country’s mainstream appeal hasn’t really wavered much since. This film about Bud (Travolta) and Sissy (Debra Winger) and their on-again, off-again relationship, interlaced with mechanical bull riding, put Houston on the Hollywood map and produced the smash hit “Looking For Love” by Johnny Lee and Gilley’s own smash, his cover of Ben E. King’s “Stand By Me.” (Gilley even performed his version alongside King once.)

In celebration of Urban Cowboy‘s 40th anniversary, Paramount has released a new Blu-ray. When I was a little kid and we lived at Lake of the Ozark – yes, the one from the Netflix show – Gilley often used to perform at the bar my father’s best friend owned. So, when Paramount asked if I wanted to talk to Gilley, I couldn’t resist. And now, at 84, he’s still out there “performing for the folks.”

Well, at least he was before everything shut down, now he’s just keeping safe and reminiscing about the time he got to fly a plane with John Travolta.

How are you doing? Have you been staying safe? Been keeping busy?

Oh, yeah. I’m doing fine. We’ve been out of work now for quite some time, but the time is not bad.

Where in the world are you right now?

I’m in Branson, Missouri.

I’m in New York City right now. I went to junior high in Springfield, which isn’t that far from Branson.

I go to Springfield to go shopping and to do some things that they don’t do here in Branson. It’s about 35 miles, so it’s no problem.

The Battlefield Mall.

Battlefield Mall! You’re right.

Speaking of Missouri, I was a very little kid when Urban Cowboy came out, but I do remember all of a sudden my parents were going to honky-tonks and learning country dancing.

It was so awesome. It changed my life. I tell people I think John Travolta is keeping my career alive, at 84 years old and still singing the music from the soundtrack of Urban Cowboy. And it has been one heck of a ride.

I rewatched it the other night. It’s not at all what I remember. There’s a lot going on. So how did you get involved with it in the first place?

The article had come out in Esquire magazine, “The Ballad of the Urban Cowboy.” And my business partner, he knew that I didn’t appreciate what the guy had written in Esquire magazine, because I thought he was poking fun at country music. And that was my life. I was was going out to do the Mike Douglas or the Merv Griffin show, one of those shows out there. And he said, “Look, don’t say anything bad about that article in Esquire magazine, because we may get a film on this particular article.” And I looked at him and I said, “What side of the bed did you roll off on?” And he says, “No, I’m serious.” He said, “They’re looking at John Travolta to play the part.” And when he said John Travolta, I said, wait a minute. Saturday Night Fever was the first thing I thought about. And I said, “Saturday Night Fever? Country Night Fever!” And I did not mention that that article at all in Esquire magazine. I kept my mouth shut about it.

Do you still dislike that article?

Oh, I love the article now.

I bet.

The bottom line was, if you read the article, it said, “Boy meets girl. Twang, twang. Boy falls in love with girl. Twang, twang.” They were using the “twang, twang” on it. And that kind of irritated me a little bit. But we got to film Urban Cowboy with John Travolta playing the part, and it has become such a big thing in my life because of the music. I had “Stand By Me”, the old Ben E. King song. It wasn’t really a country song. It was a blues type song. And then Johnny Lee, of course, had the “Looking For Love,” which was a major hit in the film.

It is like the soundtrack of 1980.

And when I found out, now they’re going to put it out on Blu-ray, which is going to enhance the whole thing. And it’s been 40 years ago since that film came out, I’m very excited about it. It’s wonderful.

Do you think the influence of Urban Cowboy making country music mainstream led to even the ’90s explosion with people like Garth Brooks?

I think that the film changed a lot of people’s lives, as far as the music scene was concerned. Because a lot of people didn’t listen to country music until that film came out. And when it came out, and they heard all these other acts in this film doing some of this music that they could listen to, and they could relate to, and all of a sudden country music, well, it boomed all of a sudden.

Again, I was very young, but your version of “Stand By Me” was the first version I heard because my parents had the record. How did that become a thing?

Actually, the guy who picked it was a guy by the name of Jim Ed Norman. And he bought the song and he says, “I want you to record this song, and we’re going to use it for the dance in the film. Well, I thought we were going to do it like Ben E. King. And he changed the complete arrangement of it. And we started doing that differently, and it turned out to be a one heck of a song for me, because it was so different. It’s been a dynamite song. When I play it, people say, “What are you doing? You trying to milk the crowd?” And people get on their feet and stand up. I said, “Hey, it’s just a song.”

What’s wrong with milking the crowd? Why is that a bad thing? Milking the crowd is a good thing.

Well, I tell you what, I’m very fortunate to be 84 and still been able to go out there and sing the music for the folks. And people say, “Why don’t you retire?” And I say, “Because I enjoy the music. I love the music.”

I’m curious, did you ever hear from Ben E. King?

I got to perform with him in Los Angeles.

Oh, that’s great.

And he did his version. If I recall it correctly, he did the song, part of it, and I did part of it my way. I got to work with him on that one particular thing. It was Rhythm and Blues and Country, I think, or something, what they called it. I don’t remember exactly now, because it’s been awhile back. But it was quite a few acts on the show.

Tell me about Gilley’s, the bar. It’s such a huge part of Urban Cowboy.

We opened the club in 1971. And in 1973 or 1974, I had my first number one song in the country charts. And then in 1978, I’m on the road traveling. And my business partner, Sherwood Cryer, installed this mechanical bull in Gilley’s. And when he did, I thought it was a big mistake. And I told him, “We’re going to get people hurt on this thing. We’re going to start getting sued.” It had my name on it and I was a little scared about the thing. And he says, “We’re going to attract all these cowboys, who want to be a cowboy.” And it did. People coming out to Gilley’s, riding the mechanical bull, chasing the girls and drinking beer and that type of thing. And lo and behold, I didn’t believe they were going to do the film until the Paramount truck started pulling into the parking lot. Jim Bridges was the director at the time. He says, “When that film comes out, this club will never be the same.” And boy was he ever right. It changed completely after that film came out. I mean you could not get into it.

Maybe it’s movie magic, but it does look like Travolta is riding the bull.

Oh, he did ride the bull. That was him. It was actually him riding it. I don’t think he used a stuntman.

Did Debra Winger ride it, too?

Oh yeah. If you look, if you watch the film, she stands up on it and she’s dancing on top of the bull. It was awesome.

That scene when Travolta is dancing is pretty amazing. It really is a country version of Saturday Night Fever. He’s magic.

I got a private showing in Hollywood. I said, “Johnny Lee will have a hit, ‘Looking For Love.’” And they said, “Really?” And I said, “Yeah. And you know why? Because John Travolta said, ‘Turn that up. That’s my favorite song,’ in the film.”

What was he like to hang around then?

He was a very nice young man. And when I met him, the one thing we had in common was we both liked to fly. I had my multi-engine rating, my instrument rating. And he was working on his, getting his pilot’s license. And I got to fly with him. So, that’s my exciting thing that I can say that I did with John Travolta.

That actually is pretty exciting.

And I’ll carry that for the rest of my life.

You can contact Mike Ryan directly on Twitter.

While not nearly as well-traveled as much of the Uproxx Life staff, one place I actually have been is Spain (ah, travel, remember that?). The first dish I had in Barcelona was something called pan con tomate, a vaguely familiar dish that seemed to consist entirely of tomato pulp on top of some bread.

I’d had all these ingredients before a million times, just not in this exact configuration.

A traditional Catalán dish (pa amb tomaquet) dating back to the 16th century, pan con tomate was initially a way to reinvigorate stale bread. The reason I like it is that, well, for one thing, it’s incredibly easy. For another, I’m also one of the many people who used this quarantine to dabble in bread baking, and the tomatoes in my garden are just starting to ripen.

Got bread? Got tomatoes? Then you should know pan con tomate.

Ingredients

• Tomatoes
• Bread
• Garlic
• Olive oil
• Salt

Yep, that’s it. Now, the purists will say to use a rustic loaf of bread and the special hanged tomatoes they have in Spain (that lose moisture and concentrate flavor as they sit), but honestly, as long as you have decent bread, ripe tomatoes, and good olive oil it will work just fine. I’m growing early girl tomatoes in my garden and they work wonderfully.

It’s not required, and stale or untoasted bread works fine, but I like to cut mine into slices, lightly butter it (with more apologies to the purists), and stick it under the broiler until it’s lightly browned. That helps with the next step:

This is my favorite part. Take your peeled garlic clove, cut the top off, and sort of rub the cut part all over your toasted bread. Imagine the garlic is cheese and the toast is the cheese grater. Ideally, you’ll see the bread take on a slight sheen from the garlic oil and you’ll be able to smell garlic in the air. Incidentally, I use this exact technique for avocado toast.

Now, it’s true, the traditional Catalán way of doing this is to rub the tomatoes directly onto the bread. But hey, my garden is small, and fuck wasting all that tomato. I prefer grating the tomato over a bowl, which does add a bowl to clean but wastes less tomato and allows for cleaner hands. I use my microplane over a bowl and rub carefully until all that’s left ungrated is the skin.

Now I just spoon that mixture onto my toasted, garlic-rubbed bread. It’s okay that it’s making the bread soft, that’s kind of the point. To complete the dish, you simply drizzle on some olive oil (call it a teaspoon), and sprinkle on a little salt. I’ve heard there’s some argument about whether you should salt before drizzling olive oil or drizzle olive oil before salt. You could make a case for either — salt dissolves better in tomato than in oil, so you could say salt first seasons it better, though oiling last might also wash away some of the salt. I tend to go salt last, but I doubt it matters. I use more or less the same amount of salt you’d use to season an egg.

Ta-da! No really, that’s it. It’s like the laziest gourmet snack ever, which is why I love it. Once you’ve had it, you’ll almost feel guilty cooking your nice fresh tomatoes. And it’s basically the same flavors as bruschetta, pico de gallo, gazpacho, panzanella… There’s a reason we have so many different dishes based on basically the same three or four ingredients.

Avocado Toast Variation

We don’t get beautiful ripe tomatoes all year round (though you can get medium-shitty imported ones grown in a greenhouse somewhere) but you can usually find avocados. Start by toasting the bread and rubbing on the garlic in the same way, but then instead of tomato, use half of an at least semi-soft avocado. Cut it in half and add lengthwise slices, or cut it in half, score it into small cubes and then spread like butter.

To the avocado add a sprinkle of salt and a sprinkle of pepper. For extra credit, you can add a few drops of lime in place of the olive oil, and sprinkle on some chopped chives or chive blossoms.

Vince Mancini is on Twitter. Read more of his cooking commentary in UPROXX’s Cooking Battles and Viral Cooking. For past Top Chef Power Rankings, go here.

As you no doubt remember, after last fall’s WWE Crown Jewel Event in Saudi Arabia, the chartered plane that was supposed to bring most of the roster back in time for Friday Night Smackdown was delayed. The NXT roster had to fill in on Smackdown, but thankfully the disgruntled roster members all got home by Saturday. Rumors swirled that the Saudi Government had held the roster there as payback because Vince McMahon had messed with the local broadcast as part of a dispute about late payments for the previous shows. WWE, however, blamed the delay on mechanical issues and aggressively stuck to that story as they renewed their commitment to Saudi Arabia.

In the months sense, WWE shareholders have filed multiple lawsuits against WWE, claiming that the company has made misleading statements and withheld facts about their business, and making specific mention of the Saudi Arabia deal and Crown Jewel. Because WWE can be insincere to us, and that’s just The Business, but if they’re lying to shareholders too, that’s a whole other thing.

As of this weekend, thanks to Wrestlenomics, we’ve seen the official court documents from one of these lawsuits, and it backs up all those rumors we heard back in the fall. It turns out the plaintiffs have an unnamed witness who’s able to testify firsthand about the experience on the ground (and trying to get into the air) after Crown Jewel.

The witness is referred to in the document as CW-2 (short for Confidential Witness Two), a former WWE Superstar who performed at Crown Jewel and was on the ill-fated flight. Here’s the relevant text from the court document, which you can read in its entirety in PDF form at CourtListener.com:

CW-2 recalled that he was initially told the charter flight he was scheduled to leave on was delayed because the plane needed to be pulled around, and once they boarded, they were removed from the airplane after 20-30 minutes. CW-2 explained that he spoke with a stewardess on the flight about the delay, who told him that “it seems someone doesn’t want us to leave the country.” CW-2 further explained that the pilot sounded “distressed” when he informed the passengers that the flight was unable to take off. CW-2 recalled that then they were told that it was because of mechanical issues, but he recalled seeing a “ton” of guards wearing black “militia” attire and wearing guns that were blocking their exit and “staring at the wrestlers.”

CW-2 became aware that something was wrong and explained that a number of the other personnel were referring to the event as a “hostage” situation.” CW-2 explained that he asked the Senior Director of Talent Relations, Mark Carrano, about what was going on and that Carrano told him that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and McMahon had gotten into an argument over late payments in connection with the June 7, 2019 Super ShowDown event. Carrano also informed CW-2 that McMahon had cut the live feed for the Crown Jewel event and that this had made the Crown Prince “very mad.

CW-2 advised the he and other WWE personnel looked into the prospect of booking flights on their own at a different airport for early the next morning. After a few hours, CW-2 explained, he and about 10-12 other wrestlers, cameramen, and agents were put on another flight to Buffalo. CW-2 further noted that at this point he wondered why if other planes were available that they did not get everyone out of Saudi Arabia.

CW-2 also heard that while on the plane, other wrestlers communicated back home that the military police were holding the wrestlers, and that McMahon didn’t air the first 30 minutes of the pay-per-view, and that as retaliation the Prince was holding them.

In addition, CW-2 recalled a number of wives being very concerned on social media and then when wrestlers returned home there were a lot of messages expressing how grateful they were to be home. CW-2 stated that after he returned, the WWE put out a letter that attempted to remove all blame from the company and that, in his opinion, many wrestlers were scared of speaking out due to the limited job opportunities in the industry and the WWE’s comparatively high salaries. CW-2 explained that many spoke on the condition of anonymity to journalists and the WWE denounced these stories as “conspiracies” and “laughable.” Nevertheless, after the event, CW-2 said that he and a co-worker went straight to Talent Relations and said they would not go back to Saudi Arabia. CW-2 noted that other wrestlers tried to do the same but the WWE “abused” their “power” and threatened the future trajectory of their careers if they did not go.