The Pop Culture Pundit

Kate’s Greats are awards given to movies, TV shows, and music that the author has viewed and/or listened to over the past month. These awards may celebrate underrated, overlooked, or obscure moments of pop culture that may not otherwise get the attention they deserve. Other times, they will celebrate the buzziest pop culture–but will always have a fresh take. Award categories may include, but are not limited to, ‘Goofiest Thriller’ and ‘Tiniest Moustache’ (the latter of which Timothée Chalamet wins by a landslide). May the best, worst, boldest, and weirdest win. 

Most Insane Movie–Mary Supreme 

^{A24 via YouTube}

When I saw the Austin Butler-starring Elvis in theaters back in 2022, it was at once exhilarating and exhausting. It felt like a complete fever dream–there’s no other movie in which Tom Hanks sounds like the living version of a garden gnome, after all. But it made me realize the absolute star power that Austin Butler was born with. He was Elvis (so much so that he couldn’t drop the accent for literally years). 

This is exactly how I feel about Marty Supreme, the Timothée Chalamet-starring movie in which he plays the titular tennis table whiz who is trying to whip up enough cash to go to an international tournament. This is gonna be a cute lil’ movie about ping pong, I told myself. It’s like Challengers but table tennis, I thought as I watched the previews in which Marty has a love triangle with his childhood best friend (Odessa A’zion) and a movie star (Gwyneth Paltrow). 

Well, none of that ended up being true. In fact, the movie was barely about table tennis, even though Chalamet had apparently trained to play the sport for six years. Marty Supreme is a wild ride, a film that makes you hate the titular character so much in part because Chalamet is so committed to making him unlikeable, but yet you can’t help but root for him and shed a tear at the film’s conclusion. Leonardo DiCaprio must be raging–he had to eat bison liver in The Revenant to finally win his Oscar, and Timothée could be winning just based on playing ping pong?? Well, my friend, it is SO MUCH more than ping pong. Chalamet is clearly one of the defining actors of this generation, and his win for Marty Supreme would be well deserved. 

Best Pop Star Comeback: Harry Styles

Honestly, enough said in just the title alone. HARRY STYLES IS BACK. He is back after a year in which he was photographed with possible girlfriend Zoë Kravitz in the chicest clothes possible, ran a marathon in Berlin under the pseudonym Sted Sarandos, and also casually saw the Pope getting announced in Italy (allegedly because he was in the country for a haircut). Harry seemed so unbothered, yet apparently was working on a new secret album that was finished last summer called Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally. He joked he could’ve named it Drink Water All Time Time & Pee Occasionally because sure, that metaphor makes sense. It’s so good to have our Silly King back. 

^{Harry Styles via YouTube}

Best Cat: The orange fluffy boy in The Night Manager (season 2, episode 1)

Have you seen The Night Manager? It’s a riveting crime drama about Tom Hiddelston going undercover to find a drug kingpin in Columbia and sure, interesting stuff, but THERE’S ALSO A CAT. In the season 2 premiere, trying to live a somewhat normal life, Hiddelston’s Alex Goodwin (formerly Jonathan Pine) wakes up, talks to a female neighbor in his apartment who knocks on his door, and holds a cat (this “normal life” does not last beyond even the next fifteen minutes of the show). I haven’t even watched anything beyond the season 2 premiere, because the episodes are long and I swear I have at least 57 more seasons of various RuPaul’s Drag Race shows to catch up on. But all I know is seeing that giant, orange, fluffy cat made my entire week and I really hope this cat continues to be a presence in the show. And even if it’s not, at least it’s now a presence on my blog. 

Best Song from Canada’s Drag Race: “Work (Freemason’s Radio Edit),” Kelly Rowland

The entire Drag Race franchise has been keeping me fed for an entire year now–it makes sense considering there are approximately 700 million spin-offs. Recently, I watched Canada’s Drag Race for the first time, and this past season did not disappoint. The episode “Lip Sync Slayoffs” gave us new lip sync assassins who will surely be contestants on future seasons of Canada’s Drag Race: Canada vs. The World (like I said, there are a million spinoffs). My absolute favorite lip sync was Eboni La’Belle and Karamilk’s face-off to Kelly Rowland’s “Work,” which is now a staple in my car playlist for my commute to work. I thought the only song titled “Work” that existed was the Rihanna/Drake collab–but apologies to them, because if I had to choose the better one Rihanna and Drake would be sashaying away. 

Best TV Lineup: The Rookie, High Potential, and Will Trent on ABC

My favorite time of year for TV used to be September when all the best shows on broadcast TV came back on after summer hiatus. Well, ever since ABC decided to move The Rookie and Will Trent to a January debut, this is now my favorite time of year for season premieres. Additionally, the Kaitlin Olson-led High Potential has joined them in the ranks, giving us three great detective procedurals per week. For those unfamiliar, the concepts are all pretty similar–The Rookie follows Nathan Fillion’s Officer John Nolan as he solves cases with the LAPD, Will Trent follows Ramón Rodríguez in the titular roles as he solves crimes (and attempts to get over his never-ending will-they-won’t-they relationship with Angie Polaski, who’s now having a baby with a different man, mind you), and High Potential follows Olson’s Morgan Gillory, a woman with a high IQ brought on as a police consultant who is somehow better at solving cases than every single officer she works with (basically, it’s a gender-swapped Psych). 

The lineup may be about to get even better starting March: while The Rookie has tragically switched to Monday airings, the Scott Speedman-starring RJ Decker will begin in the former’s time slot March 3. RJ Decker is based on the beloved crime novels of Carl Hiassen, so it’s bound to be a good time (Hiassen’s novel Bad Monkey was also the basis for the Vince Vaughn-starring show with the same name on Apple TV, which was a similarly great watch). While we’re all stuck inside with the freezing weather, there’s no better feeling than watching some classic comfort food TV for entertainment.