Editor's note:There's so much that's beautiful, funny, smart and informative on the Internet. Problem is, there's also a bunch of garbage. Here's the best of the web right now:
1. Bill Murray plays golf in PBR pants. When you are as rich and famous as Bill Murray, well, you can do whatever you want. And that includes wearing Pabst Blue Ribbon pants on a golf course.
2. Brian Williams raps "Rapper's Delight" on Jimmy Fallon. Video editing is a highly sought-after skill, especially in the late-night television market. This clip from The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon includes NBC's Brian Williams and Lester Holt in a rap duo that's just perfect.
3. Teen proves U.S. government could save $400 million by changing font. To call 14-year-old Suvir Mirchandani a budding researcher is an understatement. The teen created scientifically rigorous experiments to prove that different typefaces cost millions more than others due to ink usage. He's got a plan to save federal and state governments $400 million.
4. The Wonkblog guide to efficient drinking. We're so busy sometimes that even so-called leisure activities like going out for a drink end up on an excel spreadsheet. Thankfully, Wonkblog understands this and has put together a guide to efficient drinking, complete with a graph breaking down drinks on a buzz-per-calorie basis.
5. Texas has a toll-free hotline for wildflower sightings. Spring is here, y'all. And what better way to celebrate the season than with a good old fashioned road trip/wildflower photo session. The Texas Department of Transportation has all the deets.
Mabel (Piper Kurda) and King George (Bobby Moynihan) in Hoppers.
For the first 15 years of their history, animation studio Pixar delivered one classic film after another, an astonishing streak that included their first 11 movies. Things got bumpy starting with Cars 2 in 2011, and even though the majority of their output has been good-to-great ever since, their releases are no longer considered slam dunks like they once were.
They’re back with an original film, Hoppers, trying to return to form by going back to the animal world. The film centers on Mabel (Piper Kurda), a 19-year-old environmentalist who’s trying to stop a new highway being built by Mayor Jerry (Jon Hamm) in the fictional city of Beaverton. Her activism has as much to do with helping displaced local animals as it does with being nostalgic for her youth, in which she spent years observing nature with her Grandma Tanaka (Karen Huie).
She finds an unlikely possible solution when she discovers that her college professors have created a system that allows them to transfer - or hop - their consciousness into animal-like robots. Hijacking a beaver robot, Mabel joins up with the local wildlife, including beaver King George (Bobby Moynihan) to try to convince them to help her execute her plan. But with the highway almost complete and Mayor Jerry willing to do anything to make it happen, Mabel might be too late.
Directed by Daniel Chong and written by Jesse Andrews from a story by Chong, the film cycles through a variety of genres in its 105-minute running time, including comedy, drama, thriller, and even a touch of Pixar-style horror. When Pixar has been at its best, it seamlessly goes back and forth between genres, trusting that audiences will go along with them for the ride, and Hoppers feels like a return to form in that respect.
Humor rules the day as Mabel adjusts to being part of the animal world while her professors desperately try to get her and their robot back. Mabel encounters not only wildly confusing things like “pond rules” (if a predator catches you, you don’t fight it), but also the existence of a hierarchy within the world that involves kings or queens from various animal classes like reptiles, birds, amphibians, fish, and insects. Her one-track mind and the way of the world she is invading clash in a variety of funny ways.
As the film goes along, Chong, Andrews, and the rest of the filmmaking team also find a way to burrow into the audience’s heart. There are many elements that threaten to tip into eye-rolling territory, but the filmmakers consistently pull back before that happens. The number of fun characters on both the human and animal side helps in that regard, as does the simple yet profound message they’re trying to convey.
Pixar has assembled one of the best voice casts in recent memory for this film, including such big names as Meryl Streep, Dave Franco, Melissa Villaseñor, Vanessa Bayer, and the late Isiah Whitlock, Jr. However, due to the sheer number of characters, only Kurda, Moynihan, and Hamm truly stand out. Still, they all fit together well and give the always-stellar animation even more life.
Since the pandemic, Pixar has only released one truly great film (Inside Out 2), but with Hoppers and the seemingly bulletproof Toy Story 5 coming within a few months of each other, they might go back-to-back on that front. Like the classic films from the studio, it has goofy, heartfelt, and exciting parts, mixing together for an enthralling time at the theater.
