SALON

Friday, Jul 22, 2011 11:01 PM UTC

Five pop culture items we missed

Today's catch: "Machete" in space, the loss of Barbie's founder, and Dreamworks' fighting words

By

Topics: Pop five, Viral Video, Television,

Five pop culture items we missedMattel co-founder and Barbie creator Elliot Handler passes at 95.

1. Studio slap-down of the day: CEO of Dreamworks Animation Jeffrey Katzenberg just putting it out there, asking people at a Fortune conference to raise their hands, “if the last seven or eight months of movies is the worst lineup of movies you’ve experienced in the last five years of your life.” I would have raised mine, but only because I saw “Kung Fu Panda 2″ recently. Sorry, Katzenberg.

2. Cult’s cult of the day: I can’t tell if the indie band Cult’s use of Jonestown footage for their latest music video is really cool or in incredibly bad taste.

3. Sad thing of the day: Mattel co-founder Elliot Handler passed away at age 95. He’s the guy who named Barbie, though technically it was his wife who created the doll.

4. “Dear God no, Robert Rodriguez!” of the day: I don’t care how good “Spy Kids” was. This is not happening:

“The 43-year-old filmmaker said the ‘Sin City 2′ script is being refined, while ‘Machete’ may see two sequels, one of which will be set in space.”

Please, just tell me it’s a joke. Because that would be a pretty good joke! Otherwise, I’m terrified.

5. Freak shows of the day: TLC is marketing its lineup of “Hoarders: Buried Alive” and “My Strange Addiction” with a mashup of the two programs.

I hear if you watch too much TLC the commercials will just start chanting, “One of us! One of us!”

Drew Grant is a staff writer for Salon. Follow her on Twitter at @videodrew. More Drew Grant.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 2 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: So long, Sookie Stackhouse

Recommendations