The It List: 'The Springfield 3' podcast investigates a mysterious disappearance, 'In the Heights' dazzles and the best in pop culture the week of June 7, 2021
The It List is Yahoo's weekly look at the best in pop culture, including movies, music, TV, streaming, games, books, podcasts and more. During the coronavirus pandemic, when most of us are staying at home, we're going to spotlight things you can enjoy from your couch, whether solo or in small groups, and leave out the rest. With that in mind, here are our picks for June 7-13, including the best deals we could find for each. (Yahoo Entertainment may receive a share from purchases made via links on this page.)
HEAR IT: The Springfield Three: A Small-Town Disappearance podcast investigates a mysterious true crime
On June 7, 1992 — 29 years ago this week — three women disappeared from a home in the Missouri Ozarks. Teens Stacy McCall and Suzie Streeter, who'd graduated from high school the previous day, and Streeter's mother, Sherrill Levitt, haven't been seen since. Police never found any DNA or bodies, and the unsolved case has continued to haunt the small town of Springfield. This eight-episode podcast is hosted by someone who knows: Anne Roderique-Jones, whose family has lived in the town for generations. (For a time, they owned a local Christian bookstore.) So she has an easy way in to re-examining the investigation from the beginning, through interviews with law enforcement officials, family members and witnesses. All the while, Roderique-Jones offers context that you normally wouldn't hear on this kind of project, like the fact that a church, one that she's attended several times, is a place "where people talk in tongues. They don't drink alcohol and regular tithe is deducted from their bank accounts." Through all of this, she plans to show how the missing women have "forever changed" the town and its residents. — Raechal Shewfelt
The Springfield Three: A Small-Town Disappearance is available on all podcast platforms.
STREAM IT: Mark Wahlberg learns how to live forever in the action-packed sci-fi adventure Infinite
Charlize Theron isn't the only action hero who has cracked the code to eternal life. A year after The Old Guard became a summertime hit for Netflix, Mark Wahlberg drinks from the Fountain of Youth in Infinite — his second collaboration with director Antoine Fuqua, premiering on June 10 on Paramount+. The Wahl Street star plays Evan McCauley, who learns that he's the latest incarnation of a warrior who has lived and fought across millennia. In the present day, he and his allies have to battle a fellow immortal, played by Chiwetel Ejiofor, in a series of elaborate action set-pieces like the turbo-charged car chase seen in this exclusive clip. Good thing Wahlberg has had centuries to learn how to drive. — Ethan Alter
Infinite premieres Thursday, June 10 on Paramount+.
WATCH IT: Pierce Brosnan plays Pace, Richard Pace in the new thriller, The Misfits
Before he was super-spy James Bond, Pierce Brosnan was former super-thief Harry Chalmers on the hit '80s series Remington Steele. Flash-forward three decades, and the retired 007 is revisiting his criminal roots in The Misfits, a new heist picture from '90s action guru Renny Harlin. Brosnan plays Richard Pace, who gets sprung from his maximum-security prison with an offer to join the titular rob-from-the-rich-give-to-the-poor crew, which also includes Nick Cannon and Jamie Chung. The Misfits's latest target is Tim Roth's villainous tycoon, Schultz... who has a personal beef with Pace. This exclusive clip shows that Brosnan still has a flair for explosive action sequences that'll leave you shaken and stirred. — E.A.
The Misfits premieres June 11 in theaters and June 15 on VOD services including FandangoNow.
WATCH IT: Manifest's third season wraps up in suitably chilling fashion
Not since Oceanic Flight 815 has a fictional airline so captured the imagination of millions of TV viewers. Now in its third season, NBC's hit sci-fi series Manifest follows the passengers of Montego Air Flight 828, who deboarded their Jamaica-to-New York City flight only to discover that their arrival was delayed — by five-and-a-half years. The show's mystery continued to deepen throughout Season 3, which concludes with a two-part finale packed with eerie moments like the dream sequence seen in this exclusive clip, where the plane's ceiling runs red... with blood. Jack Shephard never had to worry about that problem. — E.A.
The Manifest Season 3 finale airs Thursday, June 10 at 8 p.m. on NBC.
STREAM IT: Prime Video's new crime drama, Dom, transports you to the mean streets of Brazil
Based on a true story, the Brazilian crime saga, Dom, follows the diverging path of a father and son over the course of two decades on the mean streets of Rio de Janeiro. Moving back and forth between the 1970s and the 1990s, the show follows a scuba diver-turned-narcotics enforcement officer (played by Filipe Bragan?a as a teenager and Flávio Tolezani as an adult) as he wages a seemingly unwinnable battle against city's flourishing drug trade. His battle becomes personal when his own son becomes one of Rio's leading kingpins. This lyrical clip from the series showcases father and son in happier times, when they take a nighttime motorcycle ride through the city streets. — E.A.
Dom is currently streaming on Prime Video
WATCH IT: From stage to screen, In the Heights is magic
Good things really do come to those who wait. A movie adaptation of In the Heights — the Tony-winning Broadway musical that announced the arrival of greatest showman Lin-Manuel Miranda before Hamilton subsequently took over the world — has been in the works since 2008, and was originally scheduled to open a full 10 years ago. Development began so long ago that Miranda aged out of the lead role of Usnavi, an uptown Manhattan bodega owner who dreams of restoring his Dominican family's beachside bar. Even once In the Heights was completed — now starring Anthony Ramos as Usnavi, with Miranda in a supporting role, and directed by Jon M. Chu (Crazy Rich Asians) — the film, like so many others, was delayed a full year by the pandemic. It finally arrives this week, and its long haul will be forgotten minutes in, once you're swept up in its infectious energy, vibrant sets, electric cast and of, course, toe-tapping, percussive Latin music numbers. In the Heights could go down in the history books as one of the all-time great musicals. — Kevin Polowy
In the Heights opens in theaters and premieres on HBO Max on Friday, June 11. Get tickets at Fandango.
HEAR IT: Garbage rules again on No Gods No Masters
The supergroup, comprising Butch Vig, Duke Erikson, Steve Marker and incomparable voice-of-a-generation Shirley Manson, returns with its seventh album — and it's Garbage’s darkest and most overtly political yet. Inspired by their doomy 2017, Trump-era protest song "No Horses" and set in tone by ferocious opening track "The Men Who Rule the World," the LP is a pointed "critique of the rise of capitalist short-sightedness, racism, sexism, and misogyny across the world." Guests include Manson's fellow, fierce female rockers Brody Dalle (of the Distillers) and X's Exene Cervenka the latter alongside X bandmate John Doe. — Lyndsey Parker
No Gods No Masters by Garbage is available Friday, June 11 to download/stream on Apple Music.
BUY IT: Biggie murder-mystery thriller City of Lies has some juicy theories
Who shot Biggie? That's what the Blu-ray cover for the true-life crime thriller City of Lies asks, and it might even have some answers. Or at least theories. Based on Randall Sullivan's controversial (and epically titled) 2002 book Labyrinth: A Detective Investigates the Murders of Tupac Shakur and Notorious B.I.G., the Implication of Death Row Records' Suge Knight, and the Origins of the Los Angeles Police Scandal, the film stars Johnny Depp as Russell Poole, a real-life LAPD detective who became consumed with solving the legendary rapper's murder, and Forest Whitaker as a journalist who teams up with him on the case. Bonus features include deleted scenes, a featurette on the characters and audio commentary from Sullivan and director Brad Furman. — K.P.
City of Lies is available on Blu-ray, DVD and digital Tuesday, June 8 at Amazon.
HEAR IT: Maroon 5 shares memories of late friend on all-star album
Adam Levine and company return with Jordi, their first studio album in four years, and they've brought along a posse of famous friends, including Megan Thee Stallion, Stevie Nicks, H.E.R., Jason Derulo, Blackbear and YG. The record also features posthumous guests spots by Juice Wrld and Nipsey Hussle, and it is named after Maroon 5's manager and Levine's childhood friend Jordan Feldstein, who died of a heart attack at age 40 in 2017. The Jordi track "Memories," which was originally released in 2019 and peaked at No. 2 on Billboard Hot 100, is dedicated to Feldstein. — L.P.
Jordi by Maroon 5 is available Friday, June 11 to download/stream on Apple Music.
STREAM IT: Tom Hiddleston returns as Asgard's favorite trickster in Disney+ series Loki
He's baaaack! Killed by Thanos during his Infinity War, but resurrected thanks to the Avengers's time-traveling Endgame antics, Thor's trickster brother is now headlining his own streaming series. Set moments after an earlier version of Loki (fan-favorite Tom Hiddleston) absconded into the Marvel Cinematic Universe timestream with the Space Stone-powered Tesseract, this six-episode adventure finds the Asgardian captured by the agents of the Time Variance Authority, and enlisted in their strenuous efforts to keep Earth-199999's timeline intact. Before you can say Timecop, though, this Loki variant tries to pursue his own mischievous agenda. He'd better hope they don't call his older, buffer brother. — E.A.
Loki premieres Wednesday, June 9 on Disney+.
HEAR IT: Sleater-Kinney makes a riotous return
The trailblazing Riot Grrl band, now a duo of Corin Tucker and Carrie Brownstein following drummer Janet Weiss's exit, returns with its 10th album, Path of Wellness. Sounding as gritty and visceral as Sleater-Kinney ever have, the record was created during summer 2020's lockdown in Portland, amid the turmoil of that Northwestern city's social justice protests. The vibe is perfectly encapsulated by Brownstein's bitter refrain of "It's not the summer we were promised/It's the summer that we deserve" on standout track "Down the Line." — L.P.
Path of Wellness by Sleater-Kinney is available Friday, June 11 to download/stream on Apple Music.
STREAM IT: The game's afoot as breakout French heist series Lupin returns to Netflix
Launched in January, the French-made thriller Lupin quickly became a global streaming sensation on Netflix, reaching more than 70 million households. Following its mid-season cliffhanger finale, the series returns with five more episodes that depict the continuing adventures of Omar Sy's super-suave, super-smart "gentleman thief." With his teenage son currently held hostage by his nemesis, Assane Diop (aka Lupin) has to figure out how to use his talents to free him while also staying off the radar of an increasingly aggressive police force. — E.A.
New episodes of Lupin premiere Friday, June 11 on Netflix.
HEAR IT: Mammoth WVH carries on the Van Halen family legacy
Mammoth WVH, the eponymous band of legendary guitarist Eddie Van Halen's son, Wolfgang Van Halen, debuted in November 2020 — a month after Eddie's death — with the touching tribute song "Distance," an "open letter" to Wolfgang's late dad. Now Wolfgang, who once played bass as Michael Anthony's replacement in the Van Halen band lineup, fully moves centerstage with his group's full-length debut. — L.P.
Mammoth WVH by Mammoth WVH is available Friday, June 11 to download/stream on Apple Music.
STREAM IT: George A. Romero's long-lost The Amusement Park has been found by Shudder
During the 10-year period that separated his pioneering zombie classics Night of the Living Dead and Dawn of the Dead, George A. Romero explored other facets of horror, from witchcraft (Season of the Witch) to viruses (The Crazies). Made in between feature film projects, the hour-long The Amusement Park — originally commissioned as an educational movie by the Lutheran Society — covers territory that unnerves everyone equally: growing older in America. With Romero behind the camera, an elderly man's trip to a local amusement park becomes a nightmarish descent into the kind of neglect and abuse that the country's aging population suffered at the time and still today.
The director's dark vision proved too intense for his backers, who promptly buried the movie, leading many to believe it was lost to the ages. (Romero died in 2017.) Fortunately, a missing print was located in 2018, and The Amusement Park is finally getting its streaming debut on Shudder following an extensive restoration process. "We at the GARF deemed it absolutely necessary to restore this film so that Maestro Romero could once again grace us with his poignant social commentary and shine a light on our failings," the director's widow, Suzanne Desrocher-Romero, tells Yahoo Entertainment via e-mail. "For the love of yet another Romero social commentary piece, Shudder proves to be the right custodian for this beloved filmmaker. The GARF and Shudder are thrilled to lay bare another piece from Romero and his influence in American Cinema." — E.A.
The Amusement Park premieres Tuesday, June 8 on Shudder.
STREAM IT: The Tribeca Film Festival returns for its first post-pandemic edition with in-person and virtual screenings and events
Like many global film events, the Tribeca Film Festival was forced to cancel its 2020 edition following the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic. But with New York City officially re-opening, this year's festival is looking to bring moviegoers back into local theaters, while also allowing movie lovers in other cities to sample its line-up virtually. Tribeca kicks off June 9 with multiple outdoor screenings of the highly-anticipated movie musical, In the Heights, and closes a week-and-a-half later with the world premiere of Dave Chappelle's new COVID-era documentary at Radio City Music Hall. In between those events are screenings of films like the horror-comedy, Werewolves Within, and the rousing sports doc LFG; panels with filmmakers and performers, such as Gina Prince-Bythewood and John Legend; and anniversary reunions celebrating contemporary classics like The Royal Tenenbaums and Fargo. — E.A.
The Tribeca Film Festival begins Wednesday, June 9; visit the official site to purchase individual tickets and packages.
HEAR IT: Danny Elfman messes around
The pioneering Oingo Boingo frontman-turned-renowned screen composer's Big Mess is his first studio album (outside of his film work) since his former band's 1994 effort Boingo, and it's also his first solo album in 37 years. The record was partially inspired by the aborted comeback show Elfman was planning to play at Coachella last year (before the 2020 festival was canceled due to coronavirus concerns), and tracks like "Happy," "True," "Kick Me," and "Love in the Time of Covid" — along with their absurdist music videos — are every bit as trippy as anything he's ever recorded for longtime film partner Tim Burton. Hopefully Elfman will be playing these songs at Coachella in 2022. — L.P.
Big Mess by Danny Elfman is available Friday, June 11 to download/stream on Apple Music.
HEAR IT: AFI releases its most full-bodied work to date
The shapeshifting alt-rock quartet, whose discography since 1995 has careened from NoCal hardcore to goth to glam, distills all those influences into its most fully realized, most diverse, and hookiest album yet. Anchored by iconic frontman Davey Havok's evocative and provocative lyrics and guitarist Jade Puget's production, Bodies segues from the pogo-worthy, Devo-esque new wave of "Escape From Los Angeles" and "Looking Tragic" to the moody post-punk romanticism of "Dulceria" (a collaboration with the Smashing Pumpkins' Billy Corgan, AFI's first-ever co-write) and "Tied to a Tree." And yet, the album always manages to sound like no one else but AFI. — L.P.
Bodies by AFI is available Friday, June 11 to download/stream on Apple Music.
BUY IT: Let your inner horse lover loose with new Spirit Untamed Playmobil playsets
Netflix's popular animated Spirit series — starring the titular cartoon horse originally introduced in 2002's Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron — recently rode onto the big screen with Spirit Untamed. And now Playmobil is getting into the equine action with a new line of figures and playsets based on the film. The collection includes recreations of scenes and locations featured in the film, including the Miradeo Candy Stand and Tack Shop visited by the movie's heroine, Lucky Prescott (voiced by Isabela Merced), and rodeo-themed versions of her pals, Pru (Marsai Martin) and Abigail (Mckenna Grace). — E.A.
Playmobil’s Spirit Untamed playsets are available on Amazon.
BUY IT: Hey, you guuuuuuys! Try a spoonful of Serendipity's new Goonies-themed ice cream in time for Goonies Day
Here's one treasure One-Eyed Willie can't keep hidden from you: the ice cream wizards at Serendipity have whipped up a Goonies flavor to commemorate "Goonies Day" on June 7. And now it’s your time to sample a pint of "Sloth & Chunk Rocky Rooooad," named after two of the movie's fan favorite characters and boasting a potent mixture of chocolate ice cream with marshmallow and almonds. Like the song goes, what's good enough for the Goonies is good enough for me. — E.A.
Serendipity's Goonies ice cream is available at Serendipity Brands and at most major convenience stores, including Wawa.
— Video produced by Jon San and edited by John Santo
