Pop Culture Happy Hour
NPR
300 episodes
Trying to keep up with the latest in pop culture? We’ve got you covered. The Pop Culture Happy Hour podcast helps you find the best new binge-worthy tv shows, movies, music, and videogames. Join hosts Linda Holmes, Aisha Harris, Stephen Thompson, and Glen Weldon four episodes a week - plus a rotating cast of guest pop culture enthusiasts. It’s your fix for reviews, recommendations, and recaps of the pop culture everyone is talking about. From lowbrow reality TV to Oscar-winning movies to the stuff in between, we take it all with a shot of cheer. On the Pop Culture Happy Hour podcast, we watch everything so that you never miss anything. Support public media by joining NPR+ at plus.npr.org. You’ll get perks for over 25 NPR podcasts, including bonus episodes and sponsor-free listening for Pop Culture Happy Hour.
Episodes page 1 of 6
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Wildwood
Wildwood is one of the best movies of the year. It’s an epic stop-motion animated saga about a young girl trying to rescue her brother, and it’s filled with raging battles, fantastical animals and a voice cast…
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Clayface
Clayface brings R-rated body horror to this origin story of a Batman villain. The film stars Tom Rhys Harries as an actor whose dream life crumbles after an encounter with a mob boss leaves him disfigured. Desperate…
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Wicker and What’s Making Us Happy
Wicker is somehow the coziest and horniest movie of the fall. Olivia Coleman and Alexander Skarsgård star as the unlikely couple: She’s a fisherwoman who commissions a husband literally made of wicker. The…
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Youth
We all love actor/writer Sharon Horgan, and she’s got a new show on HBO called Youth. Horgan stars as Alex, a 50-year-old divorcée who finds herself at several simultaneous personal and professional crossroads. But…
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Sense and Sensibility
A new Jane Austen adaptation is going to give you love, family and honor, repressed emotions and probably financial peril that can only be resolved through marriage. A new film version of Austen's Sense and Sensibility…
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Whalefall and What's Making Us Happy
Guy meets whale; complications ensue. That's basically the plot of the new survival thriller Whalefall. It stars Austin Abrams as Jay, who goes diving in search of his deceased father (Josh Brolin) – and is swallowed…
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You Can See Everything
About a month before Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes went to prison for defrauding her investors, she and her partner Billy Evans invited a film crew to document their lives at home with their kids. And they didn't…
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The Lowdown
The great FX series The Lowdown stars Ethan Hawke as a freelance investigative reporter with a knack for sticking his nose where it doesn't belong and getting that nose punched. He gets drawn into the seedy goings-on…
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Other Mommy
The trailer for the movie Other Mommy went viral when it dropped a few months ago. It dominated the box office this weekend, but was panned by critics. But is it really one of the worst movies of the year? It’s about a…
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Carrie
The new series Carrie updates the Stephen King book for the digital age, and plays with what we think we know in some surprising ways. Streaming on Prime Video, it follows a young Carrie who has led a sheltered life…
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The Social Reckoning and What’s Making Us Happy
Don’t call it a sequel: The Social Reckoning is a companion piece to The Social Network. While the first movie chronicled the invention of Facebook, this one focuses on where Facebook is now. Jeremy Allen White stars…
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East of Eden
A new series on Netflix is taking a bold crack at the American classic. Maybe you read John Steinbeck’s East of Eden in school. Or maybe you’ve seen the very loosely-adapted film starring James Dean. Anchored by a…
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Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother
Mahershala Ali’s new movie isn’t the Blade reboot, but it’s still worth your time. Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother follows a newly widowed hitman who wants out of the game. He's also a devout Muslim, and after his…
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Verity
Verity stars Dakota Johnson as a struggling novelist who gets an unusual assignment. She's been asked to ghostwrite the final books by a superstar writer, played by Anne Hathaway. It’s an erotic thriller about…
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Digger and What’s Making Us Happy
Digger is a loud, surprising, audacious, and sure-to-be-polarizing entry in this year’s Oscars race. The film stars Tom Cruise as a powerful oil baron who’s helped unleash an existential threat on the world — but…
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A Different World
The TV series A Different World has loomed large in the culture since ending in the ‘90s, and now school is back in session in a new sequel series on Netflix. The show welcomes a new generation of students to the…
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Forgotten Island
Forgotten Island is a wonderful new animated feature from the team that brought you Kung Fu Panda 2 and Puss In Boots: The Last Wish. We’re introduced to childhood friends Jo (H.E.R.) and Raissa (Liza Soberano). One is…
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The Love Hypothesis
The Love Hypothesis brings the beloved trope of fake dating to the world of science and academia – but does it bring a fresh take to the bestselling book by Ali Hazelwood? The new Prime Video movie follows Stanford…
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Primetime and What's Making Us Happy
The new docudrama Primetime is a weird and highly fictionalized account of the meteoric rise of To Catch a Predator. Robert Pattinson plays host Chris Hansen, who is struggling to get bigger ratings. Hansen and his…
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Jay-Z
Jay-Z has been everywhere lately. It’s been 30 years since his acclaimed debut Reasonable Doubt, and he celebrated with a series of concerts at Yankee Stadium. And now there’s the HBO docuseries, JAŸ-Z In 8, in which…
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Fall Guide
This fall, there’s a lot of movies and TV on tap for you to see. And we're as excited for all of it to arrive as you are. So we’ve got a guide to what’s worth keeping on your radar, including Wicker, Wildwood, Wild…
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Great documentaries you don’t want to miss
We talk a lot about movies and TV shows, but new documentary films sometimes can sometimes get lost in the shuffle. So today we’re highlighting some new documentaries that are worth your time and you don’t want to miss…
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Resident Evil and What's Making Us Happy
The new Resident Evil movie is wild, scary, inventive, fast-paced, and funny. That’s because the videogame-turned-film franchise got a reboot courtesy of director Zach Cregger (Weapons and Barbarian). Austin Abrams…
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Last Seen
The new Apple TV series Last Seen is a compelling thriller. It stars Patrick Brammall (Colin from Accounts) as an emergency dispatcher named who gets a call one night from a girl he thinks might be his long-missing…
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Crew Girl
The Netflix TV show Crew Girl follows in the footsteps of successful coming-of-age dramas like Sterling Point and The Summer I Turned Pretty. It follows Teagan, an ambitious high school rower (Miku Martineau) trying to…
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2026 Emmys recap
This year’s Emmys were a big night for shows we really love, including Widow’s Bay, The Pitt and Pluribus. Actors Jean Smart and Matthew Rhys picked up wins, and Rhys made some history. And we’ll explain why we love…
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Practical Magic 2 and What’s Making Us Happy
In Practical Magic 2, Sandra Bullock and Nicole Kidman return as witch sisters doomed by a family curse that means any man they love will die. They embark on a new chapter where the next generation is discovering the…
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Unapologetically basic TV and movies that we love
When you hear the words “pumpkin spice latte,” maybe you think of fall. But maybe you just think about the pleasures of something unapologetically basic. The same can be said for movies and TV. Today, we are revealing…
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Watch this: Filipiñana
Are you tired of the same eat-the-rich narratives churned out by Hollywood? There is a great new film Filipiñana offering a new take about the inner-workings of a country club in the Philippines. It’s both beautiful to…
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The hidden money financing your favorite songs
We all need a trusted source for music discovery – a music-savvy friend or family member, a music site – or someone on social media. But are influencers taking money to promote music and not telling you? Today we’re…
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Sterling Point and What’s Making Us Happy
The buzzy fantastic new TV drama Sterling Point has it all. A mysterious inheritance. A teen love triangle. Secrets and lies that echo across generations. The Prime Video series has twists, turns, and heart. You won’t…
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Beyond Wordle: Our favorite online games
Millions of us play little daily games on our phone. But if you’re looking to expand the horizons of your morning distractions beyond Wordle and Connections, we’re here for you. Today we’re recommending some fun daily…
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It Ends
Have you ever been on a road trip that feels like it goes on forever and things started getting a bit existential? That’s the whole deal with the chewy new film It Ends. The horror-meets-psychological thriller follows…
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The Dog Stars
In the new post-apocalyptic film The Dog Stars, a virus has wiped out most of humanity and the survivors eke out a meager existence trying to stay alive. Sound like an oh-too-familiar tale? What if it featured stars…
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Coyote vs. Acme and Dolly Parton
The movie Coyote vs. Acme comes with some buzzy lore: it was famously shelved, and almost didn’t see the light of day. But it’s here now, and it’s good and looney! It follows Wile E. Coyote when he decides to sue the…
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Adults
Every generation gets its own version of a “20-somethings hang out and make mistakes” sitcom. And Gen Z’s got Adults, a silly series about a group of friends cohabitating in Queens, New York – and it makes for fun and…
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Fictional teachers we wish we had
It’s back to school season, which has us thinking about our favorite teachers. The ones who really saw us, changed our points of view, or set us on new paths. But of all the teachers we've seen in TV and movies, which…
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Lanterns
HBO’s new DC superhero show Lanterns is not the show you think it is. It’s about a couple of space cops: Kyle Chandler plays Earth’s Green Lantern, Hal Jordan, a grizzled, impulsive old-timer reluctantly training up…
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Tony and What’s Making Us Happy
In the new film Tony, we meet chef and author Anthony Bourdain before he was in the public eye. He was a wayward, overconfident young guy, and, as played by Dominic Sessa, kind of a piece of work. The movie focuses on…
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What's Making Us Happy (1970s Version)
We're traveling way back in time to 1971 -- when Richard Nixon was president, the Beatles were newly broken up, and Fiddler on the Roof was one of the biggest movies at the box office. Today in this encore episode,…
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Phoebe Bridgers’ album Lost Weekend
Phoebe Bridgers is your favorite pop star’s favorite pop star. And she’s just released a gorgeous new solo album, Lost Weekend. It’s packed with guest stars including her boygenius bandmates, pop superproducer Jack…
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Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma
The new movie Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma is a bloody and bewildering queer slasher film. Directed by Jane Schoenbrun (I Saw the TV Glow), it stars Hannah Einbinder as a queer young filmmaker tapped to reboot…
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The End of Oak Street and What’s Making Us Happy
In the fun, entertaining new film, The End of Oak Street, Anne Hathaway and Ewan McGregor star as a married couple in the early 1980s. One night, their entire suburban neighborhood is transported to a time filled with…
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Summer blockbusters we somehow missed
Summer blockbusters are hugely popular and as a result, financially successful, and seen by lots of people. So with summer blockbuster season coming to a close, we decided to revisit our conversation about our own…
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Ted Lasso
Ted Lasso is finally back. But is this new fourth season worth the wait, and does it have anything fresh to say? Ted (Jason Sudeikis) has returned to the U.K., only this time, he’s coaching a brand new women’s soccer…
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Our dream TV workplaces
We spend the majority of our adult lives at work. We also see so many depictions of working life on TV. So where’s the fictional place we’d like to work? We’ll talk about Ted Lasso, Game of Thrones, The Muppet Show and…
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One Night Only and What’s Making Us Happy
One Night Only is set in an alternate universe where premarital sex has been outlawed, except for one 12-hour window a year. The film stars Monica Barbaro and Callum Turner as two beautiful New Yorkers looking to have…
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Ariana Grande’s album Petal
Ariana Grande has been omnipresent the last few years. Discussions of her relationships and her weight have made Grande an internet fixture in recent years. She’s coming off a long run promoting and starring in the two…
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We debate the sweatiest movie of all time
Whether they're lightly perspiring, gently glowing, or soaked through from sweltering, people in the movies sweat a lot. But what movie has had people sweat the very most? With another summer underway, we are…
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I Want Your Sex
Sex is back, baby! In the fun new movie I Want Your Sex, Olivia Wilde plays Erika, a mixed-media artist who enters into a very consensual, very kinky, but very unprofessional sub/dom relationship with her assistant…
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