Disney Loses $100M (each) on 7 Recent Movies, New Competitor Enters?! The Breaking of Britney Spears, Jason Momoa + Oscar Isaac + Gerard Butler=The Next Great Mafia Movie?! (The Five for 10/20/23)
Disney Loses $100M (each) on 7 Recent Movies, New Competitor Enters?! The Breaking of Britney Spears, Jason Momoa + Oscar Isaac + Gerard Butler=The Next Great Mafia Movie?! (The Five for 10/20/23)
Plus, how does the new Godzilla show from Apple TV+ look this good? The Millennial Generation's Nirvana return with a new album, Beloved 90's Cartoon, based on Shakespeare, a 2023 Live Action Hit?!
Hey, welcome to The Five, a publication about the stories that shape our lives.
As much as possible, stories about global conflict will be kept to the weekly news issue (Tuesdays at noon CST), and emitted from the Friday feature, which focuses on Culture & Commentary.
Because constant doom scrolling aint good for anybody.
With that being said, let’s dive in.
[one]
Former pop queen Britney Spears revealed this week that former boyfriend Justin Timberlake forced her into an abortion.
“It was a surprise, but for me, it wasn’t a tragedy. I loved Justin so much. I always expected us to have a family together one day. This would just be much earlier than I’d anticipated,” Spears, now 41, writes of the pregnancy in the book. “But Justin definitely wasn’t happy about the pregnancy. He said we weren’t ready to have a baby in our lives, that we were way too young."
Spears endured a horrific at home procedure, according to Page Six:
Britney Spears aborted her and Justin Timberlake’s baby at home without telling her family that she had been pregnant.
The “Stronger” singer shares in her forthcoming memoir that she and the *NSYNC member agreed not to go to a doctor or hospital in order to keep their secret from going public.
“It was important that no one find out about the pregnancy or the abortion, which meant doing everything at home,” she writes in “The Woman in Me” (via the Associated Press).
Spears, who was about 19 at the time, describes the physical pain of the medication abortion as “excruciating.”
The general public didn’t realize it at the time, but Spears channeled her grief into the music video for her 2009 single “Everytime.”
In the video, Spears attempts suicide by drowning, and is saved by her on-screen boyfriend, which, statistically, is pretty accurate for post-abortion women, according to one study:
The Finnish study indicates that in the year following an abortion (with most deaths occurring in the first two months) women were three times more likely to commit suicide than the general population, and nearly six times more likely to commit suicide than women who gave birth.
As for Mr. Timberlake? He got to just walk away, and wash his hands of the situation. For all the talk of “girlboss” and “accountability culture” for men, nobody is coming for Justin’s career, despite the fact that others have had their work or livelihoods destroyed for much less (Chris Pratt for attending church, Vince Vaugn for talking to the wrong person at a football game, J.K. Rowling for questioning if putting biological men in women’s prisons might result in rapes)…the former N*SYNC member hasn’t face much serious backlash.
Feminism seems to be having trouble living up to it’s own declared standards this week.
Which is true for every movement, I suppose…but what’s irrefutable is something broke in Britney Spears doesn’t appear to be fixable enough for her to be a functioning adult.
Now we know who broke it.
[two]
A clip went viral on Twitter of an event held by Race2Dinner, an organization that charges white people $5,000 to be willingly yelled at.
Hey, people can spend money on whatever they want. I would recommend taking that same $5,000 and buying a struggling minority family a car with cash, but hey, if burning a pile of Benjamin Franklins to make yourself feel better (or worse) is your thing…you’re an adult. Do you.
But what is not OK is the fact that Race2Dinner is masquerading as a nonprofit. Given that there are only a limited number amount of money people can donate…by definition, Race2Dinner is taking resources from poor minorities.
“Any reasonable person who visits this site will immediately assume it’s a nonprofit based on the presentation and all the nonprofit and social justice buzzwords that are incorporated throughout its content,” said Laurie Styron, executive director of Charity Watch, a nonprofit watchdog group. “If it is a for-profit, or if it is an aspiring nonprofit in the process of applying for tax-exempt status, it should explicitly communicate this information on its website so that people can make an informed decision about whether or not they want to fund it.”
When The Post tried to make a $5 donation on Race2Dinner’s website, the message that appeared onscreen said “you will donate $5.00 to Race2Dinner,” which is a for-profit limited liability company, incorporated by Rao and Jackson in Denver in 2019, public records show.
To be clear here, it’s not that I don’t think racism is a problem…I just don’t think two rich minority women grifting rich white women for stacks of cash solves any aspect of it.
If you’re wondering how the dinners go, here’s a gem of a (since deleted) Tweet from the Race2Dinner co-founder, which has big “75-year-old-white-man-complaining-about-stuff-while-drinking-coffee-at-mcdonalds” energy.
[three]
One of the few animated shows I would recommend watching in adulthood (largely due to drawing heavily from Shakespeare’s MacBeth) is getting a live action reboot, 30 years later thanks to producer James Wan (Aquaman, Fast & Furious 7) and horror writer Gary Dauberman (The Conjuring and Annabelle series, It Chapter Two).
From The Hollywood Reporter
Gargoyles was made by Walt Disney Television Animation and aired three seasons, from 1994 to 1997. The premise involved gargoyle statues moved from a castle in Scotland to modern-day New York. Once in the Big Apple, the statues awaken from a thousand-year-old spell and take on the mantle of protecting the city, becoming, as the show’s narration gravely said, “stone by day, warriors by night.”
The series, created by Greg Weisman, came during a time of innovation in series animation, with Gargoyles riding a wave of shows with more complex storylines and darker tones that also included Batman: The Animated Series and X-Men. As with those shows, Gargoyles burrowed into the consciousness of a generation of TV watchers who have given it cult status.
Oddly enough, the closest show I can compare Gargoyles to is motorcycle gang drama Sons of Anarchy, which draws heavily from Hamlet, another major Shakespearean work. Not bad for a playwright who died in 1616, to continue to influence pop culture 400 years later.
Another “hook” is that this reboot could appeal to Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones fans, as the original animated show reguarly jumped back 1,000 years in time to midieval Scotland, which may draw in fans of entertainment which features swords, dragons and magical elements.
[four]
Conservative platform The Daily Wire launched a kids entertainment app, which quickly hit #1 on the Apple charts.
According to Co-CEO Jeremy Boering, the effort is a result of the direction Disney has gone with their programming:
Walt Disney loved America. The company he founded seems to think America is systemically racist, and beyond just their content, Disney as a corporation pushes all the worst excesses of the woke Left — paying for its employees to travel for abortions, promoting “anti-racism” indoctrination of its employees, and going to war on behalf of radical Left-wing social policy in Florida.
It would be impossible to overstate just how big a loss this is for Americans who believe in basic reality. Disney controls the greatest content library ever created. Their cultural reach, particularly with children, is beyond anything that’s ever existed.
Recognizing the scope of this loss, The Daily Wire announced we would spend $100 million over three years to begin our own kids entertainment company. And today, on the 100th anniversary of the day Walt Disney founded his company, I’m proud to announce the launch of ours.
Introducing Bentkey, an entirely new company from The Daily Wire, a company dedicated to creating the next generation of timeless stories that transport kids into a world of adventure, imagination and joy.
Why the name Bentkey? Why not D.W. kids, as we’ve been calling the initiative for the last year? Well, put simply: D.W. Kids is just too political. Bentkey isn’t about teaching kids politics. It’s about childhood and wonder and adventure. It’s about values and all of the things on which politics are built later.
The sizzle reel above, as well as a quick preview of Snow White and the Evil Queen both look…surprisingly high budget. Or, maybe not surprisingly, given the $100 million the company threw at this.
However, to put this in perspective…Disney spent $33 billion on theatrical releases, TV and streaming in 2022. Despite the budget, the House of Mouse just can’t buy a hit these days, with Srange World, Turning Red, Haunted Mansion, A Wrinkle in Time, Lightyear, Mulan and Jungle Cruise all losing upwards of $100 million at the box office in the past few years.
Remaking Snow White, which is in the public domain, is a smart business move. Especially after a bevy of issues with Disney’s remake, including leading actress Rachel Zegler openly hating the original animated film and the “Seven Dwarfs” being transformed into weirdos from your local RenFair, I guess?! Seriously, the costuming is just horrible.
But for now, this is all speculation. Bentkey’s app exploded in popularity, but that’s not a sign that users love the content and will stay subscribed in an uber-competetive entertainment market.
Nor is it a sign that Snow White & The Evil Queen can outpunch it’s weight class and draw a significant audience from Disney’s live action feature, which will have the advantage of a probable $100M+ marketing budget.
Daily Wire made a big (and audacious) move into entertainment, and you’ve gotta give them credit for swinging for the fences. Now, the market will tell us if it was a good idea or not.
[five]
As always, let’s head into the weekend with a pop culture roundup:
Despite my early malaise towards Apple TV+, the tech giant’s streamer has been among the most consistent entertrainment platforms of the past 2 years…which is why I was surprised that the team would take on Godzilla, when there’s already an active Godzilla/King Kong movie universe.
But dang…this looks good. Kurt Russell (Tombstone, Guardians of the Galaxy 2) looks to be in fine form here. Catch it on 11/17.
In American Fiction, Jeffrey Wright (The Batman, The Hunger Games) plays a struggling writer who pens an intentionally terrible novel as a middle finger to his publisher…and then it’s a hit.
Gotta say, the premise is intriguing here. The December release date points to the possibility that this may be an awards season contender.
NEW MUSIC
Apple Music | YouTube Music
Nicole Galyon has penned songs for some of the biggest names in country music for decades before stepping out on her own with last year’s stunning First Born. She return with a fresh batch of songs for her latest EP that I just can’t stop listening to.
If you like narrative driven singer-songwriter projects…I can’t recommend this one highly enough.
Apple Music | YouTube Music
And finally, Blink-182 made their “hell freezes over” comeback today with their first album since 2011, when the trio infamously split without even talking to one another, communicating via lawyers. It took drummer Travis Barker nearly burning to death in a private jet crash and bassist Marcus Hoppus suffering through cancer to get the San Diego natives to even talk again. The results are an album that’s largely about the band and breakup itself (in particular) and the highs and lows of friendships (in general).
To elder Millennials like me, Blink-182 occupies a similar space that Nirvana did for Gen-X. It’s entirely possible that a 17-song record is over-stuffed and should have been trimmed up a bit, but there are some real gems here.
Until the next one,
-sth