If you’ve read any of my political posts in recent years, then you’ve probably seen the term “cultural hermeneutics” pop up now and then. The term “hermeneutics” is often used within the realm of biblical studies, where it refers to the study and method of interpreting and understanding biblical passages. Cultural hermeneutics, as I use the term, therefore refers to the interpretation and understanding of cultural references and artifacts.

As it turns out, Donald Trump and the rest of the Trumpian Right possess a hilariously poor grasp of cultural hermeneutics. For proof of this, look no further than Trump’s recent Truth Social post that features a badly Photoshopped image of him holding a handful of Uno Wild cards with the caption “I Have All The Cards.”

Based on his other posts around the same time, Trump was probably referring to the ongoing tensions in Iran and the Strait of Hormuz, and his belief that he’s got them under control. Which makes his choice of imagery all the more bizarre. As everyone knows, given the game’s long-standing popularity, the entire point of Uno is to hold as few cards as possible, even Wild cards. Thus, you’d think that someone in Trump’s camp would’ve realized that if the president were playing a real game of Uno with that hand, he would be losing. Which is probably not the message that Trump sought to convey.

When I talk about Trump and his followers having a poor grasp of cultural hermeneutics, this is precisely what I’m talking about: a pop culture reference that doesn’t understand the pop culture that it’s referencing, and as a result, actually undermines its intended message.

Consider Trump’s fondness for Creedence Clearwater Revival’s “Fortunate Son” — a song written to criticize people who used their wealth and privilege to shirk military service, like Trump did with his bone spurs. Or Nancy Mace’s use of the “Cheating CEO” meme to tout Trump’s economic benefits for American workers without apparently considering the real-world pain caused by that display of adultery or Trump’s own long history of infidelity. And then there’s what is arguably the ur-text for Trumpian cultural hermeneutics: a 2020 video of two Trump supporters dancing to Rage Against the Machine’s “Killing In the Name.”

Where to even begin with this? With the woman singing along to lyrics like “You justify those that died/By wearing the badge/They’re the chosen whites” whilst wearing a “Thin Blue Line” flag? Or the guy waving a Trump flag as he dances to a band that proudly (and loudly) identified with leftist politics? The most likely explanation for this odd performance is that the couple simply latched onto the song’s rebellious spirit, as exemplified by Zack de la Rocha screaming “Fuck you, I won’t do what you tell me,” without giving any thought as to what the song actually rebels against (i.e., white supremacy and police brutality).

Thus, we see that Trumpian cultural hermeneutics are ultimately about vibe above all else. If something looks, sounds, or feels like it’s inline with Trump’s image of himself as a tough-talking, swamp-draining, hard-bargaining, lib-owning alpha male, then that’s all that matters, and never mind things like the creator’s stated intent, relevant cultural context, or evidence that Trump is, in fact, none of those things. The goal is maintaining and promulgating Trump’s “strong man” persona, and any other concerns are of secondary importance — if they’re considered at all.

So why does this matter? For starters, pop culture matters. It’s not just disposable fluff and entertainment. Even seemingly insignificant examples of pop culture can speak powerfully to human wants and desires, and what we value and care about as a society and species. Pop culture might not have the same unifying power that it did even just 10 – 15 years ago, but at its best, pop culture can serve as a sort of lingua franca, a common language that transcends usual divides to give us a way to understand and communicate with each other.

Therefore, we ought to give some thought as to how we use pop culture. Obviously, we don’t want to look like fools and frauds. But we should also want to be honest about what a particular pop culture artifact represents, lest we become guilty of simply twisting it to fit our agenda regardless of what might be true. Trump et al.’s use of pop culture is often shockingly crass and callow, displaying no understanding or curiosity, and certainly no concern about any deeper meanings. Like so much of Trump’s activity, it’s just a display of naked power that cares nothing for context, nuance, or truth.

Perhaps Donald Trump really does like “Fortunate Son.” He would not be alone in that; it’s one of the great American rock n’ roll songs for a reason. And I’m a firm believer that people can like what they like for no other reason than because they like it. But Trump goes beyond mere personal preference. He has tried to promote and glorify himself — as he did with last year’s Army parade on his birthday — by using a song that was actually written to criticize and ridicule people like him. And he doesn’t seem to care, not so long as it helps to sell his vibe.

But what about the rest of us? I think we ought to care about such things, at least a little bit. Otherwise, we end up with an “alternative facts”-style approach to art and culture. When I see the Trumpian Right use a pop culture artifact, be it a beloved song or a simple card game, without any care for its actual meaning, I can’t help but think about how Christians in the late ’90s and early ’00s bemoaned post-modernism and what its embrace of relativism meant for things like absolute truth and objectivity. As it turns out, their concerns were not unfounded, but their ire was misplaced.

It wasn’t Hollywood, liberals, or any of the usual conservative Christian boogeymen that perfected a relativistic approach to culture. Rather, it was a man that many American Christians have embraced as their political savior, a man who cares for the truth only to the extent that he can twist and distort it for his own personal gain. With each lie, each “alternative fact,” and yes, each poorly executed pop culture reference, Donald Trump and his followers corrode our culture’s respect for, and valuation of, the truth.

In order to better track my various cultural experiences (e.g., movies, TV shows, books, restaurants), I’ve created the Cultural Diet. Think of it as my own personal Goodreads, Letterboxd, and Yelp, all rolled into one (more info here). Every month, I recap everything that I watched, read, etc., in the previous month.

No one can ever accuse Jonathon Smith of having a poor ear for sonic details. As the mastermind behind My Science Fiction Twin, the Kansas City-based songwriter has clearly immersed himself in lush worlds of sound, including the Beatles, the Beach Boys, and perhaps most of all, Terry Taylor.

Indeed, much of his latest album, A Slow Unlearning, feels like an ode to Taylor’s own work in Daniel Amos, from the intricate and surprising arrangements and instrumentation — like the keytar solo on “Astir and Apart” or the weepy pedal steel on “Marbled” — to Smith’s thoughtful lyrics about the difficulties of human communication, the beauty of old friends, and perils of skepticism.

That said, the song that sticks with me the most is “Uneasy Does It,” a sprawling, eight-minute instrumental replete with trilling strings, shimmering guitar notes, layers of clattering beats and percussion, and plenty more of that weepy pedal steel. One gets the sense that Smith was inspired to compose the song after taking a nice, long drive through the American heartland sometime around sunset.

A Slow Unlearning will officially be released by Poptek Records on May 8, 2026 but can currently be ordered via Bandcamp.

When I was a kid, there were several TV shows that I was obsessed with. The Dukes of Hazzard. The A-Team. MacGyver. Airwolf. Above them all, however, reigned Knight Rider. Created by Glen A. Larson — who also created Battlestar Galactica, The Fall Guy, and Magnum, P.I. — and starring David Hasselhoff as Michael Knight, a loner who traveled the country meting out justice, Knight Rider had everything a young boy could possibly want from a TV show.

Specifically, Knight Rider had KITT, a high-tech Pontiac Firebird Trans Am that could go 0 – 60mph in two seconds, travel faster than 200mph, plow through brick walls, and talk. Y’know… everything.

Although it was poorly received by critics at the time, Knight Rider developed a devoted following that has remained to this day, and ultimately, it exemplified a certain era in American television where action reigned supreme. That phenomenon is the focus of Knight Rider: Declassified, an upcoming five-part documentary series featuring interviews with the Knight Rider cast and crew alongside other celebrities and personalities from the era. The documentary also highlights the stunt performers who risked life and limb for the series’ many memorable car stunts as well as the fanbase that’s kept Knight Rider’s spirit alive all these years.

Knight Rider: Declassified is currently still in production, but is available in several pre-orders that range from $99 for the basic package (a Blu-ray release, digital soundtrack, and collector print) all the way up to $5,999, which gets you a bunch of schwag, an “Executive Producer” credit, and featured in the documentary as one of the interviewees.

Knight Rider: Declassified is a production of WheelhouseTV, which specializes in creating premium content for auto enthusiasts. Some of their other titles include Picture Car, which highlights film and TV’s most famous automobiles; Cut to the Chase, a series about automotive stunt performers; and Gladiators of Steel, which explores the world of demolition derby.

Nearly ten years after Twitter shut it down, Vine is back. The recently launched Divine aims to recapture the original Vine’s look and feel, including an archive of thousands of its most classic six-second videos from creators like King Bach, Zach King, Rudy Mancuso, Lele Pons, and Thomas Sanders.

Originally founded in 2012 and then acquired by Twitter, Vine grew in popularity as creators and influencers took advantage of its constraints to create infectious, meme-worthy content. In 2016, though, Twitter decided to shut down the Vine app in part due to rising competition from the likes of Facebook and Instagram, who rolled out their own versions of Vine’s short-form videos. The final nail in Vine’s coffin came in 2019, when Twitter shut down an archive of the platform’s videos (though many of those videos have since been uploaded to YouTube channels like “Funny Vines”).

Which brings us to Divine.

Divine’s launch was spearheaded by Evan “Rabble” Henshaw-Plath, a former Twitter employee, and funded by And Other Stuff, a nonprofit launched by Twitter co-founder (and former CEO) Jack Dorsey in order to fund the development of “open tools, protocols, and applications that strengthen human liberty.” Besides Divine, AOS has also funded projects like Shakespeare (an AI-powered app builder), Chorus (a tool for creating online communities), and White Noise (a secure private messaging app).

Techcrunch’s recent profile contains more information about Divine’s development and launch, as well as this interesting bit: Divine does not allow AI-generated content. Rabble explains: “I decided that I was going to filter out AI content because I personally don’t like seeing AI content. I don’t like feeling tricked. I don’t like the idea that tons of content can be made very quickly and with little humanity or thought.”

Furthermore, Divine is built on the open Nostr protocol and is experimenting with other protocols, including Bluesky’s AT Protocol. Which, in non-techie terms, means making it impossible for a single company to control Divine content, as opposed to “walled garden” platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok. (For more on this, read Rabble’s 2025 appeal for a new social media bill of rights that prioritizes privacy, security, transparency, and non-corporate control.)

Obviously, given Instagram and TikTok’s market dominance, Divine faces an uphill battle. For starters, do people really need yet another social media platform clamoring for their attention? And will Divine be able to survive and offer more than just a decade-old sense of nostalgia? Time will tell, I guess, though I certainly laud Rabble for prioritizing open protocols and pushing back against AI slop, two steps that feel nigh-revolutionary these days.

Since their original formation in 1992, Arizona’s Alison’s Halo have only released a handful of EPs and compilations, including the stellar Eyedazzler compilation that was reissued in 2024. Nevertheless, the band is still going strong, and remains an exemplar of the American shoegaze scene thanks to their rich guitar dynamics and Catherine Cooper’s voice.

Both of those are on full display in the band’s Audiotree studio performance from last November. The quartet perform songs from throughout their catalog, including “Jetpacks for Julian” from the 2009 EP of the same name and arguably their signature tune, “Dozen,” which was originally released on Independent Project Records back in 1995. The performance is followed by a short interview with Audiotree host Psalm One where they talk about their experiences as a hidden shoegaze gem, their favorite venues to play, and their memories of the ’90s Arizona shoegaze scene.

On a related note, I’m still kicking myself for not seeing Alison’s Halo last June, when they opened for Panchiko at Omaha’s Slowdown. If you’re in Europe, learn from my mistake and go see them this October, when they tour with Panchiko again.

As Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, et al. add more content, it can be difficult to know what to look for amidst all of the new titles. Every month, I compile a list of particularly noteworthy and interesting movies and TV shows to add to your streaming queues.

If you’d like to receive my streaming recommendations even sooner, become an Opus subscriber today.

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Amazon Prime Video

Babe (May 1)

Baa-ram-ewe! Baa-ram-ewe! The Citizen Kane of talking pig pictures, as one critic called it, will start streaming as soon as the new month rolls around. I plan on watching it with my kids, and all the while, I’ll try to wrap my mind around the fact that the man responsible for this charming little film is the same deranged genius who gave us Mad Max.

Gosford Park (May 1)

Robert Altman turns his incisive eye to the foibles of the British gentry in this darkly comic murder mystery. When a murder occurs in the posh country estate of Gosford Park during a lavish hunting party, the entire estate is thrown into chaos and everyone becomes a suspect. Thanks to its star-studded cast, which includes Michael Gambon, Kristin Scott Thomas, Maggie Smith, Clive Owen, and Helen Mirren (to name just a few), Gosford Park is a thoroughly enjoyable whodunit that packs an emotional punch in its final act.

Hot Fuzz (May 1)

Nicholas Angel is London’s best cop. He’s so good, in fact, that he makes all of the other cops look bad. Which is why he gets transferred to the sleepy town of Sandford, where the crime rate is zero and nothing bad ever happens. But when locals start disappearing, Angel’s convinced something’s going on. Has Sandford gotten to him, or has he cracked the biggest case of his career? Inspired by classic buddy cop films like Lethal Weapon, Hot Fuzz is action comedy of the highest sort (read my review).

Serenity (May 1)

When Firefly went off the air after just one season, the series’ fans rallied on the internet, clamoring for more. Due in part to their efforts, writer/director Joss Whedon was able to pitch a full-length feature to give his beloved sci-fi western a bit of closure (read my review). Serenity stars Nathan Fillion as Captain Malcolm Reynolds, who leads his crew of ne’er-do-wells on a mission that could bring the solar system’s totalitarian government to its knees.

Sneakers (May 1)

Martin Bishop and his team are the best at what they do: hacking and penetrating security systems to uncover their weaknesses. But Bishop hides a dark past that comes back to haunt him and his colleagues when they’re hired by the NSA to retrieve a top secret Russian device that could undermine national security. With its ensemble cast led by Robert Redford, Ben Kingsley, and Sidney Poitier, and a smart and thoughtful plot about espionage and government secrets, Sneakers still feels thoroughly relevant despite being released all the way back in 1992 (read my review).

WarGames (May 1)

“Shall we play a game?” That’s the deadly question faced by a young hacker (Matthew Broderick) when he accidentally hacks into a military supercomputer in charge of America’s nuclear weapons. Though a big box office success, WarGames had a much bigger impact. Its representation of the internet, and the unintended impact that computers could have on security, led to the creation of the 1984 Computer Fraud and Abuse Act as well as the first Presidential directive concerning computer security.

Spider-Noir, Season One (May 27)

After previously voicing the character in the Spider-Verse movies, Nicolas Cage stars in this live-action series as Ben Reilly, a down-on-his-luck private investigator who must re-don his superhero persona to solve a particularly difficult case. Spider-Noir, which also stars Lamorne Morris (New Girl), Li Jun Li, and Brendan Gleeson, will be presented in both black-and-white and retro-looking color versions.

Here’s everything arriving on Amazon Prime Video in May 2026.

HBO Max

Enter the Dragon (May 1)

Enter the Dragon was the final film that Bruce Lee completed before his untimely death at the age of 32, and it was the film that sealed Lee’s status as the greatest martial arts actor of all time. Enter the Dragon’s plot is pretty straightforward — Lee must use his skills to infiltrate a martial arts competition run by a ruthless crime lord — but it’s all about Lee’s charisma, lighting fast fists and feet, and superhuman skill with the nunchaku. Enter the Dragon also stars John Saxon, Jim Kelly, Angela Mao, and Bolo Yeung.

Song of the Samurai, Season One (May 9)

Produced by the studio behind Netflix’s Alice in Borderland, Song of the Samurai is a live-action series based on the popular Chiruran: Shinsengumi Requiem manga series. In 19th century Kyoto, the Shinsengumi are tasked with protecting the city. But even as their camaraderie grows, they must struggle with living up to their lofty ideals while battling various threats and enemies. The series stars Yuki Yamada (Godzilla Minus One) and is directed by Kazutaka Watanabe.

Josh Johnson: Symphony (May 22)

Following his gig hosting The Daily Show, Josh Johnson has steadily become one of today’s most popular comedians. After previously appearing in comedy specials for Peacock and Comedy Central, Johnson ventures onto HBO to deliver a set that tackles such topics as family, religion, and relationships.

Tomb Raider (May 24)

Based on the best-selling video game franchise, 2018’s Tomb Raider stars Alicia Vikander as the famous adventurer and archaeologist Lara Croft. Determined to find her missing father, Croft follows his trailer to a mythical island located in the Pacific where she encounters other nefarious forces at work. Though nothing mind-blowing, Tomb Raider is a decent enough popcorn film that also stars Dominic West, Walton Goggins, Daniel Wu, and Kristin Scott Thomas.

Here’s everything arriving on HBO Max in May 2026.

Hulu

The Prestige (May 1)

Christopher Nolan may be best known for the “Dark Knight” trilogy — which is arguably the definitive film version of Batman — but in 2006, he directed this entertaining little suspense thriller about the escalating rivalry between two magicians in the late 19th century. As is Nolan’s wont, The Prestige is full of clever little visuals, twists, and turns. Oh, and it features a David Bowie cameo as the legendary inventor Nikola Tesla.

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (May 1)

The first Star Wars anthology film follows a ragtag group of Rebel fighters on a mission to steal something that could bring the Empire to its knees: the plans for a new battle station called the Death Star. The film’s cast includes Felicity Jones as the group’s leader, Donnie Yen as a zen-like fighting master, Mads Mikkelsen as a brilliant weapons designer, and Alan Tudyk, who steals the show as the misanthropic droid K-2SO.

Here’s everything arriving on Hulu in May 2026.

Netflix

Hitch (May 1)

Alex Hitchens (Will Smith) is an expert at teaching other men how to woo women. But his latest case may prove his most challenging yet. Adding further complications, Alex finds himself falling for a cynical reporter who seems resistant to his charms, and who could ruin his career. Hitch’s plot may have you rolling your eyes, but it’s still a fun date movie due in large part to Smith’s charisma and comedic timing.

Starship Troopers (May 1)

While it’s entirely possible to watch Starship Troopers as a parody of military fascism, you can also just enjoy it for the over-the-top violence as a bunch of clean-cut, attractive teenagers join the military in order to fight an alien insect race. Despite receiving quite the critical drubbing at the box office, it has since inspired four sequels and two TV series.

Veronica Mars (May 1)

Set nine years after the events of the acclaimed TV series, Veronica Mars finds Kristen Bell’s redoubtable sleuth returning to Neptune, California in order to try and clear her former boyfriend of murder charges — and uncovering a web of corruption beneath the town’s idyllic facade. Veronica Mars successfully translated everything that we loved about the series (e.g., colorful characters, witty humor, intriguing mysteries) to the movie format without losing a step.

The Boroughs, Season One (May 21)

On its surface, The Boroughs seem like an idyllic place to spend your remaining years. But just beneath its surface lies a strange threat, and it’s up to an unlikely group to stop it. Starring Geena Davis, Alfred Molina, Alfre Woodard, and Bill Pullman, it’s tempting to say that The Boroughs look an awful lot like Stranger Things for the senior citizen crowd. Then again, it is produced by the Duffer Brothers.

Here’s everything arriving on Netflix in May 2026.

Peacock

The Blues Brothers (May 1)

When Jake and Elwood Blues (John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd) learn that their old orphanage needs $5,000 to keep going, they decide to track down the members of their old blues band and put on a show to raise the money. Along the way, they’ll demolish a shopping mall, enrage a country band, take on some Nazis, and cause massive vehicular chaos across the state of Illinois. Easily one of the best Saturday Night Live films, The Blues Brothers is a true cult classic.

The Foreigner (May 1)

In this suspenseful thriller set in London and Belfast, Jackie Chan plays a seemingly nondescript man seeking justice for his daughter after she dies in a terrorist bombing. Unfortunately for the bombers, he was a special forces soldier during the Vietnam War, and he’s not afraid to put his deadly skills to use in order to get vengeance. Grim and gritty, The Foreigner is a far cry from Chan’s usual action/comedy blend, but it’s also something of a revelation, and proof that Chan can carry purely dramatic fare.

Galaxy Quest (May 1)

The premise — actors from a classic sci-fi TV series are kidnapped by aliens who believe the show to be real — makes it sound like Galaxy Quest does nothing but poke fun at all things Star Trek. Which it does, and brilliantly so, but all of its jokes come from a place of love. As a result, it’s the best kind of parody, one that recognizes the inherent silliness of Star Trek while also capturing what makes Star Trek so great in the first place. By Grabthar’s Hammer, indeed.

Fearless (May 1)

When Fearless was released, it was touted as Jet Li’s final wushu (i.e., traditional martial arts) film. A loose re-telling of the life of Huo Yuanjia, a real-life martial arts master who helped defend China’s national honor in the early 20th century, Fearless easily ranks as one of Li’s best films (read my review). While it boasts some impressive combat sequences (choreographed by the legendary Yuen Woo-Ping), the film’s ultimate message of piece and forgiveness makes it more than just another martial arts epic.

Jojo Rabbit (May 1)

Young Jojo is under a lot of stress. He wants to fit in with the rest of the Hitler Youth, but he’s too kind-hearted and is mercilessly mocked by his peers. The only one who believes in him is his imaginary friend: Adolf Hitler. But even that friendship gets tested when Jojo discovers that his mom is hiding a young Jewish girl. As you might guess, Jojo Rabbit is far from your typical World War II film, but what else would you expect from writer/director Taika Waititi?

The Martian (May 1)

Based on Andy Weir’s best-selling novel, The Martian chronicles the efforts of astronaut Mark Watney (Matt Damon) to survive on Mars after he’s presumed dead and left behind. But even as Watney struggles to stay alive, his NASA comrades and fellow astronauts are mounting a massive rescue effort. Released in 2015, The Martian received numerous awards and accolades, and was nominated for “Best Picture” and “Best Actor” at the Academy Awards (read my review).

Mary and the Witch’s Flower (May 1)

If you were to think that Mary and the Witch’s Flower was a long lost Studio Ghibli film, no one would blame you. For starters, it was created by Ghibli alumni at Studio Ponoc, including director Hiromasa Yonebayashi, who previously directed The Secret World of Arrietty. And it has all the hallmarks of a classic Ghibli film, including a spirited female protagonist and lush, richly detailed animation. Even so, Mary and the Witch’s Flower is an utterly charming film that is no less so for feeling familiar (read my review).

The Mummy (May 1)

Starring Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz, The Mummy is a delightful throwback to the classic action serials of the ’30s and ’40s. When an Egyptologist discovers a map to a hidden city, she enlists the aid of an American soldier of fortune to help her, not knowing that they’re about to face a slew of supernatural threats. Filled with cutting edge (for the time) special effects, and more importantly, a sense of fun and adventure, The Mummy is popcorn cinema par excellence.

Munich (May 1)

After Palestinian terrorists attack the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, Germany, a Mossad agent is tasked with tracking down and eliminating eleven Palestinians who were involved in the attack. Based on a true story, Munich may seem a far cry from Steven Spielberg’s use fare, but it’s nevertheless a brutal and riveting thriller about the endless cycle of violence and its consequences. Munich stars Eric Bana, Daniel Craig, Ciarán Hinds, Mathieu Kassovitz, and Geoffrey Rush.

Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair (May 22)

Quentin Tarantino originally released his martial arts-inspired revenge epic in two parts that were released six months apart. After promising for years that he was going to combine the two into a single film, Tarantino finally made good on his promise last year with the release of Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair, which features new footage, including an animated sequence by Production I.G (Ghost in the Shell). After screening in theaters, The Whole Bloody Affair makes its television debut on Peacock.

Here’s everything arriving on Peacock in May 2026.

Tubi

Broken Arrow (May 1)

I know that, as a longtime fan of Asian cinema, I’m contractually obligated to denigrate all of John Woo’s Hollywood films. Even so, Broken Arrow is a total guilty pleasure. When terrorists steal nuclear warheads from a crashed bomber, it’s up to a pilot and a park ranger to stop them. But there’s a catch: the lead terrorist is the pilot’s commanding officer, played to scene-chewing perfection by John Travolta. The film also stars Christian Slater, Samantha Mathis, and Delroy Lindo.

Conan the Barbarian (May 1)

What is best in life? Well, as Conan taught us once so well, it is “to crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentation of the women!” In this classic sword-and-sorcery film, Arnold Schwarzenegger plays one of his signature roles, the titular barbarian who must take on an evil cult to avenge his family’s death.

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (May 1)

Ang Lee’s martial arts epic was a huge success when it appeared in 2000, winning numerous awards (including four Oscars) and becoming the most successful foreign film in American box office history. With its dramatic storyline, sweeping cinematography, evocative score, and graceful combat, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon proved that martial arts films could be more than cheesy action comedies, and ushered in a wave of artsy martial arts films including Hero, House of Flying Daggers, and The Promise.

Gladiator (May 1)

Ridley Scott’s Gladiator was one of 2000’s biggest and most successful films, thanks to an epic plot, incredibly special effects, and thrilling action sequences. Russell Crowe stars as Maximus Decimus Meridius, a disgraced Roman general who is enslaved and forced to compete in Rome’s brutal gladiatorial exhibitions. Gladiator also stars Connie Nielsen, Oliver Reed (in his final film appearance), Djimon Hounsou, Richard Harris, and Joaquin Phoenix as the corrupt Roman emperor.

Heat (May 1)

When it was released in 1995, Heat was widely promoted as the first film in which Al Pacino and Robert De Niro appear on-screen together. And while that’s cool, that overlooked the fact that Heat is a scorching (npi) crime thriller about a gang of elite thieves (led by De Niro) and the police officers (led by Pacino) trying to stop them. Directed with panache by Michael Mann, the film oozes style and atmosphere, and features one of the best shootouts in movie history. In 2022, Mann announced that a sequel was in the works.

Kung Fu Hustle (May 1)

Sing (Stephen Chow) has one dream in life: to become a member of the feared Axe Gang. But when he encounters a group of reclusive and unlikely martial artists, he’s slowly begins to realize that he could be something more. But not without plenty of hijinks — this is a Stephen Chow movie, after all. Coming on the heels of Shaolin Soccer, Kung Fu Hustle went even further into CGI-fuelled leaps of martial arts slapstick. While Shaolin Soccer is the better film overall, Kung Fu Hustle still has plenty of hilarious delights all its own.

No Country for Old Men (May 1)

In this harrowing adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s novel, a hunter discovers a bunch of drug money and decides to keep it — which puts him in the sights of a psychotic hitman (Javier Bardem, in a chilling performance). Meanwhile, the only one who might save him is an aging, world-weary sheriff (Tommy Lee Jones, also giving a fantastic performance). No Country for Old Men may not have the quirky humor that the Coen Brothers are best known for — O Brother, Where Art Thou? this most certainly is not — but its depiction of human evil and darkness is captivating and provocative in its own right (read my review).

Shaolin Soccer (May 1)

I still remember the first time I watched this film, and being absolutely charmed and thrilled by its tale of a group of Shaolin monks who decide to use soccer to promote Shaolin kung fu (with the help of lots of CG effects, of course). Shaolin Soccer is completely bonkers, but also completely enjoyable from beginning to end.

Here’s everything arriving on Tubi in May 2026.

I became aware of this inventive short film courtesy of the boys at Corridor Crew, who discussed it in a recent “VFX Artists React” video. Created back in 1979 by Mike Jittlov, who basically did everything — directing, editing, etc. — The Wizard of Speed and Time is one of those films that feels distinctly ahead of its time. Sure, it’s all grainy and whatnot, but the visual effects, which were all done sans any computer, are still pretty mind-blowing, especially the stop motion animation in the second half.

Several years later, in 1988, Jittlov created a feature-length film (also available on YouTube) inspired by his earlier short in which he plays a special effects guy trying to make a film, only to end up butting heads with the Hollywood studio system. In keeping with the quirkiness of the original, Jittlov inserted subliminal messages into the feature film to promote positive thinking.

When he died at the far-too-young age of 46, Satoshi Kon had already established himself as one of the world’s premier animators thanks to sublime and thought-provoking films like Perfect Blue, Millennium Actress, and Paprika. Even so, he was hard at work on what looked to be his most ambitious film yet: a retrofuturistic tale titled Dreaming Machine that remains unfinished despite the existence of a wealth of production material.

Much of that material remains locked away. However, Animation Obsessive — a fantastic newsletter that all animation aficionados really ought to subscribe to — has dug through the material that has been released, along with interviews and blog posts, to provide our most complete look yet at Kon’s Dreaming Machine. Noting Kon’s desire to create a “retrofuturistic post-apocalypse” that hearkened back to the works he loved as a child, Animation Obsessive writes:

Kon was a child of the ‘60s, and all too familiar with the “shining future” that’d been promised. He mentioned the illustrator Shigeru Komatsuzaki, for example, who spent years conjuring optimistic future-tech worlds. In Dreaming Machine, this kind of world happened, but utopia failed somehow. Kon observed a similar feeling in the 21st century, where things haven’t played out as expected.

Even as Kon drew the past’s future in ruins, he wanted to get into the spirit of it. So, he immersed himself in the cartoons of his childhood.

In 1960s Japan, animation was often called manga eiga (cartoon movies) and terebi manga (TV cartoons). By the time Kon started Dreaming Machine, both terms sounded impossibly naive and old-fashioned, and they brought to mind animation in the same vein. But that’s what he hoped to channel. “A story of love and courage, a boy’s growth and adventure,” Kon wrote on his blog in 2002, half-joking. “The royal road of manga eiga.”

While working on Dreaming Machine, Kon listened to a 120-track playlist named “Shining Future.” It was four-plus hours of Japanese cartoon themes from the old days: Leo’s Song, Super Jetter. In these shows, Kon wrote, justice and love triumphed over the “bad guys” and scientific progress saved the day. The work still appealed to him, in a way, even though he saw right through it.

Given the relative darkness of Kon’s other movies, especially Perfect Blue and Paprika, it’s interesting to note that Kon intended Dreaming Machine to be a family film, i.e., “a dual-structured movie… in which children can enjoy it as a fantasy while adults can find the other message in it.” I suspect, however, that it would’ve been a far cry from what we typically consider a “family film,” and all the better as a result.

I encourage you to read the entire article, which goes into great detail about the few plot elements that have surfaced, as well as the surprising amount of material, much of it created by Kon himself, that remains unseen. It seems highly unlikely that Dreaming Machine will ever be finished or released in any form. Perhaps the most we can hope for is that the film’s storyboards, etc., are someday compiled and published as a tribute to Kon’s ambition and genius.

My family’s very first computer was a Commodore SX-64, which — at a mere 23 lbs — was considered a portable computer. I spent many an hour on it playing video games like F-15 Strike Eagle, Summer Games, Knight Games, and Temple of Apshai. And of course, imagining that I was an intrepid hacker breaking into top secret government systems à la Matthew Broderick in WarGames or Ricky Schroder in that one episode of Silver Spoons.

Just to be clear, in case any government agencies read this, any hacking that I might’ve done was purely a figment of my imagination. But if I was going to do some hacking, then I’d definitely need an appropriate soundtrack. This month’s playlist, titled “Hack the Planet!” — with respect to Crash Override, Acid Burn, and their friends — is designed to be the perfect soundtrack for your next dive into the Net.

Accompanying the playlist is the latest episode of my “Playlist Breakdown” podcast, in which I spotlight one of the playlist’s songs and why it’s so special, interesting, and/or meaningful. This month’s episode focuses on Banco de Gaia’s “887 (Structure),” an epic bit of trance that evokes exotic locales and vistas — and highlights the Tibetan struggle for independence.

Both of these are little bonuses for subscribers who support Opus financially. If you’d like to get access to them (and more), subscribe to Opus for just $5.00/month or $50/year. (You can also subscribe for free and get my weekend newsletter.)

According to Semafor (via Manton Reece), the company that currently owns a majority stake in Letterboxd — a social network popular amongst cinephiles and movie lovers for tracking what they’ve watched and getting recommendations à la Goodreads — is now looking to sell the platform.

The Canadian holding company Tiny has spoken to potential buyers, from CNBC and MS NOW parent company Versant to the Hollywood startup The Ankler, about the platform, which plays host to a community of millions of movie buffs and has turned into an entertainment media player that produces videos and licenses films.

Tiny approached The Ankler in 2025, and when they couldn’t agree on sales terms, instead pursued a series of events, newsletters, and a sales partnership. The investment bank Liontree is now marketing the deal.

I’m not at all surprised if this news has Letterboxd users worried. This sort of transition rarely seems to go all that well these days. It’s easy to imagine some private equity firm swooping in, proceeding to enshittify the site, and then cutting out having made a tidy little sum in the process, leaving Letterboxd users with a hollowed out version of something they used to enjoy.

That sort of concern is precisely why I built my own personal Letterboxd in the form of my site’s “Cultural Diet” section, which has actually become one of my favorite aspects of Opus in recent months. Even so, I’ve found Letterboxd invaluable at times for tracking down information about obscure films, and in particular, Godfrey Ho’s manic ninja movies.

Of course, not everyone has the time or wherewithal to build out their own movie-tracking system, which means that I hope whatever fate befalls Letterboxd, it can still retain the charm and utility that’s made it so popular since its launch in 2011.

Earlier this year, the Criterion Collection released a special edition of Tsui Hark’s The Blade, an experimental martial arts film that pushed back against the tropes and expectations of the wuxia genre. And to explain just how, exactly, Hark did that, Criterion partnered with Every Frame a Painting — i.e., the best YouTube film channel of all time — for this excellent video essay that serves as a primer for both the wuxia genre and Hark’s film.

Originally released in 1995, Tsui Hark’s The Blade — a remake of Chang Cheh’s One-Armed Swordsman from 1967 — was somewhat controversial for the ways in which it undermined and deconstructed the martial arts genre. It’s certainly a far cry from other wuxia films, filled with amoral characters and wild, frenetic camerawork and cinematography. As I wrote in my review, The Blade is probably not for wuxia newbies, but it does offer a fresh and insightful take on the genre.

On a related note, Every Frame a Painting’s Taylor Ramos and Tony Zhou also produced a similar video essay for George Romero’s Night of the Living Dead when it began streaming on the Criterion Channel.

In recent years, my wife and I have both become starkly aware of our parents’ aging as we’ve cared for them through various health concerns and emergencies. And it’s not just us; several close friends have had similar experiences. This may just be the stage of life in which we all now find ourselves. Nevertheless, it’s sobering to realize that you’re now caring for the same people who brought you into this world, a reversal of roles that might have been inevitable but was still unforeseen and unimaginable.

The Twilight Sad’s It’s the Long Goodbye emerges from a similar space. In a recent interview with Treble’s Rob Duguay, singer James Graham explained how the title of his band’s sixth album was inspired by the decline and eventual death of his mother following the onset of dementia. During that tumultuous time, Graham became a father himself and experienced his own mental health issues. “It really does sum up the seven years where I said goodbye to my mom,” he said, “along with saying goodbye to my brain at one point.”

Not surprisingly, It’s the Long Goodbye is a tumultuous album. Then again, one doesn’t expect anything quiet or subdued from The Twilight Sad. Ever since their self-titled 2006 EP, the Scottish band has excelled at producing, as one critic put it, a “cathartic racket,” blending My Bloody Valentine-esque squalls and swells with Graham’s pointed and confessional lyrics. But I daresay that the band has never been so cathartic as they are on these ten songs.

Unlike Sufjan Stevens, whose grief over his own mother’s death led to 2015’s heartbreaking Carrie and Lowell, Graham doesn’t use intricate storytelling to communicate his grief and confusion. Rather, he latches onto single, simple phrases that he repeats like a mantra that grows increasingly distressed with each repetition until it hits like an emotional sledgehammer.

“Why are you leaving me? Why are you slowly leaving me?” is the constant refrain throughout album opener “Get Away From It All,” which concludes with Graham crying out “And I’m the son you know” and “You’re my mother” — a defiant attempt in those last seconds to reaffirm what’s true even as time and dementia tries to steal it away. The chorus of “Designed to Lose” is just Graham plaintively repeating “Are we playing dead in my head?” before intoning “No, this can’t happen to you/I won’t let this happen to you.” Finally, album closer “TV People Still Throwing TVs at People” finds Graham working himself into a frenzy as he sings “No, I don’t wanna feel this way/Is it okay you feel this way?”

While many of the songs on It’s the Long Goodbye are from Graham’s perspective, “Waiting For the Phone Call” shifts that around, placing us in the mind of a woman watching her family watch her die: “There’s a pain in me no one can see/Gather ’round and come die with me/Watch me die.” That said, it’s worth noting that many of the album’s lyrics work as a description of both Graham’s decline and his mother’s; his line about a pain that no one else sees could just as easily describe the demons in one’s own head. That’s certainly the case on “The Ceiling Underground,” where Graham questions reality (“Why does it feel like this?/Why does it feel like nothing is real?”) before surrendering to his own confusion (“Can you hear me underground?/I tried to not scream and shout/My body doesn’t know how/It’s better if I’m not found”).

Graham’s Scottish burr adds an extra layer of emotion to his lyrics, communicating all on its own rage and frustration one moment, gentle care the next, and desperate pleading the one after that. Meanwhile, bandmate Andy MacFarlane creates an appropriately riotous wall of sound from his Jazzmaster and what I can only assume is a stack of amps the size of a barn, particularly on “Designed to Lose,” “Dead Flowers,” and the closing minutes of “TV People Still Throwing TVs at People.”

Don’t be surprised if parts of It’s the Long Goodbye sound Cure-ish, like centerpiece “Dead Flowers,” which evokes both Pornography’s chill and Disintegration’s majesty, or the jagged riffs on “Inhospitable/Hospital.” The Twilight Sad have frequently toured with The Cure — they delivered a stunning opening performance when we saw The Cure back in 2023 — and Robert Smith has become something of a mentor for the band, even going so far as to describe them as “the best band playing the best songs.” It’s only natural, then, for Smith to contribute his inimitable playing to three of the album’s songs, which dovetails quite well with Graham and MacFarlane’s style.

Fortunately, Graham is in a better place now, due in part to pushing through and completing It’s the Long Goodbye. “I actually look back on that time with pride because I did it, I got it out of myself and just the fact that this record exists is a win for me personally,” said Graham in the aforementioned Treble interview. He even goes so far as to call It’s the Long Goodbye his “defining record.” That’s a lofty statement, but the sentiment is well-deserved. After 20 years of acclaimed releases, James Graham and Andy MacFarlane have delivered their masterpiece — an album that, for all of the grief and suffering that it contains, feels vital, inspired, and triumphant.

There’s a single moment that best encapsulates why Godfrey Ho’s Undefeatable was so enjoyable for me. No, I’m not referring to its amazing final duel, which went viral years ago, not because of any impressive martial arts choreography, but rather, because the two combatants spend most of the scene ripping off their shirts, posing, flexing their well-oiled muscles, and grunting and screaming at each other like two elk bulls during the rut. The scene I’m thinking of happens earlier in the movie, when Cynthia Rothrock (Martial Law, Yes, Madam!) finally confronts the deranged serial killer who murdered her sister.

In the course of their fight, the killer’s katana — because of course he has a katana — catches on a box filled with packing peanuts and sends them flying through the air, with Ho filming them in slow motion as they rain down around the two opponents. Punctuated by Todd M. Hahn’s synth-heavy score, the moment feels like Ho’s attempt at the sort of stylized, dream-like sequence one typically associates with a Wong Kar-wai arthouse film, and yet we’re still just talking about freakin’ packing peanuts. It’s both utterly sincere and utterly ridiculous, which is a very apt description of Undefeatable as a whole.

Kristi Jones (Rothrock) is desperately trying to put her sister through college. Unfortunately, waitressing just doesn’t earn enough, so she does what anyone in her shoes would do: participate in underground fight clubs. Kristi’s dreams are crushed, however, when her sister becomes the latest victim of a deranged serial killer named Stingray (Don Niam) who uses martial arts against his victims. Teaming up with homicide detective Nick DiMarco (John Miller), who also knows martial arts — it’s probably easier to count the number of characters who don’t know any martial arts in this movie — Jones is determined to track down her sister’s killer, even if that means cutting a swath through the city’s underworld.

Godfrey Ho is infamous for his “cut and paste” approach to filmmaking in which he spliced together original footage featuring white actors like Richard Harrison and Stuart Smith with scenes that he cribbed from low-budget Chinese, Filipino, and Korean movies. The result was a long string of Z-grade ninja flicks with such fabulous titles as Empire of the Spiritual Ninja and Ninja Knight Thunder Fox. Undefeatable features nary a single ninja, nor does it contain footage from another, totally unrelated movie. Nevertheless, it exists in the same sort of liminal space as Ho’s ninja movies, a space where every other random person knows martial arts and nobody bats an eye when goons don football pads or a flamboyantly colored karate gi to look bad-ass. (Which reminds me; someday I ought to write something about bad guy fashion choices in ’90s “B” action movies.)

To its credit, Undefeatable does boast some legitimately good stunt work courtesy of Douglas Kung and Tai Yim. (Fun fact: Yim was a grandmaster of Hung Fut-style kung fu who ran his own martial arts school, and Undefeatable stars several of his pupils, including Messrs. Niam and Miller.) Ultimately, though, what sticks with me is the movie’s aforementioned sincerity. Normally, I’d say that Rothrock et al. were in on the joke while making Undefeatable, but to all appearances, they meant every single overwrought scene and performance that crops up in the movie’s 90 minutes.

Rothrock plays her tough-as-nails lady street fighter to the hilt and Miller aims for a similar intensity with his street smart detective. Never once do I doubt that I’m watching an actor who wants to sincerely portray a detective with every earnest fiber of his being. However, Don Niam steals the entire movie as Stingray, who snaps and embarks on his killing spree after his wife leaves him due to — surprise! — his increasingly violent tendencies.

A master martial artist, Stingray uses his skills to kidnap, rape, and murder any woman who remotely resembles his wife. The movie tries to provide some explanation for Stingray’s cruelty by hinting at his unresolved abandonment issues, which explains why he says “Mommy” at the most awkward times (like when he’s sexually aroused). Niam, it seems, saw that he was playing an unhinged lunatic and opted to capture that in a perpetually bug-eyed performance that becomes even more ridiculous thanks to his puffy mullet, distinct lack of blinking, and excessive line deliveries — and I love every single second of it.

I’ve gone on record saying that one of the reasons why I love “B” movies — and even “Z” movies — is their scrappiness and distinct lack of polish. Strip away the polish, and you strip away the pretense that so often adorns Hollywood movies, even Hollywood movies that try to achieve a “B” movie vibe. For all of its tropes and silliness — it literally ends with a group high five at the grave of Kristi’s sister — there’s something refreshingly honest about a movie like Undefeatable that knows exactly what it is and does its damndest to deliver that to the audience. The fact that it culminates with one of the very best “worst fighting scenes” in cinematic history is just the icing on the cake.

Several years ago, Vinegar Syndrome released a deluxe 4K remastered edition of Undefeatable that’s packed with a slew of special features, including a commentary by Cynthia Rothrock; interviews with Godfrey Ho, Rothrock, Don Niam, and others involved in the production; a couple of video essays; and much more. The fact that a true cult classic like Undefeatable, which no doubt languished in obscurity and bargain bins for decades, has now received so much care and attention puts a big smile on my face.

By all rights, Coyote vs. ACME should’ve been released three years ago. Except Warner Bros. decided to shelve the movie — which had done well with test audiences and received praise from other filmmakers — simply to get a tax write-off. And they did this without telling the cast and crew until after the movie was finished, meaning all of their hard work was for naught. Coyote vs. ACME subsequently became something of a cause célèbre, a prime example of movie studios caring more about their shareholders and the bottom line than the movies they make.

Last March, however, Ketchup Entertainment inked a deal with Warner Bros. to release Coyote vs. ACME, and here we are. As its title implies, the film features Wile E. Coyote, fed up with his inability to capture the Road Runner, finally deciding to sue the ACME Corporation for their faulty and unreliable products. But when Mr. Coyote discovers a massive coverup, ACME will stop at nothing to silence him. Coyote vs. ACME stars all of the classic Looney Tunes characters you’d expect alongside Will Forte, Lana Condor, Luis Guzmán, and John Cena.

Coyote vs. ACME will finally arrive in theaters on August 28, 2026.

Last week, Boards of Canada dropped “Tape 05,” the first new snippet of music from the duo since 2013’s Tomorrow’s Harvest. It was an intriguing piece of music that, as I wrote, was hopefully a sign of much more to come. And as it turns out, that was indeed the case.

Earlier today, Mike Sandison and Marcus Eoin announced Inferno, their fifth album and first full-length in thirteen years. Multiple pre-order options are available, including a couple of vinyl editions, and the album will also be released on CD and digital. To promote Inferno, Boards of Canada released a short YouTube clip that, like “Tape 05,” seems to hint at a darker, more ominous approach to the duo’s trademark hauntology.

Here’s the full tracklist:

1. Introit
2. Prophecy at 1420 MHz
3. Hydrogen Helium Lithium Leviathan
4. Age of Capricorn
5. Father and Son
6. Somewhere Right Now in the Future
7. Naraka
8. Acts of Magic
9. Memory Death
10. The Word Becomes Flesh
11. Into the Magic Land
12. Blood in the Labyrinth
13. Deep Time
14. All Reason Departs
15. Arena Americanada
16. The Process
17. You Retreat in Time and Space
18. I Saw Through Platonia

Inferno will be released by Warp Records on May 29, 2026.

It is a truth universally acknowledged that video game movies just aren’t very good. And yet, it looks like we might be getting two halfway-decent ones this year. The first is the Karl Urban-starring Mortal Kombat II, the sequel to 2021’s underwhelming Mortal Kombat. The second is a live-action Street Fighter, based on the other great fighting game franchise. (Both of the movies made my list of 2026’s most anticipated movies.)

There was, of course, an infamous live-action Street Fighter movie released in 1994 starring Jean-Claude Van Damme, Ming-Na Wen, and Raúl Juliá in his final theatrical performance. But this latest Street Fighter really looks like it’s wholeheartedly embracing the camp and aesthetic of the video games; there’s even some car smashing for good measure. Also, it has packed cast: Andrew Koji as Ryu, Noah Centineo as Ken Masters, David Dastmalchian as M. Bison, Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson as Balrog, and Jason Momoa as Blanka — and every single one of them looks to be in on the joke in this new trailer, especially Centineo who looks perfect as a washed up, karaoke-singing Ken.

As for the actual fighting, I saw one commenter compare it to Edgar Wright’s Scott Pilgrim movie, which strikes me as pretty accurate and frankly, bodes well. The Street Fighter games have always been over-the-top, and the more the movie channels that, the better. So please, give me all the video game-realistic Hadoukens and Sonic Booms. Listen, I’m not expecting anything life-changing or earth-shattering, but if it puts a big, cheesy grin on my face, then I’ll consider it time well-spent.

Street Fighter arrives in theaters on October 16, 2026.

Thirteen(!) years have passed since Mike Sandison and Marcus Eoin, aka Boards of Canada, last graced us with new music. (That’d be 2013’s Tomorrow’s Harvest.) But earlier this month, several individuals received mysterious VHS tapes stamped with the band’s iconography that contained “degraded analogue visuals, shortwave-style audio, and layered voice fragments.” Boards of Canada’s hauntological sound practically begs for analysis, and fans immediately began theorizing about the band’s return. Warp Records encouraged said speculation with some enigmatic billboard imagery.

All of which brings us to “Tape 05,” which the duo posted on their YouTube channel yesterday. Put simply, it’s everything you could want from a Boards of Canada song, starting with the murky analog textures that feel like radio broadcasts emanating from a parallel universe. As the song unfolds, it grows increasingly ominous, its sounds matched by the video’s strange and occasionally discomfiting imagery. In its final moments, though, some light seems to pierce the gloom as plucked strings emerge from the darkness to join with the song’s arcane swells.

There’s been no official word yet concerning an actual album or EP release, but hopefully, “Tape 05” is a sign of much more to come from Messrs. Sandison and Eoin, and soon.

Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction is filled with scenes and dialog that are still memorable, even after more than 30 years. Jules and Vincent’s debate about the significance of foot massages. Christopher Walken’s watch monologue. Marsellus’s threat to “get medieval” on “Mr. Soon-To-Be-Living-The-Rest-Of-His-Short-Ass-Life-In-Agonizing-Pain Rapist.”

And then there’s Jules’s recitation of Ezekiel 25:17, which is delivered with all of the conviction of a fire and brimstone preacher before he and Vincent execute poor, hapless Brett.

The real Ezekiel 25:17 is nowhere near that long or verbose, but rather, simply reads “I will execute great vengeance on them with wrathful rebukes. Then they will know that I am the Lord, when I lay my vengeance upon them.” As part of a prophecy against the Philistines, it contains no mention of the righteous man’s path, the inequities of the selfish, or the tyranny of evil men. And there’s certainly nothing in there about being a shepherd or the finder of lost children.

The fact that it’s a fictional Bible passage didn’t stop Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, however, from using a variation of Pulp Fiction’s Ezekiel 25:17 to lead the audience in prayer during a recent service at the Pentagon. Claiming that it was a prayer called “CSAR 25:17” that’s recited by Combat Search and Rescue (CSAR) teams like the one that rescued the downed airman in Iran earlier this month, Hegseth prayed:

The path of the downed aviator is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he who in the name of camaraderie and duty shepherds the lost through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother’s keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to capture and destroy my brother, and you will know my call sign is Sandy One when I lay my vengeance upon thee. Amen.

Is this “prayer” really recited by CSAR teams as Hegseth claims? It certainly seems plausible, the sort of thing that soldiers might recite to psych themselves up before going on a dangerous mission. But as Andrew Thayer writes, there’s also something dangerous about using Scripture in the context of military violence, and especially made up Scripture like Pulp Fiction’s Ezekiel 25:17:

First, it falsely presents fabricated movie dialogue as scripture, blurring the distinction between revelation and entertainment. Second, it shifts language spoken by God in the Bible into the mouth of human military actors, subtly granting divine authority to state violence. Third, because the borrowed language comes from films built around vigilante revenge fantasies, it imports into military prayer the moral psychology of righteous vengeance rather than the tragic restraint that should accompany any use of force.

Prayer in a military context is never merely decorative, it shapes imagination. When the language of prayer teaches soldiers and leaders to hear themselves in the voice of divine vengeance — especially through words borrowed from cinematic executions — it risks sanctifying violence by wrapping it in sacred prestige. The danger is not that a movie quote slipped into a ceremony. The danger is that the state begins to speak of lethal power in the idiom of mythic revenge, and mistakes that idiom for holiness.

On a side note, Thayer gets some bonus film nerd cred for pointing out that Pulp Fiction’s Ezekiel 25:17 was, in fact, inspired by the opening speech from 1973’s The Bodyguard, starring Japanese martial arts legend Sonny Chiba. (Tarantino’s admiration of Chiba is no secret; he cast the actor in the Kill Bill movies as Hattori Hanzō, the legendary swordsmith who forges the katana that Uma Thurman’s character wields on her quest for revenge.)

In addition to the points that Thayer makes, Hegseth’s use of the passage — which, again, he doesn’t just share as an anecdote but actually prays, and asks others to pray along with him — also serves as yet another sterling example of the lack of cultural hermeneutics that so pervades Trumpian circles.

If you’ve seen Pulp Fiction, then you know that Jules recites Ezekiel 25:17 twice. The first time occurs early in the film, when he and Vincent pay their deadly visit to Brett and his friends. The second time occurs at the film’s end as Jules and Vincent eat some breakfast and reflect on the day’s strange events, and in particular, the moment when Brett’s roommate jumped out, unloaded a gun at them point black… and somehow missed.

Jules is convinced that was a miracle. “I felt the touch of God,” he tells an incredulous Vincent, who dismisses it as just a freak occurrence. While Jules is contemplating his miracle and its significance for his life, though, two would-be thieves decide to rob the restaurant. Being a hardened hitman, Jules quickly turns the tables on them, and holds one of them at gunpoint. Then, in one of my all-time favorite movie scenes, he recites Ezekiel 25:17, only now from a very different perspective.

Ezekiel 25:17 used to be “some cold-blooded shit” that Jules would say before killing someone, a little sermon he would preach to justify his violence as the work of a righteous man. But after experiencing the touch of God — or perhaps more accurately, the inexplicable grace of God that would spare even a violent man such as himself — that same passage now convicts Jules and forces him to realize the truth: that far from being righteous, he’s actually “the tyranny of evil men” who preys upon the weak. And now, he desires nothing more than to lay down his gun and become a man of peace — to become the shepherd.

Ultimately, Pulp Fiction’s Ezekiel 25:17 is not a call to “strike down… with great vengeance and furious anger.” Rather, Jules — and the attentive viewer — realizes that it’s a call to walk away from violence, to embrace peace, and to even extend grace to one’s enemies. We never learn what ultimately happens to Jules. Presumably, he’s still out there walking the Earth, like Caine in Kung Fu. As for Vincent, who chooses to deny the miracle and remain in Marsellus Wallace’s employment, he receives a bloody end.

Jules is not the only character in Pulp Fiction to face a moment of moral crisis. Butch the boxer, for example, is forced to ask himself whether he’ll go back and rescue Marsellus Wallace, the man who’s hellbent on killing him, from a group of sadists. For all of its violence and foul language, Pulp Fiction’s overarching theme — regardless of whether Quentin Tarantino intended it or not — seems to be a warning against those like Vincent who choose to embrace violence instead of grace.

Given his macho posturing and love of violent rhetoric, it’s not surprising that Pete Hegseth missed that entirely, and chose instead to glory in the empty, blood-soaked vengeance that Jules Winnfield walked away from.

For this year’s Coachella festival, Nine Inch Nails teamed up with producer Boys Noize — who previously contributed to the soundtracks for Challengers and Tron: Ares — to form Nine Inch Noize. Along with Trent Reznor’s wife, Mariqueen Maandig (How to Destroy Angels, West Indian Girl), the supergroup then proceeded to melt the faces of Coachella attendees. That is, if this performance of “As Alive as You Need Me to Be” from the Tron: Ares soundtrack is any indication.

Some have gone so far as to call Nine Inch Noize’s performance one of Coachella’s best ever. The festival has posted a couple of other songs from the set — specifically, “Heresy” and “Closer” from The Downward Spiral — but here’s hoping that the entire thing is eventually uploaded in full 4K. But if that doesn’t happen, we can still look forward to the upcoming Nine Inch Noize album, which will be released this Friday, April 17, 2026.

As I wrote in my review, 2023’s Godzilla Minus One took everything that we love about Godzilla films and distilled it down into its purest essence. Not surprisingly, the film was a massive success, commercially and critically, and notably won an Oscar for “Best Visual Effects.” Anticipation for the inevitable sequel has been running pretty high, and Toho has finally dropped a relatively short teaser for Godzilla Minus Zero. But it’s enough (for now), or as one YouTube commenter put it, “Only Godzilla could spend 2 days hyping up a teaser only for it to be like 10 seconds long, yet still satisfy fans.”

Set two years after the events of Godzilla Minus One, Godzilla Minus Zero finds a regenerated Big G back for another ruckus. Only this time, he’s heading stateside, to New York City. How this will all connect to the previous film’s characters, most notably ex-kamikaze pilot Kōichi Shikishima (Ryunosuke Kamiki) and his love interest, Noriko Oishi (Minami Hamabe), who somehow survived the events of the previous film, remains to be seen. But even so, after seeing less than a minute of footage, I’m all in.

Godzilla Minus Zero arrives in Japanese theaters on November 3, 2026 and American theaters on November 6, 2026.

When Elizabeth Fraser and Robin Guthrie entered the studio to start working on the fourth Cocteau Twins album, they did so without bassist Simon Raymonde, who’d been recruited by 4AD boss Ivo Watts-Russell to work on This Mortal Coil’s Filigree & Shadow. As such, the duo opted for a more stripped down sound that focused on Fraser’s angelic voice and Guthrie’s ethereal guitar-work.

“Stripped down” is very much a relative term, though, because the resulting Victorialand is easily the dreamiest and most ambient album in the Twins’ catalog. Which means that it’s also one of the dreamiest and most ambient albums of all time by any band. Untethered by anything rhythmic — the Twins’ usual drum machine programming is also largely absent here — Fraser’s voice and Guthrie’s guitar are allowed to drift freely like the winds that cross the Antarctic region for which the album’s named. Richard Thomas’s (Dif Juz) languid saxophone only adds to that drifting sensation on album opener “Lazy Calm.”

Fittingly, the album’s nine songs all possess a chilly aspect, due in large part to the glittering timbre of Guthrie’s heavily processed acoustic guitar. “Fluffy Tufts” and “Oomingmak” sound like they were carved out of the purest ice, their delicate guitar notes seeming to refract the rising Antarctic sun. “Whales Tails,” on the other hand, takes on a slightly darker tone that’s no less gorgeous and inviting. Guthrie’s melodies summon the aurora australis, and Fraser’s voice trills and coos as if lost in wonder at the strange lights shimmering high overhead. Similarly, “The Thinner the Air” ends Victorialand on a pensive note that’s a true showcase for Fraser’s vocals, which sound particularly fragile and forlorn here.

Fraser is in full glossolalia mode throughout Victorialand, and the album is so much the better for her indecipherability. More so than on any other Cocteau Twins release, Fraser is fully content to sing in made-up languages, or pull from languages that she doesn’t understand (as is the case with “Whales Tails”). But much like label mate Lisa Gerrard (Dead Can Dance), who’s also known for singing in tongues, Fraser’s lyrics — though cryptic and nonsensical — still tap into and channel a sense of beauty that’s both deep and primal. In other words, I have no idea what she’s singing, but in some impossible-to-explain way, I know precisely what she means.

Victorialand is my second favorite Cocteau Twins album after 1990’s Heaven or Las Vegas. And on some days, particularly when the temperature’s a little chillier and the feel of snow is in the air, it might take the top spot. Although it’s inspired countless other dream pop acts (e.g., Autumn’s Grey Solace, Love Spirals Downwards, Memoryhouse), Victorialand forever remains set apart from the Twins’ many devotees. Huddled in the studio by themselves, Elizabeth Fraser and Robin Guthrie created something truly sublime with Victorialand: an album that, more so than most, conjures up a discrete world that’s entirely and wholly its own.

One potential solution is the nascent “human.json” protocol, which allows “humans to assert authorship of their website content and vouch for the humanity of others.” Website owners upload a human.json file that contains some basic information about their website followed by a list of websites that they vouch for as human-generated:

{
	"version": "0.1.1",
	"url": "https://domain.com/",
	"vouches": [
		{
			"url": "https://human-website-1.com",
			"vouched_at": "2026-04-06"
		},
		{
			"url": "https://human-website-2.com",
			"vouched_at": "2026-04-06"
		}
	]
}

This file, which “indicates that the content of your site was generated by you, not AI,” is then linked to in the website’s <head> like so:

<link rel="human-json" href="/human.json">

For what it’s worth, here’s Opus’s human.json file, which vouches for several websites, including several by friends and family as well as some other sites that I trust. The file’s purpose, according to the protocol’s documentation, is to create “a network of trusted sites that allows people to discover other real humans by following that web of vouches.” But just how do you discover and take advantage of this network?

Enter browser extensions for Chrome and Firefox that identify if the website you’re visiting has a human.json file. If one’s detected, then the extension will notify you and display a list of other websites that are vouched for by the website you’re currently visiting. If you choose to trust that website, it’s then added to your “trust graph.” As you visit other websites, even ones without human.json files, the extension indicates if they’re connected to a website in your “trust graph” as well as how many “hops” they are from that website, thus giving you a better idea of who can be trusted.

The protocol is far from foolproof — for starters, there’s nothing that prevents an AI slop blog from having a human.json file of its own, thus falsely claiming that its content is human-generated — but I still think it’s an interesting step in the right direction. Meanwhile, the browser extensions enable and encourage users to take a closer look at the websites they’re visiting, and determine just how trustworthy they might be.

As I mentioned earlier, the protocol is still in its early stages. The proposed v0.2.0 release refines the standard and sets the stage for future enhancements, like the ability for website owners to specify an AI policy URL (such as an /ai slash page). Other proposed enhancements, like a scoring system, strike me as adding unnecessary complexity, though. I think human.json will ultimately work best if it’s kept as simple and direct as possible to encourage easier and wider adoption. By humans, of course.

Trump has posted a lot of objectionable and offensive crap on Truth Social, which serves as the primary channel for his all-caps-littered rants and ramblings. Be it insults directed at the recently deceased, a video of him dropping poop on protesters, an image of him as the Pope, or a video of a woman being killed, there just doesn’t seem to be any bottom to his social media depravity.

Some of his Truth Social activity has even approached the realm of blasphemy, which should be alarming for the many Christians who make up his base. But this weekend, Trump decided to go “full blasphemer” and posted an AI-generated image of him as a distinctly Christ-like figure.

Trump’s hands are suffused with golden light in the image, and one of them is placed on the forehead of a hospital patient. That’s right, Donald Trump is using his “divine” power to heal a man. Various individuals surround Trump and gaze at him in adoration, including a soldier, a nurse, and a woman who is literally praying to him. Meanwhile, all manner of patriotic imagery looms behind the white-and-scarlet-garbed Trump, including bald eagles, the American flag, the Statue of Liberty, fireworks, fighter jets, and soldiers emerging from a heavenly light in the sky.

It’d be bad enough if some random MAGA had posted the image, but the fact that it was posted by Donald Trump himself — a man with a well-documented lust for power and a long history of low morals — only adds to the insult, as does the fawning and preening that the image received in the comments. (Some might insist on the possibility that a Trump staffer posted the image. Even if that were the case, which strikes me as highly unlikely given the other posts surrounding it — including an unhinged broadside against Pope Leo XIV that Trump posted less than an hour beforehand — it’s still Trump’s account and he’s responsible for what’s posted on it.)

While some do criticize the image as a bad look for Trump, the vast majority of commenters fall all over themselves in a rush to see who can be the most obsequious and sycophantic. There are images of Trump being embraced by Christ or depicted as an angel, posts drawing parallels between Trump and Christ, and more than a few images depicting Trump as a bad-ass. And of course, there are those who claim the image was just another example of Trump owning the humorless libs.

I have always tried to avoid making totalizing statements about Trump supporters because I know there are a host of reasons why people might have voted for the man. I probably don’t agree with many of those reasons, but I understand and respect that people do have them. That said, if you’re a Christian supporter of Trump, and this image doesn’t at least make you a little twitchy, then I urge you to ask yourself why that’s the case. Why doesn’t this blatant and jingoistic usurpation of Christianity in the service of one man’s ego bother you? And more pointedly, is there anything that Trump could do that would bother and offend you?

If your answer to that is “Nothing,” then now might be a good time to consider who you actually worship.

Update #1 (4/13): When asked by a reporter, Trump confirmed that he posted the image. However, he claims to have thought it was an image of him as a doctor. (Because we all know that doctors wear long, flowing robes and have glowing hands.) Of course, he blamed the “fake news” for the whole brouhaha while failing to mention his own supporters who thought the image was in poor taste. In any case, the image has been removed from Truth Social, though I doubt we’ll see any sort of apology or mea culpa for posting it in the first place.