Culture Feature

Boots Riley Drops Major Truth Bombs in Endorsement for Bernie Sanders

Boots Riley recognizes the need for radical direct action––Because without radical direct action, nobody will listen and nothing will change.

Boots Riley, the activist, rapper, writer, and director behind Sorry to Bother You–the most underrated movie of 2018 (although that's to be expected from majority white mainstream media when it comes to a biting satire about code switching and capitalist enslavement of black people)–has taken to Twitter with his endorsement of Bernie Sanders.

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CULTURE

What Is Mukbang: These Beautiful Women Are Paid to Eat

Mukbang finds its massive audience by pandering to the three pillars of Internet culture: loneliness, sex, and absurdity.

YouTube

The concept of posting "food p*rn" pictures to social media was taken to new heights in 2010 when a bizarre Korean phenomenon featuring petite women eating impossible portions of food took off.

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TV Features

"The Masked Singer" Is Over: What's Next in Mind-Boggling Reality TV?

Imagine a show featuring Miley Cyrus teaching Nicolas Cage and Jenny McCarthy how to be vegan. Sounds like Fox network's next hit!

Miley Cyrus

Photo by Kobby Dagan (Shutterstock)

America's trust in television was broken long before NBC's The Masked Singer held up a mirror to our low standards for "expert judges" and our underlying fear of Teletubbies.

For the past two months, one of the top-rated shows on prime time has featured twelve has-been celebrities dressed as inbred Looney Toons. The singing competition is based on the Korean reality TV show with the same concept. Now that we know The Masked Singer will assault us with a second season next year, let's brace ourselves–the worst is yet to come.

Other hit Korean TV shows spotlight celebrities' moldy leftovers and strained parent-child relationships for the amusement of the masses. We're betting it's only a matter of time before one of these bizarre series debuts in the States.

1. Please Take Care of My Refrigerator

Ever want to see inside your favorite celebrity's refrigerator? Why would you? That's weird. Each episode of Please Take Care of My Refrigerator features eight of the country's best chefs and invites them into the guest star's kitchen, having them compete to create edible dishes using only the ingredients and old leftovers in the celebrity's refrigerators. They have 15 minutes. The celebrity then judges each dish and selects a winner. There is no apparent reward for winning, except for the chance to feed BTS' best boy, Jungkook.

For a US adaptation, we predict the E! network would milk this reality show for all its worth. Hosted by: Gordon Ramsay.

[ENG] Please Take Care of my Fridge BTS Cut_3rd Dish (Hot Braised Short Ribs)youtu.be

2. Dad! Where Are We Going?

Riffing off the common assumption that celebrities must be terrible parents, each episode features five celebrity fathers traveling or camping with their children. Sometimes they try to "cook" and other times they pull their hair out. We predict CBS would be the first to adopt this on account of its eagerness to exploit any celebrity for prime-time ratings (yes, we're talking about The World's Best).

[ENG SUB] Dad!Where are you going?-Hoo's 9th b-day party 후9살생일축하 20141221youtu.be

3. Human Condition

Six A-list actors are deprived of their phones, television, and the Internet as they live in a dorm for one week. But rather than being a simple Big Brother setup, each episode features a challenge imposing new restrictions, like not creating any trash or living on minimum wage. For a US version, we see this show on ABC. With moralizing shows like The Good Doctor and Grey's Anatomy but reality TV trash like The Bachelor, ABC would jump on the chance to teach celebrities about social issues like climate change while benefiting from their potential moral failures. Hosted by: Miley Cyrus

The Human Condition | 인간의 조건: Living on a Shoestring Budget – The First Episode (2014.12.03)youtu.be


4. The Return of Superman

It's another show banking on male celebrities being incapable of caring for their children. This time, celebrity fathers are left alone with their kids for 48 hours without any help from wives, family members, or the legion of celebrity nannies who keep Hollywood afloat. American actors like Steven Yeun have also guest-starred as "Uncles" left to take care of other's children on their own. NBC, America's publicist for family values, would love this shit.

[The Return of Superman] Steven Yeun's special way to feed a babyyoutu.be

5. Unpretty Rapstar

It's worse than it sounds. This music competition features aspiring female rappers competing against each other American Idol-style. Hosted by any mildly successful rapper, the show features challenges like diss battles and filming a one-take music video for an original song they've written and arranged themselves while on the show. Considering Fox's love of reality shows that sound wrong, the network probably has its eye on adapting this bad boy already. Hosted by: Iggy Azalea.

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Of all the movies to come out in 2018, from Alfonso Cuaron's poetic Roma to Yorgos Lanthimos's biting The Favourite, only two stood out as truly mind-blowing.

One was Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, a blend of extraordinary animation coupled with the best superhero script to-date. It was so good that even pervasive superhero movie fatigue couldn't hinder its buzz. Of course it got nominated for Best Animated Feature.

The other was Sorry to Bother You, the directorial debut of rapper Boots Riley. Watch the trailer below. Then we'll chat.


The story takes place in an alternate version of Oakland and follows Cassius 'Cash' Green (Lakeith Stanfield), an African American telemarketer who discovers that using a "white person voice" makes him extra-successful with sales.

That's all you should know going in. Anything beyond that could ruin the surprise.

But trust that we're talking about the most original movie in years — one with a strong, angry, passionate political viewpoint that never speaks down to its viewers. It's a movie that puts you directly into the shoes of a young, poor black man struggling to make his way against the myriad disadvantages heaped on him by white society, all while maintaining an outrageous sense of humor and visual oomph. It's a movie that transcends category, at once comedy, drama, socio-political commentary, and horror, rife with magic realism.

Sorry to Bother You absolutely deserved a Best Picture nod. Lakeith Stanfield deserved a Best Actor in a Leading Role nod for his turn as Cash. But most of all, Boots Riley deserved nominations for Best Director and Best Original Screenplay.

Boots Riley has stated that he's not bothered by the Academy's decision not to nominate because he "didn't actually run a campaign." While that may be true, it's still bullshit.


The Academy Awards are meant to be a celebration of the best movies in a given year, not the ones that spent the most on their Oscar campaigns. A movie like Sorry to Bother You getting left off a "Best Feature" list that includes Bohemian Rhapsody calls the entire endeavor into question.

If one of the best original movies in years doesn't get nominated for any Oscar, why the hell should we care about the Oscars at all?


Dan Kahan is a writer & screenwriter from Brooklyn, usually rocking a man bun. Find more at dankahanwriter.com


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FILM & TV

BOX OFFICE BREAKDOWN | Save some crimes this holiday weekend

JULY 6TH-8TH | What's Coming to Theaters this Weekend?

indiewire.com

The big guy this weekend at the box office is actually quite small.

In Popdust's column, Box Office Breakdown, we aim to inform you of the top flicks to check out every weekend depending on what you're in the mood to enjoy. Looking to laugh? What about having your pants scared off? Maybe you just need a little love? Whatever the case may be, we have you covered. Take a peek at our top picks for this week…

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