This is a preview of our pop culture newsletter The Daily Beast’s Obsessed, written by senior editor Kevin Fallon. To receive the full newsletter in your inbox each week, sign up for it here.
This week:
- Checking in The White Lotus.
- One pop diva reigns supreme.
- Remember Avatar?
- Kelly Clarkson is flawless (again).
- Incredible casting news.
Let’s Talk About Meghan Trainor
Here we are, talking endlessly about Taylor Swift’s new album. We’re watching Adele float down a lazy river, pretending like it hasn’t been 11 months since she released that music video’s song. Rihanna releases a new song, and we suddenly forgive her for musically abandoning us. And then there’s Carly Rae Jepsen! (Sorry, no narrative structure is worth maligning my bop queen.)
Still, we are fawning over all these pop divas’ music moments. We’re going to do all that, but we’re not gonna act like Meghan Trainor is out here slaying them all?
This is, perhaps, the most geriatric millennial stance I will ever take: Meghan Trainor doesn’t get the praise she deserves. Especially now that she just dropped her new single, “Made You Look.”
It is the pop song of the season. Taylor Swift was found shaking.
Hahaha, I’m just kidding, Swifties. (Don’t send me death threats.) Taylor Swift is our one true queen. (I can’t handle being doxxed.) She is the High Priestess of music, to whom I have devoted my heart and my life. (OK, I am putting my family into witness protection.) As the story goes, when Taylor first started writing folklore, those little piano tinkles made it up to heaven, and Mozart shed a single tear. (Please, have mercy on me.) As soon as Angel Shakespeare heard the line, “Sometimes I feel like everybody is a sexy baby/ And I'm a monster on the hill,” he made a direct appeal to God herself, asking for all of his plays to be eradicated from Earth’s existence out of shame. (I beg of you, spare me.) Wendy Williams has resurfaced, just to hold up a photo of Taylor and say, “She is the moment.” (Help.)
It shouldn’t be a pop-diva battle royale whenever they release new music at the same time. All I’m saying is we should be paying more attention to what my girl, Meghan, is doing. This is a major moment for us Megatronz! Our Grammy-winning icon is keeping us fed! So fed, we may have to take a break and poop next to our spouse in our adjoining toilets!
The great thing about “Made You Look” is how perfectly it cements Trainor’s vibe. Drawing influence from Motown isn’t exactly a new thing. But from 2014’s “All About That Bass” onward, Trainor has figured out a way to bottle that inspiration, pour in a dash of current pop effervescence, and shake it up until it fizzes into something very modern. Is it the greatest song of the century? No! (Then again, neither is anything off Midnights. Again, forgive me, Swifties.) But it does capture something that feels more centrally located in the music zeitgeist, for better or for worse, than what the other efforts that have been getting more attention are doing.
Regardless of any of that music-business conversation, it’s a fun song! “Made You Look!” Go listen! Meghan Trainor did not pay me to write this, I swear!
Avatar 2 Is Still a Thing
This week, I was once again reminded that the Avatar sequel exists. This news landed as if it was revealed for the first time. (Avatar 2 comes out Dec. 12, a full 13 years after the first movie.)
Avatar is fun to think about. Before Avengers: Endgame came out, it was the highest-grossest movie of all time. It has its own area at Disney World. Not one person could tell you what happened in the film, beyond the fact that they were blue and had sex with their hair.
The thing is, I think the movie will be a hit—especially after reading the recent New York Times interview with director James Cameron and the cast. In the interview, we learned that there will be a six-year time jump, Sigourney Weaver will return (but as a different character entirely), and Kate Winslet trained herself to hold her breath for seven minutes underwater. (Remember that photo?)
In any case, I look forward to being utterly shocked once again when this film is in theaters. But Cameron is doing a good job of making us feel like it could be good!
Kelly Clarkson Outslays Herself
If you only understood the willpower it takes for me not to make this entire newsletter about Kelly Clarkson’s “Kellyoke” selections week after week. (Last week, The Rock joined her for a cover of a Loretta Lynn song, the most ridiculous pop-culture Mad Libs there has ever been, and I didn’t make a peep! Where is my Nobel Peace Prize?)
But I can stay silent no longer. This week, Clarkson covered Ghost Town DJ’s ’90s R&B classic (and Kevin Fallon dance party staple) “My Boo.”
I am so proud of scientists and Kelly Clarkson for figuring out a way to transform serotonin and endorphins into musical form. Each time (of the 449 times) I have pressed play on this video, my mood has risen to a state akin to if I mixed caffeine and happy pills into the world’s biggest mimosa and then drank it while orgasming. May it work the same wonders for you.
Dream Casting
Zac Efron, Jeremy Allen White, and Harris Dickinson will play brothers who wrestle, in my most recent wet dream a new movie from A24 that will be written and directed by Sean Durkin. I already have notes:
What to watch this week:
Below Deck: Adventure: As if any of us would ever not watch a new season of Below Deck. (Tues. on Bravo)
Blockbuster: A series made for ’90s kids, specifically. (Thurs. on Netflix)
The White Lotus: It’s refreshing for a second season to be this good. (Sun. on HBO)
What to skip this week:
Christmas movies: I forbid anyone to watch any of the holiday content that has already started airing, even though it’s not even Halloween. (Now on Hallmark)
