EPISODE 927: THE RETURN OF JOY
Also, I guess add whip before you blend?
POP CULTURE SPIRIT WOW
Hi and welcome to Pop Culture Spirit Wow, the Substack widely celebrated as what happens when Gen X nostalgia metastasizes into Gen Z cringe. I’m your host Jim McDermott, and this week I have White people holding rallies! Marvel movies !%%ing with you! Popcorn buckets not for the faint of heart! And giggles for your troubles!
Let’s get into it!
THE WOWND UP
Last week, white people held massive rallies, which is almost never a good thing. But these events were in support of the Democratic Presidential candidate, Vice President Kamala Harris. Women for Harris, which attendee Connie “Mrs. Coach” Britton suggested should be called “Karens for Kamala,” had so many people it crashed Zoom repeatedly and raised $8.5 million. Meanwhile “White Dudes for Harris,” which opened with actor Jeff Bridges—who played “The Dude” in the Coen Brothers’ film The Big Lebowski—saying “I’m white, I’m the Dude, and I’m for Harris,” raised $4.5 million.
Neither event was actually exclusively white, or gender-exclusive, but both got a lot of attention. They followed other Zooms organized by Black Women, Black Men, Latinas, South Asian Women, South Asian Men (and probably others).
Reflecting on the surge of excitement around Harris, writer and pastor John Pavlovitz, whose Substack “The Beautiful Mess” is worth following, wrote a piece on Harris’s approach as offering “the return of joy”:
In the span of a few short days, Vice President Harris and her campaign have reminded us why we’re fighting in the first place: so everyone can pursue happiness unfettered, so that no one is a permanent stranger to optimism.
With her beaming smile, her confident countenance, and her clear love for this life, she has given us permission to laugh again, to feel lightness, to dance; to do this important work of equity and justice, not just with a furrowed brow and aching back—but a twinkle in our eyes and a spring in our steps.
There’s some definitely honeymoons are for lovers vibes going on here, but it is also true that Kamala Harris seems to have undeniable Cool Auntie playfulness.
Meanwhile in Italy, a mayor trying to lose weight has sparked his entire town to take walks after dinner with him. There’s a former Episcopal monk who won the lottery and uses his money to support theater around the country (#Goals). And American Olympic gold medalist Ryan Crouser, the only three-time Olympic gold medalist in shot put history, recently told CNBC that “[his] typical breakfast might consist of a five-egg omelet with cheese and a quarter pound of turkey sausage followed by two servings of oatmeal and a cup of blueberries. For his two lunches he’ll have a pound of lean ground beef or chicken and 12 ounces of rice. Dinner, meanwhile, is shared with his girlfriend. ‘We’ll follow a recipe for a family of four. She has one serving and I’ll have the other three.’” He is 6’7” tall, 320 pounds, and 100% Wow.
FUCK YEAH, MARVEL
In its second weekend Deadpool vs. Wolverine continues to slice through all opposition—sorry M. Night and Harold’s Purple Crayon—and with it have come more fun stories. Including the fact that people say the word “fuck” in the film 116 times, a ridiculous number for a Disney/Marvel movie and also nearly 20 more than Deadpool 2.
But it turns out 116 fucks is actually not as many fucks as you might think. Scarface, which came out 40 years ago, supposedly had 226 fucks, and honestly, that seems like an awful low count on the number of fucks in that fucking movie—that is, a movie which includes the word fuck. Seriously, I’m shocked they didn’t call that film It’s Fucking Scarface, You ******** Fucking Mother****** Fuck.
Casino, which is almost 30 years old, included 422 fucks, and more than half of those fucks are fucks given by Joe Pesci, who as of 2022 had said more fucks in films than any other fucking actor—that is, an an actor who says fuck. But most of those fucks were fucks he fucking said in fucking Casino: 241 out of 272 fucks.
Number two on the list of actors who have said the most fucks is Al Pacino at 197. Meanwhile Sam Jackson, who once did the Audible narration for a children’s book called Go the Fuck to Sleep, doesn’t even crack the fucking top 10. Sam, what the fuck?
Wikipedia actually has a list of the top 178 most fucks sworn in a movie—along with the rate of fucks per minute. The Wolf of Wall Street, which used the word fuck on 560 occasions, has 3.16 fucks said per minute. Believe it or not, that only puts it in the top 15 of fucks per minute. The characters in Swearnet: The Movie, which has the World Record for most fucks said in a movie—935—say 8.35 fucks per minute. And the documentary Fuck, which yes, is an entire documentary about the word fuck, includes fuck at a rate of 9.21 fucks per minute. That is a fuck every 6 seconds. That is a fucking lot of fucking fucks.
…
Wait, what the fuck was I talking about?
IDFK
POP ART
About a year ago a very niche aspect of the cinema experience suddenly made the public go very insane.
The context was the sequel to the When Zendaya-Almost-Met-Timmy barnstormer, Dune. And the culprit was, of all things, a popcorn bucket designed for the film.
Designed to look like the mouth of the massive sandworms which populate the film, the bucket was from the start, as the kids say, “a weird flex.”
First of all, who is going to put their hand in that? It was not even clear that a normal-sized hand could fit in it without getting all scratched up.
But that was just the tip of the iceberg.
Yeah, it was a whole thing. And while AMC said it was horrified—and the designers of the bucket actually had the things sitting around for months and months without ever having a sense that it might be misinterpreted in this way—the buckets sold out immediately and started selling on eBay for $300+.
This insane footnote in cinema history has somehow turned popcorn buckets into the latest collectible craze. Most have not opted for the Rated X option, but Deadpool vs. Wolverine being Deadpool vs. Wolverine, well…
There are no words.
Vulture being Vulture had the great idea to interview the designers of the Dune popcorn buckets about it and this phenomenon. It is a delight.
Just posted for subscribers: Deadpool vs. Wolverine is Somehow the Spiritual Movie of the Summer.
SUMMER STOCK
It’s August, the month that we all supposedly go to the beach and read, but if you have kids is probably more the month that you come back from the beach and try to convince those kids to get ready for school, and if you do not have kids (or kids not of school age), it’s more likely an either/or when it comes to beach and reading, because sand does not go great with books or electronics.
For those looking for summer content to consume like a sand worm popcorn bucket devours a hand, here’s a few suggestions.
TV
In the spring Apple TV launched the first season of a Kristen Wiig-led show about a woman in late 60s Florida who is intent on pushing her way into Palm Beach’s upper class. Because it stars Kristen Wiig and also Carol Burnett, you might think it’s just a wacky send-up of the time period. But in fact it’s an insightful exploration of gender in the late 60s, the kind of show you end up wanting to take slow so you can enjoy it.
BOOKS, NON-FICTION
If you are a theater fan, do yourself a favor and pick up either Razzle Dazzle or Singular Sensation by Michael Riedel. In Razzle Dazzle, Riedel tells the story of Broadway in the 70s and 80s, through the lens of the Shubert and Nederlander families, who own most of Broadway’s theaters. In Singular Sensation, Riedel continues with theater in the 90s, describing the development of shows like Cats, Sunset Boulevard, and Angels in America. Riedel is a wonderful storyteller. You really feel like you get to know the people involved, and the stories behind the shows are compelling.
And if you want a deeper dive into one show, I highly recommend Ted Chapin’s Everything Was Possible, which tells the behind the scene story of the making of Stephen Sondheim’s Follies, or James Lapine’s Putting it Together, which does the same for the making of Sunday in the Park with George.
BOOKS, FICTION
During the pandemic author N.K. Jemisin, who has won just about every writing award you can, put out a book called The City We Became about a person who discovers they are the avatar [like, living embodiment] of New York City. I immediately bought it, but then could not get through the first chapter.
I dug back into it on a whim this spring, and found it to be a) not at all what I thought it was—it’s actually about 6 people who are the avatars of New York, not one—and b) a thrilling celebration of the diversity of city life and New York City. It really is one of my favorite reads of the entire year, an actually kind of spiritual book filled with characters I want to follow forever. (Thankfully, there’s a sequel, The World We Make.)
MOMENT OF WOW
Let Bill Hader’s giggles transport you to a better place.
See you next week!
Another wonderful episode...the Bill Hader/Jiminy Glick clip was the icing on the "fucking" cake!