Pop Culture Happy Hour
Episodes
Agatha Christie’s Seven Dials
15 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
The new Netflix series Agatha Christie’s Seven Dials centers on lesser known mystery solving protagonist Lady Eileen Brent (Mia McKenna-Bruce). It’...
Hijack
14 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Idris Elba is in full action hero mode in the Apple TV series Hijack. He stars as a corporate business negotiator onboard an airplane that is taken ho...
Our Dream TV Crossovers
13 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
There have been many TV crossovers over the years, but it’s a tricky balance to get right — for every mashup that feels organic, there are plenty ...
People We Meet On Vacation and What's Making Us Happy
09 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
The new Netflix rom-com People We Meet On Vacation is about best friends Poppy (Emily Bader) and Alex (Tom Blyth) who have gone on annual trips togeth...
Sabrina Carpenter and the Embarrassing Truth of Dating Men
08 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
What's it like to date a man? Ask Sabrina Carpenter, Olivia Dean, or your friends, and you might hear it's a struggle. Today we’re bringing you an e...
No Other Choice
07 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
No Other Choice is a new bleak comedy about a man (Lee Byung-hun) at a crossroads. After losing his job at a paper company, he resorts to desperate, u...
Stranger Things
06 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
After five seasons and almost ten years, the saga of Netflix’s Stranger Things has reached its end. In a two-hour finale, we found out what happened...
2026 Resolutions and What’s Making Us Happy
02 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Hope springs eternal, and that is nowhere more true than in the realm of New Year’s Resolutions. Today, we give ourselves goals for 2026. And becaus...
2026 Pop Culture Predictions
31 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What does 2026 have in store for pop culture? Today, we’re back for another year of pop culture predictions. We’ll touch on A.I., the future of Ru...
2025 Best Video Games
30 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
If you’re anything like us, you spend a fair amount of your screen time playing video games. Whether you like combat, horror, or peacefully going ov...
2025 Books We Love
29 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
NPR’s Books We Love is a roundup of the best books from the past year, sorted and tagged to help you find exactly what you’re looking for. This ye...
Anaconda
26 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The new Anaconda movie is a meta reimaging in which Jack Black and Paul Rudd play aspiring filmmakers who attempt to make… a meta reimagining of Ana...
Marty Supreme and What’s Making Us Happy
24 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The new movie Marty Supreme asks, can Timothée Chalamet play a supremely annoying character and still keep us interested from beginning to end? He st...
Best Christmas Gift I Ever Received
23 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What's the best Christmas gift you ever received? You probably didn't have to think about it; you knew it in your bones. Today, in this encore episode...
The Housemaid
22 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The twisty thriller The Housemaid stars Sydney Sweeney as a newly hired live-in housekeeper to Amanda Seyfried’s wealthy housewife. Both women have ...
Avatar: Fire And Ash and What’s Making Us Happy
19 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In Avatar: Fire and Ash, James Cameron’s saga continues in a visually stunning movie full of epic battles, uneasy alliances, human assimilation, and...
Heated Rivalry
18 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The new show Heated Rivalry is a very sexy and very queer hockey romance streaming on HBO Max–and it’s a phenomenon. It follows archrival players ...
Fallout
17 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Fallout is based on a hugely successful video game series known for blending a sardonic, very dark comedic sensibility, and violence. The series is se...
Great Movies We Missed
16 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Every year, we like to take a moment to look back and spotlight a few favorite films we didn’t have time to talk about. Today, we're making recommen...
Mailbag: The Movies We Walked Out Of
14 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Aisha and Stephen answer a mailbag question! Send in your own questions at [email protected], and we may answer it in a future bonus episode.This usually w...
Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery And What’s Making Us Happy
12 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Netflix’s Wake Up Dead Man is the third installment in the Knives Out franchise. Daniel Craig returns as detective Benoit Blanc -- with a cast of su...
Jay Kelly
10 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In Netflix’s Jay Kelly, George Clooney plays the aging movie star Jay Kelly. His longtime manager (Adam Sander) and publicist (Laura Dern) struggle ...
The Worst Christmas Movies
09 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
‘Tis the season you’ll find plenty of good holiday movies – films that can be counted upon to deliver warmth and cheer. And bad holiday movies? ...
The Abandons
08 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In Netflix’s The Abandons, Gillian Anderson and Lena Headey play two steely matriarchs that face off on the American frontier. But don’t let the s...
Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 and What’s Making Us Happy
05 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In the new film Five Nights at Freddy’s 2, Josh Hutcherson returns as the protagonist trying to survive in a haunted children’s restaurant called ...
2025 Pop Culture Favorites
04 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
It’s been a great year for TV, movies, and music. And we are highlighting some of the best, including KPop Demon Hunters, Sinners, and Severance. We...
Rereading Pride & Prejudice
02 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This year, readers around the world are celebrating Jane Austen’s 250th birthday. Today we’ve got an episode of NPR’s Books We’ve Loved where ...
Hamnet
01 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Hamnet tells the fictionalized account of the lives of William Shakespeare and his wife, played by Paul Mescal and Jessie Buckley. They fall in love, ...
All’s Fair And What’s Making Us Happy
28 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Ryan Murphy’s latest show All’s Fair centers on an all-female law firm led by Kim Kardashian, Naomi Watts, and Niecy Nash-Betts. The high-powered ...
Zootopia 2
26 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Disney’s Zootopia grossed over a billion dollars worldwide. Now our heroes return in the sequel Zootopia 2. Judy Hopps (Ginnifer Goodwin) and Nick W...
Sentimental Value
25 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The new movie Sentimental Value is one of the great films about absentee dads who reappear in their kids’ lives. Stellan Skarsgård plays a renowned...
All Her Fault
24 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The entertaining Peacock series All Her Fault begins with a cute kid, an Emmy winner, and a mystery. Sarah Snook plays a mother who goes to pick up he...
Wicked: For Good And What’s Making Us Happy
21 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Wicked was a smash hit that earned Oscar nominations for Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo–but that was only the first half of the story. Wicked: For ...
A Man On The Inside
20 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The charming Netflix sitcom A Man on the Inside stars Ted Danson as a lonely widower who’s hired by a private investigator to live undercover in a s...
The Beast In Me
18 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In the new Netflix series The Beast In Me, a writer played by Claire Danes struggles to find the topic of her next book – until a nefarious real est...
Now You See Me: Now You Don't
17 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In Now You See Me: Now You Don’t, the magical Four Horsemen – played by Jesse Eisenberg, Woody Harrelson, Dave Franco and Isla Fisher – reunite ...
The Running Man And What's Making Us Happy
14 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The Running Man is a new dystopian thriller starring Glen Powell as a man so desperate for money to care for his family that he volunteers to run for ...
Death By Lightning
13 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Netflix’s Death by Lightning pits President James Garfield (Michael Shannon) against Charles Guiteau (Matthew McFadyen), the disgruntled would-be po...
Pluribus
11 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The new and highly anticipated Apple TV series Pluribus, from Vince Gilligan (Breaking Bad), asks a simple question: What if a proud misanthrope sudde...
Predator: Badlands
10 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Predator: Badlands is the latest film about an alien race that hunts things using all sorts of space-gadgets. It’s told from the Predator’s perspe...
Frankenstein And What's Making Us Happy
07 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein is a new reimagining of Mary Shelly’s classic gothic horror tale about a misunderstood monster who’s abandoned...
I Love LA
06 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Rachel Sennott’s next project, the HBO series I Love LA, has finally arrived. And like plenty of shows before it, it’s about young people trying t...
Hedda
04 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In the new film Hedda, Tessa Thompson plays a woman bored with her dull husband, and who devilishly manipulates the affections of everyone in her orbi...
IT: Welcome To Derry
03 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In new HBO prequel series IT: Welcome to Derry, we return to the clown who keeps on giving. Based on the Stephen King novel and a prequel to the films...
Bugonia And What’s Making Us Happy
31 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Bugonia stars Emma Stone as a high-powered CEO who’s kidnapped by conspiracy theorists, one of whom is played by Jesse Plemons. The conflict grows m...
If I Had Legs I'd Kick You
29 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Rose Byrne shows off her dramatic chops in the new movie If I Had Legs I’d Kick You, where she plays a therapist shouldering all the responsibility ...
Halloween Songs
28 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Who's the Mariah Carey of Halloween? Every year we hear many familiar Halloween songs – from the Ghostbusters theme to “Thriller” to “Monster ...
Blue Moon
27 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In the new movie Blue Moon, Ethan Hawke plays songwriter Lorenz Hart, who is having maybe the worst night of his life. His long term collaborator Rich...
Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere And What’s Making Us Happy
24 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In the new film Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere, the currently red-hot actor Jeremy Allen White plays the eternally red-hot rock star, Bruce Spri...
Nobody Wants This
23 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In the Netflix series Nobody Wants This, Kristen Bell plays an agnostic podcaster, who meets a rabbi, played by Adam Brody. They like each other immed...
The Reality TV Show I'd Like To Judge
22 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
When you watch a competitive reality show, you might think about how you'd win. But maybe you think about a much more powerful role for yourself: the ...
Good Fortune
21 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In Good Fortune, Keanu Reeves plays a doofy, well-meaning guardian angel named Gabriel who gets a little too involved in the life of a gig worker name...
Black Phone 2 And What’s Making Us Happy
17 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Grabbers gonna grab, even from beyond the grave. In Black Phone 2, Ethan Hawke returns from the dead as the serial killer who hides behind a demonic m...
Roofman
15 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In the new movie Roofman, Channing Tatum and Kirsten Dunst ooze with their signature charm and chemistry. Tatum plays an exceptionally savvy military ...
After the Hunt
14 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In the new movie After The Hunt, Julia Roberts plays a Yale professor who finds herself in a hard place when one of her star students (Ayo Edebiri) ma...
Kiss of the Spider Woman
13 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Jennifer Lopez stars in the new film adaptation of Kiss of the Spider Woman. Set in an Argentine prison, one man (Tonatiuh) tells his cellmate (Diego ...
TRON: Ares And What's Making Us Happy
10 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
TRON: Ares is the third film in the franchise, and this time flips the script: Instead of humans entering the digital world, this movie sees human-sha...
Most Overused Songs In Movies
09 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Some great songs are so overused in movies, they’ve become cliches. Everyone’s mileage is bound to vary, but we’re rounding up a few songs we lo...
The Lost Bus
07 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In the new movie The Lost Bus, Matthew McConaughey and America Ferrera play a bus driver and a teacher who have to transport more than 20 kids to safe...
Taylor Swift The Life Of A Showgirl
06 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Taylor Swift just dropped her new album The Life Of A Showgirl. It touches on her relationship with fiancé Travis Kelce while reflecting on fame, nor...
The Smashing Machine And What's Making Us Happy
03 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and Emily Blunt star in the new sports biopic The Smashing Machine. Johnson plays Mark Kerr, a UFC champion who is reeling f...
Brokeback Mountain
02 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This year marks 20 years since Brokeback Mountain hit theaters. The film starred Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal as two sheep herders who fall in lov...
The Lowdown
30 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The Lowdown is a great new FX series starring Ethan Hawke as a freelance investigative reporter with a knack for sticking his nose where it doesn’t ...
Wayward
29 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In the new Netflix series Wayward, Toni Collette plays a deeply creepy woman who runs a facility that promises to fix troubled teens. A cop (Mae Marti...
One Battle After Another And What's Making Us Happy
26 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
One Battle After Another is an action-thriller starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Teyana Taylor and Sean Penn. DiCaprio plays a washed up ex-revolutionary se...
Showgirls
25 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Showgirls stars Elizabeth Berkley as a Vegas dancer trying to move up from a seedy club to a glamorous hotel show. Paul Verhoeven’s NC-17 movie was ...
Task
24 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The new HBO series Task stars Mark Ruffalo and Tom Pelphrey in a grim, but stealthily hopeful drama. From the creator of Mare of Easttown, the show is...
Haunted Hotel
22 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
From one of the minds behind Rick and Morty, Netflix’s new animated comedy Haunted Hotel is the perfect mix of fun and creepy to kick off spooky sea...
Him And What’s Making Us Happy
19 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In the new horror film HIM, Tyriq Withers stars as a young football player who has a chance to be trained by his idol, played by Marlon Wayans. As the...
Fall Guide
18 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The fall of 2025 is shaping up to have something for everyone with a fresh Knives Out mystery, Guillermo del Toro’s take on Frankenstein, and a new ...
The Summer I Turned Pretty
16 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The TV series The Summer I Turned Pretty features a messy love triangle, plenty of drama, and a LOT of Taylor Swift songs. The show has become a word-...
2025 Emmys Recap
15 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This year’s Emmy Awards saw big wins for Adolescence, The Studio, and The Pitt. The telecast was also packed with a couple of surprise wins, a show ...
The Long Walk And What's Making Us Happy
12 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The new film The Long Walk is Stephen King meets The Hunger Games. It takes place in a dystopian America in which one young man from each state compet...
Great Movies With Silly Plots
11 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Have you ever found yourself completely caught up in a film only to find, after the lights come up, that the story didn’t make any sense, yet you lo...
Watch This: Twinless
09 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Dylan O’Brien and James Sweeney star as unlikely friends in the new movie Twinless. They meet in a support group for people who have lost their twin...
The Paper
08 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The Paper is a spinoff of The Office, and like its predecessor, it’s a mockumentary about a workplace that's facing financial and cultural headwinds...
The Conjuring: Last Rites And What's Making Us Happy
05 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The Conjuring: Last Rites winds down the story of the demon-hunting couple loosely based on Ed and Lorraine Warren, played by Patrick Wilson and Vera ...
Sabrina Carpenter Man’s Best Friend
04 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Sabrina Carpenter is following her breakout album Short n’ Sweet with a new collection of cheeky earworms called Man’s Best Friend, which includes...
The Thursday Murder Club
03 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Netflix’s The Thursday Murder Club is a cozy British mystery set at a posh retirement community. The movie stars Pierce Brosnan, Helen Mirren, and B...
Caught Stealing
02 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Austin Butler, Zoë Kravitz and Bad Bunny star in Caught Stealing, the new grungy, throwback film from Darren Aronofsky. Butler plays Hank, a sad sack...
The Roses And What's Making Us Happy
29 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
First a novel and a 1989 hit film, the story of The Roses has been told before. This time around, Benedict Cumberbatch and Olivia Colman play a couple...
Jaws
28 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Steven Spielberg's Jaws turns 50 this year. It’s been called the perfect movie, the first blockbuster, and the film that changed why we go to the mo...
Songs For When Your Flight Is Delayed
27 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
If you travel by plane with any regularity, you've been there: stuck in an airport because your flight is delayed. So we thought it best to give your ...
Watch This: Long Story Short
26 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Long Story Short is a very funny and surprisingly moving new Netflix animated comedy series from the folks behind BoJack Horseman and Tuca & Bertie. T...
Lurker And What's Making Us Happy
22 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Fame does strange things to people. In the new film Lurker, Théodore Pellerin plays a young retail clerk making his way into the inner circle of a po...
Best John Grisham Adaptations, Ranked
21 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
There’s a new TV version of The Rainmaker out, so today, we’re ranking the five best John Grisham adaptations – including The Firm, The Pelican ...
Our 15th Anniversary Time Capsule
19 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
We launched Pop Culture Happy Hour 15 years ago this summer, and we had a lot of pent-up hot takes. To celebrate this milestone, today we’re breakin...
Highest 2 Lowest
18 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Spike Lee's new crime thriller Highest 2 Lowest reunites him with his favorite leading man, Denzel Washington. The film is based on Akira Kurosawa’s...
Alien: Earth And What's Making Us Happy
15 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Alien: Earth is a new TV spinoff of the Alien movie franchise, and as one might expect, it has plenty of Facehuggers, chestbursters, and dark metal co...
Bring It On
14 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The cheerleading film Bring It On spawned direct-to-video sequels and a Broadway musical. And with an all-star cast of Kirsten Dunst, Eliza Dushku, an...
Platonic
12 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In the breezy comedy series Platonic, Seth Rogen and Rose Byrne play former best friends who reconnect years after a falling out. The Apple TV+ show f...
Weapons
11 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The intriguing and seriously creepy new film Weapons follows what happens after 17 third-graders get out of their beds on the same night, at the same ...
Freakier Friday And What's Making Us Happy
08 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Lindsay Lohan and Jamie Lee Curtis first switched bodies over 20 years ago in the beloved Disney body swap movie, Freaky Friday. They return in the lo...
Y2K Pop Culture
07 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
We are 25 years into the 2000s, so we wanted to debate: what’s the most definitive piece of Y2K pop culture? We try to pinpoint the essence of that ...
Together
06 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Every couple goes through certain rites of passage. You date, maybe you move in together, maybe you get married. And maybe a visit to a mysterious cav...
Wednesday
05 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Wednesday is one of the most popular Netflix shows of all time, and it helped make Jenna Ortega a star. It takes the breakout Addams Family character ...
The Naked Gun And What's Making Us Happy
01 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The Naked Gun franchise has always been a rapid-fire delivery system for gags, delivered straight-faced by a cop who doesn't know that anything is fun...
The Hunting Wives
31 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The Netflix series The Hunting Wives is a soapy murder mystery full of nudity and intrigue, about a group of Texas women who are up to no good. It sta...
Happy Gilmore 2
30 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
It's been almost 30 years since Happy Gilmore gave Adam Sandler one of his best-loved movie roles. The rowdy golf comedy gets a belated sequel on Netf...
Song Of The Summer
28 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Last year was Brat summer and saw the rise of Chappell Roan, Shaboozey, and Sabrina Carpenter. But is there a song of the summer for 2025? Today we're...