Sunday Special: This Summer in Culture

This is Agee Solzberger. I'm the publisher of The New York Times, and I'm also a former reporter who's watched with a lot of alarm as our profession has shrunk in recent years. Normally, this is where I'd ask you to subscribe to The Times. But today, I'm encouraging you to support any news organization that's dedicated to original reporting. Whether that's your local newspaper, a national paper, or The New York Times, what matters most is that you subscribe to a real news organization doing first-hand fact-based reporting. And if you already do, thank you. Hey, everyone. It's Rachel. I am here with my colleague Gilbert Cruz, the editor of The New York Times Book Review. Hey, Gilbert. Hey, Rachel. Gilbert, you were also, we should point out, the culture editor here for many years. That is true. And now you're here to talk about a new project that you're working on. I am and I will. So starting today and going through the end of the year, every Sunday, you're going to find me here talking with our colleagues who cover culture and lifestyle at The New York Times about the fun stuff, movies and TV and books and food and art and so many other things. I love that stuff. Do you love that? I love it too. We're calling it the Sunday Special. And if you're subscribed to the daily, it will just appear in your feed. You don't have to press any buttons. I love that. I love the idea of not having to press a single button. Okay, great. So you are starting this project today. Tell us what you have planned. Absolutely. So today I had a conversation with two very fun, very knowledgeable people here at The Times. One of our music critics, our internet reporter, we talked about music. We talked about a couple movies. We talked about, obviously, Taylor Swift. We talked about some internet memes. It's just three of us mixing up about things that we really enjoyed over the past few months. Well, that sounds fantastic. Let's hear it. Welcome everybody to the inaugural episode of The Sunday Special. This week I'm here with two wonderful guests, John Caramonica, sitting to my left music critic, host of the Popcast Podcast. John, thank you for being here. Also in the room, sitting right across from me, right over there is Madison Malone Kircher, who covers internet culture for The New York Times. This means, according to her, she spends way too much time on TikTok. Madison, thank you for being here. Sorry, did you say something? I was scrolling. Great. Great start. Great start. It's Labor Day weekend, and we are going to look back at this past summer in culture. And I'm going to start, really, I have to start with something that's both the most recent news and arguably one of the biggest things that happened this summer, which was a certain couple got engaged. So, okay, can I say, before we talk about that, do you identify as an English teacher or a gym teacher, or do you reject that those are non-overlapping categories? Do you believe that is one category? I had a gym teacher that was also my English teacher. So, we can contain multitudes. I like to hear that. That's actually a very compelling thing. I feel I'm positioned at the exact middle of that Venn diagram, if I'm being wholly honest. So, a thrilling day for English teacher rising, gym teacher moons everywhere. As someone who hasn't been to the gym in two plus years, I'm just going with English teacher respectfully. I heard the news not in a way that you would expect, which is to say, like, looking at the internet, I heard it because my texts started going off crazy, as if something horrific had happened. But in fact, it was just everyone trying to tell me that Taylor Swift and Travis Kelsey had gotten engaged. My group chats began blowing up and I was sitting in the cafeteria here at the office, just having sat down to eat my salad. And I had this moment of being FaceTimed by a friend and thinking I was going to enjoy this and then going, oh no, this is my job. And just running towards the elevators. I've since heard from at least one colleague who does not work with me being like, I heard you were running through the news, like sprinting to get to my desk. This is commitments. This is what we do here. Why was this interesting? And what did people find most interesting about it? I mean, I've been preparing for this no joke since January, truly. Yes, you have. I thought you were going to say like 2017. The year was 2007. Our song has just hit the, you know, I'm kidding. Look, it was an educated guess that these two people seemed to perhaps be on the train towards marriage. They are juggernauts both in their own spaces independently and you put them together and you sort of get, well, what's bigger than a juggernaut? The people needed to know. The people wanted to know. And I was shocked by the reaction online, both to this news piece I wrote and more broadly, the state of my inbox. Everyone, I think, needed just a little bit of happy news this week. And it came in the form of the Tavis engagement. Wait, is Tavis what we're doing yet? Yeah, that's what we're doing. Get on board. So Madison for, I don't know, the 12 people listening right now to this episode who were on vacation and totally missed the news. How did this actually come out? Taylor and Travis posted a joint Instagram post on a Tuesday afternoon. I believe it was 1 pm Eastern-ish. It contained a series of photos of them standing in an elaborately decorated garden, just lots of flowers and arch. I believe there's a candle chandelier covered in flowers. The works. And in the first photo, Travis is on bended knee in front of Taylor. She's clutching his head in her hands. He's wearing shorts, which has been criticized by some, not me, but some. And the caption, your English teacher and your gym teacher are getting married, also contains a tiny emoji. It's a stick of dynamite, which you might call TNT. Get it? And the ring. And the ring. So in a subsequent photo, you get a close-up, but very, let's say, wisely selected close-up, leaves a lot of details to the imagination. But a close-up of a just, I believe the official gemologist term is honking diamond ring. Speculation is it's an antique cut elongated cushion in some sort of gold. I definitely know what that means. Trunkey faceting. Look, I bought an engagement ring last year. I actually bought two, one from you, one from my partner. So you learned diamond speak, and I didn't realize it would become useful. But also in that frame is a very flashy Cartier watch. Best believe she is still the jewel. Wow. Why am I even here? Like seriously, I'm like all just bars. Look, I'm not here to tell anyone what to do or how to announce their love or how to announce their engagement or what to wear when they're doing so. But you're mad about the shorts. I am mad, small mad about the shorts. It's like, I don't care how warm it is. These are engagement photos. They're going to go around the world. They're going to live in their, you know, in their couple, them forever. They're going to be up in every house that they own. And the guy is freaking wearing shorts. I do think that that speaks to Travis emerging not from the world of true celebrity Hollywood. It's because he's emerging from the world of athletics. And I just like, this is no commentary on Travis's legs, you know, two thumbs up. But I do think like that. This is a person who likes to bum around in casual wear. And now he likes to get engaged in casual wear as well. I'm just going to proffer up a third option. Maybe he was just hot. Perhaps it is summer. Yeah, I got nothing on that. Look, it's extremely dangerous to bring me onto a podcast under the pretense of talking about the culture of the summer. And then it veers sharply into short discourse. This is violence you guys don't want to get to. So we should bring up the loafers he's wearing. We should just stop this right here. I didn't get the idea on the loafer. I thought the loafer was fine. It's short discourse. That's really dangerous. You know, you're right. Let's move away from short discourse. I would encourage us to step aside. This is coming, of course, 13 days after, and 13 is a very auspicious number for Taylor Swift, 13 days after another massive bit of news in her world, in their world. Taylor Swift! That intro, Jason. Oh my God. I've seen this before. No, look, his solo has left his body. She went on her now fiance's podcast, New Heights. So I wanted to show you something. Okay. What do we got? This is my brand new album. To announce her upcoming album, The Life of the Show Girl, which is coming out this fall. I can't believe this is the moment I finally had to watch a boy podcast. Yeah. Okay. I make a boy podcast. So you've never, you just called yourself out. Absolutely. I admittedly do not watch podcast period. I listen to them. But this one I watched sat at my dining room table, wrapped. Yeah. You made an event out of it. I did. I did indeed. But was that a sort of professional rapture or was that a personal rapture? Yeah, I was being paid to watch that podcast, John. Yes. I mean, as was I. I mean, we all were. John, how many times did you watch it? And tell us what you thought. I watched it in full, not twice. One full time and let's say 60% of a second time. Here are some takeaways from Taylor and Travis. One, they were having two incredibly parallel, but not cut, not same experiences side by side. Taylor was there for war. Taylor was there. Eyes on the camera. Eyes on the prizes. Communicating with the fans. I do think at one point she looked straight into the screen and spoke my name. Is that yes, by name? Truly. Anyone who's ever watched. I think it was. Anyone who's ever bought a Taylor album, you were named. Just like donors on the wall at the mech or something. Yeah, exactly. Exactly like me, the Sacklers, too. Travis and Jason on the other hand, like what are they're like? They're roughhousing. They're like two slant hair. They're like, Hey, buddy, they're not in the same room and they're still two slant each other's hair. It's absolute madness. I think that they realized, obviously, the power of having Taylor on the show, what it would draw to them in terms of audience. But I don't think that they understood that Taylor is not there to pod, as podcasters say. She was there to settle. Yeah, and she did. I bought it. I bought an advanced purchase CD. Which one did you buy? A CD. I don't need it. No, no, no, I know. But of the 19 million versions of these albums you can tell us. I don't need no, just original issue. Original issue. I don't need purple, glitter, vinyl. I have enough of that. Is the briefcase on sale? Because I was interested in the briefcase. The thing that she opened to pull out the vinyl. I'll have one sent to Jersey. Thank you. You're welcome. How do you know where I live? What medicine? I was watching the show through the lens of a very active group chat of the Swift sisters. It's not a great portmanteau. And I was struck by a camera member who said it, perhaps my literal sister, saying, I've never heard her say this many words in a row before. And it was this illusion that we were getting for maybe the first time since Miss Americana, her documentary, a full picture, a portrait of what Taylor Swift has been up to and what her behind the scenes real life is like. Of course, this is highly manipulated. All of this was, to use your verb, the cell. Yes, highly choreographed. Except, you know, I, as someone who listens to Taylor Swift doesn't necessarily, I don't know that I've seen Miss Americana. I'm not decoding numerology. I'm not doing any of the sort of Easter egg stuff. I knew that she had perfect lighting. I knew that she had perfect hair. I knew that this was all choreographed to the end degree. And she gave me the illusion of realness as well as I've seen in a very long time. I felt like I was there in the room with her, even though at the same time, I knew this was highly edited, completely an illusion. It was amazing. So I have a couple of questions. One, how were you in the room with her, but Jason Kelsey was trapped in a basement because the lighting on his half of the podcast, like we're in here, I've got four different light sources. So much like Jason Kelsey, like, borrowed under a table, like potting from underneath. Do you think they told him, you're fine. You know, when it was, when it was like Mike checking all that stuff, they were just like, no, you look great. I think that boy casts don't have lighting budgets. I see. That's my, that's my, that's surely they can afford it. No comment. I just, he was not seated in front of a stack of art books. You know, those books are those. Ruth Asawa and, you know, all of these. No, it's literally, it's just the Barnes and Noble, like art book table. It's just like one of, one of the, there's probably like a cause book in there. Right. And conversion of the power broker. Exactly. And meanwhile, the Swifties are like, Ruth Asawa died at the age of 87. Travis Kelsey is number 87. Song about Ruth Asawa? It's a song. On the new album? Like my sincerest apologies to the Asawa family and the estate. Are you kidding? Her price is about to go through the roof. It's unbelievable. Look, there's no real intimacy happening here. I appreciate that you allowed yourself to be swept away. What is that like? What must that be like? I have no idea. I know it's been a very long time since you were able to, you know, sort of buy into the illusion. Raw cynicism. I wake up every day, dripping cynicism. Let the world in. But how? That is the world. I regret to inform you. That's literally the world. So fine. I am, you know, the sucker here who took it for what I wanted it to be. And you are the man who sees through the illusions, who took it for what it was. Okay. But only one of you gave her your money. And it's John. I'm a collector. I have an archive to maintain. Also, he's expensive. So it's fine. Also that. Okay. So let's pivot to music more broadly. Song of the summer. John, I know that there's some contention over the entire concept of a song of the summer. Talk to me. Okay. It is the position of me and of podcast for that matter that the song of the summer is a farce. It's not real. It's a fallacy. It does not actually exist. Okay. You have declining monoculture deeply fragmented. Everybody's in their individual silos. They're like, I like K-pop and reality television. I like hip hop and ESPN. They're like, I'm picking and choosing from the full plate that's in front of me. And it's very, very hard for one song to really appeal broadly across people who have the option of listening to any song at any time. There has been a song that's been the number one song, as you say, for 10 weeks. It's called Ordinary by Alex Warren. Don't make me out of where we've found something so wild. We'll be ordinary. You got me kissing the ground. But who saves you, Larry? It is, and I say this with, I say this zestily, but with no zest. It is heinous. It is unbearable. It makes me physically uncomfortable to listen to. Okay. 10 weeks at number one. It makes me wonder who's out there tapping in, pressing play, absorbing. I don't know. Is that the song of the summer? If so, it's been a summer of misery. Actually, I have a question for you about that. How much do you think of it as algorithmically driven? Because I was force fed that song against my will, not only on TikTok, but on Spotify. I would finish listening to seemingly disparate albums or tracks. Force fed in that direction. And how am I here listening to this TikTok guy, Hype House Dude? Fake British. Fake British. Fake British. Wait, is that British? See, not British. Looks extremely British. And also sounds extremely British. Okay. Yes, I do think part of his algorithmic. I do think part of it is a collective dearth of taste amongst people. So good luck with that. Grant, Grant, Claim. Yeah. Not really. Yeah. It's pretty straightforward. I mean, the title is just so unknowing. It was also like, sorry, ordinary. It's called ordinary. The amount of like a wedding and engagement TikToks that I watched with ordinary. Look, I'm pro love. Yeah. I'm pro romance. I'm pro betroval. Say it loud. I'm on that. Yeah. Yeah. The amount of if I come to your wedding. October 11th, Brooklyn. If I come to your wedding and ordinary is even playing out of an Amazon delivery van that's driving by outside, I'm going home. I cannot be in physical proximity to it. It won't. No, I that's a workplace related injury. Yeah. What was your song in the summer? Um, it's called can't go broke. The remix of can't go broke. It's by Zeddy will who is a Internet comedian, meme artist and also emerging rapper. Should I guess with that many jobs? I can't go broke. It's almost like a great Nickelodeon skit of a rap song. Okay, Tom. And makes a tremendous. It's it's it's performed. It's comic. It's lighthearted. It's youthful. I'm jumping in the pool. We're going to get the pool. It's not really in discourse with like what's happening on rap radio. You know, it's not there. It's very viral on tech talk. When I think of my summer and how I encountered music, I encountered so much music through the phone. I encountered a lot of music in the context of doesn't make sense on a video. How does it interplay with all the other media that I'm consuming? And so for me, the song of the summer is a song of multimedia consumption. Yeah. And it's that Madison. What is your song in the summer? My song of the summer is a live performance of Addison Ray's Diet Pepsi by Ben Platt. Oh, gee. At a fake award show. I have worn it out. Madison, this is something that sort of like bubbled up over the last few weeks of August. Sure. So Lost Cultures, this is a podcast hosted by Matt Rogers, Bo and Yang. And for several years now, they've run this very funny, wonky, fake award show. This evening's ceremony will be just to use some technical terms. Random sauce. Cuckoo Lulu. She gone. Here we award the film The Substance, but also the spirit tunnel from the Jennifer Hudson show. And this year it kind of went more mainstream. It's on Bravo if we just assume that to be mainstream media. Absolutely. Absolutely. One of the acts was Ben Platt of Dear Evan Hansen fame, singing with all the earnestness and seriousness that won him the Tony Award for Dear Evan Hansen Ray's Diet Pepsi. It is incredibly catchy. It contains a little ad lib in which that man sings, I like it from the fountain. I like it from the fountain. It just scratches the inside of my brain in a nice way. Y'all love a meme. Unbelievable. Y'all are the problem. Speaking of Diet Pepsi, speaking of sodas, not the Diet Dr Pepper that you're drinking right now. Not Diet. It's full test. It's full test. Okay. You talked to Addison right earlier this morning. Sure did. Yeah. Yeah. You know what Addison Array said? Taste is a privilege. I saw that. Taste is a privilege. And what did you think of her saying that? I thought that it was one of the most elegant, self-aware things that a pop star has ever said to me in an interview. She was locating herself as a person who, when she was 16, 17, 18, did not have access to a lot of cultural product outside the very obvious mainstream, didn't know how or where to dig, and had this kind of life force urge to get out of the circumstance that she was in. And in moments like that, you can't necessarily be like, I want to be artful. I want to be weird. I have unusual perspective. You're just like, how do I get out of here as fast as possible? The speediest route. And for her becoming a TikTok star and kind of being very relentless about like, I'm on every trending audio, anything that's viral, I'm participating in. That was her speed run through the internet. And now she's like, now I can have taste. It can happen for all of you. I'm just saying the Hype House birth dust, both Addison and Alex Warren, are extraordinary. Taste is a privilege. Taste is a choice and a privilege. Can I talk about my favorite song in the summer? My song in the summer. It's Rudy didn't ask, actually. It is Rudy didn't ask, which is why I'm butting in. Do it. Yes. Your song of the summer was? Thank you for asking, Madison. My song of the summer, John's second favorite song of the summer, is Golden. The song Golden from the movie K-Pop Demon Hunter. Have either of you watched this movie? No, because as John said, we all experience culture in our own fun little, you silos. Yeah. All right. Well, let me tell you, let me tell you about the movie. Before you talk about your love, your shared love for the song Golden. This is a movie that came out earlier this year on Netflix. It's an animated film. It is, it sort of imagines a world in which there are demons, much like the real world. Yeah, I was gonna say. Demons have always haunted our world, stealing our souls and channeling strength back to their king, T-Moth, until heroes arose to defend us. There's always a group of three women that are responsible for keeping evil at bay. Also, also, in modern times, those women take the form of pop groups. And in the movie, we're catching up with the sort of the present day pop group, a K-pop group. They are called Huntrix and they are out there singing songs. And then the demons, they say, well, what if we come up with a band? It's time for a new strategy. We fight the hunters where they least expected. Go after the very thing that powers the honeymoon, the fans. A demon boy band. And it's Alex Warren. And we can steal people's souls with the power of our music. And they do. So there's Huntrix, the ladies, and then there's Saja Boyz, the guys. Just for clarity, I'm supposed to be rooting for the girl group. The women always. You're always, because the other group sounds pretty lit to me. Yeah, the demon pop group. I bet the music's better. Yeah, probably. Okay. So this movie came out in late June on Netflix and it has risen over a month and a half to be the number one most viewed movie on Netflix of all time. And in mid August, early to mid August, three or four of the songs from K-pop demon hunters hit the billboard charts. And that might be because there was a lot of other good stuff out there. But this one song, Golden, in addition to songs like soda pop and your idol have gone up there. And I'm going to tell you straight up, I was introduced to this movie by my child. He heard Golden while he was on the school bus to a camp field trip. He brought it back. We played it for days. We watched the movie. We've seen it six, seven, eight times. It's been on loop and I can't get out of my head. And I love it. I love the way it goes up, up, up in the middle. I think it's very catchy. All right, John. It's fine. Okay, it's fine. It's fine. Here's the thing as no, I love John Caravaggio say that's fine. It's fine. I've been writing about K-pop's entree into the American marketplace for a decade or more. I'm aware of every article. There are so many gestures of sort of what I think of as big tent K-pop in these songs, but they are all tempered with the kind of impulses of children's music and be a casual listener would say, oh, pop and children, there's not that much gap between children's songs and pop songs. And in many cases there aren't. But when I hear the singing here, what I hear is a denuded, desiccated version of the vocals that I think mark the best K-pop. I also think the production is so optimistic. K-pop is about or at least the generation of K-pop that this feels like it's referencing. It's maybe like a little bit prior to what's happening now. It's broad and chaotic and kind of like nuclear powered. And this feels like what if we just made it smile? And you're just like, no, no, let's hear the other guys. You want to hear Sasha boys? Soda pop. Can two things be true at the same time? I also like this song. This is wonderful. This to me is a better song. It's a better approximate, I think of K-pop. Yeah, I'm more pro this. On that positive note, let's take a quick break. Get three months half price when you switch to an unlimited sim with three. That means quick streaming, faster downloads, and more money to spend on the things you love. Join the UK's fastest 5G network and get your unlimited sim today. Buy now in store or see 3.co.uk. Unlimited 24 month light plan, proof of switching required, based on Ucchle's BTest Intelligence data to age 2025. All rights reserved, subjected credit checks and terms. Madison, something that I feel like broke through all algorithms because it was everywhere in sort of gross was Coldplay Gate. Is that what we're calling it? What are we calling it? We're calling it Coldplay Gate. Yeah. Coldplay Gate was a Coldplay concert at which a man and a woman who should not probably have been at the Coldplay concert together were spotted on the Jumbotron looking mighty comfy. Oh, look at these two. All right, come on. You're okay? Oh, what? Trying to jump out of frame didn't really work. Either they're having an affair or they're just very shunned. And we all knew who they were by the following morning, thanks to the magic. That is the surveillance state we currently live in. And these were two people who were in fact not married to each other. And I think at least one of them was married to someone else. How did that make you feel? Terrified. And I look frustrated because this is a story with so many deliciously easy villains. You've got cheaters, Coldplay fans, Gwyneth Kavotro's ex-husband. You didn't identify Coldplay itself as a villain. Oh, yeah, sure. Coldplay, Chris Martin, absolutely. Any other easy marks in this that I'm missing? All the people maybe that turn this into various memes. Right. And so it's super fun online to have somebody who's clearly quote unquote in the wrong, but people like to punch ad and mock and a tech CEO makes for a real good fit for that role these days. But honestly, it's just a warning shot to all of us. You should be scared. Okay, a couple of things. One, are we entirely sure this isn't a Psyop by Coldplay's marketing team to draw attention to how many people are at Coldplay concerts? Are we entirely sure? That's number one. No, no, no, don't answer that. Don't answer that. Okay, that's the first thing. Number two, look, we should be scared. I totally agree. We should be scared. But also, you shouldn't be cheating on your wife. You shouldn't be doing it in the public place. You shouldn't be doing it where there's cameras and phones. I think we've normalized this way too much, right? I've written many, many stories about scenarios like these. You know, I can think about a woman in a restaurant being like, girl, your bridesmaids actually hate you. Oh, yeah. Like, you know, your roommates secretly hate you. Don't you want to know, though? No, they do hate me. That's why I don't have any bridesmaids. Okay. But we've normalized the culture where this is not just happening in a place where you're correct. You're at a concert. There are jumbotrons. There are cameras. Everyone is literally holding a camera, turned on the entire time. But you can draw a direct line between that and you on the New Jersey transit being overhurt. So unfortunately, as we have just laid out, that was one of the bigger things on the internet this summer. Arguably not great. Bad for everyone involved. Were there any less depressing internet trends this summer, Madison? All I have to say is nothing, and I do mean nothing, beats a jet to holiday. Nothing beats a jet to holiday. So this is an advertisement for a British touring company. The ad goes, nothing beats a jet to holiday. Starting right now, you can save 200 pounds off a family of four pretend I'm British. I'm not doing that to our listeners, but pretend. We have an AI filter for that. That's kind of you. Fantastic. Yes. And all the while, Jess Glins, Hold My Hand plays in the background. And this, it underscored just an incredibly comedic trend on TikTok, right? You would use the video to be like, maybe it's a jet to holiday and it's a picture of you just experiencing something deeply awful. And right now, you can save 50 pounds per person. It also came with a song people already like in a summer where we've described this absolute hunger for decent tunes. And this tiny little TikTok audio, which I believe originated at the beginning of the year, like January of maybe even last year, just took off like wildfire. One thing about the jet to holiday meme, which is I feel like there's always conversation of like, how do we make something go about? It's like, you know, there's people in offices higher up in our floor on the 28th floor right now. We're pretty high. There's people on the 30th floor, the 40th floor. I don't know. They're actually all in buildings, 50th, 60th floor. And there's people in rooms being like, how do we make something go back? And we got like, we stole 20 kids from a college and we put them in a room and we forced them to tell us what was viral. It's like, it's not that hard. You have a lightly funny thing that anybody can participate in. Everybody has been humiliated. Everybody has at least one video on their phone of an absolutely either traumatic or sad thing. You can be like trauma with funny audio. Viral champion. Easy. What are you doing as a music critic? You could be working on 50th floors all over the country. Can I say now that if anybody has an office for me on the 50th floor of any building, I'm accepting DMs. We should talk about the Benson Boone crumble cookie then because that actually sits kind of at the intersection of what you're talking about, which is like a highly, highly curated internet moment. Okay, I'm going to try my own crumble cookie today. Movie, mass cream, crumble cookie. Benson Boone. He did a crumble cookie and in case you're not familiar with crumble, it's a- Alex Warren of cookies. It's a wildly popular. That collab is in the works already. It's a wildly popular. It's a wildly popular bakery chain that sells cookies that contain and this is not to shame anyone for eating more calories than a human being needs in a week in a single cookie. I believe they actually sell like a little pizza cutter to cook to cook. To cook. To cut these cookies into like relatively reasonable by the FDA or formerly FDA portion sizes. And they're gross. No, don't tell RFK Junior about these cookies. Don't tell them. No, no, no, no, look. I think this is like he and I like handshake meme aligned. Those cookies are my nemesis. I wandered around New York City trying to try the Benson Boone crumble collab cookie, which was a moonbeam ice cream cookie. And there were lines at the door at all of the crumbles I went to both for the cookies in general, but because people around the country had turned going to get this cookie into a trend. You walk into a crumble and you backflip. Is there space in a crumble to backflip? It's a great quote. In Jersey, if the crumble you go to, is there a lot of square footage? Less square footage. It's pretty big. I mean, that's what the suburbs allow. There you go. Backflipping. So look, a cookie connoisseur myself. Crumble comes along. I see all the TikToks, people in like Irving, Texas with like a six pack of six different flavors. Again, as Madison said, all flavors that should not be in Congress with each other. And I'm like, I'm hitting crumble next time I see crumble wherever it is I'm hitting it. There are more than a thousand locations across the United States, Puerto Rico and Canada. This thing is taking over. It's a blight. Well, I found one and I said, I'm going to get just the rawest combos that you could possibly have. Like just give me the six strangest cookies that are available here. Each one tasted like a pack of Post-it notes. It was unbelievable how for something with seven flavors in it, somehow still tasted like spiced cardboard. How can I, I'm running out of negative things. You're listening to this podcast and not watching it. So what you can't see is I'm scraping my teeth against the top of my tongue as though to remove some film that is still there from this cookie that I ate six weeks ago. So do you think it was appropriate then that Benson Boone and crumble came together? Absolutely. Yeah, he was the right person. And it was wildly effective. So how did we get talking about this? We got talking about it because Jet Do Holiday was not meant to be this hyper viral moment. I kept talking it blew up anyway. This, they were hoping was going to hit. They wanted like a grimace shake, Duolingo hour. They wanted a moment. Where were you in 2023? Where were you? Because I was at the McDonald's on 42nd Street drinking purple shakes for journalism. That's a very good performance. And we did it on Popcast. I went to the one on 7th Avenue. Got it live, live. Squeezed it right out of grimace. In the field. Yeah, the field recording. Squeezed it right out of grimace. Can we talk about another movie? Yes. Okay. Would love to. Madison, you and I both saw a movie that's at least I loved, even though it got a lot of crap on the internet the summer, which was a movie called materialist. I saw this too. Oh, okay. Good. Oh my God. We're going to pre-mix conversation going on. Unbelievable. This was Celine Song, who was her first picture past lives was nominated for best picture. This is her follow up. It stars Dakota Johnson, Chris Evans, Pedro Pascal. It was sold sort of as a rom-com. Definitely not a rom-com or of a rom-drom. I have a thought on that. Do you think it's funny? And I went in, I was late to the movie. I had heard a lot of negativity about it. And I actually had a great time despite the performance. Great Twitter about this movie. Yeah. How much of the film did you miss? Oh, you weren't literally late to the movie. You were culturally late to the movie. You saw it. I did see it. And I thought it was quite beautiful. It was one of those, you know, warm, lush New York City films that makes you go, man, I wish I could live in that city where I ostensibly live. I was infuriated by this movie. Infuriated? Perhaps not for the reasons that the discourse was. Where you lose me is Dakota Johnson's character Lucy. Lucy. Lucy. Yeah. Lucy takes great pains at one point to disclose her salary. I make 80 grand a year before taxes. Do you make more or less than that? More. I know. Finance, right? She's a matchmaker. She's a matchmaker and she makes $80,000 a year is what she tells Pedro Pascal's character, who does not disclose what he makes, but we are led to believe it is... $81,000 a year. It's 81? Pedro Pascal plays a very rich man. He plays someone in finance. I think I've got him from like 82. Yeah, 82.5. And the movie is about Dakota Johnson, who's a matchmaker, ostensibly having to choose between Pedro Pascal's very rich guy and Chris Evans's broke actor. Bushwick resided in after. Guy who lives with three roommates in Brooklyn somewhere. Look, there. I'm not going to pay $25 to park this piece of shit for an hour. That's the cheapest we'll ever get. We'll find street parking on the next block. John, it's been 20 minutes. I'll just pay for it. You're not paying. Dakota Johnson makes $80,000 a year. She has a wonderful apartment. Everything's great. Everything's great. She's out here wearing Kate and Perronza and Bottega, and that drove me just... Clearly, the real real shopper. Nonetheless, I think there was a lot of stress. Sticking points. There's a lot of stress about the $80,000. I mean, I think we wrote an article. Did you write that article? I didn't write that article. So you can just merge it if you'd like in front of me. There are a lot of articles about like, oh no, $80,000. Not like, it's a movie. It's gonna get a couple things. It's literally fiction. I agree. It's literally fiction. I agree. Here's the thing. You, when you introduced this movie, you said a rom-com, but not a rom-drum. And a lot of the 1.0 discourse on Twitter about this movie was like, no human beings actually talk like this to each other. But you must know a lot about love. I know about dating. What's the difference? Dating takes a lot of effort. A lot of trial and error. A ton of risk and pain. Love is easy. Is it? I find it to be the most difficult thing in the world. And that's because we can't help it. It just walks into our lives sometimes. It just walks into our lives sometimes. Are you kidding on me? Definitely not. But I do think- This is not how people who are falling in love or trying to feel each other out. What? It's a business deal. Right. It's a transaction. So here's the question. Are these terrible lines? Are they terrible actors delivering good lines? Are they terrible actors delivering terrible lines? Are they good actors delivering- Here's my thing. It's actually on paper. Everything's fine. But if the whole thing was delivered as like a slapstick romantic comedy from the early 2000s, the kind of like, what is it, like 10 things I hate about you or whatever, if it was delivered in that manner, almost identical script, A film. But because everybody was so busy, just like having a serious like- You're saying it's too stately. For no reason. It's not the physical comedy baked into it. Every like romantic interaction, Lucy, that's her name, has a handshake. It's like we're just banging you over the head with the fact that this is a business deal. We are shaking hands. Me and Pedro Pascal in the kitchen as we break up, shake hands. I'm going to marry Chris Evans. Spoiler, shake hands. Yeah. That would be very funny. I think- This is a true comedy. Genuinely, like I was excited. I have very rarely been so excited by negative discourse about a film, so much so that it made me want to see it. The Twitter conversation was so angry about this movie. And at the end, I'm like, it's almost there. But no one involved in making the movie had a sense of humor. And it is fundamentally a funny film, but no one there knows how to laugh. Well, let's turn to something now that I'm pretty sure the two of you are going to find hilarious. We are going to have the two of you take a summer pop culture quiz. There's a quiz? I feel like we should have been allowed to cheat a little. What's the quiz? So let's take a break. We'll do that when we come back. Get three months half price when you switch to an unlimited SIM with three. That means quick streaming, faster downloads, and more money to spend on the things you love. Join the UK's fastest 5G network and get your unlimited SIM today. Buy now in store or see 3.co.uk. Unlimited 24-month light plan. Proof of switching required based on Ucchia's BTES intelligence data to age 2025. All rights reserved. Subjected credit checks and terms. Welcome back. I'm Gilbert Cruz. I'm here with John Caramateca and Madison Malone-Kurcher. We are closing out the Sunday special this week with a pop culture quiz. I've got a bunch of trivia questions here about other pop culture happenings from the summer. I'm going to read out a question and the first person who buzzes in with the correct answer gets a point. The most points win. Is this Jeopardy rules? You got to get through the clue first before we're allowed to buzz. Which is buzzing at any point. That's a good question. That isn't right. I think for the sake of our listeners, I should ask the full question before you. But who determines when the question is over? When the sentence ends. Okay. All right. Okay. Fingers on buzzers or space bars or mouse pads. Ready? Let's go. Number one. What stand-up comedian and actor announced this summer that he'd be ending his long running interview podcast? Mark Marin. Correct. What seminal American film set over the fourth of July weekend on Martha's Vineyard celebrated its 50th anniversary this summer? Big shelf. Great movie. Wrong answer. The answer is Jaws. Tiktoker Lil Bulls official claims to have the world's only 24 carat gold version of what viral Madison you ragged too early. What viral plus toy? I have the world's only 24 carat La Boo Boo. La Boo Boo. The answer is La Boo Boo. That is correct. According to a single from singer Addison Ray's album Addison released the summer, What is Fame? Madison. Fame is a gun. Fame is a gun. This is a multiple choice question. One of the top grossing films of the summer was the newest installment in the Jurassic World franchise. What is the title of that film? Was it A. Jurassic World Dominion, B. Jurassic World Rebirth, or C. Jurassic World Fallen Kingdom? Madison. Jurassic World Dominion. Incorrect. That's a real movie, right? That is a real movie. Great. Next, Trollelero Trollelah, Ballerino Cappuccina, and Bombadero Crocodile. Italian Brainrod. I did not finish the question. Next question. In what video game released this summer for Nintendo's new Switch 2 console might you see a cow shoot a blue shell at a giant ghost? Bro, what? Neither of you play video games. This is one of the video games are one of the biggest things in the world. All right, the answer is Mario Kart World. The pop star Justin Bieber got a lot of attention this summer for 7th Studio Album Swag, but also for a viral video clip in which he berates paparazzi for not plucking that Bieber is doing what? Standing on business. He was standing on business, as we all know. Is it not clocking to you that I'm buzzing before you finish the question? All right, next question. This is a lightning round. The summer of 2025 was full of blockbuster movies about teams. I'm going to give you the names of the members of a team. You tell me what movie that team is from. Number one, Mr. Fantastic. Fantastic Four. Next movie, Luther, Benji, Grace, and Ethan. Give me the full names. What if I gave you the full names? I would get the hits. You would not have gotten that one. This is Mission Impossible, the final record, the eighth Mission Impossible movie. Ethan. Tom Cruise. Rumi. Jinu. Mira. K-pop even 100. I just talked about this. All right. And finally, a trivia question for two people who claim to think a lot about Taylor Swift. As we discussed, she announced her album on Travis Kelsey's podcast. She talked about baking bread. What did she identify as the best sourdough variety that she bakes? That's a good question. That was a good question. You have five seconds. She put sprinkles in it for the Kelsey kids. That's not it. No. The answer is Cinnamon Swirl. Yeah. Yeah. You know what? Yeah. I'm going to admit defeat. We're both defeated. No, no, no. I just want to say I should have known that. Fair enough. I accept that. And all the Swifties out there who are listening who are going to drag me for whatever I write about the Taylor album. Yeah. Yeah. They feel free to come for me. I am getting a note from our wonderful producer that tells me that the person who won our inaugural quiz is John. Would you like to see what your prize is? I have no choice. Alice Warren emerges from under the table. We're going to award this every week. Oh. I'm going to. Here we go. It is a Gilby. This is a trophy with my face on it. With your face on it. Yes. Oh, I'm keeping this. I'm sorry, Madison. I really hope you didn't actually win. Can you read what it says? It says the Gilbert Cruise Award. Also known as the Gilby. The Gilby Libri Peleculae Televisio Musica, which I assume is Latin for books, movies, TV shows and songs. Yes. Um, Gilbert. John. This looks cheap, but I hear. Okay. So now you have to invite me back because by the end of 2025, my desk covered in these. I love it. I love it. Covered in these. John, thank you for appearing on today's episode, looking back at Southern culture. This has been a blessing. Madison, thank you so much for being here. Anytime. Gilbert, it was a joy. I appreciate you. I appreciate your patience. I got thrown by your sincerity. This episode was produced by Luke Vander Ploeg with help from Alex Barron, Tina Antolini, Kate LaPresti, Franny Cartoth and Dalia Haddad. It was edited by Wendy Doar and Paula Schumann and engineered by Sophia Landman. It features original music by Dan Powell, Marion Lozano and Diane Wang. Thanks for listening. See you next week.