The It List: Joel McHale returns to E! with 'Celebrity Beef,' Beavis and Butt-Head are revived in new Paramount+ series, Simu Liu strips down to survive 'Running Wild With Bear Grylls' and all the best in pop culture the week of Aug. 1, 2022
The It List is Yahoo's weekly look at the best in pop culture, including movies, music, TV, streaming, games, books, podcasts and more. Here are our picks for Aug. 1-7, including the best deals we could find for each. (Yahoo Entertainment may receive a share from purchases made via links on this page.)
WATCH IT: Celebs battle it out in the kitchen in Celebrity Beef
Joel McHale, the longtime host of E!'s The Soup, returns to the network seven years later to present this new cooking competition — with a side of personal drama. Each episode pits celebrities against one another to whip up a recipe and hash out their issues, with McHale throwing in some unpleasant surprises along the way. The lineup: Celebrity Big Brother alums Cynthia Bailey and Todd Bridges; actor Justin Baldoni (Jane the Virgin) and singer Andy Grammer; WWE Hall of Famers and sisters Brie and Nikki Bella; former The Real Housewives of New Jersey cast members Dolores Catania and Caroline Manzo; actresses Rachael Harris (The Hangover) and Cheryl Hines (Curb Your Enthusiasm); The Bachelorette's Ben Higgins and Nick Viall; actress Missi Pyle (Gone Girl) and Flipping Out star Jeff Lewis; plus Loni Love (The Real) and Justin Sylvester (Daily Pop). While the chef who creates the tastiest meal goes home with $10,000 for their preferred charity, the idea is that both competitors will leave their beef behind. — Raechal Shewfelt
Celebrity Beef premieres Tuesday, Aug. 2 at 10 p.m. on E!.
STREAM IT: '90s bros Beavis and Butt-Head are back for the streaming generation
One month after Beavis and Butt-head did the universe in an all-new Paramount+ feature film, the duo return to the streaming service for their first TV series since a short-lived 2011 revival. B&B creator Mike Judge is back in the driver's seat for the latest incarnation, which includes episodes depicting his sniggering creations in both their classic teen personas, as well as middle-aged doofuses. Storylines from the season include Beavis and Butt-Head getting trapped in a men's room after assuming it's an escape room, and Beavis communing with a fire spirit. Like back in the ’90s, the pair also share their "enlightened" opinions about short form entertainment, commenting on TikTok videos as well as popular music videos (remember those?) like BTS's "Dynamite." Hey, if Judge is playing his hits for the streaming era, can we get an Office Space series soon? — Ethan Alter
Beavis and Butt-Head premieres Aug. 4 on Paramount+.
WATCH IT: See Marvel superhero Simu Liu strip down to survive Running Wild With Bear Grylls: The Challenge
Shang-Chi himself, Simu Liu, trades his superhero suit for a pair of tighty-whities in this week's episode of Running Wild With Bear Grylls: The Challenge, the latest National Geographic series starring the world-famous survivalist. In this week's episode, premiering Aug. 1, Grylls takes Liu high into the Canadian Rockies, where the former Kim's Convenience heartthrob faces a variety of challenges, ranging from causing an avalanche to avoiding hypothermia. In this exclusive clip, Liu has to take on the ultimate Rocky Mountain High challenge... skinny-dipping in subzero temperatures. To say it takes his breath away is an understatement. "This is the worst pain I've ever felt in my entire life," he tells the camera. Too bad he doesn't have those Ten Rings handy. — E.A.
Running Wild With Bear Grylls: The Challenge airs Mondays at 9 p.m. on National Geographic.
STREAM IT: A hitman puts the infected out of their misery in Addison Henderson’s pandemic thriller Givers of Death
A deadly, incurable virus is decimating America’s population to the point where those infected with the debilitatingly ghastly disease have begun hiring assassins to take their lives. Hit too close to home? Probably not for a nation that made the decade-old Contagion a streaming charts topper in the earliest months of COVID-19. Addison Henderson wrote, directed, produced and stars in the gritty and cerebral Givers of Death — a frighteningly prescient thriller that the rising filmmaker (who won Best Screenplay for G.O.D. at the American Black Film Festival) made pre-COVID. As the film now hits theaters and streaming, it’s a reminder that things could always be worse. Check out an exclusive clip from the film above. — Kevin Polowy
Givers of Death releases Friday, Aug. 5 in select theaters and on VOD and digital, including iTunes.
WATCH IT: Patton Oswalt catfishes his own son in the dark comedy I Love My Dad
Parents, step away from the keyboard. After winning the top prizes at this year's SXSW Film Festival, the Patton Oswalt-starring cringe comedy, I Love My Dad, comes to theaters on Aug. 5, with a VOD run set for Aug. 12. The Ratatouille star plays Chuck, a middle-aged screw-up whose estranged son, Franklin (played by the film's writer/director, James Morosini), is ready to cut ties with him for good. So Chuck takes the (il)logical next step... inventing a fake Facebook profile and becoming his son's fake virtual girlfriend so that he's able to keep tabs on his life. As if that set-up isn't uncomfortable enough, this piece of info will really make you squirm: Morosini based the film on his own lived experience with his own dad. This exclusive clip from the film reveals how Chuck hatches his crazy catfishing scheme, and gives Oswalt the opportunity to do some of his best screen acting since 2009's Big Fan. — E.A.
I Love My Dad premieres Friday, Aug. 5 in theaters; visit Fandango for showtime and ticket information.
STREAM IT: Neil Gaiman's The Sandman is here to fulfill the dreams of comic book fans
It's taken over thirty years, but Morpheus the Dream King is ready for his close-up. The signature comic book creation of beloved author, Neil Gaiman, The Sandman has finally overcome years of false starts and creative disputes to emerge as a 10-episode Netflix series that adapts the first two installments in the sprawling saga. Tom Sturridge plays the title character, one of the seven Endless siblings who oversee the cosmic forces that shape our world. Gaiman's faithful translation begins with the Dream King's decades-long imprisonment at the hands of an occultist, and then expands outwards to track his journey as he puts his kingdom back together and confronts one of his most dangerous nightmares. The Sandman's existence just goes to show you that you should never give up on your dreams of seeing a classic comic serial come to life... even if you have to wait awhile. — E.A.
The Sandman premieres Friday, Aug. 5 on Netflix.
HEAR IT: Calvin Harris and his famous friends bring Bounce to the house
Scottish super-producer Calvin Harris has one of the most impressive Contacts lists in the biz, so his sixth album, Funk Wav Bounces Vol. 2, is expectedly stacked with talent. The album’s A-list tracklist features 21 Savage, Dua Lipa, Young Thug, Stefflon Don, Chlöe, Coi Leray, Charlie Puth, Shenseea, Normani, Tinashe, Offset, Busta Rhymes, Halsey, Justin Timberlake, Jorja Smith, Lil Durk, 6LACK, Donae’o, Snoop Dogg, Latto, Swae Lee and Pusha T, all offering plenty of Bounce to the ounce. — Lyndsey Parker
Funk Wav Bounces Vol. 2 by Calvin Harris is available Friday, Aug. 5 to download/stream on Apple Music.
READ IT: Break out the straw hats, One Piece hits the century mark
Monkey D. Luffy and his loot-happy band of buccaneers have been hunting treasure for 25 years, with Eiichiro Oda’s manga spawning a multimedia franchise that includes a blockbuster anime, a bevy of video games and an upcoming live-action Netflix adaptation on its way to rivaling Harry Potter as the most successful fiction series. This week sees the English-language debut of the 100th volume of the serialized comic, featuring Luffy and crew clashing with Kaido and Big Mom in a battle royale. — Marcus Errico
One Piece, Volume 100 is available Tuesday, Aug. 2 in digital and print formats from Amazon, Shonen Jump and other booksellers.
WATCH IT: Ron Howard's Thirteen Lives recreates the 2018 Thai cave rescue that enraptured the world
From Apollo 13 to Thirteen Lives, Ron Howard has a knack for dramatizing real-life near-tragedies. Based on the 2018 Thai cave rescue — where a group of British divers hatched a perilous scheme to save the members of a kid soccer team that became trapped in a flooded cave system — the director's latest film overcomes a rushed first hour with an extended rescue sequence that's genuinely emotional and nerve-wracking. Colin Farrell, Viggo Mortensen and Joel Edgerton play three of the real-life divers who swam those narrow cave corridors and submerged their own star power in favor of emphasizing the teamwork that got the job done. Watch it on a double bill with last year's documentary, The Rescue, which fills in some of the historical and cultural gaps that Howard's film misses. — E.A.
Thirteen Lives premieres Friday, Aug. 5 on Prime Video.
HEAR IT: Kasabian hits the ‘reset’ button
Following the 2020 departure of longtime lead singer Tom Meighan after he was shockingly convicted of assaulting his fiancée, Kasabian — one of the biggest Britrock bands of the past two decades — undergoes what they describe as a “reset” for their seventh album, The Alchemist's Euphoria. With guitarist/songwriter Sergio Pizzorno (who recently told The Guardian that Kasabian couldn’t “end the story like this”) assuming full-time frontman duties, the Leicester group’s first album in five years is an ambitious, fittingly titled alchemy of psychedelia, hip-hop and EDM. Clearly their story is just getting started. — L.P.
The Alchemist's Euphoria by Kasabian is available Friday, Aug. 5 to download/stream on Apple Music.
READ IT: Pulp Power celebrates vintage heroes that inspired the DC and Marvel universes
Lovingly assembled by author Neil McGinness with an introduction by comic kingpin Frank Miller, this jam-packed visual history features a treasure trove of stunning artwork from the Street & Smith publishing empire, vital works of 1930s and 1940s pulp fiction that established a roadmap for 20th and 21st century pop culture. The lavishly illustrated, thoroughly researched collection revisits the fantastical two-fisted exploits of the Shadow and Doc Savage — whose DNA lingers on in Batman, Superman, James Bond, Indiana Jones and the Jurassic series — along with such lesser-knowns as proto-hero Nick Carter, the Whisperer, the Skipper and the Avenger. — M.E.
Pulp Power: The Shadow, Doc Savage and the Art of the Street & Smith Universe is available at Amazon and other booksellers.
STREAM IT: Former New Orleans residents grapple with life post-Hurricane Katrina in Forced Change
More than 15 years after Hurricane Katrina hit and the levees protecting the city broke, an estimated 100,000 people remain displaced. This documentary from Rennik Soholt (a former producer on Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations) zooms in on one of the nation's costliest disasters in history to expose four individual stories of its long-term effects. Filming over 14 years, Soholt, who first aimed a camera at the recovering city in Oct. 2005, just two months after the hurricane hit, introduces the audience to former New Orleanians like Lorne, whose extended family once got together regularly, but whose members are now scattered across Texas, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida, making him feel split between multiple locations, rather than anchored in the home his family had known for generations. There are bright spots too, like a couple who got together in the wake of the storm and are now married and living in Leander, Tex. — R.S.
Forced Change premieres Tuesday, Aug. 2 on Apple TV and Amazon.
HEAR IT: Neil Young promises to bring the noise
A live album documenting Neil Young’s 2019 European tour with frequent backing band Promise of the Real, Noise and Flowers serves as a memorial for the classic rock legend’s manager of more than 50 years, Elliot Roberts, who died two weeks before the tour began. In the record’s liner notes, Young describes this celebratory experience as “one of the most special tours ever. We hit the road and took his great spirit with us into every song. This music belongs to no one. It’s in the air. Every note was played for music’s great friend, Elliot.” — L.P.
Noise and Flowers by Neil Young is available Friday, Aug. 5 to download/stream on Apple Music.
PLAY IT: Get looney with Ravensburger's new licensed Warner Bros. puzzles
Generations of pop culture fans have grown up on such Warner Bros. franchises as Looney Tunes and The Lord of the Rings. And now those generations can come together... to solve Ravensburger's new line of puzzles based on those properties. The toy company is premiering seven new licensed puzzle lines featuring characters from the aforementioned franchises, as well as Harry Potter, Scooby-Doo, The Flintstones and Tom & Jerry. Each individual line includes puzzles for all skill levels, from 200-300 piece beginner sets to 1000-2000 piece challenges for experienced jigsaw sorters. On your mark, get set... puzzle! — E.A.
Ravensburger's lines of Warner Bros. puzzles are available at Amazon.
— Video produced by Jen Kucsak and edited by Jason Fitzpatrick
