This Band is 100% Dead, 100% On-Tour, Bud Light Is Desperate (Not Because of Dylan Mulvaney), Ben Affleck's Incredible New Thriller, DC Stumbles Again? (The Five for 04/07/23)
Hey, welcome to The Five.
Iโve got lots of updates on projects (and life changes?!) coming up next weekโฆincluding a possible return to podcasting (well, a test run, at least).
But today is Good Friday, and I wanted to let you know that The Five is an exercise in the pursuit of Truth, in a media world gone mad.
Although the topic of faith doesnโt come up often in this format, the Greco-Judeo heritage of thought is what drives The Five. This would not exist without the New Testament.
I write because I love itโฆbut also because the person and presence of Jesus has completely shaped my view of the world. That is why I do this.
Get yourself to church this weekend ;)
๐๐๐ ๐ต๐ฒ ๐๐ฎ๐ ๐ฝ๐ถ๐ฒ๐ฟ๐ฐ๐ฒ๐ฑ ๐ณ๐ผ๐ฟ ๐ผ๐๐ฟ ๐๐ฟ๐ฎ๐ป๐๐ด๐ฟ๐ฒ๐๐๐ถ๐ผ๐ป๐; ๐ต๐ฒ ๐๐ฎ๐ ๐ฐ๐ฟ๐๐๐ต๐ฒ๐ฑ ๐ณ๐ผ๐ฟ ๐ผ๐๐ฟ ๐ถ๐ป๐ถ๐พ๐๐ถ๐๐ถ๐ฒ๐; ๐๐ฝ๐ผ๐ป ๐ต๐ถ๐บ ๐๐ฎ๐ ๐๐ต๐ฒ ๐ฐ๐ต๐ฎ๐๐๐ถ๐๐ฒ๐บ๐ฒ๐ป๐ ๐๐ต๐ฎ๐ ๐ฏ๐ฟ๐ผ๐๐ด๐ต๐ ๐๐ ๐ฝ๐ฒ๐ฎ๐ฐ๐ฒ, ๐ฎ๐ป๐ฑ ๐๐ถ๐๐ต ๐ต๐ถ๐ ๐๐ผ๐๐ป๐ฑ๐ ๐๐ฒ ๐ฎ๐ฟ๐ฒ ๐ต๐ฒ๐ฎ๐น๐ฒ๐ฑ. ๐๐๐ฎ๐ถ๐ฎ๐ต ๐ฑ๐ฏ:๐ฑ
With that being said, letโs dive into Culture & Commentary.
[one]
I canโt believe Iโm using this source, but TMZ appears to have broken the footage, and The Five prioritizes the outlet that breaks the story (even if it feels weird this time).
Cash App founder Bob Lee's final moments were reportedly caught on video before he collapsed dead from stab wounds on a California street.
Surveillance footage, reviewed by The San Francisco Standard, showed Lee tending to his injuries with one hand while holding his mobile phone with the other hand as he staggered down a desolate city street early Tuesday morning. A trail of blood was left in his wake.
The video also depicted Lee approaching a Toyota Camry with its hazard lights on and raising his shirt to reveal a stab wound to the driver. As Lee asked for help, the motorist sped away.
Moments later, Lee fell to the ground, but he got back up and walked further down the road before collapsing again.
Using his cell phone, Lee called 911 and screamed, "Help! Someone stabbed me!" By the time San Francisco police arrived, Lee was already unconscious and later died at a local hospital.
I didnโt know Bob Lee (a St. Louis native who was a generous philanthropist to local causes), but I have contacts who have met and/or worked with him, and have heard nothing but wonderful things.
In addition to the human tragedyโa husband, father, son, friendโlost to this world (and his two daughters orphaned), thereโs another cost to this murder. Bob Lee created 12,000 jobs through founding Square.
Now itโs all gone, likely due to a mentally ill person who just wanted to stab somebody. Nothing was taken, and no motive has surfaced for the killing. The facts lean towards a random act of violence.
The human cost is incalculable.
The financial cost to St. Louis, where Square maintains a large office, where Bob Lee gave generously and created more than four thousand jobs, is likely the tens of millions of dollars.
The question is, why?
Observations:
A). The person who drove away and left a mortally wounded man on the street doesnโt bear as much responsibility as the attacker wielding a knife, but the driver still helped kill Bob.
B). San Francisco cut $120 million from the local force during the Defund the Police movement. Less beat cops and 911 dispatchers mean more deaths of the innocent.
C). The third party to the murder are the city officials that have left San Francisco develop the tics of the third world. A random act of violence can happen anywhereโbut anecdotally, it seems to happen a lot more in places where violent crime is less likely to be prosecuted.
No government can prevent 100% of murders.
But Bob Leeโs death likely wouldnโt have happened in a city that took public safety more seriously.
[two]
Megyn Kelly called out likely Presidential candidate Ron Desantis for ignoring her request for an interview, while taking interviews with the likes of Piers Morgan, who havenโt asked Desantis any tough questions.
Kelly hit the nail on the head when she described the role of a journalist.
โThis is an interview, not a friendship. The relationship is supposed to be adversarial. For the love of God, these journalists should show it. [The candidates] are not your friend. Your friend is your audience. Your friend is the truth.โ
-Megyn Kelly
Slow. Clap.
I worked for years as an on-the-ground reporter, and sometimes the police and local politicians didnโt like me.
One Illinois Congressman got up and left the interview after I tossed a tough question his way. (This one).
A former Illinois Governor once cursed me outโcanโt say I was that sad when he went to prison just weeks after that little tirade. (This one).
What I was doing wasnโt being a jerk. It was being a reporter.
If the media donโt have a contentious relationship with the politicians, theyโre not operating as a free and independent press.
[three]
Bud Light is dyingโฆnot because of Dylan Mulvaney.
The sponsorship may (or may not) have been the right move for the brand, but thereโs something much bigger going on hereโmore than a decade in the making.
Anheuser-Busch defended transgender activist Dylan Mulvaney appearing to be used as a Bud Light spokesperson after the beer maker celebrated "365 Days of Girlhood," saying the pact helps "authentically connect with audiences."
The trans activist revealed on Saturday that the beer company sent packs of Bud Light featuring the influencerโs face as a way to celebrate a full year of "girlhood" that Mulvaney recently reached.ย Mulvaney said the cans were her "most prized possession" on Instagram with a post featuring "#budlightpartner." A video then featured Mulvaney in a bathtub drinking a Bud Light beer as part of the campaign.
The announcement was met with significant backlash, with Twitter users describing the ad campaign as another attempt to push gender propaganda, but the beer juggernaut believes the controversy is much ado about nothing.ย
"Anheuser-Busch works with hundreds of influencers across our brands as one of many ways to authentically connect with audiences across various demographics and passion points. From time to time we produce unique commemorative cans for fans and for brand influencers, like Dylan Mulvaney. This commemorative can was a gift to celebrate a personal milestone and is not for sale to the general public," an Anheuser-Busch spokesperson told Fox News.ย
From a glance at social media, it appears that a large chunk of Dylanโs fanbase are teenagers, so the sponsorship seems to be:
A). severely misaligned, or
B). completely unethicalโif Bud Light is trying to attract underage drinkers.
The sponsorship popped up around March Madness, a topic Mulvaney claims to know little to nothing about. Dylan, to the best of my knowledge, has never been affiliated with Bud Light, which skews towards blue collar workers and college football fans.
The completely expected backlash also happenedโฆwith Kid Rock shooting a bunch of beer or whatever. At this point, Mr. Rock, who is about eight years past his last hit album (2015โs Last Kiss) is in the business of being outraged in order to keep his brand alive.
Bud Light does benefit from Rockโs outrage, as it serves to generate more headlinesโฆbut the whole thing smacks of desperation. Likely because beer consumption continue to fall year-over-year.
Like a car dealership on the verge out going out of business that puts an inflatable gorilla or dinosaur out frontโฆBud Light seems to be grasping at straws as their core customer base turns to other forms of adult beverages.
Itโs a losing strategyโฆsocial media controversy can be good for some brands, but I doubt the headlines can recapture interest in a beverage the public has become apathetic towards over the course of a decade.
[four]
Lynyrd Skynyrd are all dead as of 2023, with the passing of the last original member, Gary Rossington.
And yet, Lynyrd Skynyrd are going on tour.
This Lynyrd Skynyrd, to be precise.
Nobody from the first pic appear in the second pic, because those four people are just the session musicians who played with Gary in the last says to โkeep the brand alive,โ when the group was down to a single member.
Now that Lynyrd Skynyrd is no more, the session musicians are going on tour as Lynyrd Skynyrd.
This is messed up.
When everybody in the band is dead, the band isโฆdead.
Itโs shocking that we live in an era where that has to be clarified.
[five]
Woah! Ben Affleck (Good Will Hunting, Batman V Superman) leads a heck of a thriller (at least at first impression) about a detective trying to untangle a string of bank robberies and his own daughterโs disappearance.
Feels like thereโs a bit of Memento/Inception going on here.
In theaters 05/12.
What are we looking at here, exactly?
Iโm a big fan of director Greta Gerwig, who I interviewed during the press cycle for her Oscar-winning Ladybird. Maybe this make more sense to those who played with Barbiesโฆbut is this a satire? Slapstick comedy? Musical?
Barbie was ranked as one of the best unproduced scripts in Hollywood, and Ryan Reynolds (Drive, The Place Between the Pines) and Margot Robbie (The Suicide Squad, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood) donโt normally pick bad projectsโฆbut Iโm confused about who this is for (obviously not me).
Adult women who played with Barbies? Young girls?
Anyway, the trailer has a lot of hype.
Extraction 2, which once again reunites Chris Hemsworth with the writer/director team behind Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame to continue the story of Special Ops dude who rescues kidnapped rich kids or whateverโฆIโm not terribly concerned with plot here.
Dope.
On Netflix 06/16.
If youโre not familiar with the โFlorida Manโ meme, it has to do with the fact that there are so many news stories out of Florida as crazy asโฆthis:
Netflixโs Florida Man appears to be chasing the success of Reacher and The Lincoln Lawyer seriesโฆwith a big heap of crazy thrown in. The quick plot synopsis is an ex-cop is hired to find a Mobsterโs girlfriend in Florida.
And then things get nuts.
Either you love Gerard Butler movies (which are all pretty much the same) or you feel a deep sense of apathy. If youโre in the former camp, heโs back with the Angel Has Fallen director for another spy/shoot-em-up/mystery/something-something-CIA flick in Kandahar.
In theaters 05/26.
Ughโฆlongest two minutes of 2023, maybe. The Blue Beetle trailer looks like a rehash of the movies weโve been seeing so far from Marvel & DCโฆpretty bored here.
This just feels like the Aldi version of Ironman/Spiderman. Itโs not that every movie has to be super original (every genre of film leans on tropes, to some extent), but Good Lordโฆcan we do SOMETHING original here?
In theaters August 19th, if you have a VASTLY different opinion than me.
Until the next one,
-sth