Pop Culture Happy Hour

Tue, 29 Apr 2025

Weddings make great fodder for TV writers. It's wedding season, so today we're breaking down the dif...

Mon, 28 Apr 2025

Étoile is the latest series from Amy Sherman-Palladino, the creator of Gilmore Girls and The Marvel...

Fri, 25 Apr 2025

There was Barbenheimer Summer, then Brat Summer, what will this year bring? Maybe it's the season of...

Wed, 23 Apr 2025

Pope Francis' death not only led to an outpouring of remembrances. It also unleashed a new wave of m...

Tue, 22 Apr 2025

The lovely rom-com The Wedding Banquet has a stellar all-star cast, including Kelly Marie Tran, Lily...

Mon, 21 Apr 2025

We cover a lot of TV on this show, but we don't get to everything. Today we're recommending some of ...

Fri, 18 Apr 2025

The very scary movie Sinners finds Michael B. Jordan playing twin brothers who open a 1930s juke joi...

Wed, 16 Apr 2025

In the Apple TV+ series Your Friends and Neighbors, a very rich guy reacts to becoming a bit less ri...

Tue, 15 Apr 2025

The last season of the venerable British science fiction series Doctor Who brought a lot of change. ...

Mon, 14 Apr 2025

The new film Warfare dispenses with a lot of things you've come to expect from Hollywood war movies....

Fri, 11 Apr 2025

In the bonkers thriller Drop, Meghann Fahy plays a woman whose first date goes off the rails when sh...

Thu, 10 Apr 2025

At a certain point, most of us settle into a groove with our pop culture consumption. We know what w...

Wed, 09 Apr 2025

The premise might be a tough sell: a young woman attempts to finally own her sexuality following a t...

Mon, 07 Apr 2025

Season three of The White Lotus just wrapped up, but not before serving up a tropical buffet of sex,...

Fri, 04 Apr 2025

Based on the best-selling game, A Minecraft Movie stars Jack Black and Jason Momoa in a goofy and sp...

Wed, 02 Apr 2025

In Daredevil: Born Again, Charlie Cox returns as everyone's favorite blind-but-with-heightened-sense...

Tue, 01 Apr 2025

The delightful Netflix series Survival of the Thickest is about an up-and-coming stylist whose profe...

Mon, 31 Mar 2025

In the very funny new satire The Studio, Seth Rogen plays a Hollywood studio head desperately trying...

Fri, 28 Mar 2025

In Death of a Unicorn, Paul Rudd and Jenna Ortega star as dad and daughter facing off against some a...

Wed, 26 Mar 2025

In the new Netflix series The Residence, a dead body shows up in an awkward location: the White Hous...

Tue, 25 Mar 2025

The Apple TV+ series Dope Thief is a great high-stakes crime thriller to stream now. It stars Brian ...

Mon, 24 Mar 2025

In season two of Severance (streaming on Apple TV+), we got a blowout finale with answers to mysteri...

Fri, 21 Mar 2025

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs was Disney's first fully animated feature film back in 1937. Now, it...

Wed, 19 Mar 2025

In the gleefully grisly action movie Novocaine, Jack Quaid plays a sweet, nerdy guy who does not exp...

Tue, 18 Mar 2025

Anora recently cleaned up at this year's Oscars, winning five awards, including best picture. Direct...

Mon, 17 Mar 2025

In the new movie Opus, Ayo Edebiri plays a journalist who attends a press event at the compound of a...

Fri, 14 Mar 2025

The cool, stylish new Steven Soderbergh film Black Bag is about a group of British spies who discove...

Thu, 13 Mar 2025

You should watch the surreal new movie On Becoming a Guinea Fowl. It opens with a Zambian woman find...

Wed, 12 Mar 2025

Lady Gaga has kept busy as a singer and actor, but it's been five years since she's released a full-...

Mon, 10 Mar 2025

Live television is all about high risk, high reward. Whether it's musical performances, awards cerem...

Fri, 07 Mar 2025

Mickey 17 is writer-director Bong Joon Ho's follow-up to the Oscar-winning film Parasite. In the sha...

Thu, 06 Mar 2025

What is it about a show that turns you into a bitter-ender, that keeps you dutifully watching every ...

Wed, 05 Mar 2025

Perhaps you've heard that Saturday Night Live is celebrating its 50th anniversary — they've mentio...

Mon, 03 Mar 2025

This year's Oscars was a big night for Sean Baker's Anora, including wins for best picture and direc...

Fri, 28 Feb 2025

This year's Oscar nominees include Wicked, The Substance, Emilia Perez, and Conclave. And we watched...

Thu, 27 Feb 2025

In Hulu's twisty drama series Paradise, Sterling K. Brown plays a Secret Service agent caught up in ...

Tue, 25 Feb 2025

The Netflix series Zero Day begins with a terrifying moment in which everything in the United States...

Mon, 24 Feb 2025

The standard line for awards season goes: "It's an honor just to be nominated." But when it comes to...

Fri, 21 Feb 2025

In the new horror-comedy The Monkey, Theo James plays a pair of identical twin brothers who get sadd...

Wed, 19 Feb 2025

For more than 20 years on screen, Bridget Jones has been making her way through dating, working, hav...

Tue, 18 Feb 2025

The Peacock reality show The Traitors continues to be a delightful mix of treachery, foolishness, an...

Mon, 17 Feb 2025

In the new movie Paddington In Peru, Paddington Bear and the Brown family fly across the globe, into...

Fri, 14 Feb 2025

Anthony Mackie is the new Captain America, and he's finally got his own movie. In Captain America: B...

Thu, 13 Feb 2025

The Substance is a bloody, campy, fiercely feminist body horror film. Demi Moore plays a TV aerobics...

Tue, 11 Feb 2025

In the age of streaming content and "Prestige TV" it's easy to forget that old school TV networks ar...

Mon, 10 Feb 2025

At this year's Super Bowl, the Philadelphia Eagles beat the Kansas City Chiefs 40-22. During the hal...

Fri, 07 Feb 2025

In the new action movie Love Hurts, Oscar-winner Ke Huy Quan stars as a real estate agent who has re...

Wed, 05 Feb 2025

In the raunchy movie You're Cordially Invited, Will Ferrell and Reese Witherspoon face a mortifying ...

Tue, 04 Feb 2025

We watched many films at this year's Sundance Film Festival. Today, we're recommending some of the b...

Mon, 03 Feb 2025

This year's Grammys was a huge night for Beyoncé, who finally won album of the year for Cowboy Cart...

Fri, 31 Jan 2025

In the smart, twisty thriller-comedy Companion, three young couples gather at a swanky lake house fo...

Thu, 30 Jan 2025

The excellent Netflix series Mo is about a man who figures out how to get by: how to find work as so...

Tue, 28 Jan 2025

In the new Steven Soderbergh film Presence, a family moves into an old house, and weird stuff starts...

Mon, 27 Jan 2025

The Max hospital drama The Pitt stars ER veteran Noah Wyle. It takes some elements that are common t...

Fri, 24 Jan 2025

An FBI agent working in a lonely, secret office in the White House basement gets a phone call. A wom...

Thu, 23 Jan 2025

This year's Oscar nominations are out, and if you liked Emilia Pérez, Anora, Wicked, The Brutalist,...

Wed, 22 Jan 2025

Keke Palmer is one of Hollywood's most charismatic leads, and SZA is one of the world's biggest pop ...

Tue, 21 Jan 2025

The new movie The Brutalist is earning a lot of Oscar buzz. Adrien Brody plays a fictional Hungarian...

Fri, 17 Jan 2025

Everything old is new again, it seems, and there's no reason that wouldn't apply to werewolves. We n...

Thu, 16 Jan 2025

The Netflix series XO, Kitty is a spinoff of the hit YA book and movie franchise, To All the Boys I'...

Wed, 15 Jan 2025

In Netflix's gritty, brutal Western series American Primeval, Betty Gilpin plays a woman determined ...

Tue, 14 Jan 2025

Some bands are The Beatles and some singers are Beyoncé: Smash after smash, their legend grows. And...

Fri, 10 Jan 2025

In the new movie The Last Showgirl, a woman finds herself with few options as she approaches the end...

Thu, 09 Jan 2025

In the past year, there have been a lot of movies that feature older women falling in love with much...

Wed, 08 Jan 2025

Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl is the latest film in the beloved stop-motion animation series...

Mon, 06 Jan 2025

We covered dozens of new movies in 2024, some we loved, some we didn't, and everything in between. A...

Fri, 03 Jan 2025

Adapted from the Pulitzer prize-winner novel from Colson Whitehead, Nickel Boys tells the story of t...

Wed, 01 Jan 2025

The Korean drama Squid Game became the most popular offering in Netflix's history by combining pitch...

Tue, 31 Dec 2024

As a new year arrives, it's only natural to have some goals in mind: What you want to achieve, what ...

Mon, 30 Dec 2024

Nobody can predict what the future holds, but that doesn't stop us from trying. Trying, that is, to ...

Fri, 27 Dec 2024

A Complete Unknown isn't a traditional biopic. Instead of covering Bob Dylan's life story from birth...

Thu, 26 Dec 2024

In the new movie Babygirl, Nicole Kidman plays a high-powered CEO who has an affair her mysterious i...

Wed, 25 Dec 2024

Nosferatu is a Dracula story with a twist. It stars Lily Rose-Depp as a new bride stalked by an evil...

Tue, 24 Dec 2024

Some people hate jury duty, but in Clint Eastwood's new film Juror #2, one guy's experience is worse...

Mon, 23 Dec 2024

The new Peacock series Laid is a very dark rom-com. Stephanie Hsu plays a young woman who discovers ...

Fri, 20 Dec 2024

It's been five years since Disney remade its animated classic The Lion King as a photorealistic bloc...

Thu, 19 Dec 2024

Watching a movie on a plane can be a great way to pass the time if you're traveling for the holidays...

Wed, 18 Dec 2024

We first met the Garvey sisters two years ago when the Apple TV+ series Bad Sisters made its debut. ...

Mon, 16 Dec 2024

Nobody ever said the housing market was easy. In the new Netflix ensemble dark comedy No Good Deed, ...

Fri, 13 Dec 2024

The movie Queer stars Daniel Craig as you've never seen him: as a junkie prowling the streets, hooki...

Thu, 12 Dec 2024

For a lot of people, It's A Wonderful Life is the Christmas movie. George Bailey's story of learning...

Wed, 11 Dec 2024

We check out a lot of things in a given year: Lots of movies, TV shows, and music. Today, we are hig...

Mon, 09 Dec 2024

The new Netflix series Black Doves is a pulpy and stylish British spy show starring Keira Knightly a...

Fri, 06 Dec 2024

The new movie Nightbitch stars Amy Adams as an exhausted stay-at-home mom to a toddler. Missing her ...

Thu, 05 Dec 2024

It's holiday movie season, and there are so many new movies to choose from. So where do you start? W...

Tue, 03 Dec 2024

What do you do when you need a good movie, but you don't have much time? The answer is that you find...

Mon, 02 Dec 2024

In the Netflix series The Madness, Colman Domingo plays a CNN pundit who witnesses a brutal murder, ...

Fri, 29 Nov 2024

The super-meta Hulu series Interior Chinatown mashes up a whole bunch of genres — including kung f...

Wed, 27 Nov 2024

In the hit Disney film Moana, a girl (Auli'i Cravalho) finally gets her chance to see more of the wo...

Tue, 26 Nov 2024

You may not see Denzel Washington in the new Netflix film adaptation of the August Wilson play The P...

Mon, 25 Nov 2024

The charming Netflix sitcom A Man on the Inside stars Ted Danson as a lonely widower who's hired by ...

Fri, 22 Nov 2024

The musical Wicked is a bold, revisionist take on The Wizard of Oz. It imagines that back in college...

Thu, 21 Nov 2024

The new film Gladiator II is a sequel to Gladiator, Oscar-winning swords-and-sandals blockbuster tha...

Wed, 20 Nov 2024

The moving dramedy A Real Pain stars Jesse Eisenberg and Kieran Culkin as two very different cousins...

Tue, 19 Nov 2024

If you've ever loved a movie musical, then you've probably got a favorite movie musical number — a...

Fri, 15 Nov 2024

In the deeply goofy Christmas action comedy Red One, the holiday season comes to an emergency halt w...

Thu, 14 Nov 2024

One night in Belfast in 1972, a mother of ten was abducted from her home in front of her children an...

Wed, 13 Nov 2024

Emilia Pérez is Netflix's new divisive musical about a Mexican cartel boss who disappears from the ...

Mon, 11 Nov 2024

There are songs you want to groove to, and songs you want to pump up to. But sometimes, you just wan...

Fri, 08 Nov 2024

In the claustrophobic thriller Heretic, two young Mormon missionaries (Sophie Thatcher and Chloe E...

Wed, 06 Nov 2024

Today, we're bringing you an episode of How To Do Everything, a new NPR podcast from the team behind...

Tue, 05 Nov 2024

Elections can be pretty stressful. And it never hurts to have some emergency distractions on hand if...

Mon, 04 Nov 2024

In the HBO new series The Penguin, an unrecognizable Colin Farrell reprises his role as Oswald Cobb ...

Fri, 01 Nov 2024

What if you spent eternity in one living room? That's the premise of Here, a new drama starring Tom ...

Thu, 31 Oct 2024

In the Netflix drama The Diplomat, Keri Russell plays an ambassador who's thrust into an internation...

Wed, 30 Oct 2024

The new movie Conclave is a fun and twisty political thriller. Ralph Fiennes plays a cardinal tasked...

Tue, 29 Oct 2024

Agatha All Along is a darkly funny new Marvel show on Disney Plus. It stars the selfish, sardonic an...

Fri, 25 Oct 2024

In Venom: The Last Dance, Tom Hardy returns for a third time as a sad-sack loser with an alien symbi...

Wed, 23 Oct 2024

Netflix's Woman Of The Hour is not your conventional serial killer movie. It's based on the true sto...

Tue, 22 Oct 2024

We've all been there. A major movie is mentioned, you shrug, sheepishly, and someone says, "I can't ...

Mon, 21 Oct 2024

The new movie Anora is a dark rom-dramedy about an enterprising sex worker (Mikey Madison) who links...

Fri, 18 Oct 2024

The horror movie Smile was a massive hit. Its flashy new sequel Smile 2 finds the franchise's terrif...

Thu, 17 Oct 2024

Two people meet, they fall in love, and someone gets sick. The new film We Live In Time tries to bri...

Wed, 16 Oct 2024

A lot of us are about to have the experience of opening our front doors to find witches, goblins, gh...

Tue, 15 Oct 2024

In the powerful new Apple TV+ drama Disclaimer, Cate Blanchett plays a woman who's terrified after s...

Fri, 11 Oct 2024

The new film Saturday Night attempts to capture the chaotic 90 minutes leading up to the very first ...

Thu, 10 Oct 2024

The word "basic" often gets thrown around to describe anything that's mainstream, popular, frictionl...

Wed, 09 Oct 2024

We're in a pretty critical election year. And in times like these, a lot of us are turning to politi...

Mon, 07 Oct 2024

The off-beat psycho dramedy A Different Man follows Edward (Sebastian Stan), an aspiring actor livin...

Fri, 04 Oct 2024

The new film Joker: Folie à Deux is the sequel to 2019's Joker, which won Joaquin Phoenix an Oscar....

Wed, 02 Oct 2024

The Wild Robot is a gorgeous and moving new animated movie from Dreamworks. It follows a helper robo...

Tue, 01 Oct 2024

In the new Netflix series Nobody Wants This, Kristen Bell plays an agnostic podcaster, who meets a r...

Mon, 30 Sep 2024

The latest season of HBO's Industry was over the top. The drama is about backstabbing, morally compr...

Fri, 27 Sep 2024

Francis Ford Coppola, the legendary filmmaker behind The Godfather trilogy and Apocalypse Now, is ba...

Thu, 26 Sep 2024

Elizabeth Olsen, Carrie Coon, and Natasha Lyonne are often the best thing about their projects, and ...

Tue, 24 Sep 2024

The fun series Colin From Accounts is part raunchy comedy, part romantic comedy, part friendship sto...

Mon, 23 Sep 2024

The Substance is a bloody, campy, fiercely feminist body horror film. Demi Moore plays a TV aerobics...

Fri, 20 Sep 2024

The Transformers franchise has been around for decades, and it's brought us many toys, TV shows and ...

Thu, 19 Sep 2024

What would you do if you met your future self, who's a couple of decades older and maybe a little wi...

Wed, 18 Sep 2024

Fall is beginning, and it's the perfect time to talk about all the great things we're excited to wat...

Mon, 16 Sep 2024

Last night's Primetime Emmy Awards included big wins for Hacks, The Bear, Shōgun, and Baby Reindeer...

Fri, 13 Sep 2024

Never visit your weird new friends at their enormous isolated country estate. That's a basic rule th...

Wed, 11 Sep 2024

In Netflix's new film Rebel Ridge, Aaron Pierre plays Terry, a young Black man who enters a small So...

Tue, 10 Sep 2024

Maybe you think you've seen every scary mother-in-law fiction has to offer — you absolutely haven...

Mon, 09 Sep 2024

We all love a fancy wedding. The music, the flowers — the body washing up on the beach. At least t...

Fri, 06 Sep 2024

There's a reason Beetlejuice was a hit back in 1988: it delivered both the spectacle and big stars o...

Thu, 05 Sep 2024

Maybe you're going up for a promotion, or just got out of a bad relationship. Whatever it is, your m...

Tue, 03 Sep 2024

In the clever new Netflix series Kaos, the Greek Gods are a rich and powerful modern-day family. The...

Mon, 02 Sep 2024

Some people may flinch at the genre of reality TV – it's full of tropes and manipulative editing a...

Fri, 30 Aug 2024

The new movie Afraid is latest in the well-established genre of "the computer is alive" stories. Joh...

Thu, 29 Aug 2024

In the new film The Crow, Bill Skarsgård plays a man who gets brutally murdered alongside his soulm...

Wed, 28 Aug 2024

Sabrina Carpenter has had two of the year's biggest hits with "Espresso" and "Please Please Please."...

Tue, 27 Aug 2024

It's practically a tradition for famous people to portray a really offbeat version of themselves in ...

Fri, 23 Aug 2024

In the new psychological thriller Blink Twice, Naomi Ackie plays a woman who is invited to the priva...

Wed, 21 Aug 2024

Part of the fun of reality TV is putting yourself in the shoes of the people you're watching. Maybe ...

Tue, 20 Aug 2024

In the new Apple TV+ series Bad Monkey, a fishing boat in the Florida Keys pulls in a human arm, and...

Mon, 19 Aug 2024

The vinyl record, the CD, the DVD, the VHS tape — even the paper book has been the subject of deba...

Fri, 16 Aug 2024

Alien: Romulus is the latest entry in the venerable Alien sci-fi/horror film franchise, and it leans...

Thu, 15 Aug 2024

The movie Didi is a vibrant coming-of-age dramedy and was a Sundance film festival favorite. It star...

Wed, 14 Aug 2024

We've got dirty words on the brain, and we're chatting about the use and functions of profanity in e...

Mon, 12 Aug 2024

In the new, stylishly odd horror film Cuckoo, Hunter Schafer plays an American teenager who reluctan...

Fri, 09 Aug 2024

The 2016 Colleen Hoover novel It Ends With Us was a massive bestseller. And now that book is a movie...

Thu, 08 Aug 2024

It's summer, and whether you're taking a trip – or simply staying out of the heat with the AC runn...

Tue, 06 Aug 2024

There is nothing better for the summer doldrums than a blast of Olympic glory. For a couple of weeks...

Mon, 05 Aug 2024

The moving drama Sing Sing stars Colman Domingo as the leader of a tight-knit theatre ensemble withi...

Fri, 02 Aug 2024

M. Night Shyamalan's new thriller Trap stars Josh Hartnett as a father attending a pop concert with...

Thu, 01 Aug 2024

The second season of HBO's House of the Dragon is almost over. The war between two rival factions of...

Wed, 31 Jul 2024

The dryly funny new Apple TV+ series Time Bandits reimagines the 1981 Terry Gilliam film of the same...

Tue, 30 Jul 2024

Trying to declare the "official" song of the summer isn't a new sport. But this year feels like the ...

Fri, 26 Jul 2024

In the highly meta Deadpool & Wolverine, Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman finally meet up for their ow...

Thu, 25 Jul 2024

In Netflix's weirdly compelling dark comedy The Decameron, the bubonic plague is ravaging Florence i...

Tue, 23 Jul 2024

What makes a good karaoke song? In this encore episode, we're suggesting three great songs to sing a...

Mon, 22 Jul 2024

In the new Apple TV+ series Sunny, Rashida Jones stars as a woman living in Kyoto, whose husband and...

Fri, 19 Jul 2024

Twister was one of the biggest disaster movies of the '90s. Now, it's finally got a sequel — one w...

Wed, 17 Jul 2024

The nominations the Emmy Awards were just announced, and it was a good day for The Bear, which set a...

Tue, 16 Jul 2024

The best-selling card game Exploding Kittens has been adapted into a new Netflix animated series. It...

Mon, 15 Jul 2024

They're calling it the scariest movie of the year. The new horror film Longlegs follows FBI special ...

Fri, 12 Jul 2024

The cheeky new romantic dramedy Fly Me to the Moon stars Scarlett Johansson as a NASA publicist at t...

Thu, 11 Jul 2024

Sports aren't just games. They're intertwined with epic stories about struggle, human behavior, hist...

Wed, 10 Jul 2024

Despicable Me 4 is the latest film in an animation franchise that made household names of reformed s...

Mon, 08 Jul 2024

It's summer, so we're talking all about road trips. Should you blast music that's familiar or unfami...

Fri, 05 Jul 2024

The new movie MaXXXine stars Mia Goth as an adult-film actress who gets her big break in Hollywood, ...

Thu, 04 Jul 2024

The Pop Culture Happy Hour team is off today, so we're bringing you an episode of the NPR podcast Wi...

Wed, 03 Jul 2024

A lot has happened to rapper Megan Thee Stallion over the last couple of years including a highly pu...

Tue, 02 Jul 2024

The Bear just returned for its third season and it's still one of the most stressful and most intere...

Mon, 01 Jul 2024

In the post-apocalyptic world of A Quiet Place, aliens kill anyone who makes a sound, forcing humans...

Fri, 28 Jun 2024

Kinds of Kindness is a weird, dark, and bleak film. It's directed by Yorgos Lanthimos (Poor Things) ...

Thu, 27 Jun 2024

The new film Fancy Dance offers something all-too-rare on screen: contemporary Indigenous perspectiv...

Tue, 25 Jun 2024

Jim and Pam. Mulder and Scully. Janine and Gregory. Carmy and Sydney. Meredith and McDreamy. You kn...

Mon, 24 Jun 2024

The new Disney+ Star Wars series The Acolyte is a murder mystery. Someone is killing great Jedi mast...

Fri, 21 Jun 2024

Financial scams are an unfortunate phenomenon, but what happens when a fraudster messes with the wro...

Thu, 20 Jun 2024

The brilliant and idiosyncratic new HBO series Fantasmas has a simple plot. Creator and star Julio T...

Tue, 18 Jun 2024

The second half of Bridgerton's latest season just dropped on Netflix, and naturally the course of t...

Mon, 17 Jun 2024

Whether they're lightly perspiring, gently glowing, or soaked through from sweltering, people in the...

Fri, 14 Jun 2024

Pixar's Inside Out introduced us to the core emotions inside an 11-year-old girl named Riley. We met...

Thu, 13 Jun 2024

Presumed Innocent was a blockbuster legal thriller as a novel, and then a hit movie starring Harriso...

Tue, 11 Jun 2024

This is the time of year when so many students graduate. Whether it's graduation episodes of our fav...

Mon, 10 Jun 2024

Am I OK? is a about what happens when you finally come to accept your sexuality much later in life t...

Fri, 07 Jun 2024

Netflix's entertaining dark comedy Hit Man is not about a hired killer. It's about a guy who pretend...

Thu, 06 Jun 2024

The venerable British science fiction series Doctor Who is back with a new season. Ncuti Gatwa — w...

Wed, 05 Jun 2024

The new FX limited series Clipped tells the story of Donald Sterling, the then-owner of the Los Ange...

Tue, 04 Jun 2024

The Sopranos changed television. The HBO series was centered on mobster Tony Soprano (James Gandolfi...

Fri, 31 May 2024

Get obsessed with us. Four days a week, Pop Culture Happy Hour serves you recommendations and commen...

Fri, 31 May 2024

Sometimes, our favorite musical artists are too good to be true because they're sprung from the imag...

Wed, 29 May 2024

The Peacock series We Are Lady Parts is a bold and very funny comedy about an up-and-coming London p...

Tue, 28 May 2024

What is it about a show that turns you into a bitter-ender, that keeps you dutifully watching every ...

Mon, 27 May 2024

Today, we are bringing you an episode of a new NPR podcast hosted by our pal Rachel Martin. It's cal...

Fri, 24 May 2024

Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga is packed with bone-crunching practical stunts and lots of gnarly, diesel-po...

Thu, 23 May 2024

It's rare to find a series with such an impeccable pedigree as HBO's The Sympathizer. It's based on ...

Wed, 22 May 2024

In the new movie IF, a 12-year-old girl (Cailey Fleming) discovers she can see other people's imagin...

Mon, 20 May 2024

The Netflix series Bridgerton is back, as gossipy and over-the-top as ever. Penelope Featherington ...

Fri, 17 May 2024

The new music biopic Back to Black chronicles the life of singer-songwriter Amy Winehouse. The film ...

Thu, 16 May 2024

The new movie Babes stars Ilana Glazer and Michelle Buteau as longtime best friends who've made very...

Wed, 15 May 2024

For years, Black Twitter was the watering hole. It was where we could pop off jokes about Olivia and...

Tue, 14 May 2024

I Saw the TV Glow is a strange and pleasantly unsettling new film from writer and director Jane Scho...

Mon, 13 May 2024

If you're familiar with Interview with the Vampire — because you read the Anne Rice novel or you s...

Fri, 10 May 2024

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes follows Noa (Owen Teague), an extraordinary chimpanzee whose clan ...

Thu, 09 May 2024

2024 seems destined to go down as the Year of Pop Culture Grievances. Megan vs. Nicki. Beyoncé vs. ...

Wed, 08 May 2024

The British singer Dua Lipa has become one of the world's biggest pop stars. Now, she's back with Ra...

Tue, 07 May 2024

The new Netflix film Unfrosted tells a fanciful invented version of the Pop-Tart's origin. The film ...

Mon, 06 May 2024

In Jerrod Carmichael Reality Show, the comedian doubles down on the uncomfortable intimacy of his st...

Fri, 03 May 2024

In the entertaining new film The Fall Guy, Ryan Gosling plays a down-on-his-luck stunt performer who...

Thu, 02 May 2024

The new movie The Idea Of You tells the story of a boy band star (Nicholas Galitzine) who falls in l...

Wed, 01 May 2024

The new Netflix series Baby Reindeer has a lot of people talking, including us. It tells the hauntin...

Tue, 30 Apr 2024

Today, we're offering up a guide to spotlight some of the movies, TV, and music we are most excited ...

Mon, 29 Apr 2024

The new show Dead Boy Detectives is a spinoff of Neil Gaiman's beloved series The Sandman – both t...

Fri, 26 Apr 2024

The terrific new film Challengers is about being intense about tennis, sex, and competition. Directe...

Thu, 25 Apr 2024

It's easy to notice when a sex scene is bad. But what makes a sex scene good? Today, we are recommen...

Wed, 24 Apr 2024

In the new Starz series Mary & George, Julianne Moore plays a low-born, scheming woman who recognize...

Mon, 22 Apr 2024

Taylor Swift dropped an epic new album that spans two hours — and two high-profile breakups. The T...

Fri, 19 Apr 2024

The new show Fallout is based on a hugely successful video game series known for its sardonic, very ...

Thu, 18 Apr 2024

Hot Ones is the YouTube show where famous people answer questions while eating increasingly hot chic...

Tue, 16 Apr 2024

For millions of kids, the popular 1990s X-Men animated series served as a gateway drug into the worl...

Mon, 15 Apr 2024

NPR's Books We Love is a roundup of favorite books of the year, sorted and tagged to help you find e...

Fri, 12 Apr 2024

The new film Civil War depicts a contemporary America torn apart by a military conflict between the ...

Thu, 11 Apr 2024

The new Apple TV+ documentary Girls State asks: how would high school girls do things if they were i...

Wed, 10 Apr 2024

The sweeping historical epic has roared back with Shōgun. The FX miniseries takes place beginning i...

Tue, 09 Apr 2024

Stephen King is one of the most successful living writers. He's written more than 50 books that have...

Fri, 05 Apr 2024

The new action film Monkey Man is Dev Patel's film – he serves as star, director, and co-writer. H...

Thu, 04 Apr 2024

Tom Ripley is back — and still can't be trusted. The character — created by novelist Patricia...

Tue, 02 Apr 2024

Throw on those boots with the spurs, grab your cowboy hat, and saddle up that horse, because Beyoncé...

Mon, 01 Apr 2024

Movies had a big year in 1999. Today, we're going back 25 years to talk about some of the most inter...

Fri, 29 Mar 2024

Godzilla has been around for 70 years and recently won his first Oscar. The beloved 2023 Japanese pr...

Thu, 28 Mar 2024

In the new Netflix sci-fi series 3 Body Problem, a killing during the Chinese Cultural Revolution sp...

Tue, 26 Mar 2024

The new docuseries Quiet on Set: The Dark Side of Kids TV examines the working environment of the yo...

Mon, 25 Mar 2024

Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire is the latest entry in the blockbuster action-comedy franchise. This tim...

Fri, 22 Mar 2024

The 1989 movie Road House starred Patrick Swayze as a no-nonsense bouncer who saves a honky-tonk bar...

Thu, 21 Mar 2024

In the new movie Immaculate, Sydney Sweeney plays Cecelia, an American woman who joins a convent in ...

Tue, 19 Mar 2024

If there is a spot in your heart-shaped like a rom-com, we've got some good news for you. You can st...

Mon, 18 Mar 2024

In the very funny and gently surreal new film Problemista, Julio Torres plays Alejandro, a young man...

Fri, 15 Mar 2024

The movie Love Lies Bleeding is a fun and weird erotic thriller. It's set in the late 1980s and star...

Thu, 14 Mar 2024

The bingeable comedy series Girls5eva is a silly parody of the music industry. It's about four down-...

Wed, 13 Mar 2024

Kung Fu Panda 4 is the latest movie in the popular and surprisingly thoughtful animated film franchi...

Tue, 12 Mar 2024

Netflix's Love is Blind is like a bad relationship that's hard to give up. We've had doubts. We've h...

Mon, 11 Mar 2024

At this year's Oscars, Christopher Nolan's Oppenheimer won in most of the major categories, includin...

Fri, 08 Mar 2024

Will it be Oppenheimer? Will it be Barbie? Or will it be some other story entirely? It's time to get...

Thu, 07 Mar 2024

This year's Oscar nominees for outstanding documentary feature are really strong entries that are av...

Wed, 06 Mar 2024

Most dating shows have two things in common: They are terrible and they are watchable. That dynamic ...

Tue, 05 Mar 2024

This year's crop of Oscar nominees for the best international feature adopt vastly different approac...

Mon, 04 Mar 2024

This year's Oscar nominees for best original song are headlined by two songs from Barbie: one from B...

Fri, 01 Mar 2024

Dune: Part Two is a sweeping, soaring space epic and this year's first big movie. Starring Timothée...

Wed, 28 Feb 2024

The new and unsettling Lifetime docuseries Where Is Wendy Williams? documents the former daytime tal...

Tue, 27 Feb 2024

The animated series Avatar: The Last Airbender is regarded as a classic. Now, it's gotten a live-act...

Mon, 26 Feb 2024

Oppenheimer tells the story of the brilliant physicist (Cillian Murphy) who oversaw the construction...

Fri, 23 Feb 2024

The movie Drive-Away Dolls is a shaggy comedy about a couple of lesbian friends (Margaret Qualley an...

Thu, 22 Feb 2024

The wait to learn more about Jennifer Lopez's love life is finally over. The singer and actress has ...

Tue, 20 Feb 2024

Madame Web, the latest Spider-Man-adjacent film that stakes out its own corner of the Spider-Verse. ...

Mon, 19 Feb 2024

HBO/Max's True Detective: Night Country is the fourth season of the murder mystery anthology series....

Fri, 16 Feb 2024

Feud: Capote Vs. the Swans is the latest reimagining of historical events produced by Ryan Murphy. T...

Wed, 14 Feb 2024

There have been countless romantic movies and TV shows — and a virtually infinite number of ways t...

Tue, 13 Feb 2024

The fantastic ABC series Abbott Elementary is a workplace sitcom set at a severely underfunded Phila...

Mon, 12 Feb 2024

This year's Super Bowl featured an exciting game in which the Kansas City Chiefs beat San Francisco ...

Fri, 09 Feb 2024

In the new '80s horror comedy Lisa Frankenstein, an introverted teen (Kathryn Newton) finds comfort ...

Wed, 07 Feb 2024

On Prime Video's fun new spy show Mr. & Mrs. Smith, Donald Glover and Maya Erskine play spies going ...

Tue, 06 Feb 2024

The new Prime Video series Expats fits quite neatly into the recent work done by its star, Nicole Ki...

Mon, 05 Feb 2024

Every night is a big night for Taylor Swift. But this year's Grammy night proved especially big: Swi...

Fri, 02 Feb 2024

In the comedic spy thriller Argylle, a reclusive author (Bryce Dallas Howard) gets sucked into a web...

Thu, 01 Feb 2024

Maybe you think you shouldn't read a book before seeing the movie adaptation, or you're convinced se...

Wed, 31 Jan 2024

Marvel's Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur is an all-ages animated series that's got style and energy –...

Tue, 30 Jan 2024

Over 75 feature films premiered at the Sundance Film Festival this year, including a deeply personal...

Mon, 29 Jan 2024

For more than a decade, Vanderpump Rules has been a hit reality show on the Bravo network. The show ...

Fri, 26 Jan 2024

In her smart and funny comedy special Get On Your Knees, performer Jacqueline Novak delivers a kind ...

Wed, 24 Jan 2024

Barbie was the biggest movie of last year. We saw the memes, we heard the songs, and it was 2023's h...

Tue, 23 Jan 2024

This year's Oscar nominations were announced today and Christopher Nolan's Oppenheimer leads the fie...

Mon, 22 Jan 2024

In The Zone of Interest, a German couple and their family live a bucolic life, but over the garden w...

Fri, 19 Jan 2024

Origin is the story of a writer who faces personal loss at the same time she works on a book based o...

Thu, 18 Jan 2024

The new Marvel series Echo spotlights Maya Lopez (played by Alaqua Cox), whom we first met as the st...

Wed, 17 Jan 2024

The TV cartoon Bluey is a hit with young children. But it's also found a devoted following among the...

Tue, 16 Jan 2024

The 75th annual Emmy Awards are over, and it was a big night for The Bear, Beef, and Succession. Plu...

Mon, 15 Jan 2024

In the new Netflix action-comedy-heist movie Lift, Kevin Hart plays an experienced thief and con man...

Fri, 12 Jan 2024

Mean Girls is a film adaptation of the Broadway adaptation of the beloved Lindsay Lohan and Tina Fey...

Thu, 11 Jan 2024

Baldur's Gate 3 was the most acclaimed video game of last year and recently won Game of the Year at ...

Tue, 09 Jan 2024

In the new horror film Night Swim, Wyatt Russell plays a former baseball player who's been forced in...

Mon, 08 Jan 2024

The movie All of Us Strangers is a wistful fantasy drama that tells two intersecting stories about d...

Fri, 05 Jan 2024

The new Netflix series The Brothers Sun is a fun genre mashup of action, comedy, and family drama. M...

Thu, 04 Jan 2024

NPR's Books We Love is a roundup of favorite books of the year, sorted and tagged to help you find e...

Wed, 03 Jan 2024

The delightful new Disney+ series Percy Jackson and The Olympians is a new adaptation of a beloved s...

Tue, 02 Jan 2024

Your local library is a great source for books. But it can also be a great resource for helping you ...

Mon, 01 Jan 2024

Do you make resolutions in January? We do. Today, we make pop culture resolutions for 2024, and we c...

Fri, 29 Dec 2023

What do we do at the end of every year? We hope, we fear, and we make wild guesses. Today, we're che...

Thu, 28 Dec 2023

We cover a lot of new movies around here, and some even become our new faves of the moment. Yet at t...

Wed, 27 Dec 2023

The new film Ferrari tells one chapter in the life of a man who wanted everything to go as fast as p...

Tue, 26 Dec 2023

The very good new film The Iron Claw tells the tragic story of the Von Erich family. They were profe...

Mon, 25 Dec 2023

The Pop Culture Happy Hour team is off today. So we're bringing you a very special holiday extravaga...

Fri, 22 Dec 2023

The Color Purple was a Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, then it was a movie, and then, a Broadway music...

Thu, 21 Dec 2023

In American Fiction, Jeffrey Wright stars as an author who finds that the books he loves to write ar...

Wed, 20 Dec 2023

The Netflix film Maestro is an Old-Hollywood style biopic about the composer and conductor Leonard B...

Tue, 19 Dec 2023

Maybe you're at school and need to concentrate while hitting the books. Maybe you're trying to get w...

Mon, 18 Dec 2023

Alice Walker's novel The Color Purple has been adapted a few times. Next week, a new version based o...

Fri, 15 Dec 2023

The story of Willy Wonka and his chocolate factory has been told and retold, both in the classic Roa...

Thu, 14 Dec 2023

The lovely new animated film The Boy and the Heron is the first film in 10 years from visionary Japa...

Wed, 13 Dec 2023

Taylor Swift has had a very big year. Her career-spanning Eras Tour is on pace to become the biggest...

Tue, 12 Dec 2023

As we come to the end of 2023 we find ourselves in the familiar position of wrapping up the year. Fr...

Mon, 11 Dec 2023

Last month, a civil lawsuit was filed against rap mogul Sean "Diddy" Combs by his ex-girlfriend and ...

Fri, 08 Dec 2023

In the wild and wonderful new film Poor Things, Emma Stone plays a woman brought back to life from t...