Financing a Burrito is a Really Bad Idea, "Based on a True Story" No Longer Means Anything in Pop Culture, The Case for Quitting Twtter(The Five for 03/23/25)
Plus, this 90's comedy sequel looks surprisingly great. Studio behind "Civil War" goes Rom-Com. You have to check out Texas singer/songwriter Kat Hasty.
Hey, welcome to The Five, a publication about the stories that matter.
It’s Friday, so let’s dive into Culture & Commentary.
[one]
A new Netflix show, which aims to blame influencer Andrew Tate for knife murders in the UK claims to be “based on true events,” but follows a trend of “true story” entertainment being largely fabricated.
From the Australian Broadcasting Company:
Could a teenage boy be so influenced by the likes of misogynist Andrew Tate that he's driven to murder his young classmate?
This is the question at the centre of Adolescence, the gripping new Netflix crime drama.
In four episodes, each told through one continuous shot, the ramifications of 13-year-old Jamie's arrest is played out in spectacular style.
First-time actor Owen Cooper, who was just 14 at the time of his performance, compellingly leads in a series that takes toxic masculinity, loneliness and the gender divide to its extreme.
The show questions "what can happen to a boy who's rejected by traditional masculinity", explains Ryder Jack, the principal facilitator at Tomorrow Man, a social enterprise helping young people break down harmful gender stereotypes.
"Where does he go? What happens to [someone] craving affection and validation, [who] is so isolated?"
Those are worthy questions, and ones worth asking in powerful FICTION, rather than lying about the origin of this story.
The news story the show is allegedly based on…has no clear influence on motive.
A teen boy who stabbed a teen girl to death in England has been sentenced to prison.
Hassan Sentamu was sentenced March 13 to at least 23 years behind bars for the murder of 15-year-old Elianne Andam in South London in September 2023, per court sentencing remarks.
According to the remarks, Sentamu, who was 17 at the time, had broken up with his girlfriend. The plan was to meet up with his ex and exchange trinkets from their time together, including a teddy bear the ex had wanted back. Andam came along with the ex as a show of support.
Prior to their meetup, Sentamu reportedly had been made fun of by a group of girls, including Andam, and he told a friend “Bro, I can’t let this slide.”
On the day of the meetup, the ex brought the promised items, but Sentamu showed up with nothing, Metropolitan Police said in a news release.
The ex gave the items to Sentamu, but then attempted to follow him down the street to try and get them back. That’s when Andam stepped in taking back the things to try and help her friend, police said.
Sentamu immigrated with his family from Uganda, a country that is 80% Christian, but has a sizable minority of the population who practice traditional beliefs, which include human and child sacrifice (AI summary), with multiple incidents of human sacrifice being recorded from 2006 to 2014. Or, Sentamu could have been Muslim. Certain sects of Islam obviously have a pretty low value of the lives of women.
Or, he could have been influenced by Andrew Tate. We don’t know. In fact, in the other cases that allegedly inspired the miniseries (like this one) often don’t even use the name of the alleged murderer, let alone share motive. Per UK law, the media is not allowed to print the name of accused minors. Sentamu is the exception, as he was a legal adult when arrested, and even then, we just don’t have enough info here to assign motive beyond rage. Something drove that rage, but we don’t know what.
But the idea that the hit Netflix show is “based on a true story” is garbage. No one despises Andrew Tate more than me…but the reality is, if we don’t have any evidence of Tate inspiring murder in the UK, there shouldn’t be a “based on a true story” series about it…
Elsewhere, the new Assassin’s Creed game, an allegedly “true story” that is otherwise getting great reviews, is full of nonsense. Specifically, a gay romance between the main character Yasuke, an African immigrant to Japan and foreign-born samurai and a “non binary” biological male.
The new Assassins Creed game is so woke that there are multiple gay romances, including one with a nonbinary male Japanese man. The concept didn’t even exist in the 16th century.
Could this have happened? There’s no recorded info on Yasuke being straight or gay, or anything else. We have no records of him being in a romantic relationship, because he was at war all the time. I suppose you can argue creative license on that point.
But trying to apply “non-binary,” a trend that has largely popped up in the 2010’s on Tiktok and Instagram, to feudal Japan…goes way too far.
Wanna write a fictional video game based on a fictional non-binary romance in feudal Japan? Or a fiction show based show inspired by knife crime in the UK? Knock yourself out. But drop the “based on a true story” tagline.
These stories are no more true than Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter is…just because it starts with a historical figure (as far as fun, dumb action movies…that one is fun and dumb enough to add to your list—trailer).
[two]
People are going into long term debt for…brief moments of entertainment.
From The Hustle:
Florencia Vallejo couldn’t afford Taylor Swift tickets, so she decided to see the next best thing: an Olivia Rodrigo concert.
“I’m not someone who spends a lot,” said Vallejo in an email interview. But after being shocked by Swift tickets for as high as $5k, ~$400 for two Rodrigo tickets for her and her kid sister didn’t seem too steep.
The Montreal show was exciting, providing a bonding moment for Vallejo and her sister and giving Vallejo an opportunity to see opener Chappell Roan before she blew up. But afterward Vallejo, who’s 25 and works in the nonprofit sector, thought about her refrigerator, which is “so old and broken that the whole back is literally just a frozen block of ice.” Months later she has yet to replace it.
“Do I regret the concert? A little. I regret the price. I could’ve spent much less and [pocketed] the extra cash for at least a mini fridge,” said Vallejo, joking only slightly.
It’s a story that captures a distinct 2023-2024 sensation: a coveted, expensive purchase for an experience followed by guilt.
Chappell Roan and Olivia Rodrigo at a concert in Los Angeles. (Christopher Polk/Billboard via Getty Images)
The Hustle surveyed 350 people who said they’d splurged on an experience or event in the last couple of years. While just over half reported the high prices didn’t dampen their satisfaction level, nearly 37% said their experience was at least a little bit of a letdown because of the expense.
Their high from the experience turned into what we should just call experiangst.
Experiangst is similar to buyer’s remorse. Experiangst is dissatisfaction that strikes before, during, or after an experience. Experiangst can remind you of something else you should’ve bought. And experiangst can be just plain exhausting.
“I felt like I had to continually go go go to get the most out of my money,” said a guy who spent $300 per day to ski at Keystone Resort. “Any break was flushing money down the toilet.”
All this experiential spending has helped keep the economy humming, and earlier this year some 38% of Americans said they’d even go into debt to travel, dine out, or see live entertainment. But is it worth it?
To answer that question…no, it’s not.
To be fair, previous generation’s didn’t have to compete with “Instagram envy,” which can drive us to being more concerned about FOMO than our basic needs (like a fridge that works). But they did have “keeping up with the Jonses,” in which 90’s suburbs became a war of who got the nicest convertible/boat, etc.
But hey, at least then you had a car, or a boat, and not a burrito…that you financed.
[three]
Uhh, breakups take up to eight years to get over. While I don’t comment on relationship stuff (not my lane), this does have wider societal implications.
From Psychology Today:
What did the scientists find out? In the long run, the emotional bond to ex-partner reached zero in the statistical models. This is good news for anyone struggling with a messy breakup: The data show that at some point, almost all people really “get over” their exes fully and do not have a stronger emotional bond to them than to a stranger on the street.
However, the time it takes to get to this point is surprisingly long. It takes about 4.18 years to reach the halfway point of dissolving the emotional bond to an ex. While this suggests that the emotional bond to an ex is, on average, fully dissolved around 8 years, the individual variation was large, and, for a few volunteers, the emotional bond to an ex was higher than that to a stranger even many years later. Thus, among a few select people, the emotional bond to an ex never fades fully.
The scientists also analyzed which factors affected getting over an ex-partner. Interestingly, being in a new relationship and gender did not affect how quickly the emotional bond to the ex-partner faded.
The most important factor in predicting a continued emotional bond to the ex was if someone continued to have contact with their ex. Moreover, very anxious people tended to have longer-lasting bonds with their exes. Having children with the ex-partner resulted in an initially stronger emotional bond, which faded more quickly than for childless ex-partners.
Many younger Millennials and Gen-Zers use the term “situationships” in which two people are kinda/sorta dating until one of them finds something better, or living together, but one partner won’t commit to marriage.
Aside from the heartbreak, loneliness and anxiety of never really knowing if you’re secure (in the way that marriage provides), people who are casual…are less likely to get involved in their communities, because where they live could change as quickly as their romantic situation. They’re less likely to buy houses, have kids, join the local bowling league or craft night.
And when our young people are jumping in and out of a series of relationships that will take the better part of a decade to fully detach from (stacked one on another), it’s not just mental health and happiness that decay…it’s society that rots.
[four]
Ugh. I’m going to have to do it…I’m going to quit the Bird App.
I’ve been a fan of Twitter since 2006, but it’s grown into a monster that wants to suck up every waking minute of it’s users.
From Normie McDonald on Substack:
The poisonous element lies in the fact that it really is the everything app. It really does have an endless supply of news and commentary and drama and visual stimulation- so much so that it has the ability to make everything else seem dull by comparison. I think very few are willing to admit that. But you can see the effects of it pretty clearly, and the effects are drastic.
I came to twitter solely to speak on what amounts to the most severe side effect present in those who are addicted to it. I speak with twenty year olds who are convinced after scrolling their timelines that a world they’ve barely experienced has nothing to offer them. I speak with men who have never dated who are convinced that “modern women” are evil succubi waiting for an opportunity to make them look like fools. I speak with some of the loneliest individuals I have ever encountered, who are convinced that they are living under a microscope, and genuinely believe that their mentions and groupchats qualify as tangible social interactions. I speak with the bright, creative, and hopeful who carelessly discard their time and potential in exchange for a few extra hours of scrolling every day. I speak with those who spend all of their time screaming about how the world is falling apart while never stepping foot outside to see it for themselves.
I don’t know if twitter will grow, or shrink, or remain the same. But I do know that it’s a prison, and it’s better for you to not be there; Prison might actually be better. They have libraries and gyms and education opportunities in prison. Twitter is closer to voluntarily plugging yourself into the matrix, where you are tricked into thinking that everything happening on your screen is real, and developing resentment for all the real parts of your life that don’t take place on the screen.
There was a Twitter exodus when Elon Musk bought the platform a year or two ago, which I find kinda silly. If you’re only going to consume products from companies whose values align with your own…good luck. Cause there probably aren’t any.
But the attack on my time, the addiction to news, reactions and hot takes…I’ve tried to moderate. I deleted the app from my phone, and I just wind up using the mobile browser. For nearly everything else, I can practice moderation (for example, I use 10-15 MG of Nicotine per week as a “mental steroid” for deep tasks and as a preventative for Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s in the future), but I’m unable to apply this same discipline to my screen.
This weekend, my account gets nuked. Somebody hold me too it.
[five]
As always, let’s head into the weekend with a pop culture roundup…
[movies] Karl Urban (The Boys, Lord of the Rings) is joining the cast of Mortal Kombat 2. The first film, released during COVID, was great for the first 20 minutes, the OK-ish at best for the remaining hour or so. || A third Blade Runner movie is in the works. I know this is film heresy, but I dislike surrealism, and hate the first two movies. || The Final Destination franchise is still going. Turns out, the first movie was pitched as an X-Files episode. || Late 90’s cult classic Starship Troopers is getting a reboot. It was originally written off as dumb movie about killing space bugs, but has since been re-examined as an allegory about authoritarianism.
[shows] The Sylvester Stallone gangster drama Tulsa King is officially getting a third season. || Netflix is doing a limited series “dark comedy” with Julianne Moore (Crazy. Stupid. Love, Kingsman: The Golden Circle), Mille Adcock (House of the Dragon), Meghann Fahy (The White Lotus, The Bold Type) and Kevin Bacon (Footloose, Mystic River).
[music] Ed Sheeran popped up as a surprise performer at at Boston Irish Pub for St. Patrick’s Day. See the video here. || Drake sued his own record label over the rap battle with Kendrick Lamar, which capped off at the Super Bowl with Lamar calling Drake a pedophile. Universal Music Group responded by the lawsuit by saying Drake “should have accepted the loss like the unbothered rap artist he claims to be.” Hahahaha. || 2010’s indie folk harmonizers Fleet Foxes popped back up out of nowhere on a new single with Noah Cyrus (younger sister of Miley).”
Pulling off a sequel THREE DECADES after the original is no short order, but it looks like Happy Gilmore 2 may deliver. On Netflix 07/25.
Woah. We learn a lot from the second trailer for Ballerina, the first John Wick spinoff. The first is that Norman Reedus (The Boondock Saints, The Walking Dead) is a bad guy. The second is that the Babayaga himself will be hunting Ana De Armas’ (Knives Out, No Time to Die) character, with Keanu Reeves donning the iconic all-black assassin suit once again. Out 06/06.
When A24 (Civil War, Ex Machina) releases a movie, we sit up and take notice. Even if it is, unexpectedly, a rom-com. Dakota Johnson (The Social Network, Persuasion) pairs up with Marvel alums Chris Evans (Captain America, The Gray Man), and Pedro Pascal (The Last of Us, The Mandalorian) for a heck of a leading cast. See it 06/13.
So…Toy Story with footwear? And/or every animated kids movie about pets separated from their owners? I like Anthony Mackie (Avengers, 8 Mile) and I’ve got little ones, so it may be worth the price of a matinee showing. In theaters 04/18.
[new music]
Kat Hasty is best known for being part of the Texas Red Dirt/Oklahoma Folk scene that’s brought forth Zach Bryan, John Moreland, Turnpike Troubadours, and Miranda Lambert.
The first single off Kat’s first album in four years doesn’t follow the “Nashville Sound” blueprint for pop country, and sounds like nothing else on radio or mainstream country playlists.
Kat hails from oil country, and the narratives of her songs (including this one) heavily reference oil rigger life and culture, rather than the “smalltown, but no particulars” of country radio hits with 5-7 different songwriters contributing.
The full album drops 05/16.
[read & learn]
Steven Rinella is known mostly as a hunting/fishing/outdoor TV show host, author and podcaster…but his first foray into writing about parenting is pretty dang good.
This is a short one, and you can probably skip some parts (i.e. I’m allergic to fish, so I opted out of the chapter on fishing). Amazon | Barnes & Noble
Until the next one,
-sth